North America divided East/West

[galanx]

My first TL - fools rush in...




Background- OTL
In 1738 Master Mariner Robert Jenkins appears before the House of Commons and produces an ear in a bottle, which he claims was cut off by the Spanish.

“What did you do?” he was asked. “I commended my soul to God and
my cause to my country”, was the answer put in his mouth by the
Opposition…. Whether it was indeed his own ear or whether he had lost
it in a seaport brawl remains uncertain, but the power of this shriveled
object was immense.

Winston Churchill; History of the English-Speaking People.

Though Prime Minister Robert Walpole is reluctant, the clamour for war stirred up the opposition, known as the Patriots, is so great that he gives in.

As part of the war effort, Commodore George Anson is commissioned to attack the cities on the west coast of Spanish America, and to intercept the annual Treasure Galleon sailing from Acapulco to Manila (and vice-versa)

Not being enthusiastic to start with, the Government tries to do it on the cheap. Anson is given a load of decrepit Chelsea Pensioners for his crew (not one of whom is to survive), and shorted on Marines. Lack of resources causes delays; he finally sets sail in September and rounds Cape Horn in stormy weather in January. Two of his six ships mutiny and turn back to Brazil, the “Wager”, with midshipman John Byron on board, is shipwrecked off the coast of Chile, and when his surviving three ships rendezvous at Juan Fernandez Island in June 1741 he has lost two-thirds of his crew, and is forced to abandon two of his vessels.

Still, he manages to raid Paita in Peru in November, then proceeds to Acapulco, missing the inbound galleon by three weeks. His bad luck continues when the Spaniards spot him and decide to keep the galleon Pilar in port. After fruitless months he gives up, sails to Tinian Island (Saipan), then Macao, and –finally!- gets lucky in June 1743, capturing the “ Nuestra Senora Covadongo” with 1.3 million silver pieces of eight. He returns to England, is greeted with great acclaim, is made a Baron, and ends up as First Lord of the Admiralty.

 

[MacCaulay]

I'll keep watching this. Sounds interesting so far...shriveled ears and such...

 

[galanx]

Part One: Anson’s voyage of discovery
POD:
A young Opposition firebrand, William Pitt, gets wind of the Government’s reluctance to support Anson, and launches a savage attack on Walpole, contrasting the men who sailed with Drake the destitute, decrepit and despairing Pensioner , even suggesting that the elderly Walpole should be among them.
Stung, the Government’s purse-strings are loosened- Anson obtains crew, Marines, and stores in good time, sets sail earlier and ends up on the west coast of South America in much better shape, with four ships.

When the Pilar, loaded with Mexican silver, sets sail in January, it is spotted, and Anson chases it westward , closing in on it just off the Revillagigedo Islands, where, alas, disaster strikes- in attempting to flee, the galleon runs onto the rocks and is sunk in deep water(1).

With a year to wait for the next sailing, Anson decides to recover his fortunes by sailing north, hoping to discover the long-sought North-West Passage. He charts the west coast of North America up to the 49th parallel, where he finds what he hopes is the opening to a strait. The “Gloucester” is sent to explore, while the flagship “Centurion” continues north. However, the main passage turns north, and the “Gloucester” rejoins “Centurion” at the north end of what is now called Anson Island.

The squadron (now down to three ships) continues north- the mountains get higher and the forests darker.

Reasoning that the country to the south was Sir Francis Drake’s Nova Albion, they name this territory New Caledonia.

They make friendly contact with the natives, trading for provisions and furs

The coast starts to bend westward- after following what turns out to be a long peninsula, they head north, but soon run into heavy ice- no Passage to the East here. Disappointed, they turn back south in July

Sailing south-west, they are passing a group of larger islands when the men spot a huge sea mammal grazing on the sea-weed. They harpoon it, and cut some meat off before it sinks. To their surprise, it’s delicious, tasting like beef. Deciding to renew his provisions with these “sea cows” Anson approaches one of the island. To their great astonishment, they spot the wreck of a European ship with a small camp of survivors.

They turn out to be the remains of a Russian expedition, shipwrecked the previous November while returning from their own explorations. Their captain is already dead, but through their naturalist, a German, Anson discovers some interesting facts about how much the Chinese are willing to pay for sea otter pelts. Short of manpower, he impresses the remainder into his crew, claiming the pelts they had collected by salvage rights. Though they had been building a boat out of the wreckage of their own ship, most are just glad to get off the island. (2)

In honour of the deceased leader of the expedition, the island is named for him, and the naturalist names the 4-ton sea mammals after himself.
He does name the ubiquitous foxes after his rescuer. This may have been a back-handed compliment, as his published notes later reveal that the foxes had a nasty habit of scavenging, chewing the ears, noses and fingers off of the bodies of the Russians who perished. If so, the British Commander had the last laugh- Anson’s foxes still inhabit Bering Island, while Steller’s sea cows have long since been driven to extinction.

Anson heads for Macao, sells the furs for a very high price, re-outfits his ships, and, as in OTL, persists in his original mission and captures the “Covadango”. He sails home, pays out the prize money to his crew (including the Russians). His account of his voyage, especially the part concerning the potential value of the fur trade with China, is met with a good deal of interest. Soon ships are heading for the American west coast, and the British are entrants in the Great Sea Otter Hunt, forty years early.

Notes:
(1)Similar to what happened OTL to the “San Sebastian”, attacked by British pirate George Compton run aground sunk in 170 feet of water off Santa Catalina Island.
(2)Based on what actually happened to Bering's expedition. In OTL the survivors completed their boat, left Bering Island on August 14, and reached Kamchatka safely, though with more deaths. The otter pelts they gathered were enough to pay the entire costs for both ships of the original expedition.

 

[galanx]

Part Two: The Great Sea Otter Hunt

For the next twenty years, British and Russians are engaged in rivalry for control of the sea otter trade, and the natives who do the actual harvesting. The Spanish, alerted by Britain’s interest in what they consider to be their northern possessions, try to take a part. However, Spain and the United Kingdom are at war for virtually this entire period- Jenkin’s Ear, the Austrian Succession and the Seven Year’s War- and the British, after a number of clashes, succeed in driving the Spaniards out. The British also become increasingly antagonistic towards the Russians- they feel the Russians more directly brutal methods are stirring up hostility among the Indians and Aleuts.

A tragic instance of this cuts short the life of a promising British mariner, Captain James Cook. Cook was appointed to map the Pacific North West coast after his brilliant surveying work on the St. Lawrence during the campaign to capture Quebec. In 1761 he is killed while landing at a village of Tslingit Indians, who have been disturbed by the depredations of Russian fur hunters.

After the Diplomatic Revolution of 1756 Britain had been aligned with Prussia against France, Austria and Russia. This, combined with incidents such as the death of Cook led the British to make the effort to drive the Russians out of North America. The Treaty of Paris (1763) ending the Seven Year’s War confirms the British claims to the West Coast. In the North the boundary is drawn in a straight line south from Anson Strait; in the South the border with New Spain is set at the 35th parallel (OTL San Luis Obispo/Santa Barbara)

Spain objects; the British point to the earlier claims of Drake, and anyway, possession being 9/10ths etc. they prevail.

(In 1884, a local group of amateur historians claimed to have found Drake’s original brass plate claiming possession in the name of Queen Elizabeth, just north of the great city that bears his name. Though at first accepted as authentic and placed in the Nova Albion Museum, doubts were soon raised, and more and more scholars rejected the finding as a fake. The mystery remains unsolved, as the plaque was destroyed during the Great Drakestown Earthquake and Fire of 1906)

 

[galanx]

Part Three: Pacific Interlude

In 1766 the Royal Society commissions one of the veterans of Anson’s expedition, John “Foul-weather Jack” Byron, to sail to Tahiti and observe the Transit of Venus; he is also tasked with finding the Great Southern Continent.



After recording the Transit, he sails south-west and reconfirms Tasman’s discovery of New Zeeland, taking a month to roughly chart the islands, then sails west (1). He sights Van Dieman’s Land; circumnavigation confirms it’s an island. Byron then continues west, skirting Antarctica, and returns to London to report- no Terra Australis.



Another expedition is launched, commanded by the geographer Alexander Dalrymple of the Royal Society. It is his insistence- backed by his considerable prestige- that the Great Southern Continent lies to the south of what we now know as Australisia that leads to a delay of another fifteen years before it’s discovery


(Or, more accurately, confirmation that the lands south of the Dutch East Indies noted by the French and Dutch were actually part of a single land-mass.)


(1) Here, his sobriquet fails him: by spending less time exploring the Land of the Long White Cloud than OTL James Cook he misses the gales that drove Cook northward and led to his discovery of Australia

 

[galanx]

Part 4: Exploration and Development in New Albion:

Meanwhile, exploration of the New Albion Coast continued. In 1747 Richard Norris, captain of the “Gloucester” under Anson , discovers the mouth of the great river that bears his name (and whose mighty dams today provide power for much of New Albion)’ . The islands north of Anson Island, inhabited by fierce warriors named Haida, are mapped and named the New Hebrides, and in the south the great harbour that is to become Drakestown is discovered and charted.

By 1770 several forts have been established on the coast to facilitate trade. One of these, Fort Edward, on the southeastern coast of Anson Island, is the sight of the first settlement on the coast in 1773. With an attractive climate (by English standards; mild and wet, wet, wet) the colony has fewer growing pains than most, supported by rich fisheries and good soil, as well as doing a lively trade supplying the fur traders and whalers who sail the North Pacific.
In 1775 the name is changed to Charlotteville, which it bears to this day. Other groups of pioneers followed, settling in what is now the port city of Suquamish to the south.
The main complaint of the colonists is the lack of labour to clear the heavy timber covering the land

 

[galanx]

Part 5: Robert Roger’s Expedition to the Pacific and back (and after)

Robert Rogers raised and commanded Ranger forces during the French and Indian Wars (Seven Years War) and became a celebrated figure. After the war he suffers financial hardship. He returns to Britain to try and cash in on his exploits, publishing two non-fiction books which are generally well received, and a play which has a less kindly reception: one review saying “in turning bard and writing a tragedy, he makes just as good a figure as a Grub Street rhymester would as head of one of our Author’s corps of North-American Rangers”

However, his fame gains him an interview with King George III, to whom he proposed a trans-continental expedition to the Pacific, uniting His Majesty’s eastern ( and greatly –expanded) American territories to his newly-acquired western ones. His proposal meeting Royal Favour, Rogers returned to America to prepare to launch his expedition from Fort Michilimackinac, Michigan (1).

In 1767, after first cementing the enmity of Thomas Gage, commander of British forces in North America, who despises him as a boaster and gambler, and suspects him of seeking to make a deal with the French, Rogers sets out on a voyage that will last almost four years. After great hardships, he and the surviving members reach the mouth of the Norris River in 1769. They wait in vain for a British ship to appear, and reluctantly turn back for the overland trip. They take more southerly route, and, after losing all their possessions to hostile natives, they finally reach the newly established French trading post of St Louis on the Mississippi River in late 1770.

Unfortunately, his return from such a quarter, with a tall-tale of reaching the Pacific but without a speck of evidence only serves to inflame Gage’s suspicions that Roger’s has been double-dealing with the French, and he promptly has him arrested for treason.

George III, angered that his money has been thrown away to no purpose ( for even if Roger’s story is true, the expedition has shown that there is no easy route to the treasures of the Orient ) and now more likely to cast a suspicious eye on all colonials, doesn’t intervene- Rogers spends the next three years in an English prison, only being released in 1774. He returns to America in a vengeful mood.(2)

(1) OTL the King turns him down but appoints him governor of Michilimackinac; in both cases he arouses suspicion and contempt in Gage.

(2)[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]OTL Gage has Rogers arrested in December 1767; with support from Howe and the king he is acquitted, but dismissed with a warning. He sails to England to seek redress, and ends up in debtors’ prison for various stretches, the longest being for two years- by then he has a serious drinking problem. In this ATL he avoids that through the rigours of his expedition and a prison cell- unlike debtors’ prison, booze is less available as a guest of His Majesty.

 

[galanx]

T
Part 5: Robert Rogers, Hero of Quebec

1775- Rogers has returned, and re-forms the Rangers. He decides to relive dreams of past glory, and seize the weapons and supplies at largely undefended Fort Ticonderoga. Great minds think alike- he meets up with Ethan Allen and his Green Mountain Boys, and they are soon joined by Benedict Arnold and his troops from Massachusetts and Connecticut.(same as OTL) There’s a little jockeying for command- this is a collection of serious prima donnas- but the prestige of the great Captain Rogers gives him the edge. The Fort is successfully taken.

That summer, Schuyler launches his expedition, but plagued by ill-health, hands command over to Richard Montgomery, who settles in for the siege of Fort St. Jean (August-November 1775). Impatient, Rogers decides to follow the route of his old expedition against St. Francis (midway between Montreal and Quebec) during the French and Indian Wars. Irked by being beaten in an election for command of the Green River Boys by his cousin Seth Warner, Ethan brings some of his supporters over to Rogers, and is appointed second-in-command.



Meanwhile Arnold has organized his own expedition from Boston heading north through Maine, in horrendous conditions.

The Rangers head overland to St Francis and then on to Quebec, which they take by surprise in October.


(The frigate Lizard is not available to bring reinforcements; in 1774 she’d been sent with a squadron to Byron Bay (San Luis Obispo) in New Albion due to reports of suspicious Spanish activity. )

There are few casualties, but unfortunately –though probably luckily for his future reputation- one of them is Robert Rogers; his statue, long with Wolfe and Montcalm, stands in Quebec to this day. Ethan Allen takes command, and captures Governor Carleton after he flees from Montreal to Quebec.

(Rogers’s reputation is further bolstered in 1811 when a cairn is discovered at the mouth of the Nelson River, confirming his claim to have crossed the continent. Some Americans try to use this to advance their claim to the Pacific; the fact that he specifically claims the territories that he crossed in the name of King George is used by New Albionites to back their eastern expansionism. )


Arnold’s men come stumbling out of the woods in November; the discovery that his prize has already been taken doesn’t improve, and leads to a continuing and deepening of his quarrel with Ethan. However Montgomery soon arrives and takes command.

The news of this great victory sends a wave of excitement through the Colonies; men and supplies are rushed to Quebec. When the British arrive in the spring, they find the gates of Quebec firmly shut. After a few months of indecisive siege, they realize there’s no point of sitting there while the rest of the Colonies consolidate their Revolution, and they withdraw to Halifax.



(I realise this is a roundabout route just to take Quebec, but I'm trying to work everything off a single POD)

 

[galanx]

Part 6: The Revolution and after: the Loyalists


An attempt to attack Ft Cumberland, Nova Scotia is made in August 1776, led by Allen and joined by Jonathan Eddy, a local man moved from New England, and supporters of the cause, but it is repulsed by troops from Halifax.

After the French recognition of the Americans in 1778, another attempt is made, again launched from Quebec. With the British engaged in the Thirteen Colonies, and the Royal Navy pre-occupied with the French Fleet, this time the attack is successful- all of western Nova Scotia (OTL New Brunswick) is taken by the Americans.

(handwave rest of AWR, mainly because I don’t know enough about it)

When the Treaty of Paris is signed in 1782, the Americans hold Canada (Quebec) and New Acadia (New Brunswick; emphasis on “ New” to tell those Cajuns in Louisiana not to hurry back). These become part of the original Fifteen Colonies, whose Stars still shine in the national flag.

Canada has a very restricted franchise, based on wealth and literacy (thanks, Variato); most voters are land-owners, who quickly switch allegiance, or Anglo merchants and a few Canadien lawyers etc.

American settlement causes some friction in the early days, and there is a Habitant revolt against the corrupt ruling clique in 1820, but things generally settle down. People of French descent still compose 60% of the population in our day, and many older and rural people have French as their mother language, and there is indeed a revival among young people seeking their Canadien roots.

But, meanwhile… there are 75,000 Loyalists who need some place to go. Some 8,000 return to Britain, and 17,000 go to the Caribbean; another 15,000 settle in Nova Scotia, in their turn taking the place of American supporters who resettle in New Acadia and Canada.

But there are more than 30,000 who don’t like the idea of living among to the “Neutral Yankees” of Nova Scotia, and don’t trust the firebrands of the Revolution who insist the British must be driven out of America altogether.

There is one place to go- only reached by great hardship, but reportedly a land of plenty, far away from rebels and protected by the might of the Royal Navy. Over the next decade, in a tremendous effort, 25,000 Loyalists are transported around the Horn (and some round Good Hope) to New Albion.

Most settle in the Nelson River and the green valley inland, the area originally designated by Robert Rogers as Ouragan; or Charlotteville and Suquamish to the north; which is becoming referred to as “British” Columbia, to distinguish it from American-controlled territory.

The area from Byron Bay on the border with New Spain, to north of Fort Drake (renamed Drakestown) is mostly settled by those from the southern colonies, seeking a warmer climate. With typical Loyalist stubbornness, and to the despair of later geographers, they name the area New Carolina. (“I wish they all could be Carolina girls…”). They also bring a large number of black slaves, setting the stage for later racial tension.

 

[galanx]

Geographical Review:1785

New Albion= all of the Pacific West Coast from southern California to Alaska
New Caledonia= Northern B.C. and Alaska (from Bella Bella, Queen Charlottes north)
New Hebrides= Queen Charlotte Islands
Anson Island= Vancouver Island
Charlotteville=Victoria
Suquamish=Seattle
British Columbia= OTL southern B.C. and Washington state
Ouragan= Oregon, OTL western America referred to as such by Robert Rogers in 1763
New Carolina= California north of the 35th parallel.(border with New Spain/Mexico)
Drakestown= San Francisco
Byron Bay= San Luis Obispo(border with Mexico)

USNA= USA plus Quebec, New Brunswick (original Fifteen Colonies)
State of Canada= Quebec
State of New Acadia=New Brunswick and PEI

Nova Scotia still British

 

[galanx]

AAARRRGGHHH!!!! Just realised I forgot to post the introduction, giving the whole point of this TL.

North America divided East/West: To end up with a situation in the present where North America (north of Mexico) is divided East/West, rather than North/South, roughly along the Continental Divide.

In the East, the flag of the United States of North America proudly waves its Fifteen Stripes and Forty-Six Stars from Baffin Island to Cuba.

In the West, the Confederation of New Albion stretches from southern California to Alaska, plus Hawaii. Though an independent nation, they still give allegiance to HRH King Edward VIII.

Basically, it's Canada/USA rotated 90 degrees. Still haven't fixed all the borders- in the north, don't know who gets the MacKenzie- depends on what happens with the Hudson's Bay Company.

Same thing in the South-West- I think Mexico will be somewhat larger, taking in southern New Mexico and Arizona, and western Texas.

Also border will probably west of the divide in the Mountain States- Colorado and maybe Utah will be USNA, based on earlier settlement by Americans.

POD: Commander Anson's voyage to the Pacific Coast of New Spain, 1740.

(Apologies to anybody who's been wondering what it's all about.)

 

[WhatIsAUserName]

Are you already in the current day with New Albion and North America?

Very interesting, by the way. But each addition is kinda small.

 

[galanx]

Are you already in the current day with New Albion and North America?

Very interesting, by the way. But each addition is kinda small.

Yeah, I'm looking backwards from a definite present- it's not an open-ended TL- I want to reach the end-state described, just haven't worked out all the details how.

Sorry for the small posts- I'm a newbie and didn't want to just dump huge loads of my blatherings - plus the level of expertise here, esp. about American history, is so high that I'm being careful about not making a fool of myself.

 

[Jammy]

I like it, have you got a map?