Shattered Nation: Alternate History of North America

Tetsu

This is a timeline I've been working on for a while, and I posted a rough draft of it a long time ago. It generally seemed plausible enough to me and some others, but here I think I've wrapped up some loose ends. Here's Part 1.

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1862- The Confederate invasion of the Union planned for Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia is scrapped. Jefferson Davis and his advisors come to the agreement in early February that, in order to receive recognition by the European powers, the Confederacy must need to essentially 'play the victim' and claim that it just wants to be left alone. All Confederate armies stand on the defensive.

-The Confederate Army of the Mississipi, led by Albert Johnston and P.G.T. Beauregard, wins a narrow victory over Union forces, led by Ulysses S. Grant, at the Battle of Shiloh.

1863- After a group of Confederate diplomats meet with British officials, the United Kingdom extends recognition of the Confederate States. Britain immediately offers to mediate in the Civil War, and broker a peace with both sides. Abraham Lincoln utterly refuses, calling the British "imperialistic tyrants who would seek to destroy democracy". Soon after the USA's refusal to back down, the Royal Navy begins to assist the Confederate Navy in breaking the Union's blockade.

-Days after Britain's recognition of the CSA, Kentucky seceeds from the USA and joins the Confederacy.

1864- The Empire of France recognizes the Confederacy, followed closely by Spain, Portugal, and Holland.

-British troops invade New Orleans, wresting it from Union forces after a week-long seige. The British transfer power in the city to the Confederates soon after. In other massive naval battle, an attempted British invasion of Long Island and Manhatten is defeated by the United States Navy; British ships, lured into shallow water, are attacked and decimated by the Union's few but powerful ironclad warships.

1865- California seceeds from the United States. Many in the United States view the war, at this point, wholly unwinnable. These feelings, since 1863, have been stronger in California than anywhere else in the Union; being so far from the center of the conflict, the opinion develops in California that the goals of the USA have fallen short and that the Union is rapidly failing, amid secessionist feelings in New England and other regions.

-Union troops are sent to California, but due to the sheer lack of troops available and the long distance from the main fronts, little is done by the Union to counter the Californian rebellion. Any American forces sent over the Sierra Nevada mountains are swiftly decimated.

1866- The American Civil War comes to an end. The United States, utterly exhausted by war, faces rebellion and further destruction. The war ends on March 6th, 1866, with the USA's recognition of the Confederate States of America and the Republic of California. Other territorial losses, such as the northern half of Maine (occupied by British troops in 1864), are suffered.

-Prussia defeats Austria in the Austro-Prussian War, and the North German Confederation is formed.

1867- Abraham Lincoln, disgraced and depressed, resigns as President of the USA. His vice president, Andrew Johnson, becomes the president.

-Slavery is abolished in the United States with a Constitutional amendment.

-The British North America Act passes, and the Canadas unite into the Kingdom of Canada. The USA makes some grumblings about a "monarchy in North America" but due to their defeat by Britain just one year earlier, they are in no real shape to do anything but grumble.

-The United States and the Confederate States experience inflation and depression. The Confederate economy is hurt by an unprecendented number of slave revolts that wrack the Deep South. These revolts are usually quite large and unusually well organized, and they are vicously put down by Confederate troops.

1868- Presidential elections in the Union see Andrew Johnson and the Republicans ousted from power. Horatio Seymour wins electoral votes in nearly every New England state, and Republican cantidate Benjamin Wade wins only scattered states in the Midwest. Seymour wins the presidency.

-The Destiny Party is founded in Houston, Texas. The Destiny Party, short for Manifest Destiny of the Texan Republic, is a militant, right-wing political party, whose policies are decidedly anti-Confederate. It is founded in response to the Confederacy's increasing debt and overall weakness.

1869- The Suez Canal, linking the Mediterranean Sea with the Red Sea, is completed in Egypt.

- The first anti-Confederate rallies are held in Houston and Austin, Texas. Some protesters are arrested by CSA-loyal police forces, but for the most part the rallies are peaceful.

1870- A massive and well-orchestrated slave rebellion seizes much of South Carolina, in the CSA, after slaves attacked and captured an armoury in the northeast part of the state. The revolt is eventually put down by Confederate troops and South Carolina militia forces, but the revolt had taken its toll on both the people and infrastructure of South Carolina (entire towns were burned by slaves retreating from Confederate troops) and slave revolts are begining to seriously damage the already-poor economy of the Confederate States.

-The Republic of California and Great Britain sign the Sacramento Accord, and enter into a formal alliance. Britain will help California with more programs of industrialization and naval buildup, and Californian ports will be open to all British vessels.

-British Columbia joins the Kingdom of Canada.

1871- The American Transcontinental Railroad is finally finished, ending in Promentory, Utah. The inagural ceremony, however, is interrupted by an attack by Mormon rebels, who seize the ceremony and destroy the tracks. Utah then secedes from the United States. The rebellion is eventually put down, but not without the execution of Mormon leaders and the military occupation of Utah.

-Border clashes between California and the USA take a few dozen lives. The USA rattles its sabre at Sacramento, angered at the alliance with Britain signed a year before, but due to British pressure, the USA can't do anything extreme.

-The states of the North German Confederation join together to become a single nation-state- the German Empire- following France's defeat at the hands of Prussia.

1872- The Confederate States issues a proclamation abolishing slavery, in an effort to help the failing Confederate economy. The Confederacy no longer views slavery as profitable due to the amount of revolts suffered over the past half-decade. This causes an immediate schism in the Confederate government- the string binding the already-decentralized CSA snaps. The Deep South states; South and North Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, and Florida secede and, in late March, the Confederation of Dixie is declared, dissolving the CSA.

-In Austin, the Destiny Party declares the Confederate government of Texas is void, and a coup ousts the entire Confederate-loyal Texan government. With Texas firmly in the control of the Destiny Party, Texas annexes the former Confederate Indian Territory.

1873- The Philidelphia banking firm Jay Cooke and Company closes its doors and declares bankruptcy. This causes unprecedented economic downturn in the USA, which is already battling a crippling depression.

-Virginia, Kentucky, and Tennessee form the Republic of Appalachia.

1874- The New England states, furious at the American central government for failing to not only keep up the economy, but for failing to keep the Union together, secede from the United States, with the support of Great Britain. Skirmishes between New England militias and the United States Army erupt along the border of New York and Pennsylvania, and Union troops stationed in New England are deported, or, in some brutal cases, executed.

1875- Mormon rebels rise up against the American occupation force in place in Utah, and the entire United States Army is deployed the rebellious state. This infuriates the remaining American population, who believe that the USA can no longer keep itself together. The American economy collapses on March 6th, 1873, and the Union is effectively dissolved.

British and Californian troops swoop south and north and occupy the states of Oregon and Washington, encountering resistance only in the area around Seattle. The Nation of Deseret is recognized by these two powers, and California and Deseret split the Nevada Territory down the middle. The Texan Army invades the New Mexico Territory, claiming it in full.

The states of Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiania, Michigan, and Ohio unite to form the Federation of the Great Lakes. Pennsylvania decides to join the Republic of New England, and it is welcomed into that federation. West Virginia, Maryland, and Delaware come under the occupation of the Appalachian Republic. The Dakota Territory, Idaho, Nebraska, Wyoming, and Iowa form a very loose union known as the Federation of the Midwest. Most of the other former American states, such as Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, and other states are disputed between any of the new North American nations, at least until the borders begin to solidify over the next decade.
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Comments? Criticisms?
 
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csa945

Good stuff, but I would doubt that Lincoln would be re-elected under such circumstances, and thus the war would probably end sooner as a peace candidate would have been the most likely choice. Then again, you could have Lincoln decide to cancel the 1864 election all together.
 

Bulgaroktonos

Unsure of why the New Englanders are going to side with the British seeing as the British just destroyed their economy and took northern Maine.....
 

Tetsu

Bulgaroktonos said:
Unsure of why the New Englanders are going to side with the British seeing as the British just destroyed their economy and took northern Maine.....
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Damn! Another thing I forgot about. The British gave back the part of Maine they took after New England became independant.

I suppose New England felt that the United States government had betrayed them, and getting British support was instrumental for them to achieve independance.
 

Tetsu

FederationX said:
We want a map. Cool timeline! :cool: Although I don't see the entire U.S. Army being deployed against Utah Territory.
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Well, it doesn't quite get there. The USA falls apart before any real action is taken against Deseret.
 

David S Poepoe

Banned
The severity of the 'slave uprisings' is completely overblown. The Confederate Government can not issue a proclamation abolishing slavery since its not within its power to, tho the states may call a constitutional convention to consider such a measure.
 
MrP

MrP

Banned
I'd assumed the slave uprisings were being financed by "a foreign power", which is why they're so successful. The mess spreading everywhere certainly implies that someboy's stirring things. I could be wrong, but it feels like it. I suspect the nefarious British, to be honest! ;)

Maybe have the British occupiers in Maine treat the peoples with such sweetness and restraint that once returned, the northern half of the state becomes a "fifth column", demanding an end to the economic crisiss and pointing at all the lovely things just over the border. Something of this nature happened in Corcya, all you Peloponnesian historians will recall. :)

How bad would an Union economic collapse be for the world economy is my worry. I'm presuming larger British investment in Argentina et al to provide Britain with a safe supply of food. I rather like it, overall. My one major quibble is with the use of the word "decimated". It means one tenth of something is destroyed. It doesn't mean destroyed. Good work :cool:
 

Tetsu

Taken from: "The Shattered Land: A History of North America"
(c) 1971 by Prof. Hermann Baumer
Ludwig-Maximillian-University Munich
Munich, Empire of Germany
English Translation by Dr. George Leahy, Boston College, Republic of New England

Chapter 7: Union Lost

The recession that immediately followed the end of the War of Secession plagued both the United States and the newly-independant Confederate States with both an uncurable economic drought and immense social unrest. In the South, the black slave population was in endless rebellion, the forms of revolt as subtle as purposely sabotaging the master's crop to as violent as the destruction of entire rural towns. In South Carolina, one massive slave revolt seized over two dozen counties. Covertly, these revolts were funded by both the United States and loyal Americans who had been stuck in the South after the outbreak of war. The Confederate government, in its decade of existance, arrested nearly one hundred individuals suspected of supporting slave riots and those who sympathized with the abolitionist cause, and constantly accused the USA of funding these traitors. The Confederate States never recovered from the economic recession brought on by their rebellious labor force. When the Confederate government issued a proclamation abolishing slavery in 1872, the Deep South states took the stance that the government had stepped out of its bounds, and the country fell apart.

The economic and social woes of the United States stemmed from the same conflict, but were ultimately very different. Having lost nearly all of its established agricultural base, the bankrupt USA poured money into projects such as the Transcontinental Railroad (largely considered a wasteful prestige project, due to the fact that the planned endpoint of the railroad, California, no longer belonged to the United States.), and programs of agricultural development to build up the rural areas of the Great Plains.

The buildup of the military following the loss of the South and California in the United States also promoted dissent, especially in New England. The Union flexed its muscles in the conquest of Utah in 1871, and the overall cruelty of the American military occupation of the state prompted outrage. This did not help alleviate the fact that the Union was balancing on a thin wire over economic collapse.

The death knell of the United States came in 1873, when a wealthy Philidelphia banking firm declared bankruptcy and closed it's doors. With quiet British support, the New England states ripped their economic influence away from the Union. It was clear, then, that the United States would not see it's one hundredth birthday. On March 6th, 1875, the American economy collapsed, and the nation was dissolved.

The next ten years would see the division of what was once a strong, whole nation into a dozen squabbling regional powers. Nations formed before the Union's collapse, such as Texas and California, grabbed whatever territory they could from the American southwest. Oregon and Washington, the only outlet to the Pacific Ocean the USA had after the loss of California, were occupied jointly by Britain and California. The border states between Texas and the Confederation of Dixie, Arkansas and Louisiana, were claimed by both nations and disputes spilled over into bloodshed on many occasions.

No where was the confusion more rampant that in the western regions of the former USA. The Nation of Deseret, the Mormon nation formed out of Utah, claimed the entire Nevada Territory, but that region was effectively occupied by California. Mormon settlers also flooded east into Colorado, although that state had proclaimed it's own independance. The solution for this confusion, for many, was the formation of a loose union of agricultural communities and city states called the Federation of the Midwest, which administered Idaho, Wyoming, Nebraska, the Dakota Territory, and Iowa. The Montana Territory, claimed by the FOTM, was effectively transformed into the Lakota League, or the Black Hills Republic (The Black Hills are an area in the southern half of Dakota which the local Indian tribes, such as the Lakota, claim is a sacred site. Despite the name, the Black Hills Republic did not actually govern the Black Hills.), a nation run by the native Lakota tribe.

For many years after the fall of the USA, the new nations born of it's ashes would squabble and fight over small territories and strategic tracts of land. Major war would not break out on the continent, however, until the early twentieth century...
 

Tetsu

Conor O'Rourke said:
This is good.

What's Mexico doing? (Invading Arizona, I hope)
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Thank you. :D

Mexico, at this point, has aspirations of at least getting back some territory, but nothing as drastic as a full invasion has been attempted. Scattered rebels had crossed the border to take advantage of the post-collapse confusion, but they were generally beaten off by Texan soldiers or local militias.

She's just a little too poor at this point. This doesn't mean, however, that areas such as the Gadsden Purchase land don't have the potential to become a sort of North American Alsace-Lorraine... :cool:
 
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