The Dead Skunk
- Thread starter Lycaon pictus
- Start date
"We will talk peace when, and only when, the Uned sttes have have achieved its manifest destiny of including Florida, Louisiana, Texas and California into the Union."
Now that was a juicy, juicy, update; thank you very much.
A lot to unpack here.
As I thought the war is really straining the American economy and treasury, even Berrien can't ignore that.
But i never saw n alliance between the native peoples of Astoria and the British. Granted it hasn't happened yet, but I doubt the British would stand in the war of this lady warleader of the Chinook making trouble for Austin. Sadly my guess is that the Chinook will only do well enough so that when the US army arrives Austin will be able to spur the army to drive the native peoples out of Astoria as part of his White West vision.
So Berrien is ready to talk terms if not commit. Brougham is not expecting that, I wonder what he will ask for? America currently holds I believe most of Upper Canada effectively, bits of the border area of Lower Canada, and most of New Brunswick, alongside their shaky occupation of Apalachicola in British Florida. Against that Britain holds Astoria city effectively cutting off the Americans from the Pacific.
Both sides are stretched thin with multiple fronts, but Britain is not straining under a blockade; and while Brougham is disliked by many Tories his position is many times stronger tan Berrien's who has passed Madison I think as the most unpopular president in office. Berrien is the one having to hire extra security for fear of his life.
Also Wellington just thrashed the second invasion of the Republic so soundly it retreated to the other side of the border to no gain.
For Brougham his best possible deal would be status quo antebellum, American defeated by gaining nothing for all ts efforts.
Berrien for his part will likely try and trade parts of Canada for Florida or at lest what he holds. I can't see Brougham giving any of Florida away. Letting slavers take any of the Empire's poster child of abolitionism would be very bad press orals aside, and undermine their rule over the rest of Florida and the Caribbean. The empire can better secure itself in the medium term in the region by presenting itself as keeping the American slavers at bay.
So Berrien will be in the fix of not being in a place to get anything he wants. Would Berrien try and go for giving all of Canada back for Astoria to f-over the free states? His ideology would suggest that, and he knows he can't stand for reelection at this point; and figures he has nothing too lose? But the Quids in the senate don't have the votes to pass such a treaty.
So would Berrien try and go for broke? Abandon Astoria for now to get Taylor his mega army to conquer Louisiana? Would such an act trigger more direct action against Berrien the war becomes ever more sectional? Would the British be able o break the stalemate in Canada by Berrien stripping armies there to throw against the Republic?
Say, how many of those 39 seats were replaced by other parties men; and how many were Quids crossing the various aisles? Has Crockett walked to the Reformists yet?
The LDS enter. I was wondering if you'd bring them up ad you do not disappoint. Sounds like they will be in Nauvoo for the long haul. So no trek westward or a smaller one I guess. If Smith lives longer I wonder if his son will succeed him rather than Young, a mainline LDS more in line with the Community of Christ perhaps? For their military record looks like they were minor heroes in the North and Leroy Jenkins in the South.
A lot to unpack here.
As I thought the war is really straining the American economy and treasury, even Berrien can't ignore that.
But i never saw n alliance between the native peoples of Astoria and the British. Granted it hasn't happened yet, but I doubt the British would stand in the war of this lady warleader of the Chinook making trouble for Austin. Sadly my guess is that the Chinook will only do well enough so that when the US army arrives Austin will be able to spur the army to drive the native peoples out of Astoria as part of his White West vision.
So Berrien is ready to talk terms if not commit. Brougham is not expecting that, I wonder what he will ask for? America currently holds I believe most of Upper Canada effectively, bits of the border area of Lower Canada, and most of New Brunswick, alongside their shaky occupation of Apalachicola in British Florida. Against that Britain holds Astoria city effectively cutting off the Americans from the Pacific.
Both sides are stretched thin with multiple fronts, but Britain is not straining under a blockade; and while Brougham is disliked by many Tories his position is many times stronger tan Berrien's who has passed Madison I think as the most unpopular president in office. Berrien is the one having to hire extra security for fear of his life.
Also Wellington just thrashed the second invasion of the Republic so soundly it retreated to the other side of the border to no gain.
For Brougham his best possible deal would be status quo antebellum, American defeated by gaining nothing for all ts efforts.
Berrien for his part will likely try and trade parts of Canada for Florida or at lest what he holds. I can't see Brougham giving any of Florida away. Letting slavers take any of the Empire's poster child of abolitionism would be very bad press orals aside, and undermine their rule over the rest of Florida and the Caribbean. The empire can better secure itself in the medium term in the region by presenting itself as keeping the American slavers at bay.
So Berrien will be in the fix of not being in a place to get anything he wants. Would Berrien try and go for giving all of Canada back for Astoria to f-over the free states? His ideology would suggest that, and he knows he can't stand for reelection at this point; and figures he has nothing too lose? But the Quids in the senate don't have the votes to pass such a treaty.
So would Berrien try and go for broke? Abandon Astoria for now to get Taylor his mega army to conquer Louisiana? Would such an act trigger more direct action against Berrien the war becomes ever more sectional? Would the British be able o break the stalemate in Canada by Berrien stripping armies there to throw against the Republic?
Say, how many of those 39 seats were replaced by other parties men; and how many were Quids crossing the various aisles? Has Crockett walked to the Reformists yet?
The LDS enter. I was wondering if you'd bring them up ad you do not disappoint. Sounds like they will be in Nauvoo for the long haul. So no trek westward or a smaller one I guess. If Smith lives longer I wonder if his son will succeed him rather than Young, a mainline LDS more in line with the Community of Christ perhaps? For their military record looks like they were minor heroes in the North and Leroy Jenkins in the South.
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There was an earlier chapter where Brougham and Palmerston discussed what they wanted from the war (although that was before the Netherlands blew up):
With one slight concern over all this, Berrien can't be trusted at this point. He's basically already shown that he's willing to disregard anything and everything in regards to getting what he wants, even going so far as to lying directly to his own countrymen. Is anyone going to be willing to trust anything he says or offers over a peace treaty?
To be fair, can he afford to go back on his word? What can he really do once a treaty is signed, start another war? If the Brits demand a treaty port in Charleston, the worst he can do is put armed troops in the city and try to prevent the first Brit ship from docking, which is not a good look for him or the U.S. If Brougham demands money, the most he can do is welch on the treaty and look like a sore loser and cheap thug, which could lose the US valuable foreign allies and trading partners and cause an uproar even amongst the South. Once his signature (or someone else’s) is on the treaty, he can’t do much without other nations besides Britain agreeing that the treaty was unfair and excessive, and… well, going by the state of the US’s foreign affairs, what Brougham and his team are suggesting demanding, and Berrien’s general ineptitude and unpopularity, there’s probably not a lot of people outside the US— or outside of the South, if I’m being honest— who will be willing to help the US duck consequences if he (or someone else in the US government) decides to weasel out of the peace agreement’s terms.
True but as you say the Dutch crisis changes things. Its much closer too home and the implications of the country falling into French orbit are a major isse for the UK.
His lack of credibility is also a weakness though.
Even in the South Berrien's support is buckling as the rise of the Reformists shows. And there will be Quids looking to replace him too.
Since Berrien won't be able to trade Canada for what he wants he may try and give most of it back in order to avoid port concessions and reparations. he could spin it as saving the American economy from Perfidious Albion. Brougham may accept that as while he prefers money, losing big parts of Canada would make the British look weak at a critical time, whereas the war ending preserving the majority of their holdings from the union males them look strong.
With the Quids slipping further in Congress, they have lost even being the leading party in the House back to the DRP now, Henry Clay is now the man on any treaties it seems. Basically to get any treaty accepted will depend on Berroen getting Henry Clay to bring the DRP senators onboard. I can see Clay making a deal; the Quids are fading now and he might see this as a chance to return to "normalcy" drawing more quids back to the DRP. And both of them wanting to curb the rise of the Populists. I could see this backfire on Clay though, with Webster breaking from him over a treaty designed to end the war quickly and sooth waters with the South.
If the point is about avoiding reparations officially I could see Webster denouncing it as slaver logic of selling out the freedom fighters of Canada for the sake of money. Clay is only 61 or so at this point , but wth Adams gone I could see the DRP starting to chafe under the leadership of the former President and Webster in particular rrady to assert himself adfter Clay failed to get Berrien to resign and now this.
The problem isn’t that he’s dishonest, that’s to be expected from any elected politician - the problem is that he’s also an ideologically-driven idiot. He’s already done a lot of things he ‘can’t afford to do’ - most notably launching a second, undeclared war against Mexico - over the course of this war. There is literally no act so stupid or self-destructive, from the point of view of the British and many of his fellow Americans, that Berrien definitely won’t do it.
At the rate he's making decisions, Berrien will go down in history as a Nero at best, and a Benedict Arnold at worst he's been so preposterously bad at running the war, the country, and barely making a pretense about how deeply he's been fighting the war on behalf of the slave power.
Well, e have talked a bit on what Britain would want from the peace; but what about our dear little Republic?
At this time I don't think the USA holds any of their territory, nor do the allied forces hold any American territory in the area. So territory wise status quo antebellum seem the most likely outcome for the border. But New Orleans will surely want something, after enduring two invasions and the sheer casualties, more than the status quo restored.
The only things I can really think of they might get are reparations, or a dmz on the Union side of the border.
At this time I don't think the USA holds any of their territory, nor do the allied forces hold any American territory in the area. So territory wise status quo antebellum seem the most likely outcome for the border. But New Orleans will surely want something, after enduring two invasions and the sheer casualties, more than the status quo restored.
The only things I can really think of they might get are reparations, or a dmz on the Union side of the border.
Reparations seems the most likely. I can't see a DMZ by the US if Berrien's in charge of final negotiations, he'd just see it as an open path for slaves to escape to. Reparations seems to be most likely, although how much the US is going to pay for all this is probably going to hurt them quite a bit.
Winter is Going (1)
Lycaon pictus
Donor
After 1818[1], the north and south banks of the mighty Columbia developed in very different ways. To the Crown, the southern Oregon country was nothing more than another forested land from which to gather pelts. To the Constitution[2], it was not only this, but also potential prime farmland and the gateway to the Pacific Ocean. Of course, it was a gateway that was difficult to reach by land for eight months of the year, impossible for the remaining four, and dangerous to approach by sea all the year round, but they were not to be deterred by such impediments.
The North West Company built Fort Vancouver across the river from the modern location of Symmesburg. It was less a military outpost than a trading post for the North West Company and (after the Pemmican War[3]) the Hudson’s Bay Company. With the merger, Chief Factor John McLaughlin was placed in charge of the fort.
Over the next fifteen years or so, those loyal to Crown and those loyal to Constitution worked together in the Columbia basin better than anywhere else on the continent. This was partly because they were well isolated from their jealous respective governments, partly because their respective industries complemented one another. The American equivalent of the HBC in the area was the Pacific Fur Company, funded by John Jacob Astor, for whom Astoria City and Astoria Territory were named—but it did not dominate the economic life of the territory. Farmers and fishermen came to exploit the fertile soil of the Willamette Valley and the abundant salmon and ocean fish. Lumberjacks, brewers, blacksmiths and others soon followed, bringing civilization[4] to the land. The cabin where the eponymous John Cleves Symmes Jr. had spent the last years of his life, concocting the tales of the civilization within the hollow Earth which his son Americus had compiled into The World Within the World[5], was expanded into a meetinghouse that became the center of social life in Symmes’ Landing.
This, of course, made life at Fort Vancouver far more pleasant, as they were less dependent on supplies brought via the long and dangerous sea and overland routes. In addition, the farmers of Astoria grew tobacco, which to the HBC was more than just a smoke—furs wrapped in the dried leaves were protected from insects. At the same time, Hudson’s Bay trappers who had been living on pemmican and hardtack in the woods for months at a time would gladly paddle across the river and exchange a fox or marten pelt for a meal of fresh bread, vegetables, and beer. In this way, the economic diversity of Astoria allowed the PFC to take advantage of the HBC. And when the Hiemal Period of 1833 brought disaster to the fur market, some trappers—not only half-Gallic[6] mongrels, but men of good English stock—moved to Astoria to work on farms or cut trees for Charcoal Mill[7]. Indeed, after the March 1835 eruption of Mount St. Helens, McLoughlin’s successor James Douglas corresponded with Austin over plans to evacuate the fort and its personnel into Astoria itself in the event of a greater eruption. Small wonder, then, that when the war came, the forces on the two sides of the Columbia could barely be bothered to go through the motions…
In Astoria City, Goodman found far more accurate maps of the Columbia River and its environs. He also learned for the first time that Douglas[8] had surrendered to Governor Austin’s militia last year after firing only a ceremonial shot (from a musket, not one of his rusted and useless cannon) changing nothing beyond the flag waving atop the fort.
This complicated matters. According to his limited mandate from Whitehall, he had already achieved his objectives—with a few ships and one regiment, he had cut the United States off from the Pacific Ocean. But with that regiment at his command and the ice on the Columbia melting, it was surely his duty to relieve the fort.
The Surprisers’ march up the Columbia began April 2. The first problem they ran into was food—although they had enough small boats to maintain their supply train, the Royal Navy supply ship that was to have arrived at the beginning of April was wrecked on the Columbia Bar[9]. The crew survived, but the cargo was lost.
For many expeditions, this would have been a catastrophe. But fish and game were rich in the Columbian basin, and at this point the spring chinook had fattened up in the ocean and were heading up the river to spawn. Hunting and fishing slowed down the Surprisers considerably on the long march upstream—sometimes halting it for as much as a week at a time—and could not fully replace their food supply. But though their belts tightened, the men did not outright starve, and if anyone among them was unhappy at losing their salt beef and ship’s biscuit and having to make do with venison and fresh-caught salmon, their complaints are unrecorded.
By 1838 the Tsinúk (Chinook) peoples of the lower Columbia, believed to number as many as 15,000 at the beginning of the century, were now only slightly more numerous than the white settlers[10]. Plague after plague had whittled away their numbers—the most recent epidemic, malaria, had killed the great chief and trader Comcomly along with many others.
And even as their small society dwindled, it was going through an upheaval. It was a society of castes, with aristocrats, commoners, and outright slaves. The aristocracy, which dominated trade with the fur companies, had profited by contact with the white man, but they were not alone in doing so. In Tsinúk society, an ilaitekh[11] (slave) would sometimes be sent to steal on behalf of his master. The best targets for theft were of course white men, whose tools and weapons the Tsinúk had no way to duplicate.
Sometimes these slaves were caught—but when they were caught, they were not always killed. They had many useful skills and no particular reason to remain loyal to the masters who had sent them into this predicament.
Every frontier fort acquired a small population of natives—usually outcasts or potodoules[12]—who hung about and did odd chores, but were few in number because they seldom lived long. But Fort Vancouver was unusual in that such men, either captured slaves or commoners who sought employment, comprised much of its small garrison.
Across the river, for all that Austin dreamed of Astoria becoming a white man’s land, many of his settlers were married (at least in common law) to women of the Tsinúk or other nations. These were more likely to be low-caste women than high-caste women. Not only were there more low-caste women to begin with, but the high caste marked themselves by binding their children’s foreheads in infancy, in order to shape the bones in accordance with Tsinúk standards of beauty. But white standards of beauty were very different, and although men who had just come around the Horn or up the Astoria Trail tended to be none too particular, they certainly had no reason to favor the high caste.
As the fort and settlement thrived, so did the Tsinúk attached to them, and they shared this wealth with their extended families whenever possible. Thus, the Tsinúk aristocracy found itself losing control over what was left of its society. It was in this environment that one of Comcomly’s daughters, Koale’xoa, rose to prominence.
Most of what we know about the woman commonly called “Princess Raven” comes from her only surviving son, Ronald McDonald[13]. The son of Koale’xoa and Scots trader Archibald McDonald, he was five years old when his grandfather Comcomly died, seven when his father was killed by a bear, and thirteen in 1838 when Sir Stephen Goodman led the 48th Regiment of Foot into the Columbia delta.
By this time, Koale’xoa (despite her late husband and half-white son) had been speaking against the British and Americans for several years, urging all the Chinookan peoples, as well as the Ichishkin (Sahaptin), to unite against them while there was still time. According to McDonald, “Few heeded her warnings at first—no kukkemánan [chief] wanted to risk losing trade with the Pasi’siuks [Canadians, and Americans by extension][14], and too many of the common people were now tied to them by blood.”
This began to change as the fur trade declined, more settlers came, and rumors abounded of Austin’s desire to claim all the land south of the river for his own people. When word came from over the mountains in 1837 that the two great white tribes were at war, according to McDonald, “Mother did not counsel fighting yet. She was hopeful that they would destroy each other and we could reclaim our place and our lands.”
But a Cannibal Valley strategy[15] only works on cannibals. What the Tsinúk saw of the war between the United Kingdom and the United States hardly looked like a war at all. First Austin took Fort Vancouver bloodlessly, then Astoria City surrendered to Goodman without a shot fired. In both cases, of course, it was because the garrison was faced with overwhelming force and no prospect of reinforcement. But according to McDonald, “It was the universal opinion among the peoples that the war was a ruse, and that the white men were uniting to destroy us. Mother knew better, but she used this belief to rally the peoples behind her.”
Even as the Tsinúk and their allies assembled, it became clear that the war between the United Kingdom and the United States was indeed very real. The Astoria territorial militia began sniping at the Surprisers from the hills overlooking the river, forcing Col. Goodman to slow down. As a result of this and other delays, the British regiment did not reach the juncture of the Willamette and Columbia until May 8.
May 9 dawned over Symmes’ Landing with gray skies and the promise of heavy rain. Col. Goodman’s plan, according to his own writings, was to wait until the rain began to cross the Willamette, in the belief that “the colonials, being amateurs at war, would be less skilled at keeping their powder dry.” Amateurs at war they may have been, but Austin’s militia had been living and hunting in this damp climate for years now, and were prepared to open fire in any weather—and as frontier settlements were disproportionately young and male, they outnumbered the British.
Koale’xoa’s plan was straightforward—wait until one side had won the battle, then attack that side out of the east. To this end she assigned several scouts, including her son Ronald, to hide and watch the battle from under cover. When the time came, one of them would run to the eastern flank of Blacktail Butte[16] and light the signal fire. This was a heap of dried wood and bear fat under a rough dome of fresh pine branches, which would keep the wood dry and create a cloud of smoke when it began to burn.
As it happened, Austin had also posted a watch on his eastern flank, in case of attack. At about the same time that the rain was beginning and Goodman’s men were getting into their canoes, a young militaman, Corporal David H. Thoreau[17], was on the east side of Blacktail Butte looking for a dryish place where he could smoke his pipe. According to Thoreau:
When Thoreau returned, he found that the Surprisers had crossed the river—albeit with heavy casualties—and were slowly driving back the militia. He also found that the rain was rapidly turning to a torrential downpour, such that even the well-made bonfire could not stay lit for long. Indeed, according to McDonald, by the time he realized what had happened and ran back to the Butte to extinguish the fire, it was already dying.
This was too late. Koale’xoa led her forces down the river and attacked what appeared to be the vulnerable American flank, but was in fact the flank for both the Americans and British. What followed was a rare example of a three-sided battle, without even a temporary alliance between any two sides—indeed, as the writings of Austin, Goodman, Douglas, and McDonald reveal, each side was convinced the other two had joined forces against it.
The heavy rain not only inhibited communication, but made firing guns difficult even for the British, let alone the Americans or the Tsinúk with their handful of muskets and precious powder and shot. Bows, with wet bowstrings, were at an even greater disadvantage. This battle was fought mostly with knives, bayonets, and war axes.
Koale’xoa won. Austin and his militia retreated to Charcoal Mill, where the Willamette Falls blocked any further passage upstream by boat. The British crossed the Columbia and retreated to Fort Vancouver, liberating it as bloodlessly as it had been captured. This left the Tsinúk in possession of Symmes’ Landing.
At this point, Koale’xoa appealed to the Tsinúk living among the British and Americans, imploring them to return and promising them full equality. “Henceforth all who fight for our people and our way of life will be my brothers and sisters,” she said. According to McDonald, this created an immediate protest among her own nobles, and at least one assassination attempt. Only by quickly shielding herself with an elk hide and drawing her own axe was she able to save herself from becoming another cautionary tale in The Governing Elites…
November 9, 1838
Halifax, Nova Scotia
“It’s only fair,” said Tyler. “If you wish to involve your own colonials in this—”
Hyde de Neuville interrupted. “We, sir, are no colonials.”
“Yes, yes, you are a fully independent republic that is merely under the Crown’s protection. Florida and the Canadas cannot make the same claim. Can they?” Tyler looked from de Neuville to Auckland, and back again.
“No.”
“Very well, then. If Talbot and Papineau, and Mr. Hernández from Florida, are to be involved in these peace talks, then let Morgan and Mackenzie participate as well. They have just as much right to be heard.”
“You know perfectly well why we can’t do that,” said Auckland. “The minute they set foot on any territory of the Crown, we must arrest them and try them for treason.”
“Then you acknowledge that they are not currently on territory of the Crown?”
“I acknowledge no such… very well. You’ve made your point. But de Neuville absolutely will accompany us to London.”
“I have no objections,” said Tyler.
If José Mariano Hernández had any objections to being left out of the negotiations, he didn’t show it.
“I suppose I should thank you,” he said. “Fifty is too old to be wintering in London. Halifax in November is quite chilly enough.”
“We must all make the best of things.” If you don’t like being treated as a colonial, pick up a gun and stop being one. We did sixty years ago.
“You know what amuses me?” said Hernández. “My wife’s family comes from South Carolina. I used to have slaves before Raffles set them loose. Ana Maria and I gave serious thought to immigrating to the U.S. But it was easier to convert Mala Compra[18] to paying work than to start over again with nothing. Under other circumstances, I might have fought on your side.[19]”
Paris and London had begun to show signs of recovery as early as summer. Now, with the cease-fire, raw American cotton and tobacco once again filled the docks of Liverpool and Bremerhaven. The price was still lower than it had been before the crash, but a little money was more than none—and it wasn’t long before prospective buyers began bidding up the price…
[1] The year of the Congress of Stockholm and the Clay-Castlereagh Treaty.
[2] This particular author has his own reasons for describing the British/Canadians and Americans as “the Crown” and “the Constitution” whenever he can.
[3] The violent dispute (IOTL and ITTL) between the North West Company and the Hudson’s Bay Company.
[4] As you’ll see, this particular author’s definition of civilization does not include the natives.
[5] Which everyone but Americus Symmes thinks is a really cool work of speculative fiction.
[6] This particular very biased author is referring to the Métis.
[7] OTL’s Oregon City, here named for the sawmill powered by Willamette Falls. Charcoal is derived from the native village Charcowah.
[8] Remember, he’s a company man, not a soldier.
[9] Bars and shoals at the mouth of the river which change a little bit every year, making this a very dangerous place for ships at this point. Goodman’s flotilla was lucky to make it through in the first place without losing a ship.
[10] IOTL, according to this estimate, their population dropped from over 15,000 to around 500 by 1853. I’ve seen estimates that it was as many as 150,000, but this may have been an estimate of the total number of people speaking the Chinook-derived trade language along the northwest coast. I think if there had been that many people living in Oregon itself, the state would have looked very different from the get-go.
[11] Most of the Chinook language in this chapter comes from here.
[12] Alcoholics
[13] IOTL Koale’xoa also married Archibald McDonald, but died in 1824 giving birth to a son whose name was spelled “Ranald.”
[14] Literally “cloth people.”
[15] Cannibal Valley is a slightly racist board game, popular in the late 19th and early 20th century ITTL. The short version of the rules:
[16] OTL Rocky Butte
[17] Henry David Thoreau’s brother from another sperm, and a somewhat different character.
[18] Hernández’ plantation outside St. Augustine. (It was named “Mala Compra” by a previous owner. The name literally means “bad bargain.” The previous owner was not good at salesmanship.)
[19] IOTL he did, in fact, take part in the Second Seminole War on the U.S. side.
The North West Company built Fort Vancouver across the river from the modern location of Symmesburg. It was less a military outpost than a trading post for the North West Company and (after the Pemmican War[3]) the Hudson’s Bay Company. With the merger, Chief Factor John McLaughlin was placed in charge of the fort.
Over the next fifteen years or so, those loyal to Crown and those loyal to Constitution worked together in the Columbia basin better than anywhere else on the continent. This was partly because they were well isolated from their jealous respective governments, partly because their respective industries complemented one another. The American equivalent of the HBC in the area was the Pacific Fur Company, funded by John Jacob Astor, for whom Astoria City and Astoria Territory were named—but it did not dominate the economic life of the territory. Farmers and fishermen came to exploit the fertile soil of the Willamette Valley and the abundant salmon and ocean fish. Lumberjacks, brewers, blacksmiths and others soon followed, bringing civilization[4] to the land. The cabin where the eponymous John Cleves Symmes Jr. had spent the last years of his life, concocting the tales of the civilization within the hollow Earth which his son Americus had compiled into The World Within the World[5], was expanded into a meetinghouse that became the center of social life in Symmes’ Landing.
This, of course, made life at Fort Vancouver far more pleasant, as they were less dependent on supplies brought via the long and dangerous sea and overland routes. In addition, the farmers of Astoria grew tobacco, which to the HBC was more than just a smoke—furs wrapped in the dried leaves were protected from insects. At the same time, Hudson’s Bay trappers who had been living on pemmican and hardtack in the woods for months at a time would gladly paddle across the river and exchange a fox or marten pelt for a meal of fresh bread, vegetables, and beer. In this way, the economic diversity of Astoria allowed the PFC to take advantage of the HBC. And when the Hiemal Period of 1833 brought disaster to the fur market, some trappers—not only half-Gallic[6] mongrels, but men of good English stock—moved to Astoria to work on farms or cut trees for Charcoal Mill[7]. Indeed, after the March 1835 eruption of Mount St. Helens, McLoughlin’s successor James Douglas corresponded with Austin over plans to evacuate the fort and its personnel into Astoria itself in the event of a greater eruption. Small wonder, then, that when the war came, the forces on the two sides of the Columbia could barely be bothered to go through the motions…
William A. Silkworthy, Fur: the Empire
In Astoria City, Goodman found far more accurate maps of the Columbia River and its environs. He also learned for the first time that Douglas[8] had surrendered to Governor Austin’s militia last year after firing only a ceremonial shot (from a musket, not one of his rusted and useless cannon) changing nothing beyond the flag waving atop the fort.
This complicated matters. According to his limited mandate from Whitehall, he had already achieved his objectives—with a few ships and one regiment, he had cut the United States off from the Pacific Ocean. But with that regiment at his command and the ice on the Columbia melting, it was surely his duty to relieve the fort.
The Surprisers’ march up the Columbia began April 2. The first problem they ran into was food—although they had enough small boats to maintain their supply train, the Royal Navy supply ship that was to have arrived at the beginning of April was wrecked on the Columbia Bar[9]. The crew survived, but the cargo was lost.
For many expeditions, this would have been a catastrophe. But fish and game were rich in the Columbian basin, and at this point the spring chinook had fattened up in the ocean and were heading up the river to spawn. Hunting and fishing slowed down the Surprisers considerably on the long march upstream—sometimes halting it for as much as a week at a time—and could not fully replace their food supply. But though their belts tightened, the men did not outright starve, and if anyone among them was unhappy at losing their salt beef and ship’s biscuit and having to make do with venison and fresh-caught salmon, their complaints are unrecorded.
Eric Wayne Ellison, Anglo-American Wars of the 19th Century
By 1838 the Tsinúk (Chinook) peoples of the lower Columbia, believed to number as many as 15,000 at the beginning of the century, were now only slightly more numerous than the white settlers[10]. Plague after plague had whittled away their numbers—the most recent epidemic, malaria, had killed the great chief and trader Comcomly along with many others.
And even as their small society dwindled, it was going through an upheaval. It was a society of castes, with aristocrats, commoners, and outright slaves. The aristocracy, which dominated trade with the fur companies, had profited by contact with the white man, but they were not alone in doing so. In Tsinúk society, an ilaitekh[11] (slave) would sometimes be sent to steal on behalf of his master. The best targets for theft were of course white men, whose tools and weapons the Tsinúk had no way to duplicate.
Sometimes these slaves were caught—but when they were caught, they were not always killed. They had many useful skills and no particular reason to remain loyal to the masters who had sent them into this predicament.
Every frontier fort acquired a small population of natives—usually outcasts or potodoules[12]—who hung about and did odd chores, but were few in number because they seldom lived long. But Fort Vancouver was unusual in that such men, either captured slaves or commoners who sought employment, comprised much of its small garrison.
Across the river, for all that Austin dreamed of Astoria becoming a white man’s land, many of his settlers were married (at least in common law) to women of the Tsinúk or other nations. These were more likely to be low-caste women than high-caste women. Not only were there more low-caste women to begin with, but the high caste marked themselves by binding their children’s foreheads in infancy, in order to shape the bones in accordance with Tsinúk standards of beauty. But white standards of beauty were very different, and although men who had just come around the Horn or up the Astoria Trail tended to be none too particular, they certainly had no reason to favor the high caste.
As the fort and settlement thrived, so did the Tsinúk attached to them, and they shared this wealth with their extended families whenever possible. Thus, the Tsinúk aristocracy found itself losing control over what was left of its society. It was in this environment that one of Comcomly’s daughters, Koale’xoa, rose to prominence.
Most of what we know about the woman commonly called “Princess Raven” comes from her only surviving son, Ronald McDonald[13]. The son of Koale’xoa and Scots trader Archibald McDonald, he was five years old when his grandfather Comcomly died, seven when his father was killed by a bear, and thirteen in 1838 when Sir Stephen Goodman led the 48th Regiment of Foot into the Columbia delta.
By this time, Koale’xoa (despite her late husband and half-white son) had been speaking against the British and Americans for several years, urging all the Chinookan peoples, as well as the Ichishkin (Sahaptin), to unite against them while there was still time. According to McDonald, “Few heeded her warnings at first—no kukkemánan [chief] wanted to risk losing trade with the Pasi’siuks [Canadians, and Americans by extension][14], and too many of the common people were now tied to them by blood.”
This began to change as the fur trade declined, more settlers came, and rumors abounded of Austin’s desire to claim all the land south of the river for his own people. When word came from over the mountains in 1837 that the two great white tribes were at war, according to McDonald, “Mother did not counsel fighting yet. She was hopeful that they would destroy each other and we could reclaim our place and our lands.”
But a Cannibal Valley strategy[15] only works on cannibals. What the Tsinúk saw of the war between the United Kingdom and the United States hardly looked like a war at all. First Austin took Fort Vancouver bloodlessly, then Astoria City surrendered to Goodman without a shot fired. In both cases, of course, it was because the garrison was faced with overwhelming force and no prospect of reinforcement. But according to McDonald, “It was the universal opinion among the peoples that the war was a ruse, and that the white men were uniting to destroy us. Mother knew better, but she used this belief to rally the peoples behind her.”
Even as the Tsinúk and their allies assembled, it became clear that the war between the United Kingdom and the United States was indeed very real. The Astoria territorial militia began sniping at the Surprisers from the hills overlooking the river, forcing Col. Goodman to slow down. As a result of this and other delays, the British regiment did not reach the juncture of the Willamette and Columbia until May 8.
May 9 dawned over Symmes’ Landing with gray skies and the promise of heavy rain. Col. Goodman’s plan, according to his own writings, was to wait until the rain began to cross the Willamette, in the belief that “the colonials, being amateurs at war, would be less skilled at keeping their powder dry.” Amateurs at war they may have been, but Austin’s militia had been living and hunting in this damp climate for years now, and were prepared to open fire in any weather—and as frontier settlements were disproportionately young and male, they outnumbered the British.
Koale’xoa’s plan was straightforward—wait until one side had won the battle, then attack that side out of the east. To this end she assigned several scouts, including her son Ronald, to hide and watch the battle from under cover. When the time came, one of them would run to the eastern flank of Blacktail Butte[16] and light the signal fire. This was a heap of dried wood and bear fat under a rough dome of fresh pine branches, which would keep the wood dry and create a cloud of smoke when it began to burn.
As it happened, Austin had also posted a watch on his eastern flank, in case of attack. At about the same time that the rain was beginning and Goodman’s men were getting into their canoes, a young militaman, Corporal David H. Thoreau[17], was on the east side of Blacktail Butte looking for a dryish place where he could smoke his pipe. According to Thoreau:
Not wishing to start a fire that might draw attention to myself, I tossed the ash into what at first appeared to be a pile of damp pine branches. The ash fell into a space between two of the branches, and from within this space came a bright light and the smell of burning animal fat. As the fire quickly grew, I turned and ran for the town, fearing that this was part of some trap set by the Indians.
When Thoreau returned, he found that the Surprisers had crossed the river—albeit with heavy casualties—and were slowly driving back the militia. He also found that the rain was rapidly turning to a torrential downpour, such that even the well-made bonfire could not stay lit for long. Indeed, according to McDonald, by the time he realized what had happened and ran back to the Butte to extinguish the fire, it was already dying.
This was too late. Koale’xoa led her forces down the river and attacked what appeared to be the vulnerable American flank, but was in fact the flank for both the Americans and British. What followed was a rare example of a three-sided battle, without even a temporary alliance between any two sides—indeed, as the writings of Austin, Goodman, Douglas, and McDonald reveal, each side was convinced the other two had joined forces against it.
The heavy rain not only inhibited communication, but made firing guns difficult even for the British, let alone the Americans or the Tsinúk with their handful of muskets and precious powder and shot. Bows, with wet bowstrings, were at an even greater disadvantage. This battle was fought mostly with knives, bayonets, and war axes.
Koale’xoa won. Austin and his militia retreated to Charcoal Mill, where the Willamette Falls blocked any further passage upstream by boat. The British crossed the Columbia and retreated to Fort Vancouver, liberating it as bloodlessly as it had been captured. This left the Tsinúk in possession of Symmes’ Landing.
At this point, Koale’xoa appealed to the Tsinúk living among the British and Americans, imploring them to return and promising them full equality. “Henceforth all who fight for our people and our way of life will be my brothers and sisters,” she said. According to McDonald, this created an immediate protest among her own nobles, and at least one assassination attempt. Only by quickly shielding herself with an elk hide and drawing her own axe was she able to save herself from becoming another cautionary tale in The Governing Elites…
Daniel Ghosthorse, Though None Be Left To Sing: Accounts of Native Uprisings and Resistance to Settlement
November 9, 1838
Halifax, Nova Scotia
“It’s only fair,” said Tyler. “If you wish to involve your own colonials in this—”
Hyde de Neuville interrupted. “We, sir, are no colonials.”
“Yes, yes, you are a fully independent republic that is merely under the Crown’s protection. Florida and the Canadas cannot make the same claim. Can they?” Tyler looked from de Neuville to Auckland, and back again.
“No.”
“Very well, then. If Talbot and Papineau, and Mr. Hernández from Florida, are to be involved in these peace talks, then let Morgan and Mackenzie participate as well. They have just as much right to be heard.”
“You know perfectly well why we can’t do that,” said Auckland. “The minute they set foot on any territory of the Crown, we must arrest them and try them for treason.”
“Then you acknowledge that they are not currently on territory of the Crown?”
“I acknowledge no such… very well. You’ve made your point. But de Neuville absolutely will accompany us to London.”
“I have no objections,” said Tyler.
***
If José Mariano Hernández had any objections to being left out of the negotiations, he didn’t show it.
“I suppose I should thank you,” he said. “Fifty is too old to be wintering in London. Halifax in November is quite chilly enough.”
“We must all make the best of things.” If you don’t like being treated as a colonial, pick up a gun and stop being one. We did sixty years ago.
“You know what amuses me?” said Hernández. “My wife’s family comes from South Carolina. I used to have slaves before Raffles set them loose. Ana Maria and I gave serious thought to immigrating to the U.S. But it was easier to convert Mala Compra[18] to paying work than to start over again with nothing. Under other circumstances, I might have fought on your side.[19]”
Paris and London had begun to show signs of recovery as early as summer. Now, with the cease-fire, raw American cotton and tobacco once again filled the docks of Liverpool and Bremerhaven. The price was still lower than it had been before the crash, but a little money was more than none—and it wasn’t long before prospective buyers began bidding up the price…
Thomas Wingrove, An Economic History of the United States, Vol. 2
[1] The year of the Congress of Stockholm and the Clay-Castlereagh Treaty.
[2] This particular author has his own reasons for describing the British/Canadians and Americans as “the Crown” and “the Constitution” whenever he can.
[3] The violent dispute (IOTL and ITTL) between the North West Company and the Hudson’s Bay Company.
[4] As you’ll see, this particular author’s definition of civilization does not include the natives.
[5] Which everyone but Americus Symmes thinks is a really cool work of speculative fiction.
[6] This particular very biased author is referring to the Métis.
[7] OTL’s Oregon City, here named for the sawmill powered by Willamette Falls. Charcoal is derived from the native village Charcowah.
[8] Remember, he’s a company man, not a soldier.
[9] Bars and shoals at the mouth of the river which change a little bit every year, making this a very dangerous place for ships at this point. Goodman’s flotilla was lucky to make it through in the first place without losing a ship.
[10] IOTL, according to this estimate, their population dropped from over 15,000 to around 500 by 1853. I’ve seen estimates that it was as many as 150,000, but this may have been an estimate of the total number of people speaking the Chinook-derived trade language along the northwest coast. I think if there had been that many people living in Oregon itself, the state would have looked very different from the get-go.
[11] Most of the Chinook language in this chapter comes from here.
[12] Alcoholics
[13] IOTL Koale’xoa also married Archibald McDonald, but died in 1824 giving birth to a son whose name was spelled “Ranald.”
[14] Literally “cloth people.”
[15] Cannibal Valley is a slightly racist board game, popular in the late 19th and early 20th century ITTL. The short version of the rules:
• The Christians have a small head start and must run away from the Cannibals, who outnumber them.
• If the Cannibals have failed to catch a Christian to eat by the end of the turn, they must eat one of their own.
• The game ends either when the last Christian has been caught, or when the Christians outnumber the Cannibals at the end of a turn, at which point the Cannibals convert.
Thus, a Cannibal Valley strategy is “keep your distance and let your enemies destroy each other.”[16] OTL Rocky Butte
[17] Henry David Thoreau’s brother from another sperm, and a somewhat different character.
[18] Hernández’ plantation outside St. Augustine. (It was named “Mala Compra” by a previous owner. The name literally means “bad bargain.” The previous owner was not good at salesmanship.)
[19] IOTL he did, in fact, take part in the Second Seminole War on the U.S. side.
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I do love the irony that the frontier settlers are pretty cool with one another despite the national rivalries.
I find it very werid the IU writer s referring to the Union as the Constitution. I have never ever heard the USA referred to as such. Might just be an oddball ideologue writer.
The Golden Arches will rise over the West! This is shaping up to be a werid war in Astoria; the Brits still hold Astoria city?
Ahh, with manners like that its no wonder the USA has so many friend ITTL. And really brining the Cabnadian rebels to London? Berrien really is showing all the tact we have come to expect.
I find it very werid the IU writer s referring to the Union as the Constitution. I have never ever heard the USA referred to as such. Might just be an oddball ideologue writer.
The Golden Arches will rise over the West! This is shaping up to be a werid war in Astoria; the Brits still hold Astoria city?
Ahh, with manners like that its no wonder the USA has so many friend ITTL. And really brining the Cabnadian rebels to London? Berrien really is showing all the tact we have come to expect.
I wonder if we might not see the Oregon Territory becoming its own independent Republic here, at some point in the future - it's something that nearly occured in OTL with the Povisional Government, but which I rarely see explored in many TLs. And it could well be a good compromise during a period of much more hostile British-American relations, especially when the locals by and large seem to get along with each other pretty well.
But that would also cut the US off from the Pacific, which would lay the groundwork work for another war. The leadership of the US have a desire and geopolitical hunger to secure land on the Pacific Coast
Ah but as we see with Berrien, the slave power already wants another war to expand into Mexico! I think "setting the groundwork for another war" is more a matter of course rather than a less likely outcome no matter what ends this particular war.
That’s a very good point, and I can see depriving the US land on the Pacific as very beneficial to British and their Allies interests. It for one means that the Americans can’t establish a naval presence any time soon in the Pacific Ocean. Which gives England more breathing space when it comes to their own designs in Oceania.
I wonder where America is going to look for Allies after this war? Because you are right, this war was a bit too indecisive and with everyone developing harder feelings for it to be the last.
I have been thinking there will be an Astorian separatist movement. Austin has his apocalyptic collapse of America idea based in racial strife driving his White West project. And with the government "back east" abandoning them for the duration of the war we likely will see resentment from the settlers toward D.C.; even if they aren't necessarily buying what Austin is selling.
Austin's ideology may be getting two hots in the arm coming up too. If Koale’xoa's plan to win over the native populace among the settlers bears any fruit Austin will seize on it too tear down the relationship that had been building between settlers and that population. And the Troubles may be sold as vindication of his doom-saying with peopel starting to think the end of America is at hand.
As for allies, I am not sure the USA will be much in the market. In this latest war their alliances haven't been displayed as anything too useful, and aside from Astoria they have no invasion to inspire panic to seek allies. Washington's old idea of avoiding entangling alliances may gain traction with an American Against the world view entering the nationalism.
And on the other had the USA won't be looking very attractive as an ally. Their fiscal scandals aside, they have alienated very land neighbor they have making any alliance with them costly in alienating the rest of continent. Their political system has been humiliated by Berrien going rogue blatantly and then getting a slap on the wrist. And the Troubles will be looming. So I don't see the US of A being the hot item to get on the dance card of in the festival of nations any time soon.
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Winter is Going (2)
Lycaon pictus
Donor
Over the fall and winter of 1838 and spring of 1839, two sets of peace negotiations played out in or near London, and Palmerston divided his time between them. As both sets of negotiations took place on royal castles, the queen was the official host of both. Despite the entreaty of Willem of the Netherlands, she confined her role to greeting and welcoming the various parties.
In St. James’ Palace, beginning in October, the foreign minister met with representatives of France, Prussia, and the Bonapartist and Orangist factions of the Netherlands. Their goal was to decide the ruling house of the Netherlands, and the orientation of its foreign policy. Meanwhile, in Windsor Palace in mid-December, Palmerston met with U.S. Secretary of State John Tyler, Louisiana’s Hyde de Neuville, the Spanish ambassador Francisco Javier de Istúriz y Montero, and Mariano Paredes of New Spain. Representatives from France and Italy were also in attendance. Their goal was to bring a peaceful resolution to the War of 1837…
March 28, 1839
No. 10 Downing Street
“I know this isn’t what you wanted, Henry,” said Palmerston. “You wanted the situation in the Netherlands resolved first. But the Dutch are not cooperating, and Tyler is. I have delayed matters as long as I can.”
Brougham nodded. “Are the French making demands?”
“Yes. But for what it may be worth, I don’t believe the situation at St. James is their fault. The Prussians are being every bit as stubborn there.”
“Then whatever is, this isn’t all some French plot.” Brougham shook his head. “Even knowing that this is the last thing Berrien wants, I hate it. It irks me to give that popinjay anything resembling a victory.”
Suppose I don’t sign the treaty, he thought. Suppose I try to keep the territory in question. How much would it cost to fortify it? Even enough to protect it from invasion, let alone to build fleets on three lakes, to threaten—he glanced at the map—New York and Pennsylvania and Ohio and Michigan? At least with this treaty, the new border will be easier to defend.
Unfortunately, that will be true on both sides.
“Even if he signs the treaty, you will get some of what you wanted,” said Palmerston.
“Well, yes.” Brougham smiled. “And there’s always a chance that Berrien will refuse. They say he’s a madman. If he doesn’t sign the treaty, it all falls apart and the war is on again. But that gives us several months to sort things out in the Netherlands. Make the most of them.”
“Of course.”
The Treaty of Windsor was signed on Good Friday of 1839. According to its terms:
• The U.S. Treasury would pay the United Kingdom a sum of $10 million and Louisiana $5 million[1], officially as compensation for losses in the war. This was about a fifth of the cost of the war[2], but Tyler arranged for it to be payable over five years, and secured loans from the Banque de France and James de Rothschild to help meet the costs.
• Georgian Bay and the North Channel of Lake Huron would form part of the U.S.-Canada boundary. Cockburn and Manitoulin Islands would be U.S. territory. The disposition of other islands would be settled in later negotiations following a thorough survey by both nations.
• East of Georgian Bay, the border would run along the 45th parallel to the 79th meridian, then south along the 79th meridian to Lake Ontario.
While this evicted Canada from Lake Erie and put the most populous part of Upper Canada in U.S. hands, including the city of Toronto, it allowed Canada to retain a presence on Lake Ontario, Lake Huron, and Lake Superior. This meant that the United States would still need to maintain a naval presence on those lakes if they wanted to keep their conquest.
Florida was kept intact, and remained British. New Spain was determined not to have suffered enough to justify compensation.
And so, Tyler was sent back to Washington, D.C. on the steamship Great Western…
When the Senate passed the treaty at the end of April, Berrien might have felt (if the story had been written yet) as though he had turned over the black hourglass[3] and wished for a short, victorious war—and with the hour long since passed, it was too late to take back the wish. He had gone to war to increase U.S. territory, and after less than a year and a half of war, U.S. territory had indeed been increased…
April 30, 1839
White House
Washington, D.C.
Berrien couldn’t remember the last time he’d had this many people in the Oval Office at the same time. Senators Southard, Clay, Winthrop, and Crockett had pride of place in front, along with his own secretary of state. Behind them were Representative Webster, Secretaries Poinsett, Upshur, and Taney, Generals Scott, Taylor, Kearny, and Armistead, and Admiral[4] Perry.
“So many guests, and me without any whiskey,” he said. As witticisms went, it would have to do. He was betrayed, outnumbered, and quite possibly defeated, but the least he could do was keep his chin up.
“This shouldn’t take long,” said Southard, putting a sheaf of papers on his desk. “Secretary Tyler has achieved an honorable peace. The Senate has signed the treaty, 45 to 5. We are here to witness your signature.”
“What you mean to say,” said Berrien, “is that you’re all here to twist my arm until I sign it.”
“Think how silly you can make us all look if you sign it right away without any argument, Mr. President,” said Tyler. You damned traitor. I sent you to London to buy time, not this.
“What if I don’t sign it at all?”
“Then I have failed you as Secretary of State, and must resign that office and return to private life.”
“I will do the same,” said Poinsett.
“As will I,” said Upshur. Berrien tried to imagine having to replace three Cabinet officers in the face of a hostile Senate.
“So will Admiral Perry, the other generals, and myself, sir,” said General Scott. He stepped forward, looming over everyone else in the room. “In our opinion, sir, this war has come to a satisfactory conclusion. We have taken that portion of the Canadas that revolted against British authority and brought them under our own umbrella. Having to pay the British for it, and going into debt to Paris in the process—that is a blow, but a growing nation can overcome it. We’re not willing to prosecute this war any further.”
“Not to be discourteous, but why is Mr. Webster here? This isn’t House business.”
“I hoped you would ask,” said Southard. “Mr. Webster can answer that himself.”
Daniel Webster stepped forward, Clay moving aside to make room for him. “Do not forget, Mr. President, that this was my war as much as yours. If Congress had not declared war, there would be no war. And as we speak, the House Budget Committee is considering the budget for fiscal year 1840. If necessary, we are fully prepared to reduce military expenditures to 1836 levels.”
“You wouldn’t.”
“If we must, we shall.” He gestured to Taney.
“Mr. President,” said Taney, “we cannot raise enough money—not by bonds, not by taxes, not by tariffs—to win this war in one year. We cannot even sustain our current expenditures as things stand. If you doubt this, you may ask for my resignation.”
“And yet we have enough money to pay off the British.”
“Not yet,” said Tyler. “Our allies are loaning us those monies. And they were quite clear that these loans were contingent on your signature of the treaty.”
“And the rest of you gentlemen—you will allow this?”
“Do you doubt our patriotism, Mr. President?” said Poinsett. “Have we given you any cause? The generals, admirals, John Tyler, Abel, myself—each of us has labored in our own way to bring our nation victory in this war. But to continue to pursue it would be wrong, and if we have no power to prevent that wrong… well, there comes a point where even the best of men must turn Pilate. Better to wash our hands of evil than entangle ourselves further in it.”
Scott nodded. “You know the line from Beaumont and Fletcher? ‘If there were no such instruments as thou/We kings could never act such wicked deeds’[5]? You, sir, are no king, and we are no such instruments.”
I want Florida. I want Louisiana. I want Texas.
But he couldn’t get them without his secretaries of war and the Navy. Or his treasurer. Or his best generals and admiral. Certainly not in a year, and from what Webster had said, a year was all he had left.
I was defeated at Levy’s Field. I survived that, and here I am. I can survive this.
He signed the treaty.
Everyone in the room applauded. “Thank you, Mr. President,” said Southard.
“There is one more matter,” said Winthrop. Of course there is. There was only one reason Winthrop would be here.
“While I have no enthusiasm for your office,” he continued, “I must remind you—you told me after your impeachment that you would not resign because you had a war to win. You are still impeached, and you no longer have that war. What will you do?”
“What will I do? I will continue exercising this office as best I can. Certain people in this room”—he deliberately did not look at Webster—“have accused me often enough of ‘Caesarism.’ I reject the accusation. I respect the will of the people. I respect it so much, in fact, that I am willing to subject myself to it in November of next year. Let me speak to them, and then let them judge me as they see fit.”
I am an orator, after all. If I can do nothing else, I can speak and persuade.
It was a mistake to lead the people where they were not ready to go. I see that now. But give me another election, and I can make them ready.
The end of the war affected some industries more than others. In his memoris, Christian Sharpes describes how the city of Harpersburgh[6] nearly died the year after it was incorporated. Civilian demand for rifles and revolvers, though considerable in the United States, was not the same as the Army’s. Meanwhile, the Rappahannock Works, which had made the rockets deployed at Fort Severn, Falmouth, and Mount Hope, was purchased by William Aiken and re-retooled to make iron rails again.
Likewise, the majority of the incendiary-makers had to go back to selling patent medicines—and some were altogether ruined, having incurred more debt than they could meet the interest on without Army contracts. Stabler Brothers halted production of No. 23 (which although it was by far the most powerful incendiary in the American arsenal was quite dangerous to stockpile), reduced its production of white phosphorus to a tenth of what it had been, and redirected this output toward the makers of matches and fireworks. When asked why his brother Thomas did not abandon the product entirely, Robinson Stabler[7], oldest of the brothers, said, “Someone will make it, and no one can do it more safely.” The brothers continued to manufacture their less potent but safer incendiary, No. 19, albeit at reduced quantity. They also continued to produce gunpowder, and to experiment further into other propellants.
One who did not need to scale back production at all, but only retool a little, was Benjamin T. Babbitt, creator of Babbitt’s Best Incendiary. Babbitt’s distillery in Little Falls produced alcohol of a purity that the best moonshiners could hardly match. Having more interest in other fields, he sold the distillery in 1839 to Aeneas Coffey Jr., an Irish immigrant who was the son and namesake of one of the world’s most famous distillers. Aeneas Jr. would use his own knowledge of the industry to improve the Little Falls Distillery and make it an institution that flourishes to this day.
Babbitt himself had much more use for the other ingredient in his incendiary—rapeseed oil, which he extracted from oilseeds he bought in bulk from farms all over New England and the Mid-Atlantic. Although no one knew yet of the health hazards of rapeseed oil, they knew it was unpalatable to humans and not even much use as animal feed. It would be over a hundred years before agronomists in Maryland bred the cultivar from which modern brassicic oil is made. But it was an excellent lubricant, both for the trains whose tracks had expanded through the Hiemal Period and the war, and for the many machines that Babbitt himself built. He sold bottles of the oil in the same shop where he sold his patented mowing machine.
The oil had other uses as well. It could be burned in the same lamps as whale oil, and produced nearly as bright a flame—and, as it happened, the American whaling industry had been shut down by the war. Whalers towing whales back to Nantucket were too easy a target for British commerce raids. Even those whaler crews who were not captured took up fishing or working for the Navy to make ends meet. Babbitt was only too happy to flood the market with cheap lamp oil while the Nantucketers were still trying to assemble crews for new whaling voyages. (Even today, rapeseed oil is often used as a component of BPPs[8].)
CANNING BRITISH EMBASSY PARIS 040839 PNKT
GOOD MORNING PNKT
PARIS IN SPRINGTIME FINE AS EVER PNKT
TAKING FLETCHERS SOMEWHERE BEAUTIFUL THIS WINTER PNKT
SUGGESTIONS WELCOME PNKT
[1] This is about what the U.S. paid for the whole Southwest after the Mexican-American War.
[2] I’m basing this on the cost of the Mexican-American war, which involved smaller armies and less damage to U.S. assets, but greater transportation costs. Basically I’m not great at calculating the cost of a whole war.
[3] An anachronistic reference to the story “The Black Hourglass” by Charles Brady, first published in 1866.
[4] He’s been promoted since the Bay of Fundy.
[5] A King and No King, Act III, scene 3, lines 296-7.
[6] Harpers Ferry and Bolivar. As the spelling indicates, this is another Pittsburgh wannabe.
[7] You might want to recheck this post, which I’ve had to update. Turns out there were more living Stablers than I knew about when I originally wrote it.
[8] Biopiezopyric fuels (OTL biodiesels). Yes, great machines of peace and war ITTL will fill their tanks with PP. I’m not even sorry.
In St. James’ Palace, beginning in October, the foreign minister met with representatives of France, Prussia, and the Bonapartist and Orangist factions of the Netherlands. Their goal was to decide the ruling house of the Netherlands, and the orientation of its foreign policy. Meanwhile, in Windsor Palace in mid-December, Palmerston met with U.S. Secretary of State John Tyler, Louisiana’s Hyde de Neuville, the Spanish ambassador Francisco Javier de Istúriz y Montero, and Mariano Paredes of New Spain. Representatives from France and Italy were also in attendance. Their goal was to bring a peaceful resolution to the War of 1837…
H. Michael Wolcott, A History of Western International Diplomacy, 1648-1858
March 28, 1839
No. 10 Downing Street
“I know this isn’t what you wanted, Henry,” said Palmerston. “You wanted the situation in the Netherlands resolved first. But the Dutch are not cooperating, and Tyler is. I have delayed matters as long as I can.”
Brougham nodded. “Are the French making demands?”
“Yes. But for what it may be worth, I don’t believe the situation at St. James is their fault. The Prussians are being every bit as stubborn there.”
“Then whatever is, this isn’t all some French plot.” Brougham shook his head. “Even knowing that this is the last thing Berrien wants, I hate it. It irks me to give that popinjay anything resembling a victory.”
Suppose I don’t sign the treaty, he thought. Suppose I try to keep the territory in question. How much would it cost to fortify it? Even enough to protect it from invasion, let alone to build fleets on three lakes, to threaten—he glanced at the map—New York and Pennsylvania and Ohio and Michigan? At least with this treaty, the new border will be easier to defend.
Unfortunately, that will be true on both sides.
“Even if he signs the treaty, you will get some of what you wanted,” said Palmerston.
“Well, yes.” Brougham smiled. “And there’s always a chance that Berrien will refuse. They say he’s a madman. If he doesn’t sign the treaty, it all falls apart and the war is on again. But that gives us several months to sort things out in the Netherlands. Make the most of them.”
“Of course.”
The Treaty of Windsor was signed on Good Friday of 1839. According to its terms:
• The U.S. Treasury would pay the United Kingdom a sum of $10 million and Louisiana $5 million[1], officially as compensation for losses in the war. This was about a fifth of the cost of the war[2], but Tyler arranged for it to be payable over five years, and secured loans from the Banque de France and James de Rothschild to help meet the costs.
• Georgian Bay and the North Channel of Lake Huron would form part of the U.S.-Canada boundary. Cockburn and Manitoulin Islands would be U.S. territory. The disposition of other islands would be settled in later negotiations following a thorough survey by both nations.
• East of Georgian Bay, the border would run along the 45th parallel to the 79th meridian, then south along the 79th meridian to Lake Ontario.
While this evicted Canada from Lake Erie and put the most populous part of Upper Canada in U.S. hands, including the city of Toronto, it allowed Canada to retain a presence on Lake Ontario, Lake Huron, and Lake Superior. This meant that the United States would still need to maintain a naval presence on those lakes if they wanted to keep their conquest.
Florida was kept intact, and remained British. New Spain was determined not to have suffered enough to justify compensation.
And so, Tyler was sent back to Washington, D.C. on the steamship Great Western…
H. Michael Wolcott, A History of Western International Diplomacy, 1648-1858
When the Senate passed the treaty at the end of April, Berrien might have felt (if the story had been written yet) as though he had turned over the black hourglass[3] and wished for a short, victorious war—and with the hour long since passed, it was too late to take back the wish. He had gone to war to increase U.S. territory, and after less than a year and a half of war, U.S. territory had indeed been increased…
Andrea Fessler, The Waves from Sinepuxent
April 30, 1839
White House
Washington, D.C.
Berrien couldn’t remember the last time he’d had this many people in the Oval Office at the same time. Senators Southard, Clay, Winthrop, and Crockett had pride of place in front, along with his own secretary of state. Behind them were Representative Webster, Secretaries Poinsett, Upshur, and Taney, Generals Scott, Taylor, Kearny, and Armistead, and Admiral[4] Perry.
“So many guests, and me without any whiskey,” he said. As witticisms went, it would have to do. He was betrayed, outnumbered, and quite possibly defeated, but the least he could do was keep his chin up.
“This shouldn’t take long,” said Southard, putting a sheaf of papers on his desk. “Secretary Tyler has achieved an honorable peace. The Senate has signed the treaty, 45 to 5. We are here to witness your signature.”
“What you mean to say,” said Berrien, “is that you’re all here to twist my arm until I sign it.”
“Think how silly you can make us all look if you sign it right away without any argument, Mr. President,” said Tyler. You damned traitor. I sent you to London to buy time, not this.
“What if I don’t sign it at all?”
“Then I have failed you as Secretary of State, and must resign that office and return to private life.”
“I will do the same,” said Poinsett.
“As will I,” said Upshur. Berrien tried to imagine having to replace three Cabinet officers in the face of a hostile Senate.
“So will Admiral Perry, the other generals, and myself, sir,” said General Scott. He stepped forward, looming over everyone else in the room. “In our opinion, sir, this war has come to a satisfactory conclusion. We have taken that portion of the Canadas that revolted against British authority and brought them under our own umbrella. Having to pay the British for it, and going into debt to Paris in the process—that is a blow, but a growing nation can overcome it. We’re not willing to prosecute this war any further.”
“Not to be discourteous, but why is Mr. Webster here? This isn’t House business.”
“I hoped you would ask,” said Southard. “Mr. Webster can answer that himself.”
Daniel Webster stepped forward, Clay moving aside to make room for him. “Do not forget, Mr. President, that this was my war as much as yours. If Congress had not declared war, there would be no war. And as we speak, the House Budget Committee is considering the budget for fiscal year 1840. If necessary, we are fully prepared to reduce military expenditures to 1836 levels.”
“You wouldn’t.”
“If we must, we shall.” He gestured to Taney.
“Mr. President,” said Taney, “we cannot raise enough money—not by bonds, not by taxes, not by tariffs—to win this war in one year. We cannot even sustain our current expenditures as things stand. If you doubt this, you may ask for my resignation.”
“And yet we have enough money to pay off the British.”
“Not yet,” said Tyler. “Our allies are loaning us those monies. And they were quite clear that these loans were contingent on your signature of the treaty.”
“And the rest of you gentlemen—you will allow this?”
“Do you doubt our patriotism, Mr. President?” said Poinsett. “Have we given you any cause? The generals, admirals, John Tyler, Abel, myself—each of us has labored in our own way to bring our nation victory in this war. But to continue to pursue it would be wrong, and if we have no power to prevent that wrong… well, there comes a point where even the best of men must turn Pilate. Better to wash our hands of evil than entangle ourselves further in it.”
Scott nodded. “You know the line from Beaumont and Fletcher? ‘If there were no such instruments as thou/We kings could never act such wicked deeds’[5]? You, sir, are no king, and we are no such instruments.”
I want Florida. I want Louisiana. I want Texas.
But he couldn’t get them without his secretaries of war and the Navy. Or his treasurer. Or his best generals and admiral. Certainly not in a year, and from what Webster had said, a year was all he had left.
I was defeated at Levy’s Field. I survived that, and here I am. I can survive this.
He signed the treaty.
Everyone in the room applauded. “Thank you, Mr. President,” said Southard.
“There is one more matter,” said Winthrop. Of course there is. There was only one reason Winthrop would be here.
“While I have no enthusiasm for your office,” he continued, “I must remind you—you told me after your impeachment that you would not resign because you had a war to win. You are still impeached, and you no longer have that war. What will you do?”
“What will I do? I will continue exercising this office as best I can. Certain people in this room”—he deliberately did not look at Webster—“have accused me often enough of ‘Caesarism.’ I reject the accusation. I respect the will of the people. I respect it so much, in fact, that I am willing to subject myself to it in November of next year. Let me speak to them, and then let them judge me as they see fit.”
I am an orator, after all. If I can do nothing else, I can speak and persuade.
It was a mistake to lead the people where they were not ready to go. I see that now. But give me another election, and I can make them ready.
The end of the war affected some industries more than others. In his memoris, Christian Sharpes describes how the city of Harpersburgh[6] nearly died the year after it was incorporated. Civilian demand for rifles and revolvers, though considerable in the United States, was not the same as the Army’s. Meanwhile, the Rappahannock Works, which had made the rockets deployed at Fort Severn, Falmouth, and Mount Hope, was purchased by William Aiken and re-retooled to make iron rails again.
Likewise, the majority of the incendiary-makers had to go back to selling patent medicines—and some were altogether ruined, having incurred more debt than they could meet the interest on without Army contracts. Stabler Brothers halted production of No. 23 (which although it was by far the most powerful incendiary in the American arsenal was quite dangerous to stockpile), reduced its production of white phosphorus to a tenth of what it had been, and redirected this output toward the makers of matches and fireworks. When asked why his brother Thomas did not abandon the product entirely, Robinson Stabler[7], oldest of the brothers, said, “Someone will make it, and no one can do it more safely.” The brothers continued to manufacture their less potent but safer incendiary, No. 19, albeit at reduced quantity. They also continued to produce gunpowder, and to experiment further into other propellants.
One who did not need to scale back production at all, but only retool a little, was Benjamin T. Babbitt, creator of Babbitt’s Best Incendiary. Babbitt’s distillery in Little Falls produced alcohol of a purity that the best moonshiners could hardly match. Having more interest in other fields, he sold the distillery in 1839 to Aeneas Coffey Jr., an Irish immigrant who was the son and namesake of one of the world’s most famous distillers. Aeneas Jr. would use his own knowledge of the industry to improve the Little Falls Distillery and make it an institution that flourishes to this day.
Babbitt himself had much more use for the other ingredient in his incendiary—rapeseed oil, which he extracted from oilseeds he bought in bulk from farms all over New England and the Mid-Atlantic. Although no one knew yet of the health hazards of rapeseed oil, they knew it was unpalatable to humans and not even much use as animal feed. It would be over a hundred years before agronomists in Maryland bred the cultivar from which modern brassicic oil is made. But it was an excellent lubricant, both for the trains whose tracks had expanded through the Hiemal Period and the war, and for the many machines that Babbitt himself built. He sold bottles of the oil in the same shop where he sold his patented mowing machine.
The oil had other uses as well. It could be burned in the same lamps as whale oil, and produced nearly as bright a flame—and, as it happened, the American whaling industry had been shut down by the war. Whalers towing whales back to Nantucket were too easy a target for British commerce raids. Even those whaler crews who were not captured took up fishing or working for the Navy to make ends meet. Babbitt was only too happy to flood the market with cheap lamp oil while the Nantucketers were still trying to assemble crews for new whaling voyages. (Even today, rapeseed oil is often used as a component of BPPs[8].)
Thomas Wingrove, An Economic History of the United States, Vol. 2
CANNING BRITISH EMBASSY PARIS 040839 PNKT
GOOD MORNING PNKT
PARIS IN SPRINGTIME FINE AS EVER PNKT
TAKING FLETCHERS SOMEWHERE BEAUTIFUL THIS WINTER PNKT
SUGGESTIONS WELCOME PNKT
[1] This is about what the U.S. paid for the whole Southwest after the Mexican-American War.
[2] I’m basing this on the cost of the Mexican-American war, which involved smaller armies and less damage to U.S. assets, but greater transportation costs. Basically I’m not great at calculating the cost of a whole war.
[3] An anachronistic reference to the story “The Black Hourglass” by Charles Brady, first published in 1866.
[4] He’s been promoted since the Bay of Fundy.
[5] A King and No King, Act III, scene 3, lines 296-7.
[6] Harpers Ferry and Bolivar. As the spelling indicates, this is another Pittsburgh wannabe.
[7] You might want to recheck this post, which I’ve had to update. Turns out there were more living Stablers than I knew about when I originally wrote it.
[8] Biopiezopyric fuels (OTL biodiesels). Yes, great machines of peace and war ITTL will fill their tanks with PP. I’m not even sorry.
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