The Legacy of an Adventurer: A Mexican TL

Taking Hispaniola, huh. Although that comment about the new name only having selecting appearances doesn't sound like it's a long-lating endeavor. At least concerning the guy.

Well, maybe it's just me, but at current circumstances, it does not look like it's going to easy to keep hold of the island, once the Spanish come in full force.
 
Sections 13
Section 13
The Inter-Invasion Years

Following the invasion of Lamportiola, Guillén felt secure enough to finally divert resources from the army to start the exile of pro-Spanish forces. Originally, he wanted to exile them to the northern desert but cooler heads among his advisors and Cortez prevailed and instead they were given supplies, swore an oath of loyalty and non-aggression to the Mexican Empire, and transported to San Diego Bay and the new settlement of San Diego. The most cooperative and wealthiest exiles were taken by ship, but the grand majority were taken across land where an estimated 2,000 people died of the harsh conditions. Ultimately, the new Pueblo de San Diego started with 10,000 settlers.

In late 1658, Prince Guillén and his mother made the trek across the Atlantic to join with Amalia and the House of Orange-Nassau, and in early 1659 the 13-year-old Mexican prince started taking classes at the University of Leiden with 9-year old William, under the guidance of ethics professor Hendrik Bronius. The two were friendly, but their friendship wouldn't become the stuff of legend until the expulsion of all of William's pro-English courtiers, including his friend Zuylenstein despite his pleas, in 1666. Of more direct importance in this period is the relationship between Prince Guillén and the 16-year old Maria of Nassau. Fortunately, Guillén was going through puberty and the older girl caught his "eye", and Maria of Nassau for her part grew fond of the old boy's company. By 1662, their attraction grew to the point where it continues to be referenced by modern day teenage couples. During this period Prince Guillén mastered a skill that would serve him well for the rest of his life: confusing everyone as to what his religion was. He seemed receptive to Calvinist and Reformed principles (even attending services led by Reformed pastors), yet he also tried to respect kosher traditions with his mother in private and would later claim to be a Catholic.

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Portraits of Maria of Nassau and Prince Guillén

Section 14
The Second Spanish Invasion

In 1659, the Franco-Spanish War ended with France gaining French Flanders and Northern Catalonia (Rouissillon, Conflent, Vallespir, Capcir, and French Cerdagne). This and the new Spanish Armada convinced Felipe IV that it was time to try another invasion of Mexico. From the Army of Flanders, the former Catalan troops, and troops on the Portuguese front, he amassed 40,000 men to attack Mexico along with the 4,000 men waiting in Cuba under the command of the Marquis of Caracena.

When the Army of New Spain was noticed in Cuba in March 1660, Emperor Guillén sounded the alarm and ordered all armies expect for those in Fort Montagua to make haste to Mexico City to prepare for the upcoming battle. All ships in the Mexican Armada were redirected to the Gulf. The next few months were spent in nervous anticipation.

By this point, the nearly two million inhabitants of Mexico raised an army of 70,000, that although not the best trained, had several experienced leaders and had an easier time getting supplied than the Spanish could hope for in hostile territory. The strategy was to lure the Spanish inland and then cut them off from the navy and Gulf coast until low morale, hunger, and desertion forced a surrender. Still, they planned to fight traditional battles.

In May 1660, the Spanish Armada left Cuba. This time, the Mexican Armada sent only a small force to intercept them leading to the Third Battle of Veracruz. Although the Mexican forces defending there didn't expect to win or even to be reinforced, they fought bitterly. An example of this would be the famous Assault of Fort San Juan de Ulúa where 500 Mexicans, despite being bombarded by the Spanish Armada and facing a ground assault, held out to the bitter end and not a single defender was taken as a POW or surrendered. Coincidentally, this also happened on the Fifth of May.

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modern day picture of the fort

A smaller Spanish force went to Lamportiola to capture it, and although they captured Santo Domingo with ease, a coalition of Mexican soldiers, former slaves, and fed-up settlers continued a guerrilla campaign until they could be evacuated off the island in late 1660.

Back on the mainland, the Spanish forces advanced until they met with the Mexican forces led by Emperor Guillén; Duke Ignacio of Acapulco; and Diego Espada, Marquis of San Diego near the town of Córdoba, where they disguised the size of their army using the hills Matlaquiahitl and Tepixtepec to tempt the Spanish into attacking.

The resulting Battle of Córdoba was the bloodiest and largest battle of the Mexican War of Independence with an estimated 18,000 dead between the both sides before the Marquis of Caracena ordered a retreat to Veracruz. The retreat turned into a rout as the Spanish abandoned supplies and order to reach Veracruz and flee all the way back to Cuba while the Mexicans pursued and inflicted more casualties with their cavalry and light troops.

It was too late for the Spanish, however. After the army embarked, the full force of the Mexican Armada attacked the Spanish ships in Veracruz, and the Army of New Spain was forced to make a last stand in the Fourth Battle of Veracruz. After that battle, the Marquis of Caracena surrendered and, acting as an unofficial representative of Spain as the new Viceroy of New Spain, accepted Mexican independence in the Treaty of Veracruz.

The Spanish government didn't accept the treaty, but the invasion, along with the other disasters, left the country virtually bankrupt and without means of supplying another invasion. That, combined with a new Portuguese offensive; a formal alliance between Mexico and the Dutch Republic (orchestrated by Ambassador Iglesias after the First Anglo-Dutch War); and the death of Felipe IV in 1665 and the ascension of the 4-year-old, soon-to-be-disaster Carlos II left Spain in no condition to invade Mexico. Although not recognized by Spain, 1660 is accepted as the year of Mexican independence.
 
Sections 15-17
Section 15
Guillén the Liberator During Peacetime

After the Treaty of Córdoba. Emperor Guillén returned to a grand, Roman-style triumph in Mexico City where the Cortez formally gave him the title "The Liberator" (El Libertador). He took the opportunity to finally pass the Liberation Edict of 1660 that formally outlawed slavery in the Mexican Empire (although there will still hundreds of men forced to labor in mines and fields for supporting the Spanish, but those were ignored). Similarly, he resettled roughly 2,000 Santo Domingo slaves who supported the occupation and guerrilla campaign during the War in the Rio Grande Valley in Texas in the hopes that they would act as a deterrent against Spanish invasions from Florida. They named their settlement Ciudad Guillén.

He also sent government representatives to the Pueblo people to insure that the Spanish there were respecting the toleration edict and freedom edicts. The roughly 15,000 Pueblo who remained where represented by a Tewa religious leader named Po'pay who was given the title Marquis of Tewa (guaranteeing him a vote in the Council of Nobles) and tasked with reporting on their conditions and ensuring loyalty to the Mexican government.

In honor of his friend Professor Diego Rodriguez and the strains the two cities went through, Guillén endowed the Diego Rodriguez University in Veracruz and the Emperor Guillén University in Acapulco in 1661, both on his 50th birthday.

The emperor was a man advanced in years and spent long hours sitting in a balcony overlooking the busy streets of Mexico City. Occasionally there was an adviser, courtier, or diplomat sitting with him and every once in a while someone in the streets would wave or salute and he would return the gesture. There were the odd Spanish loyalist uprisings (usually inspired by missionaries and priests who resented the loss of their privileges), but those were suppressed quickly and the ringleaders exiled to San Diego.

Peace wouldn't last. The Dutch alliance would be tested in 1665, and the Mexican Empire was loyal to its vow.

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statue of Emperor Guillén in Mexico City

Section 16
The Second Anglo-Dutch War (Europe)/ First Orange Alliance War (Mexico)

War between the English and the Dutch broke out in March 1665, and Mexico officially joined the war in November 1665 with unanimous support in the Cortez (Mexican privateers had been attacking English ships since the English capture of New Netherland/New York in 1664).

The Caribbean front was dominated by Mexican, Dutch, and (after mid-1666) French forces. The English captured Sint Eustatius, but the island was quickly retaken by the English half of St. Kitts was taken by the French and Mexican forces took Antigua. An interesting situation occurred on the island of Montserrat. Montserrat was settled by Irishmen in 1642 and thus had no loyalty to the English and invited the French to "invade" in 1666. The French didn't send troops, but the Mexicans, eager to take more land after Antigua. sent men to the island. The settlers, who didn't seem to understand the difference between French and Spanish but did understand these soldiers were Catholic, welcomed the Mexicans and would later help repulse an attempt by the English to retake the islands.

While a Dutch-Mexican fleet under Dutch Admiral Abraham Crijnssen left to liberate Sint Eustatius, another Mexican-Dutch fleet under Mexican Admiral Diego de la Vega captured Suriname with 5,000 soldiers and remained Fort Willoughby Fort Vega. He left 3,000 men to garrison the colony before returning to join Admiral Crijnssen and French Admiral Joseph-Antoine de la Barre for an invasion of the English island of Nervis.

The Battle of Nevis was almost a disaster. The French line fell into confusion and de la Barre's flagship was surrounded by English ships and mauled while it attempted to help. The Dutch and Mexicans assisted the French and gave the main English ship Coronation a fierce fight but had to withdraw when threatened by fireships. The battle became a long-range slugfest, but the French fleet, seeing the English fleet still holding the line and suffering heavy casualties alongside the injured flagship, retreated to St. Kitts. Admiral Crijnssen was furious, and Admiral de la Vega was speechless. Crijnssen signaled to de la Vega to see what he was planning, and de la Vega just pointed at Nevis. It took the rest of the day and the next, but the 11 English ships were reduced to 8 and nearly 3,000 Dutch-Mexicans managed to make an assault on the island and take it in the name of the Dutch Republic.

Crijnseen, still fuming over the French debacle, parted company with the French but continued to sail with de la Vega. He would later write, "I doubt that either France or Mexico will make great maritime powers, but at least the Mexicans can sail and fight competently." De la Vega would claim that was the first compliment given to a Mexican force from a European power in the nation's history, a claim not easily contested.

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west coast of Nevis

The French fleet would later be virtually destroyed in the Battle of Martinique, but an English attack on Cayenne was repulsed with the aid of reinforcements from Mexican Suriname.

In 1667, following the entry of Denmark-Norway into the war, a Dutch raid on Medway that destroyed the English fleet there, the Great Fire of London making Londoners feel more vulnerable, the sheer cost of the war (not helped by Charles II's extravagant spending in court), and the Great Plague left Charles II of England in a position where he had to sue for peace before an open revolt broke out.

Section 17
Aftermath of the First Orange Alliance War


On July 31, 1667 the Treaty of Breda was signed between England, the Dutch Republic, France, Denmark-Norway, and Mexico. The result of the treaty was uti possidetis (as you possess). England kept Manhattan; the Dutch kept Pulau Run (a spice island in Indonesia that insured a monopoly on nutmeg), Nevis; France kept the whole of St. Kitts; Mexico kept Antigua, Montserrat (still unaware that it was Mexican and not French), and Suriname; and the English Act of Navigation was altered to allow the Dutch to ship German goods to England. De Witt, leader of the Dutch, also used the opportunity to get Charles to join the Triple Alliance (alongside Sweden) to protect Spain from France (who had declared war for the Spanish Netherlands on flimsy legal grounds and was then forced to grant the territory back to avoid a larger war). Mexico was offered a part in the alliance, but Ambassador Iglesias (nearly a 20-year veteran in his position) refused to join any alliance to aid Spain until Spain recognized Mexican independence.

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contemporary engraving of the end of the conclusion of the peace

In October 27, 1667, amid strong pro-Mexican feelings in Amsterdam, Prince Guillén of Mexico and Maria of Nassau were married in a Reformed ceremony (they would later be remarried in a Catholic ceremony in Mexico City that was mostly for pomp but that raised the question if children born before that ceremony should be considered out of wedlock). Payments for the bride price began in early 1668. As previously stated, the friendship between William III of Orange and Prince Guillén developed during this period as evidenced during the birth of the couple's first child in 1669, a daughter named Amelia, when William III was named godfather.

In Mexico, the celebrations were tremendous. Another Roman-style triumph was held in Mexico City and Admiral Diego de la Vega was made Duke of Suriname and allowed to retire from active duty to be Lord High Admiral. In Europe, the colonial powers (aside from Spain) recognized Mexico as an important ally to have in the region seeing as its entire population, army, and navy were in the Caribbean and allowed to mobilize more effectively and with greater results.
 
Enjoying this. It's a bit of a wank but it's quite fun and I love the little details like the Irish on Montserrat not actually realizing they're mexican now.
 
Surinam, huh. As with Hispaniola, not entirely sure that could last. Could even be harder to hold it, all things considered.
 
Could use some small grammar improvements, a bit less wanking

But apart from that, this timeline seems worth following. (Watched).
 
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