Union of The Three Crowns: The History of The Nordic Empire
Chapter 14: The Dutch Revolt Continues
Welcome back guys, today we continue our story from the last update. While the failure of William of Orange’s 1568 invasions put a damper in the Dutch Revolt, things would soon ramp back up. The troubles in the Netherlands was not the only conflict Spain was involved in at this time, as they were also busy fighting The Ottomans and intervening in France’s religious strife, which will be the subject of a future update. Between this and privateering on the part of the English, Spain didn’t have enough money to keep fighting all of these conflicts. So, what did the Duke of Alba do? Well, impose a wildly unpopular sales tax of course! While this tax was largely ineffective, it galvanized the previously pacified Dutch back into revolt.
In 1572, the still exiled William of Orange began his second invasion into the Netherlands, hoping to be able to use dissatisfaction with Alba’s rule to his advantage. The results weren’t that great, though, with
Alba’s son Fadrique heading up a counter-offensive that would take the majority of the Netherlands. This counter-offensive included the sacking of several towns that refused to surrender to Fadrique’s forces, including the completely unprovoked
massacre of the town of Naarden, killing 3,000 in the process. Rather than breaking the Dutch rebels, the war crimes committed by Fadrique only solidified their will to fight, as it showed that if they were to die, they might as well die in a
blaze of glory. The Spanish soon after began to siege the city of
Haarlem, but the citizens of the city, presumably skilled in athletics and travel, refused to capitulate. Haarlem would hold out until July of 1573 before capitulating, but during that time, the Dutch rebels were able to recuperate during this time, coming out stronger after the siege. Spain’s counter-offensive stagnated after they took Haarlem, and the Dutch won some key battles and took control of the seas. The Duke of Alba resigned from his position as Governor-General at the end of 1573 and returned to Spain, but this wouldn’t stop the rebellion.
The replacement to Alba,
Luis de Requesens y Zuñiga, was more moderate and tried to reconcile with the Dutch rebels, but the question of religion prevented any sort of deal from being made. Thus, the war would continue. In late 1573, Fadrique would begin the Siege of Leiden, which went through the winter and into the spring of 1574, as the town had stocked up on food. In April of 1574, a group of mercenaries led by
Louis of Nassau attempted to break the siege and engaged the Spanish in battle, but were defeated and failed to end the siege. The Dutch wouldn’t give up though, as they had a plan that could force the Spanish to pull back. The Dutch are known for being master engineers, particularly when it comes to engineering the land. Much of The Netherlands is below sea level, hence the name Netherlands or Low Countries, with the land being kept dry by a series of dykes and earthworks that hold back the sea. So, if you broke said dykes, the land would flood. Well, that’s exactly what they did. The dykes were intentionally broken, a bunch of land surrounding the town flooded, and the Dutch were able to recapture Ledien.
By this point, the Spanish crown was beginning to run out of money. This was a serious problem, since this meant that Philip II couldn’t pay his troops, among many other issues coming from said lack of funds. The Spanish crown officially declared bankruptcy on the first of September in 1575, which certainly wasn’t a positive development. Between that and Requesens’ death the following March, the Spanish situation in the Low Countries or in general wasn’t looking too good. Being chronically underpaid and presumably having low morale, Spanish troops and mercenaries would mutiny en masse, if they weren’t busy sacking numerous towns and cities in what became known as the
Spanish Fury. These sackings included Antwerp, the largest port city in the Low Countries,
being sacked in November of 1576, with the city going up in smoke and at least 7,000 people dying, possibly up to 18,000.
This would wind up being a turning point in the Dutch Revolt, as the region was enraged by the wanton brutality and rapaciousness of the Spanish troops. Thus, shortly after the sacking of Antwerp, all of the provinces of the Spanish Netherlands aside from Luxembourg created the
Pacification of Ghent, the main aim of which was to remove unruly Spanish troops and mercenaries from the Low Countries. The Pacification would pave the way for the
Union of Brussels to be declared in 1577, uniting all of the Dutch provinces apart from Luxembourg against the Spanish crown, although the Dutch had not yet declared full-on independence. Unfortunately for the Dutch, however, this union wouldn’t last for all that long, as the divide between Catholics and Calvinists was too much to bridge. Thus, the three southern, mainly
Langue D’Oïl and overwhelmingly Catholic provinces of Artois, Hainaut and
Walloon Flanders formed the
Union of Arras in January of 1579. They’d make peace with the Spanish crown later that year, thus defecting from the Dutch revolt. Soon after several northern provinces would form the
Union of Utrecht, which would later be joined by more northern provinces and several large Flemish cities. The following year, the States-General would offer
Francis of Anjou the role of leadership in The Netherlands, which he would accept in the Treaty of
Plessis-les-Tours. The following year would have the most decisive moment of the rebellion thus far. On the 26th of July, 1581, the provinces comprising the Union of Utrecht would officially declare their independence from the Spanish crown in the
Act of Abjuration, on the grounds that Philip had become tyrannical. What had started as a revolt against Spanish excesses had now become a full-on war of independence, one that the Dutch would get foreign support in. The Dutch Revolt has by and large gone as it did IOTL thus far, but things will start to change in the third update, which should be out around the end of this month or beginning of the next. Until that comes, though, have a great day.
