Table of Contents
Look to the West : The Timeline
This is the tenth page of the simplified timeline overview for Look to the West.
Part 10: The Great American War (1849-1853)
1849
January - On New Year's Day, with New Spanish troops in California off hunting Russian bandits, a coup is staged by Californian revolutionaries (secretly led by Emilia Mendoza AKA 'La Zorra') who overthrow the New Spanish captaincy-general government in Monterey. An Independent Adamantine Republic of California is declared, with Mendoza ably playing off Russian and American allies for her cause.
In Carolina General Jones leads his troops on an audacious drive to the west from Charleston, taking the key city of Congaryton on the 20th. American troops are funnelled over the seas around neutral Virginia and through Charleston to support him, but the politicians argue about the direction of futrue campaigns. In the end Jones is ordered to continue on to loyalist Whitefort (itself besieged by pro-rebel forces), against his own recommendation to take the key naval base at Savannah.
February - An attempt by the New Spanish authorities to crush the Californian rebellion is foiled when Commodore Fowler of the ENA intervenes on the rebels' side. The New Spanish promptly assemble a fleet at Acapulco to defeat Fowler.
The loyalist town of Whitefort falls to Carolinian rebel forces on the 12th, but is freed again by General Jones only two weeks later. In this part of Carolina the Americans are welcomed as liberators. Carolina has been cut in half, with North Province separated from the rest. The Americans seek to crush the Carolinian forces trapped in North Province by heading northward from their salient.
The Celle Mutiny. With Charles III forced by treaty to continue funding the joint Bundesliga military even while dismissing entire regiments of his own troops on reduced pensions to pay his father's debts, the army mutinies against him in the garrison city of Celle. The Isolationsgebiet senses weakness and recognises the mutineers as overthrowers of an illegitimate government, moving in troops to support them. The Bundesliga alliance is activated. What will become known as the Unification War begins.
March - Georges Villon sends respected colonial officer Nicolas Bertrand to Nouvelle-Orléans with an ultimatum for Grand Duke Jean-Luc (the so-called Vœu impardonnable) which results in Bertrand being tarred and feathered before he is sent back with a Declaration of Independence. Villon vows to crush the revolt.
General election in Great Britain. William Wyndham's Regressive Party is re-elected, even making gains, though still short of a majority. Wyndham plans to retire and is looking for a successor, but stays on to help his King-Emperor fight the Carolinian rebels (though he himself has misgivings about the war). The opposition is divided between squabbling Populists and the new alliance between the Green Radicals and old Phoenix Party, eventually led by 'the last Whig' Stephen Watson-Wentworth.
April - Pope Innocent XIV issues the papal bull Incorruptibilis, in which he dramatically changes the nature of the Papacy by abandoning all its land possessions to either the King of the Three Sicilies or a newly created Roman Republic. Innocent is subject to many failed assassination attempts. The bull is rejected by the Hapsburgs, who launch the Patrimonial War against the Three Sicilies.
Over the 14th and 15th the naval Battle of Monterey Bay is fought between the Americans under Fowler and the New Spanish under Ortiz. The superior New Spanish numbers mean they almost carry the day, but Mikhail Pozharsky of the Russo-Lithuanian Pacific Company arrives with a fleet of his own and joins the American-Californian side. The rebellion survives to fight another day.
News of the outbreak of the Great American War reaches Colonel Alec Jaxon of the 74th (North Carolina) Emperor’s Own Dragoons, the only Carolinian regiment assigned to garrison duty far outside Carolina (Fort Hancock at the confluence of the Des Moines river in Britannia province). Jaxon leads a series of Kleinkrieger attacks against his former comrades from the Imperial forces, leading to his men becoming known as the Devil's Own and a mythic fear to future western settlers.
May - First elections to County Corporates in Scotland (two years later than England and Wales). The bodies receive mixed responses from the Scots, with Donald Black's party calling for them to be combined into a single Scotland-wide body.
Presidential election in the UPSA. Adamantine candidate Diego Luppi defeats Unionist Rodrigo del Prado, largely fought on Luppi's support for the Californian rebels. However the UPSA never becomes more than lukewarmly pro-California neutral, and in some ways will end up on the opposite side of the war. There is more bitter infighting between the Germanophile and Neo-Jacobin factions of the Colorado Party which finishes third.
June - The Batavian Dutch fleet raids and burns the Cochinchinese port of Tam Thang, where the Belgian Ostend Company has an outpost. This, together with Siamese army manoeuvres, leads to the Cochinchinese cutting ties with the Belgians.
Things look bad for the Carolinian rebels as American forces close on Raleigh, the trapped Carolinian forces in North Province retreating, and a ‘Provisional Continuity Government of the Redeemed Confederation of Carolina’ is set up in Charleston. However, at this point Captain Trimble of the Nottingham, leading a Carolinian mission to seek support in the UPSA, is subject to an attempted attack by his enemy Captain Alfred Benton of the Harrisville from Falkland's Islands. Intendant Padilla of Buenos Aires province is wounded in the attack, as well as Buenos Aires being damaged, and Trimble is able to prove via Optel intercepts that the Americans were responsible. This leads to race riots directed at American businesses in Buenos Aires and, eventually, a Meridian declaration of war on the ENA.
In theory a Virginian gubernatorial election should be held by this date, but Governor Owens-Allen spins out his term with parliamentary loopholes and talk of the 'ongoing emergency'–though this can only go on for so long.
In the German lands, the High Saxons adopt the military doctrine of Franz von Nostitz, which sees them ignore a Belgian push into Grand Hesse in favour of a quick knockout blow against Swabia.
July - French forces, led by the armourclad Périclès under Admiral Rivet and General Dufaux, attack Nouvelle-Orléans and rapidly seize control, abolishing slavery. “King” Jean-Luc takes those loyal to him and continues the fight from Baton Rouge.
In Carolina, the city of Charlotte surrenders to General Jones as the rebel General Rutledge withdraws northward, trapped against neutral Virginia.
The Meridian frigate Intrépida, operating out of Demerara, is intercepted and captured by one of Admiral Warner's ships, HIMS Chesapeake, before it had even heard of the declaration of war. This is an embarrassment to the UPSA and accelerates the timetable for their planned attack on Falkland's Islands.
The Meridians attack the Anglo-American base on Falkland's Islands. Captain Benton tries to fall on his sword and take full responsibility for his actions 'acting independently' to avert war. However, a British trader, the Toucan, is fired on by the Meridians and returns fire. Benton is thus given no chance to surrender when he tries to give an explanation and the Harrisville is destroyed when a Meridian shell touches off its magazine. The so-called 'Second Cherry Massacre' means full-scale war between the UPSA and ENA is now inevitable.
In the German lands, Bundesliga forces under Nostitz and Dalwigk bypass the Swabian armies and surround Stuttgart.
August - As part of his naval campaign to sweep up the Carolinian islands of the West Indies (many of which have rebelling slave populations), Admiral James Paul Warner of the ENA lands in Cuba.
Slave rebellions have erupted across Carolina, but most are suppressed fairly quickly - however, in the Cherokee Empire the Yazoo revolt (no connection with the tribe of the same name beyond geographic identifier) is more successful and Emperor Moytoy VI is killed by a rifle-wielding rebel slave mythologised as 'Good Eye Fred'. Things descend into chaos. The ultimate result of this is to weaken Cherokee control over their lands and ensure they will effectively be carved up in the postwar settlement.
General Alf Stotts, in command of the main body of Carolinian troops massing at Ultima, enacts a plan using intelligence networks, misinformation and an appropriated press balloon to organise a breakout of General Rutledge's troops in the north before they can be fully pocketed by General Jones' Imperial forces.
In the German lands, King Frederick V of Swabia is offered an ultimatum, switch sides or see Stuttgart (its armies bypassed) burn. Frederick accepts the ultimatum, changing the balance in the Unification War.
September - A French fleet from Bordeaux is sent to reinforce Dufaux and Rivet. In the course of its journey it intercepts near Aruba a ship carrying slaves out of Nouvelle-Orléans and ends up in a fight with patrol boats from the Republic of Guyana. This has the effect of souring Franco-Meridian relations.
With Cape Horn cut off by the Meridian declaration of war, William Wyndham orders a British fleet under Admiral Compton and HMS Rifleman to go the long way around to support the Californian rebels. Compton splits his forces, one half going via Cygnia and the other via Bengal. Only the former half actually reaches California as the latter, under Edward Cavendish, instead get involved in the Great Jihad.
General Stotts' plan is a great success, with Rutledge's forces escaping to the south and linking up with the main body. A furious General Jones pursues and the crucial Battle of Cravenville is fought. The close battle is decided when Jones is wounded and the Imperial forces retreat–as does the pragmatic Stotts, abandoning North and South provinces to the Imperials. The temporary loss of Jones means the Imperials lose the initiative in the war for crucial months, with command falling to the more cautious Generals Cushing and Day.
Scandinavian/Nordic forces conquer the city of Bremen from the Bundesliga. As this was their primary war aim, their participation in the war tapers off after this point - fatally, given later events.
October - Around this time, Haitian black rebels (many of them ultimately descended from the Haitian African Republic of Vincent Ogé from a half-century before) have seized control of the whole island of Hispaniola with some held from Admiral Warner and the Americans. Similar rebellions have taken over all of Jamaica except Kingstown but the situation in Cuba is more complex and the island seesaws between Carolinian loyalists, black rebels and Admiral Warner's forces.
With General Day advancing only cautiously, the remainder of the campaign season in Carolina is sacrificed in favour of both sides building up their forces–the Imperials bring in more troops via Charleston and the Carolinians enhance their railway network, build up Ultima's modern defences (the Alexander Line), put down slave revolts and recruit new soldiers.
November - All Bundesliga forces are now withdrawn from Swabia and turned on the Belgians in Grand Hesse. The war there in the industrial Ruhr area is miserable and bitter.
December - After initial successes by the Neapolitans in the Patrimonial War, Tuscany revolts according to a plan by the Hapsburgs to restore its independence under Giovanni Tressino, who turns out to be a distant descendant of the Medicis.
1850
January - The Uppsala Statskupp breaks out in Congress Sweden, with revolutionaries led by Mads Svedalius overthrowing the Russian puppet Stockholm Conspirator regime. Scandinavia responds by sending troops to reclaim Sweden in the Scandinavian War (though the Finnish lands remain under Russian-puppet control) and as a consequence is engaged elsewhere during crucial months of the Unification War.
February - After some months of full retreat before the Hapsburgs and Tuscan rebels, the Neapolitans rally in the Patrimonial War under the leadership of Carlo Gennaro, Duke of Syracuse and brother of the King.
March - Admiral Compton's British fleet (or rather his half of it) arrives in California.
The First Siege of Ultima begins on the 13th, with General Day's forces encircling the Carolinian capital. Ultima's modern Alexander Line defences come into play and the siege descends into the misery of trench warfare.
The American armourclad Lord Washington leaves Charlston harbour as Admiral Barker takes her out on a tour to sink Carolinian and Meridian ships in the Mediterranean, as the Meridians had been doing the same with their own armourclad Antorcha de la Libertad. In the event the two ships never meet.
Commodore Cavendish's forces reach Bengal and are welcomed by the people of Calcutta who prefer even a continuation of British rule to the ravages of the Jihad. In the end they therefore never reach California.
In India, Nurul Huq–who had helped the British in Bengal to stand against the Mahdi–is martyred by Mahdist mujahideen. His martyrdom dissuades many Bengalis from joining the Jihad.
April - Around this time the First Riverine War in China peters out with a Feng victory, gaining control over the Yangtze River and Jiangnang (Nanjing).
With the absence of the Lord Washington from Charleston, the rebel underground makes an assassination attempt on the military governor Sir Wallace Bennett, wounding him, and blows up several stores of powder. The Lord Washington returns and Admiral Barker cracks down ruthlessly, his forces incidentally offending a harmless inventor named Elias Watson.
Frankfurt falls to the Belgians in the Unification War, helped by the use of Xylofortex shells. However, these powerful weapons also cause many civilian deaths and turn European public opinion against the Belgians for the 'Rape of Frankfurt'.
May - The First Siege of Ultima is broken when General Day retreats to Mildredville, his supplies exhausted by over a month of siege warfare. This is a huge morale boost for the Carolinians.
American forces attemtping to take Tucsón are repulsed by New Spanish toops under Rodrigo Valdés.
Battle of Gotland in the Scandinavian War. The Russian Baltic fleet is decisively defeated by the Nordics under Admiral Eric Gustavsson.
June - General Day is removed from command by the Continental Parliament after his failure at Ultima and is replaced by Daniel Phelps. Phelps appoints the demoted Day to consolidating the Imperial position in North and South provinces.
July - Death of former French Prime Minister André Malraux.
Augustus Dorsey, brevet General in command of the American garrison in Santa Fe, Nuevo México, is temporarily pushed out of the city by Rodrigo Valdés. Dorsey is reduced to commanding Fort Canzus and attempting to retake Santa Fe.
Enraged by his treatment by American forces, the Charleston inventor Elias Watson uses his submarine invention (with help from the rebel underground) to badly damage the Lord Washington on the 14th, even as the rebels seize control of the city. Admiral Barker is forced to withdraw the ship north to Newton before she sinks. Charleston is back in rebel hands, though the Imperials subject it to scorched-earth tactics as they retreat north to Cravenville and Georgetown.
Naval Battle of Currituck between Captain Márquez of the Meridian ship Venganza and Captain Denison of the Imperial Navy. Márquez had strayed into Virginian waters and was retreating when he was successfully ambushed by Denison. This victory restores some American morale after the attack on the Lord Washington and lends support to the Unconditional Imperialists in the Continental Parliament. Márquez is court-martialled in the UPSA.
Kölner Aufstand breaks out in Cologne as the city and surrounding area revolt against the Belgians. The Bundesliga quickly intervenes to support them.
August - With the Carolinian and Santa Fe fronts having bogged down and Meridian naval forces beginning to have an impact in the West Indies, the Continental Parliament of the ENA passes the Conscription Act (1850) to supplement the Imperial army. This provokes riots in many American cities, especially in New England.
In the German lands, General Dalwigk of the Bundesliga successfully pushes back his Belgian counterpart General Ruyslinck against the Moselle in the Battle of Schweich. Ruyslinck was outmaneouvred due to being under the mistaken impression that the Bundesliga were planning to drive for Brussels.
September - General Flores of the UPSA allows the Carolinians to produce cycloguns according to the Meridian patent.
Trier is conquered by the Bundesliga forces. This apparently vulnerable salient is backed up by reinforcements from Bohemia.
October - Meridian forces fighting in Carolina advance on two major axes, one aimed at Salisbury and the other at Tarborough. The Imperial forces are almost divided into three, but the middle portion escape to the western or eastern ones. These are gradually pushed back towards Whitefort and Newton.
November - Major Julius Beauregard of Carolina realises that the Meridian cyclogun can be married to the Carolinians' Pioneer steam artillery platform to produce a deadly weapon.
The Meridian-Carolinian army takes Raleigh in North Province, though the city has been wrecked by Imperial scorched-earth tactics. Imperial reinforcements continue to pour into Newton.
December - The city of Crosscreek in North Province, Carolina, suffers from food shortages in the winter and survives by eating horsemeat from recent battles between Imperial and Carolinian-Meridian forces. This creates a tradition for hippophagic cookery in the area for decades to come.
By this point the Meridians and Carolinians have overrun most of North Province. Newton switches from a point of entry for Imperial troops to a point of withdrawal. Parts of General Jones' northern army become trapped.
1851
January: Imperial American troops continue to be withdrawn from one North Province port after another as they return to Carolinian hands. They are covered by the Lord Washington at first, but the ship was more damaged during the attack in Charleston than it appeared and Admiral Barker is forced to withdraw when the ship's Meridian counterpart Antorcha appears in the area.
February: Pablo Sanchez publishes the short work On Democracy.
The Northern March: General Jones' trapped troops push for the Virginian border, pursued by the Meridians and Carolinians. As they pass through Tarborough, Virginia finally holds its gubernatorial election, with Owens-Allen having put it off for as long as he can. His opponent Sir James Henry almost wins an absolute majority, but the present of the Maryland nationalist George Hume Steuart III in the race means he just falls short and according to Virginian law a runoff must be held. As this will trap Jones' troops against neutral Virginia for a few crucial weeks, the Continental Parliament organises a 'Velvet Coup' that installs Henry in power without a second round. Owens-Allen flees, but his VPB paramilitary goes to the Great Dismal Swamp and, together with the Meridians and Carolinians, manages to trap most of Jones' army anyway, taking Jones himself prisoner and badly damaging the Imperial war effort. Virginia is now joined with the rest of the Empire in the fight, but there remain many pro-Owens-Allen or pro-Carolinian partisans.
In Italy, the tide appears to turn in the Neapolitan War when Duke Carlo Gennaro retakes Siena. The war turns cautious for some months.
In the German lands, Frankfurt is retaken by the Bundesliga amid much fanfare. The Belgians are thrown back over the Rhine and the war grinds to a halt amid trench warfare misery in the Ruhr area.
March: Largely without their reluctant Meridian allies, the Carolinians under General Rutledge march north into Virginia towards Fredericksburg. Imperial forces, in disarray and confusion due to Virginia's still ambiguous and chaotic status and many of them only just having arrived, are defeated by the Carolinians at the Battle of Lunenburg. In the aftermath of this, Simon Studholme is removed from the leadership of the Patriot Party by the Unconditional Imperialist (peace and unity at any cost) MCP Francis Bassett. Bassett creates a pro-peace alliance consisting of both old Patriots and members of other parties and independents, including Mo Quedling's Pacific League.
In Old Spain, the pro-New Spanish loyalists under Serrano and Palafox are reduced to the 'White Triangle' of Seville-Badajoz-Granada, but divisions between the rebels means that they fail to make further progress and the war stalls.
News of the Great American War finally makes it to Cygnia and the Norfolk Incident breaks out: the small number of Virginian slaveholders who had moved there after the Virginia Crisis try to launch a coup under Thomson Arthur Mason. The coup fails and the slaveholders flee into the interior.
April: In China, Xie Bokang, Viceroy (i.e. warlord) of Sichuan, signs an agreement that brings formerly neutral Sichuan into the Feng sphere of influence, indicative of the Feng being on the rise.
Leopoldo Rufolfo, Duke of Venice and younger son of King Leopold of North Italy, goes missing while leading a cavalry charge. His father grieves him but is more determined than ever to win the Patrimonial War as a result.
May - General election in France returns the Rouges (now the Adamantine Party) under Dupuit to power, helped by the 'Threadbare' voter group who have suffered under Villon's economic policies. Villon continues as leader of the Verts in opposition. The Eden City of Paradis Terrestre in the Massif Central remains unfinished. As a consequence of Dupuit's victory, France's engagement in Louisiana is drawn down due to seeing defence against European wars (and profitable involvement in them) to be a far higher priority.
Carolinian troops assail Fredericksburg (really, they only get as far as the surrounding counties, but that is how it is presented). Lord President Martin attempts to resign his post to Emperor Frederick II, but there is no sufficiently unifying alternative.
In Italy, Princess Carlotta Dorotea runs away from home to see the Patrimonial War for herself. She travels to the fortress city of Ancona and is intrigued by a mysterious prisoner there held by Prospero Barberini without the King's knowledge. She communicates with the prisoner by notes and falls in love with him, then rescues him before Barberini can move him - only for it to turn out to be the captured Leopoldo Rufolfo, Duke of Venice. Barberini, who was plotting against the King, is arrested. The prince and princess from enemy powers continue to communicate in secret after the war.
June - On the 16th, the Manhattan Massacre occurs. Angry young Iroquois/Howden men led by David Johnson, enraged by the increasingly anti-Indian policies of the Supremacists in New York and expressing solidarity with the Cherokee now fighting on the Carolinian side, stage an attack on the almost completed armourclad Lord Hamilton in harbour. The ship itself is damaged but its rockets are also fired (possibly half accidentally) at Manhattan Island and almost three thousand people are killed in the ensuing fires. A climate of public anger against the Iroquois explodes in New York and race riots break out. This is the beginning of the end for Iroquois/Howden independence. The Supremacist Speaker of the New York Assembly, Charles Avery, offers the Indians 'Avery's Choice' - be annexed to the Confederation and treated the same as other citizens, or leave.
John VI orders the Portuguese army to intervene in the Spanish civil war to try to take back all of Galicia. Portugal's economy is already strained beyond repair, with John behind on the payments even for his spies and security forces, and with this last out-of-touch-with-reality declaration, the whole edifice comes crashing down. The Portuguese Revolution breaks out. John VI's paranoid regime has effectively winnowed out all his moderate opponents, leaving Neo-Jacobin purists from Pernambuco and bloodthirsty criminals like Sergio Fernandes (O Chacal, The Jackal). The first Jacobin Terror for fifty years is unleashed as a Portuguese Latin Republic is proclaimed.
July - A “Meridian” force - actually composed mostly of Guayanese and Pernambucanos - brings Jamaica under the control of a Meridian-friendly government.
“Darkest Hour” for the Empire of North America as for the first and thus far only time Fredericksburg is seriously threatened by a foe. George Spencer-Churchill gives a famous speech of defiance in the Continental Parliament. However, the Carolinians are already running into the problems of lukewarm support from their allies and superior Imperial reinforcements pouring into the area. The Carolinians are soon forced to retreat, General Rutledge being 'convinced' by General Stotts (possibly specifically by his right hook).
The French ship Restauration is sank by pro-Jean-Luc rebels in the river at Plaquemine in Louisiana. The rebels are able to turn the ship lengthways and create a blockage in the river to prevent the French coming north.
Many of the more radical revolutionaries fighting in Spain go to Portugal instead to help the Neo-Jacobins there. As a consequence, the Spanish rebels take on a more moderate tone, with the more traditionalist figure Estebán de Vega rising to the top.
John VI of Portugal is killed by revolutionaries as he flees Belém Palace. He had already sent his family into exile in Brazil, where they will continue his line.
August - The Battle of Goochland. Marylander reinforcements led by George H. Steuart III score a decisive victory over the Carolinians. Though the Carolinians were already in retreat, this is such a dramatic piece of good news that it is trumpeted by all the papers and as a consequence Steuart becomes too popular for the government to go after for his role in making the Virginian election more chaotic and perhaps dooming General Jones' troops.
Henry Frederick Owens-Allen resurfaces in Williamsburg and tries to start a rebellion against Sir James Henry in Virginia, but is rejected by the mob and shot and wounded in the process. Nonetheless his attempted act does increase his popularity in Carolina, where he goes to recuperate.
September: Pablo Sanchez publishes The Winter of Nations, the third in his main trilogy of works.
The Louisiana city of Beaumont, on the Gulf of Mexico coast, surrenders to Admiral Rivet after seeing the invincibility of the armourclad Périclès.
A bloody revenge attack on the Iroquois/Howden town of Oswego is made by Major Bockee of the New York militia. His exoneration at a court-martial sparks controversy and begins to cool the anti-Indian fervour of some New Yorkers.
In Spain, Estebán de Vega secures French support for the Spanish revolutionaries, who are still unable to eject the New Spanish loyalists from the White Triangle.
In Italy, North Italian Hapsburg forces implement a plan that sees them driving west from Perugia to the sea and pocketing Duke Carlo Gennaro's Neapolitan army in Grosseto.
October: The last Carolinian troops are driven south back over the Virginian border. Lord President Peter Martin, never really up to his role in the war, is found to have hanged himself. Former Liberal leader John Vanburen is asked by the Emperor to take over the government, despite being a divisive figure and his party having fewer seats in the coalition than the Supremacists.
French troops under General Olivier Roux cross the Pyranees and help the Spanish rebels to defeat the New Spanish loyalists in their White Triangle strongholds.
November: Calcasieuville, a coastal settlement in Louisiana, is taken by the French.
American forces cross once more from Virginia into North Province. With Virginia now in the war, troops can also now cross into the western provinces of Tennessee, Arkensor and Gualpa.
Repairs are completed on the Lord Hamilton after its damage the Manhattan Massacre.
December - Santa Fe is retaken from the New Spanish for the ENA by Dorsey.
In Italy, an attempt by the Neapolitans to rescue their troops pocketed in Grosseto by sea is foiled when their navy is defeated by the North Italian Hapsburgs at the Battle of Follonica Bay.
In the German lands, after months of inconclusive bitter war in the Ruhr area, the Treaty of Trier sees Belgium's exit from the Unification War, having lost considerable territory to Grand Hesse and Low Saxony but retaining half the industrial Ruhr area. The troops on both sides in the Ruhr celebrate with the 'Game of Peace' football match. The Nordic Empire is now the only remaining Isolationsgebiet member in the fray against the Bundesliga.
1852
January - The Lord Washington is repaired of the damage caused by Elias Watson the year before. The ENA now has two functional armourclads.
The last New Spanish loyalists surrender to the French in Old Spain. With Portugal having collapsed into revolution, the pre-Jacobin Wars borders are restored and Spain gets back the remainder of Galicia.
April - General election in Great Britain. There is much public anger over the 'tail wagging the dog' over the Great American War, the failure to prevent the formation of new powers in Europe, and an argument over Temperance that saw pro-drinking Populists cross over to the Moderates. The Regressives lose power, with the ramshackle alliance that is the Moderates taking power under Stephen Watson-Wentworth as President of the Council of Government.
The last organised anti-Imperial resistance in western Carolina is crushed by General Cushing when Nashborough falls. Kleinkrieger activity continues to a lesser extent. The Army of Whitefort goes on to push into the northern Cherokee Empire lands and occupy them.
A Spanish Republic is declared in Madrid, but is soon beset by deadlocked, nonfunctional government due to disagreements between the leaders of different rebel factions. French influence plays a major role there.
In Italy, Carlo Gennaro finally surrenders to the Hapsburgs surrounding his last holdout position in Grosseto. The war comes to an end soon afterwards.
June: The town of St-Jean in Louisiana falls to the French under General Dufaux after much bitter fighting. It is dominated by Canajun exiles and its fall dents their reputation as invincible elite fighters. This convinces Jean-Luc to take the battle to the enemy, beginning the Bataille des Bayous, a series of skirmishes in the rural swampland where the Louisiana rebels have the advantage.
A large RPLC army led by Peter Molnár - including mercenaries from Yapon, Corea, China, Yakutia and Sakhalin among others - arrives in California. The campaign had stalled with the rebels and New Spanish consolidating their positions, but this provides a shot in the arm to the rebels and ensures the Russians will have the pre-eminent position of influence in the area after the war, over and above the Meridians and Americans.
July - After some particularly bloody anti-Indian actions, Charles Avery's Supremacists are removed from power in New York by a Patriot-Liberal alliance under Augustus Delacey. The level of New York's punitive policies against the Iroquois/Howden is scaled back, but it is already too late: blood has been shed and many Iroquois (as they are henceforth known) have already left while those who remain are known as Howden.
William Wyndham dies months after leaving office.
Bundesliga forces eject the Nordics from all of Low Saxony and then, according to the Nostitz Doctrine, turn their full force on their one remaining foe.
August - Treaty of Cagliari formally ends the Patrimonial War. The Hapsburgs recognise Pope Innocent's Benevento Settlement but Tuscany becomes an independent republic under Hapsburg influence.
September - Imperial American naval forces are repulsed from Charleston in a fruitless attempt to replicate the easy victory of Admiral Barker four years before. In the wake of this defeat, Emperor Frederick II announces he will now finally appoint a new Lord Deputy rather than doing the role himself.
Bundesliga forces conquer the Billungian capital of Hamburg as many Billungians revolt against the Nordic government. King Christian flees by sea.
October: After a series of victories and defeats, 'King' Jean-Luc of the Louisiana rebels is slain on the battlefield by the French. The Louisiana rebellion begins to collapse, though not all of the pre-war colony will return to French hands.
As Emperor Frederick II is ready to make his choice for a new Lord Deputy, he receives word that General Fouracre's new tactics mean that Imperial American forces have finally broken through in South Province without needing to take Charleston. As a result, Frederick chooses the fire-breathing abolitionist Sir Edward Thatcher as Lord Deputy in the hope that total victory is imminent and no compromise is necessary.
November - The Second Siege of Ultima begins as the Carolinian capital is once again besieged by Imperial American forces. The bitter winter of 1852 causes problems for the Imperial Americans and graphic depictions of the losses shock the public back home. The Carolinians hold on with the help of their expanding railway and Lectel systems continuing to give them better responses to each American attack. These expansions are often built and even paid for on loans by Meridian companies. Meridian 'Irregular Garrison' troops from Pernambuco or Guyana are used to hold the fort elsewhere as Carolinian soldiers are funnelled into the siege, but rumours circulate of them committing unpleasant acts not only on recaptured slaves but on Carolinian civilians.
December: Baton Rouge finally surrenders to the French. However, the remaining rebel bands in the west of the country (LaSalle and Galvesville) and the north and east (Rosalie, St-Pierre and Post-du-Rapides) mostly go over to New Spain or Carolina respectively, and the French are unwilling to escalate their war further.
General Cushing is slain by a sniper's bullet at the Siege of Ultima. After miserable losses, the American position has collapsed, defeated by the Carolinians' logistics and higher morale. The banality and pointlessness of the siege will drive many recruits to the nascent movement based on the writings of Pablo Sanchez. Many American troops under General Day are trapped by General Flores and captured on December 25th: Black Christmas.
1853
January - Scheduled election in the ENA. The government loses its majority just before the election due to news of Black Christmas, with MCPs defecting to the peace alliance of Bassett and Quedling. The latter is slain in the street by Paul George Botney, whose brother had been killed in the war and who blamed Quedling for lengthening it. A sympathy vote helps the Patriot-led peace alliance, which also attracts many of the Anti-Reform voters from 1848. The redeemed parts of Carolina are allowed to vote with the Whig Party being banned, and under the Petty brothers mostly elect Patriots. The peace alliance takes power under Bassett, though many of its members were elected on vote-splitting pluralities and it does not enjoy the level of popular support its majority implies. Bassett calls for an immediate ceasefire and for everything done over the last Parliament to be considered legally void, with the precedent of the Restoration in Britain. As a consequence, slavery returns to the redeemed parts of Carolina and Bassett hopes the remaining parts will come back to the Empire.
February - Ceasefire (later referred to as an armistice) between the ENA and the Meridian-Carolinian alliance. At first only intended to be temporarily, it will effectively last for seventy years. In Carolina the bombastic Speaker Uriah Adams is removed in a coup by Belteshazzar Wragg and Duncan Beauchamp with the Meridians' help and peace is accepted. Negotiations begin in Charleston, still rebel-held but surrounded on three sites.
March - In Southeast Asia, start of the Siamese-Cambodian War.
With the Great American War effectively over, the depleted 74th (North Carolina) Emperor’s Own Dragoons (the Devil's Own) must cease their rebel attacks in Britannia province. Some return to Carolina but many go to settle in the new Superior Republic rising from the Indian and Métis peoples.
Cortes election in the UPSA, delayed a year by procedural tricks. The Adamantines lose out to the Unionist Party. This disrupts the negotiations in Charleston, which had at this point looked to be heading for a renewal of the war.
April - The Rudolfine Reforms in Austria–converting it into the new Danubian Confederation–are completed. Rudolf III takes the title 'Erzkönig' (Arch-king) in preference to Emperor.
In Charleston the Meridian and American negotiators agree to hold a plebiscite across Carolina for Kingdom versus Confederation status.
May - Congress of Demerara settles the postwar situation in the former New Spanish lands. Despite being at odds elsewhere, the American and Meridian negotiators under Jenkins and Mateováron forge an unholy alliance to damage New Spain, with a large independent California being carved out and much former New Spanish territory going to the ENA. The settlement is generally regarded as being better for the ENA than the UPSA.
Bundesliga forces, push the Nordics back to the ancient Danevirke defence.
July - Plebiscite in Carolina. Almost everywhere the vote is rigged either in favour of Kingdom by the Meridian troops there or Confederation by the American troops there. As a consequence, although the vote was intended to be all-or-nothing (and Kingdom narrowly edged ahead on that score) this effectively is treated as an endorsement for the Amerian-occupied parts being a restored Confederation and the Meridian-occupied parts being an independent Kingdom. Relations between the ENA and UPSA cool to freezing point as a result but the pro-peace government of Bassett is unwilling to go to war again. They lose credibility with the ENA voting public.
The Bundesliga breaks through the Danevirke. Although the Nordics inflict considerable losses, Nordic public opinion held the Danevirke to be impregnable and morale collapses as a result.
October - With Emperor Frederick II refusing to take the throne of the independent Kingdom of Carolina and Wragg being unwilling to embrace a republic as the Meridians suggest, Duncan Beauchamp suggests the recuperating Owens-Allen - popular in Carolina - take it instead.
Nordic forces successfully prevent the Bundesliga crossing to the island of Als.
November - Henry Frederick Owens-Allen is crowned King of Carolina at the age of 57 to huge protests in America and especially Virginia. He marries Governor Wragg's sister Susanna.
Bundesliga forces under Nostitz reach the top of Jutland proper at Ålborg (later Aalburg) but are defeated when they try to cross to the northern island. The Unification War peters out soon afterwards under French mediation.