Major events of 1795
Europe
An armed confrontation between Catholic Defenders and Protestant Peep o’Day Boys near Loughgall in Ireland leaves more than thirty men dead. More importantly it leads to the formation of the Orange Order, a group of Protestant militias in the north of the country that act to suppress anti-British Catholic outbreaks in Ireland.
With part of the Royal Navy redirected to India in order to assist in the war against the Maratha it becomes difficult to maintain an effective blockade of the entire French coast. With the decline in privateering (see below) this leads to a small revival in maritime trade in France as both French and foreign merchantmen are willing to take the risk of being stopped by the British, especially considering the previous penalties for attempting to run the blockade have been rescinded.
Keenly aware of the need to raise money to finance the war against Austria and Britain the French Assembly overhauls the country’s tax service. It is hoped that by hiring permanent tax collectors and streamlining the tax collection process the country will be able to raise enough funds. Though more money is certainly collected the reality is that, no matter how efficiently collected, the current low level of taxes in France is simply not enough to fund the French military campaign. Some kind of action has to be taken soon to rectify the deteriorating financial position of the country.
Though it costs the French government the support of many of the Jacobins it moves to retract some of the anti-clerical measures adopted earlier in the revolution. The requirement that all clergy take an oath to the government is abolished and freedom of worship is enshrined in law, though there is no talk of compensation for the seized church lands or of reopening of the monasteries. Clearly designed to undermine the support of the Royal and Catholic Army in Vendee the measures are popular in rural France, but unpopular in Paris.
The autumn levy, designed to recruit even more citizens into the French army, does not quite meet its goals. Though the French attempt to use the image of the patriotic “citizen-soldier” to attract volunteers the levee remains unpopular and volunteers are few. Only where local military commanders use the coercive tactics of the first levy do they manage to reach their recruitment goals.
Though the only active insurrection against the French Republic is in the Vendee, there is still opposition to the revolution, especially among the emigre community in Germany. Hoping either for a quick victory or for a distraction the Habsburg Emperor provides significant funds and weapons to the Comte d’Artois, who is able to put together a royalist force of a few thousand men. With the French army engaged in the Netherlands the Comte is able to surprise everyone by organizing an attack on Troyes. From there he moves quickly to threaten Paris, but the National Guard is more than capable of turning aside the royalist attack. A young lieutenant colonel by the name Napoleon Bonaparte distinguished himself in the defense of the capital.
Despite the success at Luxemburg the French fail to capitalize on their victory. With the second wave of recruits arriving logistical problems plague the French army. The French find that it is extremely difficult to organize an army of this size and so even arranging for an attack on Trier takes the better part of a month. As time goes on the French do get better by learning from their mistakes, but their push to the Rhine, where the Austrian army is encamped, is slowed down significantly and no major confrontation takes place in the fall. The major cities on the river - Cologne, Koblenz, Mainz, all remain in Imperial hands, but most of the rest of the left bank of the river has been taken by the French.
Meanwhile the Bavarian Elector Charles Theodore gathers his forces and moves them to the Rhine with the goal of attacking the Rheinish Republic, despite the fact that the Republic had fallen to Prussian troops two months earlier. His army loots parts of the Archbishopric of Cologne and the Archbishopric of Trier which are on the right bank of the Rhine before settling for the winter in Berg.
The Dutch government begins a search for competent educated men in the country’s universities. These men are then immediately appointed to top government jobs, prompting resentment from people who have worked in the country’s bureaucracy for many years. Though the new appointees are rather capable they do not know their new jobs particularly well and it will take some years for them to make much of a difference in government.
The King of Prussia, having suffered a humiliating turn of events at Cologne and Luxemburg, tries to rally his country around the opposition to the French. Republican ideas in Germany are common among the middle class burghers and so the King targets the nobility (afraid of radicalism) and the peasants (grateful for the abolition of serfdom). He is popular among both groups, with the nobility supportive of the anti-French policy and the peasantry largely supportive of the existing royal institutions.
With the loss at Luxemburg the remaining Prussian soldiers are withdrawn back to the country and the rest of the Prussian troops begin preparing for war. The Prussian military establishment is convinced that the poor performance of the army is due to poor discipline rather than to outdated tactics and so they redouble their training efforts and commitment to the existing military thinking.
Under threat from France on the Rhine the Bavarian Elector moves to try to synchronize the laws and administration of Bavaria and the Palatinate. Unfortunately the nobility, particularly the Bavarian nobles who are still unhappy with Charles Theodore, protest any change in their rights, no matter how minor. This means that the process of changing the laws of Bavaria to coincide with the laws of the Palatinate will take many years, and probably more than one attempt to convince the nobility of its necessity.
Belatedly the Austrians realize that the battle against France is not one that will only be fought on the battlefield. Though the insurrections in Paderborn and Cologne have been put down by force, the Emperor and his ministers begin work on promoting the “Enlightened” approach to government. They find a willing audience among many of the nobles and peasants of the country, the former afraid of radicalism and the latter thankful for the abolition of serfdom and other reforms. It is decided that these groups will be the foundation and backbone of the Austrian monarchy as it tries to weather the challenge posed by republicanism.
Clearly fearing war the Danes do their best to copy some of the things the British Royal Navy does as well as the (few) things done well by the Imperial Army on the Rhine. There are mixed results since military quality is not as much a matter of learning what another army does (that is usually known) as it is a matter of funding and implementing such practices. However, having studied the tactics and operations of the other countries the Danish military should have an easier time implementing them if it decides to do so in the future.
The Swedish army is further reduced in order to save money on its operations. Many of the soldiers move to the booming town of Sundsvall or to other cities around Sweden to take up jobs. Though money is saved, much of it is spent on outfitting a naval expedition to the Mediterranean in order to protect Swedish ships from Berber pirate attacks.
Ferdinand of Tuscany attempts to win back the support of his population by portraying the Venetians as brutal enemies. Though the Duke remains disliked by much of the population the idea of a Venetian (or, God forbid, French) style republic in Tuscany does worry many of the landed elite who are willing to help the Duke.
Though the landed nobles provide Ferdinand with some support and money the Duke still finds it hard to raise many new soldiers. The war in Italy means that most mercenaries are already employed and the Tuscan army is already large given the size of the Duchy. A few thousand men are found, but further increases are unlikely without an extraordinary levy.
Though the Sardinian army is already large as well, the Sardinian rulers press even more men into the army. Farmers are taken away from their fields and laborers from their jobs in the city. While the goal of twenty thousand new men is reached the levy creates a shortage of workers and the new recruits are not particularly well trained, so it may be dangerous to rely upon them in a key battle.
Though the war is being fought in Italy the Sardinians appear nearly paranoid about an attack from France. Even though some fortifications have already been built on the border with France the Sardinians begin the construction of a new set of fortifications there. Within a few years that border may be one of the heaviest fortified in Europe.
In preparation for the war the Venetians move to promote those men who have shown good grasp of combat during the early confrontation with Tuscany. However, some mercenary companies resist the changes as do some of the volunteers from elsewhere in Italy who do not want to fight under men from a different region. Therefore the changes are implemented only in the Venetian-recruited regiments of the Venetian military, which make up only a portion of the army.
A Venetian plan to bribe the mercenaries currently employed in Tuscany is discovered and the letters sent between the Venetians and the mercenaries are intercepted. Nothing comes of the plan as it is not possible to arrange any details, though this is a reminder to all Italian princes that mercenaries can be unreliable.
The failure to turn Tuscan mercenaries throws off Venetian plans. Though part of the Tuscan force is sent south to deal with the rebels the remaining force near Lucca is still significant. The Venetians hesitate, unsure of whether an attack would be wise, and thus lose valuable momentum. After the rebels in the south of Tuscany are dealt with (not overly harshly, to Ferdinand’s credit), the combined Tuscan army marches on Lucca. The Venetian defense of the city is lackluster at best, and Lucca once again falls to the Habsburgs.
Meanwhile the Venetians attempt to organize a defense of Milan, but the much larger and better trained Sardinian army that arrives there has little trouble with the defenders. The fall of Milan and the setback on Tuscany suddenly put the Venetian Republic on the defensive against two powerful north Italian countries. Venetian troops move to regroup near Mantua as they prepare for the next attack.
The issue surrounding the inheritance of Modena and Massa grows more complicated as Maria d’Este is married to Prince Francis of Sicily. Maria is Duchess of Massa and would be heir to Modena if not for the decision of the Imperial Diet which designated Ferdinand of Austria as heir to Modena when he was still married to Maria. As Ferdinand has no plans of abandoning his inheritance it is unclear how the situation will develop.
The decline in trade, both with France and across the Atlantic, has hit Spain hard. In order to compensate the Spanish government proposes a tax “reform” which consists of raising taxes on anything and everything they can get their hands on. Excise taxes on specific goods, taxes on land as well as per-head taxes in villages, taxes on paper, etc. are all increased. This brings in quite a bit more revenue, through a lot of it is taken up by the additional military spending that is required to relocate the Spanish army to the French border in a possible preparation for joining the anti-French coalition.
The Portuguese try to turn the British blockade of France to their advantage. Though they are unable to supply England with the foodstuffs that France used to provide they do manage to establish a number of new commercial links, proving that someone’s loss in trade is usually someone else’s gain.
The Catholic Church, already under siege in France and with its position somewhat tenuous in Italy due to the wars, comes under fire in Portugal. The Portuguese government attempts to force the Church to give up some of the land that it holds in the country. The Church fights back vehemently, turning much of the public opinion against the government. Though the government eventually backs off the idea, the relations between it and the Church remain strained.
The Polish King attempts to gather as many men as possible to defend his throne against the Prussian-backed nobility. However, as the situation becomes more and more desperate for the King with the threat of Russian intervention most of his supporters abandon him. The King is able to muster only about eight thousand men for an attack on Warsaw, but he ends up not needing them - the people of Warsaw, greatly supportive of the King and his liberal agenda, attack the mercenaries of the nobles and force them out of the city.
This success, however, is short-lived. A Prussian army surrounds Danzig, and though the city defends itself bravely it eventually succumbs to the attack. A separate Prussian column occupied Poznan and Sieradz while the rebels remain in control of Plok and the surrounding area. The entrance of the Russian army into the conflict largely seals the Polish fate - the northern Russian army takes Vilnius and Brest-Litovsk while the southern one secures Braclaw and marches on Lublin, though it doesn’t reach the city before winter.
Since the King’s support in Poland comes almost entirely from the urban classes the resistance offered to the invaders by the Polish population is light. In some parts the nobility even collaborate with the Russians, believing that a replacement of the King with another candidate could stem the tide of liberal reforms and return stability to Poland.
The Russian army that takes part in the attack against Poland is made up of newly recruited troops from the urban areas in the western parts of the country. Previously largely exempt from recruitment these areas were tapped for manpower in order to create a new army with relative efficiency and speed. The assignment of capable military tacticians to this army did a lot to bring this new force up to fighting standards in a very short amount of time and Russian officers have once again demonstrated themselves to be extremely capable even when working with soldiers who have not had extensive training.
Unfortunately as attention turns in the urban areas in the west of the country towards recruitment and supply of the army that is engaged in Poland the infrastructure work comes to a halt. Some half-completed projects are abandoned as workers are recruited into the army, others are left unfinished as money is diverted to the military.
The Sultan offers much higher wages for workers in Constantinople in hopes of speeding up the work. It attracts a lot more workers to the city and much of the work is finished this year, though the cost is significant. Work continues elsewhere on roads and other construction projects which are expected to last a couple more years as long as funding for them remains available.
Though the Valide Sultan attempts to negotiate a rapprochement between the Porte and Ibrahim Bey of Egypt, Ibrahim Bey and his co-ruler Murad Bey remain openly hostile to the new Sultan. Though Egypt is poor compared to other provinces of the Ottoman Empire, it is very populous, and so the fact that the Sultan has no actual control over it weighs heavily on the perception of the Ottoman government as dysfunctional.
With Venetian armies busy in northern Italy the Ottomans take advantage of the opportunity by launching an attack on Venetian Albania and the Ionian Islands. Taken by surprise the city of Perast surrenders to the Ottomans with almost no resistance, giving the Turks possession of its four shipyards as well as of the nearly one hundred merchant ships that were in the harbor at the time of the attack. The Ionian Islands fall to the overwhelming Ottoman forces with little resistance.
Americas
Though the Democratic-Republicans have won the previous year’s election on an anti-Bank platform the Administration once again attempts to pass a bill creating a Bank of the United States. Opposition from Jefferson and others means that the Administration has to compromise away most of the tenants of the original proposal. The Bank is created, though its funds may not be used for infrastructural programs by the government and the majority of funding in every state has to go to purchases of agricultural land. This effectively cripples the ability of the bank to lend any significant amount of money in New England where little new land is purchased every year.
The American government purchases two large ships of the line from the Dutch, in order to bolster the American navy. These ships, along with the rest of the American navy, are put to sea to protect American merchantmen in the Atlantic and the Caribbean.
Under pressure from the rest of the European powers Great Britain agrees to stop issuing letters of marque against ships bound for France (though existing letters run through the rest of the year, and, in some cases, through the next one). Meanwhile the American navy confronts a number of British privateers in the Atlantic, usually with a favorable result. It is, however, impossible to provide protection for all of the Atlantic merchant traffic, and so some attacks continue.
Sweden moves to outlaw the slave trade in its Caribbean possession of St. Barthelemy. Until now it has been a haven for slave traders throughout the Caribbean, with many American merchantmen making the stop there in order to purchase slaves for the American South and many Portuguese slave traders selling their cargo there. Though the move is extremely popular in Sweden it renders the colony essentially useless.
Africa
Though the ships commissioned by the Sicilians a year ago are not yet ready they decide to launch the attack against Algiers regardless. The Knights of Malta are glad to help in the expedition, though the support they are able to provide is relatively small. The Sicilian army of nearly twenty thousand men is transported to Algiers and the Algerian navy is defeated easily by the Sicilian ships of the line near the city.
Two separate attacks against the Sicilian army outside Algiers are repelled, but they leave many Italians dead. The city of Algiers eventually falls to the Sicilian army, though this does little to stop the pirate raids around Italy, which are launched from the dozens of small villages along the Algerian coast. Though there is talk of a blockade of the whole coast the Sicilian navy or nine ships is obviously not able to undertake that task by itself. A number of Swedish ships is also dispatched to try to prevent piracy in the area, though due to a lack of coordination with the Sicilians their efforts are similarly inadequate.
The Dutch move to reinforce the small fort at Walvis Bay in Namibia. It remains a tiny outpost, with no more than two dozen people, as there is little reason for the outpost to exist other than as an emergency stop for ships that run into trouble shortly before or after rounding the Cape of Good Hope.
Having stopped issuing letters of marque for ships bound for France the British begin to issue such letters for ships bound to the Maratha ports. Quite a number of British East Indiaman take up the opportunity to attack ships bound for India. The targets are typically Dutch and Portuguese merchant vessels on approach to India where they are assumed to be engaged in trade with the Maratha, but attacks have been reported as far East as the Straits of Malacca and it seems likely that the BEIC is using this as an opportunity to destroy its European competitors.
A number of Dutch ships are sent to the African coast and to the Indian Ocean to stop the British privateer attacks, and the ships engage in a number of pitted battles in the Indian waters. The British take two Dutch frigates as prizes as a result of the engagements, and the Dutch squadron is forced to seek shelter on Ceylon as British privateering continues unabated.
The Sultan of Oman attempts to reign in the Omani pirates who have previously targeted Portuguese trade in the Indian Ocean, suggesting instead that they target the near non-existent Maratha trade. About a dozen pirate vessels arrive in Muscat and the pirates burn parts of the city down, chasing the Sultan through the streets. Though the Sultan is able to escape its unlikely that he will try to dictate to the pirates again.
Even as piracy in the Indian Ocean continues to thrive so does the slave market at Zanzibar. The Portuguese eagerly buy slaves on the island, and the Sultan has chosen to use slaves in the restoration of Muscat. Slaves are now commonly taken and traded in Oman and in Iraq with the Omani merchants keeping the profits.
Asia and Oceania
The Ottoman campaign in the Caucasus continues, with Izzet Mehmet Pasha receiving ten thousand cavalrymen as reinforcements. The town of Julfa falls to the Ottomans easily but the advance into Karabakh is grueling. The mountainous area with few roads and fewer towns is essentially impenetrable by a large army, while small Ottoman columns are in danger of attack by the Karabakh forces. After months of slow progress and fighting over tiny villages the Ottomans finally reach the Kura river, having subdued most of the Azeri resistance on its west bank except for the Khanate of Ganja high in the mountains north of Karabakh.
In the city of Diriyah a number of Islamic scholars establish themselves as authority on legal matters. Using the Quran as their source these scholars use their influence to enforce the rules of sharia law in the daily affairs of those who live in the city.
Those in the service of the Saudi family undertake the task of mapping out the Arabian desert. The unfortunate reality is that the large oasis of the desert are already known, and so are the settlements around it, and the smaller off-the-path oasis are of no practical use. Still, it will not hurt to have a map of the region.
Saudi and bedouin attacks against the Al Khalifa family that rules Bahrain spark tensions and an attack against the Saudis from Bahrain. Fighting is chaotic during the year, though the bedouin do not manage to get a hold of Bahrain or Doha.
Following the pirate attack on Muscat the Sultan begins to rebuild the city. Though the process is expensive, roads are widened, a new market is built, and the harbor is renovated. Some of the effects are immediate while others will take some years to appear, but with proper care Muscat can become a large trade hub in Arabia.
With the end of the Zand dynasty Qajar Khan relocates his government to Tehran and begins to organize it into a government of all of Persia. He appoints capable commanders as governors of different provinces, though capable military rulers do not always make for best civilian administrators. In the former Zand territories especially, where Qajar Khan had to make deals with locals to win support these local bigwigs now expect a say in how the country is run.
With money becoming more and more short Qajar Khan orders the establishment of a number of mining camps around his country, hoping to sell the iron, bronze, and coal that is dug up. It is not clear whether the investment is really going to recoup itself in any near future, but it does give jobs to quite a few workers and does facilitate some trade with the Ottoman Empire.
Despite mounting financial problems Qajar Khan decides to finish the job of unifying Persia, moving now against Shahrukh Shah, the last remaining ruler of the Afsharid Dynasty. Qajar forces easily smash the local rulers of Khorsand, most of whom do not owe much loyalty to Shahrukh and so do not put up much of an effort to defend him. Mashhad is taken before the year is out and Shahrukh is paraded through the city streets before being killed, thus solidifying Qajar rule over most of Persia.
With war finally declared in India the Maratha focus on equipping their armies for the coming battles. Attempts to produce larger artillery go terribly and the Maratha army will have to make do with the smaller guns cast in previous years. Similarly, a call for volunteers for the army goes largely unanswered and the Maratha rulers will likely have to return to the traditional tactic of forcibly conscripting people if they hope to increase the size of their forces.
While the Maratha focus on equipment the British focus on drills for their Indian recruits who are taught to march, shoot, charge and other basic military maneuvers. Though success is limited due to the limited amount of time and the problems arising from communications between British officers and Indian troops there is certainly some progress and the troops are largely capable of what is required of them.
Despite the training when the soldiers are assembled to march out in Bengal a mutiny breaks out among a large number of Indian regiments. There are those who support the Maratha, but the majority of the mutineers are Muslims who heed the call of the Mughal Emperor and other Muslim figures to resist the British. Although Sir John Moore puts down the mutiny with some brutality it costs the British a significant number of soldiers and any kind of momentum in the Bengal region.
Fortunately for the British the main Maratha force takes up a defensive position in the area of Odisha rather than attack Bengal. A separate Maratha force attempts an invasion of Mysore, but as the soldiers who are sent there are those with the poorest training (and that is saying something among the Maratha military) the tiny British garrison at Bangalore is able to hold the city against a Maratha force nearly twenty times its size. Demoralized, suffering heavy casualties from the British and heavier ones from desertion and attrition, this Maratha army hastily withdraws north.
A British force from Bombay links up with a small Portuguese force in Goa, though the two armies do not engage in any serious operations against the Maratha in west India. The only British loss during the year is the port of Surat which falls to a large Maratha force, though this force is unable to press the attack further south against Bombay due largely to disorganization. In the Carnatic both sides appear willing to wait as the Nawab remains defiant in Arcot and is reinforced by thousands of troops from Hyderabad while the British maintain control over the coastal regions but choose not to press the attack against Arcot just yet.
The Portuguese attempt to convince the Nawab of Singh to take the opportunity to become “free from the Maratha yoke.” However the Nawab, having previously defeated the Maratha in 1762 and thrown them out of his country is unimpressed by such offers. He remains entirely aloof from the fighting taking place to the south.
The British colonial garrison in Australia comes again into conflict with the Darug people as skirmishes during the year leave more than two dozen British soldiers and an estimated two hundred Darug people dead.
Other events
The Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution is passed in order to overrule the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Chisholm v. Georgia.
Europe
An armed confrontation between Catholic Defenders and Protestant Peep o’Day Boys near Loughgall in Ireland leaves more than thirty men dead. More importantly it leads to the formation of the Orange Order, a group of Protestant militias in the north of the country that act to suppress anti-British Catholic outbreaks in Ireland.
With part of the Royal Navy redirected to India in order to assist in the war against the Maratha it becomes difficult to maintain an effective blockade of the entire French coast. With the decline in privateering (see below) this leads to a small revival in maritime trade in France as both French and foreign merchantmen are willing to take the risk of being stopped by the British, especially considering the previous penalties for attempting to run the blockade have been rescinded.
Keenly aware of the need to raise money to finance the war against Austria and Britain the French Assembly overhauls the country’s tax service. It is hoped that by hiring permanent tax collectors and streamlining the tax collection process the country will be able to raise enough funds. Though more money is certainly collected the reality is that, no matter how efficiently collected, the current low level of taxes in France is simply not enough to fund the French military campaign. Some kind of action has to be taken soon to rectify the deteriorating financial position of the country.
Though it costs the French government the support of many of the Jacobins it moves to retract some of the anti-clerical measures adopted earlier in the revolution. The requirement that all clergy take an oath to the government is abolished and freedom of worship is enshrined in law, though there is no talk of compensation for the seized church lands or of reopening of the monasteries. Clearly designed to undermine the support of the Royal and Catholic Army in Vendee the measures are popular in rural France, but unpopular in Paris.
The autumn levy, designed to recruit even more citizens into the French army, does not quite meet its goals. Though the French attempt to use the image of the patriotic “citizen-soldier” to attract volunteers the levee remains unpopular and volunteers are few. Only where local military commanders use the coercive tactics of the first levy do they manage to reach their recruitment goals.
Though the only active insurrection against the French Republic is in the Vendee, there is still opposition to the revolution, especially among the emigre community in Germany. Hoping either for a quick victory or for a distraction the Habsburg Emperor provides significant funds and weapons to the Comte d’Artois, who is able to put together a royalist force of a few thousand men. With the French army engaged in the Netherlands the Comte is able to surprise everyone by organizing an attack on Troyes. From there he moves quickly to threaten Paris, but the National Guard is more than capable of turning aside the royalist attack. A young lieutenant colonel by the name Napoleon Bonaparte distinguished himself in the defense of the capital.
Despite the success at Luxemburg the French fail to capitalize on their victory. With the second wave of recruits arriving logistical problems plague the French army. The French find that it is extremely difficult to organize an army of this size and so even arranging for an attack on Trier takes the better part of a month. As time goes on the French do get better by learning from their mistakes, but their push to the Rhine, where the Austrian army is encamped, is slowed down significantly and no major confrontation takes place in the fall. The major cities on the river - Cologne, Koblenz, Mainz, all remain in Imperial hands, but most of the rest of the left bank of the river has been taken by the French.
Meanwhile the Bavarian Elector Charles Theodore gathers his forces and moves them to the Rhine with the goal of attacking the Rheinish Republic, despite the fact that the Republic had fallen to Prussian troops two months earlier. His army loots parts of the Archbishopric of Cologne and the Archbishopric of Trier which are on the right bank of the Rhine before settling for the winter in Berg.
The Dutch government begins a search for competent educated men in the country’s universities. These men are then immediately appointed to top government jobs, prompting resentment from people who have worked in the country’s bureaucracy for many years. Though the new appointees are rather capable they do not know their new jobs particularly well and it will take some years for them to make much of a difference in government.
The King of Prussia, having suffered a humiliating turn of events at Cologne and Luxemburg, tries to rally his country around the opposition to the French. Republican ideas in Germany are common among the middle class burghers and so the King targets the nobility (afraid of radicalism) and the peasants (grateful for the abolition of serfdom). He is popular among both groups, with the nobility supportive of the anti-French policy and the peasantry largely supportive of the existing royal institutions.
With the loss at Luxemburg the remaining Prussian soldiers are withdrawn back to the country and the rest of the Prussian troops begin preparing for war. The Prussian military establishment is convinced that the poor performance of the army is due to poor discipline rather than to outdated tactics and so they redouble their training efforts and commitment to the existing military thinking.
Under threat from France on the Rhine the Bavarian Elector moves to try to synchronize the laws and administration of Bavaria and the Palatinate. Unfortunately the nobility, particularly the Bavarian nobles who are still unhappy with Charles Theodore, protest any change in their rights, no matter how minor. This means that the process of changing the laws of Bavaria to coincide with the laws of the Palatinate will take many years, and probably more than one attempt to convince the nobility of its necessity.
Belatedly the Austrians realize that the battle against France is not one that will only be fought on the battlefield. Though the insurrections in Paderborn and Cologne have been put down by force, the Emperor and his ministers begin work on promoting the “Enlightened” approach to government. They find a willing audience among many of the nobles and peasants of the country, the former afraid of radicalism and the latter thankful for the abolition of serfdom and other reforms. It is decided that these groups will be the foundation and backbone of the Austrian monarchy as it tries to weather the challenge posed by republicanism.
Clearly fearing war the Danes do their best to copy some of the things the British Royal Navy does as well as the (few) things done well by the Imperial Army on the Rhine. There are mixed results since military quality is not as much a matter of learning what another army does (that is usually known) as it is a matter of funding and implementing such practices. However, having studied the tactics and operations of the other countries the Danish military should have an easier time implementing them if it decides to do so in the future.
The Swedish army is further reduced in order to save money on its operations. Many of the soldiers move to the booming town of Sundsvall or to other cities around Sweden to take up jobs. Though money is saved, much of it is spent on outfitting a naval expedition to the Mediterranean in order to protect Swedish ships from Berber pirate attacks.
Ferdinand of Tuscany attempts to win back the support of his population by portraying the Venetians as brutal enemies. Though the Duke remains disliked by much of the population the idea of a Venetian (or, God forbid, French) style republic in Tuscany does worry many of the landed elite who are willing to help the Duke.
Though the landed nobles provide Ferdinand with some support and money the Duke still finds it hard to raise many new soldiers. The war in Italy means that most mercenaries are already employed and the Tuscan army is already large given the size of the Duchy. A few thousand men are found, but further increases are unlikely without an extraordinary levy.
Though the Sardinian army is already large as well, the Sardinian rulers press even more men into the army. Farmers are taken away from their fields and laborers from their jobs in the city. While the goal of twenty thousand new men is reached the levy creates a shortage of workers and the new recruits are not particularly well trained, so it may be dangerous to rely upon them in a key battle.
Though the war is being fought in Italy the Sardinians appear nearly paranoid about an attack from France. Even though some fortifications have already been built on the border with France the Sardinians begin the construction of a new set of fortifications there. Within a few years that border may be one of the heaviest fortified in Europe.
In preparation for the war the Venetians move to promote those men who have shown good grasp of combat during the early confrontation with Tuscany. However, some mercenary companies resist the changes as do some of the volunteers from elsewhere in Italy who do not want to fight under men from a different region. Therefore the changes are implemented only in the Venetian-recruited regiments of the Venetian military, which make up only a portion of the army.
A Venetian plan to bribe the mercenaries currently employed in Tuscany is discovered and the letters sent between the Venetians and the mercenaries are intercepted. Nothing comes of the plan as it is not possible to arrange any details, though this is a reminder to all Italian princes that mercenaries can be unreliable.
The failure to turn Tuscan mercenaries throws off Venetian plans. Though part of the Tuscan force is sent south to deal with the rebels the remaining force near Lucca is still significant. The Venetians hesitate, unsure of whether an attack would be wise, and thus lose valuable momentum. After the rebels in the south of Tuscany are dealt with (not overly harshly, to Ferdinand’s credit), the combined Tuscan army marches on Lucca. The Venetian defense of the city is lackluster at best, and Lucca once again falls to the Habsburgs.
Meanwhile the Venetians attempt to organize a defense of Milan, but the much larger and better trained Sardinian army that arrives there has little trouble with the defenders. The fall of Milan and the setback on Tuscany suddenly put the Venetian Republic on the defensive against two powerful north Italian countries. Venetian troops move to regroup near Mantua as they prepare for the next attack.
The issue surrounding the inheritance of Modena and Massa grows more complicated as Maria d’Este is married to Prince Francis of Sicily. Maria is Duchess of Massa and would be heir to Modena if not for the decision of the Imperial Diet which designated Ferdinand of Austria as heir to Modena when he was still married to Maria. As Ferdinand has no plans of abandoning his inheritance it is unclear how the situation will develop.
The decline in trade, both with France and across the Atlantic, has hit Spain hard. In order to compensate the Spanish government proposes a tax “reform” which consists of raising taxes on anything and everything they can get their hands on. Excise taxes on specific goods, taxes on land as well as per-head taxes in villages, taxes on paper, etc. are all increased. This brings in quite a bit more revenue, through a lot of it is taken up by the additional military spending that is required to relocate the Spanish army to the French border in a possible preparation for joining the anti-French coalition.
The Portuguese try to turn the British blockade of France to their advantage. Though they are unable to supply England with the foodstuffs that France used to provide they do manage to establish a number of new commercial links, proving that someone’s loss in trade is usually someone else’s gain.
The Catholic Church, already under siege in France and with its position somewhat tenuous in Italy due to the wars, comes under fire in Portugal. The Portuguese government attempts to force the Church to give up some of the land that it holds in the country. The Church fights back vehemently, turning much of the public opinion against the government. Though the government eventually backs off the idea, the relations between it and the Church remain strained.
The Polish King attempts to gather as many men as possible to defend his throne against the Prussian-backed nobility. However, as the situation becomes more and more desperate for the King with the threat of Russian intervention most of his supporters abandon him. The King is able to muster only about eight thousand men for an attack on Warsaw, but he ends up not needing them - the people of Warsaw, greatly supportive of the King and his liberal agenda, attack the mercenaries of the nobles and force them out of the city.
This success, however, is short-lived. A Prussian army surrounds Danzig, and though the city defends itself bravely it eventually succumbs to the attack. A separate Prussian column occupied Poznan and Sieradz while the rebels remain in control of Plok and the surrounding area. The entrance of the Russian army into the conflict largely seals the Polish fate - the northern Russian army takes Vilnius and Brest-Litovsk while the southern one secures Braclaw and marches on Lublin, though it doesn’t reach the city before winter.
Since the King’s support in Poland comes almost entirely from the urban classes the resistance offered to the invaders by the Polish population is light. In some parts the nobility even collaborate with the Russians, believing that a replacement of the King with another candidate could stem the tide of liberal reforms and return stability to Poland.
The Russian army that takes part in the attack against Poland is made up of newly recruited troops from the urban areas in the western parts of the country. Previously largely exempt from recruitment these areas were tapped for manpower in order to create a new army with relative efficiency and speed. The assignment of capable military tacticians to this army did a lot to bring this new force up to fighting standards in a very short amount of time and Russian officers have once again demonstrated themselves to be extremely capable even when working with soldiers who have not had extensive training.
Unfortunately as attention turns in the urban areas in the west of the country towards recruitment and supply of the army that is engaged in Poland the infrastructure work comes to a halt. Some half-completed projects are abandoned as workers are recruited into the army, others are left unfinished as money is diverted to the military.
The Sultan offers much higher wages for workers in Constantinople in hopes of speeding up the work. It attracts a lot more workers to the city and much of the work is finished this year, though the cost is significant. Work continues elsewhere on roads and other construction projects which are expected to last a couple more years as long as funding for them remains available.
Though the Valide Sultan attempts to negotiate a rapprochement between the Porte and Ibrahim Bey of Egypt, Ibrahim Bey and his co-ruler Murad Bey remain openly hostile to the new Sultan. Though Egypt is poor compared to other provinces of the Ottoman Empire, it is very populous, and so the fact that the Sultan has no actual control over it weighs heavily on the perception of the Ottoman government as dysfunctional.
With Venetian armies busy in northern Italy the Ottomans take advantage of the opportunity by launching an attack on Venetian Albania and the Ionian Islands. Taken by surprise the city of Perast surrenders to the Ottomans with almost no resistance, giving the Turks possession of its four shipyards as well as of the nearly one hundred merchant ships that were in the harbor at the time of the attack. The Ionian Islands fall to the overwhelming Ottoman forces with little resistance.
Americas
Though the Democratic-Republicans have won the previous year’s election on an anti-Bank platform the Administration once again attempts to pass a bill creating a Bank of the United States. Opposition from Jefferson and others means that the Administration has to compromise away most of the tenants of the original proposal. The Bank is created, though its funds may not be used for infrastructural programs by the government and the majority of funding in every state has to go to purchases of agricultural land. This effectively cripples the ability of the bank to lend any significant amount of money in New England where little new land is purchased every year.
The American government purchases two large ships of the line from the Dutch, in order to bolster the American navy. These ships, along with the rest of the American navy, are put to sea to protect American merchantmen in the Atlantic and the Caribbean.
Under pressure from the rest of the European powers Great Britain agrees to stop issuing letters of marque against ships bound for France (though existing letters run through the rest of the year, and, in some cases, through the next one). Meanwhile the American navy confronts a number of British privateers in the Atlantic, usually with a favorable result. It is, however, impossible to provide protection for all of the Atlantic merchant traffic, and so some attacks continue.
Sweden moves to outlaw the slave trade in its Caribbean possession of St. Barthelemy. Until now it has been a haven for slave traders throughout the Caribbean, with many American merchantmen making the stop there in order to purchase slaves for the American South and many Portuguese slave traders selling their cargo there. Though the move is extremely popular in Sweden it renders the colony essentially useless.
Africa
Though the ships commissioned by the Sicilians a year ago are not yet ready they decide to launch the attack against Algiers regardless. The Knights of Malta are glad to help in the expedition, though the support they are able to provide is relatively small. The Sicilian army of nearly twenty thousand men is transported to Algiers and the Algerian navy is defeated easily by the Sicilian ships of the line near the city.
Two separate attacks against the Sicilian army outside Algiers are repelled, but they leave many Italians dead. The city of Algiers eventually falls to the Sicilian army, though this does little to stop the pirate raids around Italy, which are launched from the dozens of small villages along the Algerian coast. Though there is talk of a blockade of the whole coast the Sicilian navy or nine ships is obviously not able to undertake that task by itself. A number of Swedish ships is also dispatched to try to prevent piracy in the area, though due to a lack of coordination with the Sicilians their efforts are similarly inadequate.
The Dutch move to reinforce the small fort at Walvis Bay in Namibia. It remains a tiny outpost, with no more than two dozen people, as there is little reason for the outpost to exist other than as an emergency stop for ships that run into trouble shortly before or after rounding the Cape of Good Hope.
Having stopped issuing letters of marque for ships bound for France the British begin to issue such letters for ships bound to the Maratha ports. Quite a number of British East Indiaman take up the opportunity to attack ships bound for India. The targets are typically Dutch and Portuguese merchant vessels on approach to India where they are assumed to be engaged in trade with the Maratha, but attacks have been reported as far East as the Straits of Malacca and it seems likely that the BEIC is using this as an opportunity to destroy its European competitors.
A number of Dutch ships are sent to the African coast and to the Indian Ocean to stop the British privateer attacks, and the ships engage in a number of pitted battles in the Indian waters. The British take two Dutch frigates as prizes as a result of the engagements, and the Dutch squadron is forced to seek shelter on Ceylon as British privateering continues unabated.
The Sultan of Oman attempts to reign in the Omani pirates who have previously targeted Portuguese trade in the Indian Ocean, suggesting instead that they target the near non-existent Maratha trade. About a dozen pirate vessels arrive in Muscat and the pirates burn parts of the city down, chasing the Sultan through the streets. Though the Sultan is able to escape its unlikely that he will try to dictate to the pirates again.
Even as piracy in the Indian Ocean continues to thrive so does the slave market at Zanzibar. The Portuguese eagerly buy slaves on the island, and the Sultan has chosen to use slaves in the restoration of Muscat. Slaves are now commonly taken and traded in Oman and in Iraq with the Omani merchants keeping the profits.
Asia and Oceania
The Ottoman campaign in the Caucasus continues, with Izzet Mehmet Pasha receiving ten thousand cavalrymen as reinforcements. The town of Julfa falls to the Ottomans easily but the advance into Karabakh is grueling. The mountainous area with few roads and fewer towns is essentially impenetrable by a large army, while small Ottoman columns are in danger of attack by the Karabakh forces. After months of slow progress and fighting over tiny villages the Ottomans finally reach the Kura river, having subdued most of the Azeri resistance on its west bank except for the Khanate of Ganja high in the mountains north of Karabakh.
In the city of Diriyah a number of Islamic scholars establish themselves as authority on legal matters. Using the Quran as their source these scholars use their influence to enforce the rules of sharia law in the daily affairs of those who live in the city.
Those in the service of the Saudi family undertake the task of mapping out the Arabian desert. The unfortunate reality is that the large oasis of the desert are already known, and so are the settlements around it, and the smaller off-the-path oasis are of no practical use. Still, it will not hurt to have a map of the region.
Saudi and bedouin attacks against the Al Khalifa family that rules Bahrain spark tensions and an attack against the Saudis from Bahrain. Fighting is chaotic during the year, though the bedouin do not manage to get a hold of Bahrain or Doha.
Following the pirate attack on Muscat the Sultan begins to rebuild the city. Though the process is expensive, roads are widened, a new market is built, and the harbor is renovated. Some of the effects are immediate while others will take some years to appear, but with proper care Muscat can become a large trade hub in Arabia.
With the end of the Zand dynasty Qajar Khan relocates his government to Tehran and begins to organize it into a government of all of Persia. He appoints capable commanders as governors of different provinces, though capable military rulers do not always make for best civilian administrators. In the former Zand territories especially, where Qajar Khan had to make deals with locals to win support these local bigwigs now expect a say in how the country is run.
With money becoming more and more short Qajar Khan orders the establishment of a number of mining camps around his country, hoping to sell the iron, bronze, and coal that is dug up. It is not clear whether the investment is really going to recoup itself in any near future, but it does give jobs to quite a few workers and does facilitate some trade with the Ottoman Empire.
Despite mounting financial problems Qajar Khan decides to finish the job of unifying Persia, moving now against Shahrukh Shah, the last remaining ruler of the Afsharid Dynasty. Qajar forces easily smash the local rulers of Khorsand, most of whom do not owe much loyalty to Shahrukh and so do not put up much of an effort to defend him. Mashhad is taken before the year is out and Shahrukh is paraded through the city streets before being killed, thus solidifying Qajar rule over most of Persia.
With war finally declared in India the Maratha focus on equipping their armies for the coming battles. Attempts to produce larger artillery go terribly and the Maratha army will have to make do with the smaller guns cast in previous years. Similarly, a call for volunteers for the army goes largely unanswered and the Maratha rulers will likely have to return to the traditional tactic of forcibly conscripting people if they hope to increase the size of their forces.
While the Maratha focus on equipment the British focus on drills for their Indian recruits who are taught to march, shoot, charge and other basic military maneuvers. Though success is limited due to the limited amount of time and the problems arising from communications between British officers and Indian troops there is certainly some progress and the troops are largely capable of what is required of them.
Despite the training when the soldiers are assembled to march out in Bengal a mutiny breaks out among a large number of Indian regiments. There are those who support the Maratha, but the majority of the mutineers are Muslims who heed the call of the Mughal Emperor and other Muslim figures to resist the British. Although Sir John Moore puts down the mutiny with some brutality it costs the British a significant number of soldiers and any kind of momentum in the Bengal region.
Fortunately for the British the main Maratha force takes up a defensive position in the area of Odisha rather than attack Bengal. A separate Maratha force attempts an invasion of Mysore, but as the soldiers who are sent there are those with the poorest training (and that is saying something among the Maratha military) the tiny British garrison at Bangalore is able to hold the city against a Maratha force nearly twenty times its size. Demoralized, suffering heavy casualties from the British and heavier ones from desertion and attrition, this Maratha army hastily withdraws north.
A British force from Bombay links up with a small Portuguese force in Goa, though the two armies do not engage in any serious operations against the Maratha in west India. The only British loss during the year is the port of Surat which falls to a large Maratha force, though this force is unable to press the attack further south against Bombay due largely to disorganization. In the Carnatic both sides appear willing to wait as the Nawab remains defiant in Arcot and is reinforced by thousands of troops from Hyderabad while the British maintain control over the coastal regions but choose not to press the attack against Arcot just yet.
The Portuguese attempt to convince the Nawab of Singh to take the opportunity to become “free from the Maratha yoke.” However the Nawab, having previously defeated the Maratha in 1762 and thrown them out of his country is unimpressed by such offers. He remains entirely aloof from the fighting taking place to the south.
The British colonial garrison in Australia comes again into conflict with the Darug people as skirmishes during the year leave more than two dozen British soldiers and an estimated two hundred Darug people dead.
Other events
The Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution is passed in order to overrule the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Chisholm v. Georgia.
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