Naturally, this does not apply to the CSA and the USA, which are waiting on the results of a mini.
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We have updated our Community Code of Conduct. Please read through the new rules for the forum that are an integral part of Paradox Interactive’s User Agreement.
Naturally, this does not apply to the CSA and the USA, which are waiting on the results of a mini.
BE ADVISED
All penalties are dropped. Deadline moved to 24 MAY 2017 at 1200 Eastern. Feel free to send in revised orders. Unforeseen events (a broken laptop charger) have made the update impossible to ship on time.
All penalties are dropped. Deadline moved to 24 MAY 2017 at 1200 Eastern. Feel free to send in revised orders. Unforeseen events (a broken laptop charger) have made the update impossible to ship on time.
From left to right: Minister of War von Roon, Karl Rudolf Friedenthal and Johann Jacoby
Debatte in Der Zweite Kammer
~ Debate in the Second Chamber ~
Third of May, 1861
War Minister von Roon holds a speech in the Abgeordnetenhaus, where the majority of the chamber dislikes him, due to his militaristic tendencies.[1]~ Debate in the Second Chamber ~
Third of May, 1861
"Ever since the Napoleonic Wars, our army, the backbone of the Kingdom of Prussia, has been ignored by croony politicians and thus has rotten to its core. It has not developed, it has not reformed, it has not had will. But what it does have, is the existance of proper leadership and the unending loyalty for Prussian and her people. While the king and his most loyal government wish to expand and strengthen the standing army, there are some who wish to strengthen the Landwehr, which has shown to lack what the standing army has. It lacks morale, discipline and loyalty. They are unrealiable and have shown to be an ineffective fighting force who run at the first sign of danger. Therefore, these reforms strengthen Prussia instead of weakening it."
As he finished speaking, there are loud discussion everywhere and a few liberals shout that von Roon, "Wishes tyranny and absolutism back to Prussia". As the speaker of the house calls for order, the members calms down and the prominent liberal Johann Jacoby is allowed to speak:
"It seems that our Minister of War does not seem to enjoy the liberties that was brought to the Prussian people in 1848, and albeit severely limited, it seems that he and His Majesty's Government wish to weaken the only liberal organization inside the army. The Landwehr is an segment of the army that controls the reactionary sentiment that exists in the army. The removal of this, will do nothing but strenthen the powers of the king and his military, so that the Kingdom of Prussia becomes nothing more than an army with a country. This is no premise for a modern state in the civilized world. It is an ancient idea, that for a country to be strong, it needs to be dominated by the military. A modern state should be led by a democratically elected government, with a govenment that works to provide the liberties that is the natural right of every citizen. Therefore, I urge the chamber to reject and resist these military reforms that will only strengthen the autocracy in Prussia."
As Jacoby finishes his speech to the loud cheers of his fellow liberals and the hisses of the conservatives, Karl Rudolf Friedenthal is allowed to speak:
"Fellow members of the chamber, we live in a very dangerous world. We do not know what states are friends and what states are our enemies. We may not see any threat to our integrity right now, but if we let our enemies sense our weakness through a weak military, we will soon have more than we can count on both hands. There is a serious need for military reorganization and therefore our most honorable Minister of War's proposals are exactly what we need. If we let the Landwehr decide how the military is led, Prussia will be invaded and occupied by foreign powers. The Landwehr is an organization of amateurs who have the same level of competence as a bucket of apples. To strengthen the army does not mean strengthening autocracy, but rather keeping the Prussia secure and helps to keep the liberties that the people have. We cannot have a strong Prussia without a strong army."
The debate continued until the long hours when both sides got tired and stopped.
[1] The Abgeordnetenhaus was controlled by liberal factions, which were against further military development that would hurt the Landwehr that was historically of liberal sentiment.
You folks would not believe how hard it is to replace this stupid charger. Stupid specialty one. Mini should be out by the weekend. I ended up writing most of it on pen and paper. If this damnation of a laptop doesn't get juice, I'll scan it and upload it. mark
Brig. Gen. Thomas Jonathan "Stonewall" Jackson
A Word to his Warriors
"It is no small feat which has been done - the harrying and harassment of the Union in so great a fashion that they check under their beds and in the darkness for Confederate soldiers. Blessed with an ever-kind Providence, we have impacted the Yankee mindset so fiercely that they see us as ghosts, though what they truly must fear is the one and only Holy Ghost, who has empowered us with the due firmness to fight for our homeland.A Word to his Warriors
But make not the mistake to think the war over! We have driven the Yankee mad, but he still persists in his attempt to shut down the liberation of the South. They have erected in their ranks a culture not unlike the Philistines, one of war and belligerence, of direct opposition to the righteous and fair. Looming over the Union stands Abraham Lincoln, the tyrant himself who sullies the very name of Abraham, acting the part of the subjugator and not the liberator, an opponent of God and of his People.
And so it is that we must and will continue this war until the chains around Dixie are forced off forevermore, with the same conviction as David and as Joshua, of men truly resolute of faith, in each other, in the Southern Cause, and ultimately in our Lord and Savior"
Joseph Howe [NS] (L), Frederick Carter [Nfl] (LC), Charlesm Fisher [NB] (RC), & John Hamilton Gray [PEI] (R)
The Four Colonies of the Maritimes
Prologue
The smallest colony in the Maritimes is Prince Edward Island, a fertile if small land of 80,000 souls. Overwhelmingly rural, it's only urban centre of note is Charlottestown with 6,700 individuals, PEI is a transplanted part of Scotland in the New World, with Gaelic spoken as often in the homes as the Queen's English. However the colony was not poor, as nobles from across the British Empire found it an excellent location to develop pristine palatial estates, leaving the tiny colony with perhaps the highest per-capita amount of nobility in the English speaking world. This translated to a natural reluctance to the idea of Confederation, as many members of the colony saw that it was not a needed step and that (being the tiny colony they were) Prince Edward Island was better off alone then to be swamped by swarms of "Frankish and Yankee hordes". Ironically, the foremost voice for confederation was John H. Gray, a lawyer and son of a Virginian United Empire Loyalist, who argued that the guarantee of relevance of the Island is with a union with the Canadas.
The next smallest was Newfoundland, one of the oldest colonies in the New World. Home to 124,000 people, it's a mountainous and wild land of Irish descended fishing folk. Politically, it was incredibly isolated, as it was far to the North of the other three Maritime colonies which served as a buffer to the United States. This, alongside the strength of the Royal Navy, saw the Newfies unafraid of the Americans' strength and as a result were not as interested in collective defense as their southerly neighbours. The extent of the issues with Americans were fights over fishing rights or drunken brawls between fishermen in Boston or St. Johns. This left pro-Confederation politicians struggling to present cohesive issues in which to provide the Newfoundland public in order to promote unity with the Canadas. To wit, those like Frederick Carter promoted Confederation as an opportunity in which to present Newfoundland fish a greater market without tariffs to places like Toronto and New Baltimore while at the same time allowing Newfoundland to attain greater powers by manipulating the Canadian parliament than can be attained out of Westminster.
The colony of New Brunswick, home of 252,000 colonists, is perhaps the most pro-Confederation colony on the Atlantic Coast. Overwhelmingly rural (with it's three primary towns, Saint John, Fredericksburg and Moncton, being home to 27,000, 6,000, and 1,300 individuals each), it is perhaps the most paranoid and at risk of American military intervention. Many within the colony remember the Aroostook War, when the militias of Maine and New Brunswick were marshaled over the dispute of the border. The British and Americans government came together to solve the incident without bloodshed, but to New Brunswick's loss of land and a near war lay within New Brunswickian memory. As such, it is one of foremost proponents for Confederation, and politicians such as Charles Fisher have done much legwork in the other three colonies in order to promote the ideas of collective security, responsible government, and loyalty to the crown.
Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, was the colony of Nova Scotia. The home of the second oldest continuous European settlement in the New World (outside of Hispaniola) it is the largest Maritime Colony at almost 331,000 individuals and the most industrialised (in the form of Halifax). Home of the premier port of British North America and numerous private enterprises, Nova Scotia is the most prominent voice both in favour and against Confederation. The founder of the Anti-Confederation Party was a Nova Scotian by the name of Joseph Howe, a fiery diehard loyalist and prominent promoters of both a separate dominion of Nova Scotia and a responsible government. Elsewhere, Charles Tupper was perhaps the most intelligent of the pro-Confederation politicians, uniting the various faiths (such as the Baptist and Roman Catholic Churches) in support of Confederation and saw it as an important tool in which to formally cement Nova Scotian dominance in the Maritimes.
Thus, Confederation was an embattled and controversial, yet integral, part of the politics of the early 1860s. Confederation was in no way a guaranteed thing, even in the wake of immense British pressure in order to form a proper union, due to these intercolonial rivalries.
Fortunes of the West
As 1862 dragged on, the character of the war was changing, and much of the country was changing with it. By 1862 more than a million farmworkers enlisted in the Union army, and travellers in the midwest saw more women at work in the fields than men. Despite success on the battlefield, there was more trouble for the Union. At a public meeting in Blackburn, England a public meeting declared that it was “impossible” for the North to vanquish the South, and called for a negotiated settlement to end the war. With Europe poised to recognise the Confederacy, the unthinkable looked increasingly likely, the Union was going to lose the war. “We must change our tactics or lose the game.” Lincoln wrote in 1862. To Lincoln it was clear now it was no longer possible to restore the old Union. A new one had to be embraced. By summer he knew what tactic was needed to win the war: Emancipation, but doubted he would ever have the political or military opportunity to use it.
“I find it hard to maintain my lively faith in the triumph of the nation and the law,” New York lawyer George Templeton Strong confided in his diary, “These are the darkest days we have seen since Bull Run.”
With the departure of Gideon Welles, Lincoln made a highly controversial appointment to his cabinet to replace him. He chose completely unknown George Robeson, special prosecutor for Camden County in New Jersey. He was just thirty-three, the youngest person to be nominated to a cabinet position ever, beating only Alexander Hamilton, who was thirty-four when confirmed. Congress put up a surprising resistance to the pick. Robeson’s only naval experience was that he once lived in Jersey City for a few years. Beyond that, he was little more than a lawyer from New Jersey. The Senate rejected his nomination, with only three Senators voting for him (two of which were from New Jersey). Gustavus Fox, the Assistant Secretary of the Navy, continued to run the department as Lincoln scrambled to find a replacement.
With an eye towards expanding the navy’s reach and enforcing the blockade of the cotton states, Assistant Secretary Fox authorises the construction new ironclads, based off the (mostly) successful Monitor. With the department working without a Secretary, things moved much slower, and were far less efficient. The loss of Welles was a huge determinant to the offices, as he had established himself and his system within Washington. It would be some time before the ships were floated out and ready for service.
[+3 Ironclads available in November of 1862. +19 Screw Frigates available by December 1862. +24 Minor Ships available by October 1862.]
In Virginia, General Robert E. Lee reorganised his Army of Northern Virginia, promoting J.E.B. Stuart to command his cavalry, and placing James Longstreet in charge the I Division (on the right flank) whilst having General Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson commanding the II Division (on the left flank). Jackson, known for his antics in the Valley-Maryland Campaign, was made commander of the new Valley District.
Thomas J. Jackson was a pious, blue-eyed killer, utterly untroubled by the likelihood of death. His men disliked him, he was too harsh on them, too remote and distant. Many believed him to be too entangled with his religion, calling his command the Army of the Living God, as well as of its country. He made them march incredible distances each day, and drove them like mad. He’d kill a man at the drop of a hat, and he’d be the one to drop it himself. What he always delivered, however, was victories. For that, his men revered him. His reputation preceded him, his name near a curse word in the North. To the Army of the Potomac he was was known as the “Ghost of the Shenandoah,” from his antics in the Valley-Maryland Campaign, and they took him incredibly seriously. Jackson’s men were sighted moving North past Winchester, and Generals Couch and Slocum (who had replaced General Heintzelman), on orders from General McClellan to ensure there was no rebel crossing of the Potomac, took off after him with cavalry from Stoneman’s division.
The Confederate ploy was to get the two Union commanders to move north and spread their forces out trying to find Jackson, who they believed would be scattered himself as he was moving through the enemy country. Jackson sent a small amount of men north to Inwood as well as Cross Junction, where the two federal forces also deployed in hopes to meet him. Jackson, however, attacked men from Slocum’s forces and defeated them at the Battle of Middleway Church. Jackson still attacked again, routing the Union forces at Summit Point, and just as he had done before, he simply vanished. For two more weeks Jackson rose hell on the Union, fighting them on a wide swath of land from the Potomac down to Woodstock, and as far west as Maysville, Virginia. Each time Jackson pulled off a victory, baffling the Union men and leading General McClellan to believe Jackson must have had fifty thousand men at his disposal. Jackson had less than nine thousand men, and resoundingly defeated two large Union armies, inflicting a large number of casualties and making the cautious McClellan even more hesitant.
[-1,361 Regulars, -4,109 Volunteers from the United States. -248 Regulars, -647 Volunteers from the Confederate States.]
With two of his corps entangled with Jackson in the valley for much of July, McClellan waited. Slocum returned to Washington, D.C. on the 4th of August, having declared defeat in attempting to track down Jackson and complaining of heavy casualties. This left Couch as the Union general in charge of defending the Potomac and western Maryland. Jackson retreated into the valley once again, and Couch was incredibly cautious about advancing, not wanting to enter the valley and have his force destroyed in detail, with his supplies having the potential of being severed.
One bright spot for the Union was General George Sykes reinforcements of Harper’s Ferry, preventing any Confederate breakouts through the Shenandoah River. Further good news from western Virginia was the Wheeling Convention of 1862. In it, representatives from Virginia’s western countries declared that the state Government in Richmond was in dereliction of their duties, and in their vote for secession had abdicated their offices. The Wheeling Convention formed the Restored Government of Virginia, and offered pro-Union men a civilian government to rally around. With an (unreachable) capitol in Richmond, the Restored Government of Virginia would meet in Wheeling, and was granted representation in Congress, and by the Lincoln Administration, as the government of the Commonwealth of Virginia. Francis H. Pierpont was elected the Governor of Virginia, disputing the title with Confederate Governor John Letcher.
Francis H. Pierpont, 35th Governor of Virginia
The debate raged in the convention on how to shape the restored state, fully intending on claiming the entirety of Virginia’s territory. John Carlile, one of Virginia’s pre-War Senators who remained loyal to the Union proclaimed, "Immediately upon the passage of the Ordinance of Secession, in every county, as far as I can learn, a systematic reign of terror was inaugurated." On August 13th, John Carlile introduced to the convention "A Declaration of the People of Virginia." The declaration stated, essentially, that the ordinances of secession were illegal, and that they would host their constitutional convention to be put forth to a referendum by the counties still loyal to the Union (or under Union control). The new constitution was similar to the old one, it defined the Commonwealth of Virginia has an indivisible state, part of an indivisible Union. The most surprising part, was the gradual abolition of slavery. All slaves who had been recorded in the 1860 census would remain so, all their children and all persons purported to be slaves after would be considered freemen. A vote was put forth to the counties under Union control (many county officers were still loyal to the Richmond government, and refused to vote on it), and the new Constitution passed, 64% to 36%. Virginia, albeit only the western and Union-occupied portions, thus became the first southern state to legally have a means to end Slavery. Governor Letcher called the move, “...insanity of the highest order…” The Confederate newspapers mocked the idea that President Lincoln viewed their secession as illegal, yet fully endorsed the band of western Virginia purporting to speak for the whole state. President Jefferson Davis stated that such a move demonstrated how desperate the Union was in attempting to win, restoring to abolition.
To confound matters for the Union, the Militia Act of 1862 was passed shortly after Virginia’s new constitution was announced. The Act allowed for blacks to serve in the Union Army, as well as enacting conscription of all males in state if their volunteers quotas were not met. While many blacks signed up for the army, the move was explosive in the North. Thousands protested the moves, believing that the war was turning into something many of them didn’t want to fight for. Nevertheless, the Union found itself with a large influx of men. The move spurned on further enlistment in the South, as men continued to flock to the Confederate ranks to defend their homes from invasion, and increasingly, their way of life. For Virginians loyal to Richmond, the new constitution was seen as an abomination, and an attempt to illegally wrest control of the state away from the majority.
With Lee’s forces in Centreville, just a short distance away, McClellan moved his men and engaged Lee’s smaller force, this time forcing Lee to disengage and move south, retreating to Warrenton and then Bealeton, with McClellan slowly moving forward, unsure of how to proceed given Lee’s aggressive nature, forcing McClellan out of northern Virginia just a short time ago. Lee, in reality, was retreating because of his inferior forces he knew he could not sustain himself so close to Washington without defensive positions. Instead, he retreated across the Rappahannock River and took up positions in Fredericksburg. Jackson was still in the valley, and separated from Lee. McClellan, not believing his luck, moved on to Culpeper. From there he planned a move into Virginia through Fredericksburg, as Culpeper could not sustain his army for a large amount of time. Lee, however, wired back to Richmond that he needed more men, twenty thousand or more, if he would have hopes of defeating McClellan once more.
With more ships having entered service of the Union Navy, President Lincoln authorises the creation of the Department of the South under General Thomas Sherman. Sherman’s first and major goal was to attempt to subjugate Confederate coastal defenses, and offer places for Union ships to make port. Deciding against a risky attack against Jacksonville or another port city, allowing the Confederates more time to build up their defences, Sherman opted to attack the Hatteras Inlet batteries in North Carolina first, and then Port Royal, South Carolina.
Sherman and over thirty ships sailed south to Cape Hatteras, and began operations against the Confederate defenses. Having been reinforced several times over by Bragg and Lee, the batteries would not be easily defeated. Their earthworks had been built up and cannon, imported from Europe, defending the Confederacy’s vital inner waterways. The Union assaults began in early June, and were drawn out along a few days time. The Federal Navy kept wearing down the Confederate defenses, until on July 21st, Sherman ordered a land assault against the forts, with the intent of capturing them.
The two forts in question were Fort Clark and Fort Hatteras, impressive fortifications given the fact the Confederates had a few years and a skilled engineer, Robert E. Lee, to work on them. Silas Stringham, the commander of the Union fleet in operations against the two forts, drew his ships in close for several salvos, while the men commanded by Sherman disembarked and went ashore. The Confederates were expecting an attack, and manned their defenses. The fighting was fierce, but the Union prevailed at the two forts, capturing them and providing a much needed victory. The Pamlico sound was now open to the Union, though the Confederates still had many other batteries and forts protecting other passageways into the two sounds.
Further south, the Union struggled in actions against Port Royal, South Carolina. The fortifications of the island were impressive, having been identified by Generals Bragg and Lee as an important location for maintaining the safety of Savannah and Charleston. The area had an impressive earthworks system, defended by several thousand men, and over three dozen cannons. The Federals were able to press past two coastal forts protecting the main island, and landed a few thousand men to assault the fort. The Union commanders had not expected the defenses to be so strong, and called off the attack before a land assault could be mounted against the fortifications. Instead, the Union navy pounded away at the fort, to little avail. They were forced to disengage and return north, having been defeated by the Confederate coastal defenses, showing that they would not simply fold at the first sign of pressure.
L: Surrender of Fort Hatteras. R: Confederate batteries at Port Royal.
In one of the worst military decisions of the war, and many say, in American military history, Confederate General Braxton Bragg ordered a light force of cavalry to cross the Ohio River at Parkersburg, who reported the ground to be undefended. Instead of doubling back across the river, Bragg allowed his men to ride deep into enemy territory, eager to try and emulate the likes of Jackson in the east. Bragg’s men raided Athens, Nelsonville, Logan, and Lancaster, Ohio. The news of Confederate forces that deep into Ohio sent a panic throughout the nation, and Buell’s men dispatched a force to fight, and capture, them.
The two forces met near the town of Circleville, south of Columbus. The fighting was quick, over in just half an hour. All of Bragg’s cavalry had been captured, and their ill-gotten loot taken. So focused on raiding and stealing, his men never cut a single rail link or felled a single telegraph pole. What they did do, however, was give the Union access to the entire battle plans of the Western Department, as Wade Hampton III, Bragg’s Cavalry Commander, had copies of the month’s plans of battle, straight from Richmond and General A.S. Johnston. Such valuable information was kept extremely secret, and rushed off to the commands of the Union generals operating in the Western Theatre.
The Paducah Garrison under Brig. Gen. Buckner was well stocked and well defended from attack by the land, but the Union engineers of the Mississippi River Squadron were able to demonstrate their poise and ability to work under fire. WIth shells whizzing around them, they began to remove the obstacles in the Ohio, allowing for the gunboats to draw up alongside the city. In a move which would later earn itself its own dramatisation by a playwright, one Union ship captain (who had just been a freight operator before volunteering his ship) remarked “Damn them all, damn those damnable rebels!” Before jamming his ship into full speed ahead, and beaching it along the banks of the Tennessee River, providing a large blockade to any ships that would attempt to come to Paducah’s rescue from upriver.
The initiative was all the Mississippi River Squadron needed. They drew up alongside the town and began to shell it, reducing the city’s defenses to rubble. After several battles from the Confederate Cumberland Fleet (The Confederates lost each engagement), and several weeks of fighting, Buckner had to give in. He surrendered himself, his army, and the town to the forces of Brig. Gen. William Rosecrans.
[-361 Regulars, -1,292 Volunteers from the United States. -2,207 Regulars, -6,569 Volunteers from the Confederate States.]
With Grant wounded in battle, Major General Nathaniel Lyon, the Union’s most successful commander, was given charge of the Army of the Kentucky. Lyon, a Connecticut Yankee, had led the Union to victory after victory in Missouri, and was now tasked with the control of Kentucky, and to fight the Confederacy’s vastly numerically superior forces in front of him. His reputation of being undefeated follow him into his new command. General A.S. Johnston remarked, “It would be well to whip him now, else we decide to take his mythos as fact.” Lyon struck first. Uninterested in retreating (as seemed to be common among Union commanders) and not willing to send his men against the Confederate earthworks (as Grant had done and proposed doing again), he moved his forces east, crossed the Cumberland River once, and then crossed again at Burkesville. His forces, now in a position to assault Nashville, unsettled General Johnston, who dispatched men to meet Lyon’s Army.
The two armies met at the Battle of Tompkinsville (Town Creek in the North), where the Confederates sought to force Lyon against the River and force their surrender, or at very least disarray. Lyon, however, was not like other Union commanders. He purposely masked the size of his force, keeping thousands in reserve and bringing himself into the field and committing only half his strength. Patrick Cleburne was in charge of the two divisions sent to meet the Union Army, and he ordered his men into the field totally, committing his entire army early in the battle. The Confederates captured the town back from the Union occupiers, who regrouped in the hills and wooded areas on the outskirts of town. Not content with having the Federals simply retreat from the field, he ordered their pursuit.
Lyon had expected this, and when Cleburne began to push his men in the open fields, the Federal rear reserve came online and surged out of the woods, overwhelming Cleburne’s men. Several Union charges resulted in Cleburne’s men breaking and running, heading towards Nashville (in contrary to Johnston’s orders to retreat to Bowling Green.) Lyon, with another victory under his belt, continued to move his forces behind enemy lines, striking them again at Mount Hermon and Bays Fork, before splitting his army once again and marching north to threaten Bowling Green. With reports of Lyon’s army all around him and his army split in twain, Johnston reluctantly ordered the abandonment of Bowling Green, the town he had fought so hard to take back from the enemy.
[-1,201 Regulars, -3,289 Volunteers from the United States. -1,337 Regulars, -2,871 Volunteers from the Confederate States.]
Lyon would not let Johnston escape without a fight. Lyon’s Army (now regrouped), marched after Johnston, skirmishing at Woodburn and Drake’s Creek, and finally the Battle of Franklin. It was here that Johnston had determined he would make his stand, and turned to face his pursuers. The day could not be worse for Johnston. Rains to the south slowed his supplied, while it had been dry in Kentucky, meaning Lyon had little trouble getting supplies. The Union cavalry had also rode south and tore up the tracks from Nashville, preventing trains from reinforcing his position in Franklin at all.
Johnston did not have time to set up a large number of defenses at Franklin, using little more than crossroads and stonewalls. The light defenses and wooded areas to the north of the town meant the Union could very easily swing into action and fight in the few fields separating it from the woods. Johnston thus moved his army forward to the edge of the woods, taking up positions on several small hills and depressions, hoping it would be enough to shield his men during the fighting. He had overestimated his positions, and when Lyon’s men engaged him across his line, it began to buckle almost immediately. Johnston knew if his line broke he wouldn’t be able to hold the town, so he brought in his reserve and took away from his left flank to shore up his centre. Lyon sensed this weakness and threw a feint at the rebel left, causing them to shift men from their right, and Lyon sent the bulk of his force crashing down on Johnston’s right, causing it to collapse, and swing in on itself.
Confederate forces during their one (and only) charge at the Battle of Franklin
From here, the Union line wrapped around the now crumbling Confederate defenses, which began to break and run. The bulk of the Confederate centre was able to escape by heading due south, but the Union, and Lyon, had won the field and won the day. Johnston ordered the retreat to Nashville, his next line of defense. One, he hoped, would be much easier to hold against the Union attackers. With the fall of Paducah earlier, western Kentucky was fully under the control of the Union, and with it, most of the Ohio and the northern Mississippi.
[-937 Regulars, -3,721 Volunteers from the United States. -1,031 Regulars, -3,028 Volunteers from the Confederate States.]
With the Confederacy’s orders firmly in the hands of the Union, Maj. Gen. Halleck and Brig. Gen. Sheridan pay little attention to the information coming out of southwestern Missouri that claimed Van Dorn had moved south out of Missouri. The Union command very well know that Van Dorn was going to strike out and attempt to strike into central Missouri once again. Halleck’s men played the part of being surprised, moving into to “capture” the fort, while Sheridan’s men marched west to slam into the Confederate rear, and to destroy their supply lines to the south from Arkansas. The combined forces of the Union men was around thirty thousand, Van Dorn had five.
Van Dorn was caught completely by surprise. Sheridan captured Fort Jackson purely by attacking when the Confederates didn’t expect an army to appear, and before they could call for reinforcements from Van Dorn or from Arkansas, Sheridan’s men pummeled the fort into submission. Van Dorn himself attempted to escape his encirclement by marching due west to the relative safety of Confederate-controlled land in Kansas. While he himself had been able to escape, along with several hundred men, the rest of the Army of Arkansas had been captured by Sheridan’s men. Missouri was once again under the complete control of the Union, with Maj. Gen. Halleck in charge of the state’s defenses.
[-242 Regulars, -547 Volunteers from the United States. -423 Regulars, -3,982 Volunteers from the Confederate States.]
Sheridan, not wishing to give the Confederates time to regroup, turned his army and marched south into Arkansas as the boys who were supposed to defend the state were sent north to St. Louis, bound for a Union prison. Sheridan’s cavalry marched into Jonesboro, and then continued south, capturing towns along the way and establishing control over the White River. His cavalry reached the Mississippi opposite Memphis, and took a careful look at the city’s defenses before retreating back to the interior of Arkansas. With the collapse of the Confederate forces in Arkansas, the area between the White River and the Mississippi were now firmly in Union hands. Operations against Memphis via the Mississippi were expected to begin before the year was out.
For his actions against the Federal forces at Cabin Creek, Stand Watie (also known as Degataga) was commissioned as a Colonel in the Confederate Army. He was given command of several thousand men (all natives), and dispatched under his own accord as the Army of the Plains. His orders were simple, raise hell on the Federal forces in Kansas, and try to rally any natives he could to join his cause. He was accompanied by Albert Pike, the Confederacy’s native envoy (who had by now learned several native languages). Pike entered into discussions with the Seminole and Kiowa, although there were no formal agreements made during the summer months.
With Kansas defended only by poorly armed natives and two thousand Union men under Brig. Gen. Samuel Curtis, the state was fully at the mercy of Col. Watie. Curtis’ only hope was to stall the Confederates, himself being vastly outnumbered and focused on controlling the land to the west of Kansas City, and most importantly the fortifications in Lawrence. However, the rebel commander was not interested in capturing Lawrence. Instead, he drove northwest, and surprised the fifty-man garrison at Fort Larned, Kansas. Many of the men stationed there had been pulled away to fight for the Army of the Colorado, and thus left central Kansas defenseless. Furthermore, it now placed the Santa Fe Trail under threat by Watie and his band of Confederates. Back east, McCulloch himself established Fort Lecompton (in honour of the town and the pro-Slavery constitution written in 1855) along the banks of the Verdigris River. Southern Kansas had fallen into the hands of the Confederates, and they were keen on maintaining control of it. Where Confederate luck seemed tepid, if not failing, in the east, the west continued to provide stunning successes. Stand Watie himself was promoted to Brigadier General by order of Jefferson Davis for his actions in Kansas.
With the Confederate invasion of Kansas not being responded to by the Union, the Kansas legislature passed the “Resolution of 1862” where it stated should the Union not abide by its duty to protect the citizens of Kansas from the invasion of a hostile band of rebels, then Kansas would consider itself a neutral party in the war between North and South. The Resolution also called for the arming of three thousand volunteers to defend Kansas from the Confederate invasion, subordinate to the Governor, and not the President.
In the far west, John Baylor was promoted to Brigadier General for his actions in defending the Confederate Arizona territory. Baylor still yet did not make attempts to fight against Fort Union, offering Carson valuable time to reinforce himself and redeploy his cavalry to harass Baylor’s lines. Baylor instead took the bulk of his force (with reinforcements from Texas come to replace them), and moved west to Fort Wingate, catching the small Union garrison by surprise. Baylor’s cavalry swept through the fort, forcing its surrender. Sensing his chance to seize the initiative, Carson undertook a daring maneuver, riding his men out of Fort Union and seizing Confederate waggons and supplies bound for Santa Fe. He was beaten back by the garrison’s forces, but not before inflicting a lot of casualties on them and further preventing a Confederate breakout into the Colorado territory.
[-56 Volunteers from the United States. -142 Regulars, -87 Volunteers from the Confederate States.]
Even further west, Sibley’s men left Fort Yuma and traveled north along the Colorado River, looking to try and cut off Slough’s men. Slough, who had reconnaissance in the area, moved into the undefended town and captured the fort, taking the ten Confederate men left to garrison it prisoner, all without firing a shot. Sibley, now without a base of operations, was forced to march due east to Fort Secession, where he at the very least had better communications and operations with Brig. Gen. Baylor’s Army, no longer having to be spread out to the California border. Slough, however, had left Fort Defiance unguarded. Sibley had one more trick to deploy against the Union, which was the arming of the native Navajo tribe. Sibley had been given permission by the Confederate government to enter into an agreement with them and offer them aid and logistics. The leadership accepted the Confederate overtures (the Navajo had no love for the Federal Government), and they assaulted Fort Defiance, and burned it to the ground, but not before enacting a reign of terror on white settlers in the region. With Federal forces occupied fighting the south, with Slough taking many of the men who were focused on anti-Native efforts, the Navajos quickly established themselves as the dominate force in the region, rejecting all signs of U.S. Governmental control.
In New York City, over half of the entire Imperial Russian Navy sailed into lower Manhattan, commanded by Admiral Lisovski. They dropped anchor in New York Harbour, with the Admiral himself meeting with New York’s Governor and the Mayors of New York and Manhattan. The measure was undeniably a show of force, as Russian papers in St. Petersburg called of Russia’s “unshakeable” commitment to the people of the United States, and made their displeasure of any foreign interference into the current unpleasantness known. A smaller fleet also sailed into San Francisco a few weeks later, an impressive display for the Russian Empire. A British observer noted that around eighty per cent of Russia’s fleet was now docked in American waters.
The Russian Fleet, docked in the Harbour of New York
The CSS Alabama set to work immediately, raiding the Eastern Atlantic and searching for merchant ships bound for Europe. The first ship she came across was a freighter laden down with grain bound for Spain. The Alabama fired her guns across the freighter’s bow and ordered all the men to transfer to the Alabama. As a show of force, the Confederates burned the ship, took all of the valuables off, and sailed to the Canary Islands and dropped off the crew, where word of the new Confederate ship spread rapidly to the United States.
Still, it was not the Alabama which gave the Union the most worry. A very similar series of events took place for the CSS Florida, which would join the Alabama in raiding Union commerce on the high seas, though she did got any prizes as the Alabama had so quickly. Even this was not news enough to cause fear in the United States. Again in the shipyards that built the Alabama, two warships being constructed for the Egyptians, the El Monassir and the El Tousson. Their true ownership, however, was the Confederate States of America. The El Tousson was completed and floated out by the time the British government had gotten wind of the arrangement, and she was rushed out of port. Entering into international waters, the Egyptian flag was lowered, and the Confederate flag hoisted. Her name was changed to the CSS North Carolina, and began to make her way towards North America. British agents, using their connections with Jonathan Laird, negotiated the purchase of the remaining El Monassir, commissioning her as HMS Wivern. The CSS North Carolina, however, had already slipped into the open seas, and was next spotted in the Azores, being fitted with cannon. She then disappeared in late September, her whereabouts unknown.
[+1 Ironclad to the United Kingdom]
Summer Union Volunteers: +26,165
Summer Confederate Volunteers: +34,451
Skirmish Losses:
Union: 841 Regulars, 3,224 Volunteers
Confederate: 547 Regulars, 2,301 Volunteers
Fingon888 joins us as Mexico. I am sad to say Haresus has been absent and has been removed from his position.
A letter from Major General Nathaniel Lyon to President Abraham Lincoln.
after the recapture of Bowling Green.
Several months ago you assigned me to the command of the Army of the Kentucky following the wounding of General Grant, a man with whom I am acquainted and whom I respect greatly. I write you now to beg your acceptance, as a gift, of the cities of Paducah and Bowling Green, the last great unliberated swathes of the western parts of the Commonwealth of Kentucky, nine-thousand rebel prisoners, twenty-thousand muskets, nine tons of powder, some fifty guns of mixed caliber, one-thousand horses and the saddles to ride them, various gunboats serviceable for deployment on the Ohio and Mississippi, forty tons of food and other supply for an army on the march or under siege, and one former US Army Captain of the name Simon Bolivar Buckner.
I pray this humble offering to the sacred altar of Union, since bloodied by the ingrate rebels and traitors waging war upon our Constitution and our liberties, shall render the effort of Restoration easier to secure, and shall better the national character and hurry into our arms the loving spirit of peace and brotherhood. God as my witness, the Union shall be restored by my dying breath -- or we shall at least have Tennessee.
Yours sincerely in prayer and good-will,
Brevet Major General NATHANIEL LYON
Commander of the Army of the Kentucky
Commander of the Army of the Kentucky
Liszt and the Imperial Academy of Music
Liszt's Polonaise No.2.
While the politicians bickered, aristocrats argued, bourgeois got fatter, and the commoners labored, all looked to the arts for enjoyment. Culture was a strong thread that bound the fabric of the Habsburg Monarchy together. The cultural achievements of Vienna, Prague, and Buda were disseminated throughout Europe. In his search for a new kapellmeister Archduke Max learned that the esteemed Franz Liszt had quit his position at Weimar and was in need of work. Having retired from active performance at the age of 35, the height of his skill, he continued retain within popular memory his powerful performances as a virtuoso.
The Kaiser had other plans for Liszt which would set him center stage in the artistic life of Buda. Franz talked his brother into abandoning plans to make him his personal kapellmeister and instead suggested the Imperial family endow an "Imperial and Royal Academy of Music" in Buda, that would attract students from across the Habsburg Monarchy. The Saxon composer Robert Volkmann was named Director and new luminary amongst the Viennese musical scene, Johannes Brahms, named his lieutenant. Through a grant from the Hungarian Diet, the composer Ferenc Erkel would head the Imperial and Royal Orchestra attached to the institution. It was hoped that Liszt would take up the teaching of piano but he initially refused citing exhaustion, in his place Kornél Ábrányi a pupil of the great Chopin himself was recruited for the job.
A new attempt was made, this time with summons Liszt could not evade. The Kaiser and Kaiserin requested his presence to break in a new Bösendorfer piano donated by that Viennese firm. After a masterful performance before the creme of Habsburg society, the Kaiser offered Liszt the rank of crown councilor and a stipend of 4,000 guilders in exchange for his participation in the Academy of Music. In his typical fashion of trying to avoid long-term commitments he pleaded feeling worn down by his time in Weimar and the need to resolve other personal matters. It was only through the personal intervention of the Kasier's key advisor on Hungarian affairs, Ferenc Deák and through him his appeals to his patriotic sentiments, that Liszt accepted the appointment as "kapellmeister of Hungary" and a professor of Music in Buda.
In spite of the conditions under which Liszt had been appointed as kapellmeister, he showed no inclination to supplant Erkel as head of Imperial Orchestra nor did he permanently settle in Hungary, initally. He arrived in mid-winter in Budapest. After one or two concerts of his students by the beginning of spring he left. He never took part in the final examinations, which were in summer of every year. Some of them joined the lessons which he gave in summer in Weimar or later Vienna, at the Kaiser's insistence at having him on hand to entertain his guests. After two years of this practice the Kaiser leaned on Liszt to take better care of his health and provided an estate outside of Buda for his benefit.
Not the easiest of figures to work with, Liszt's conservative, Catholic views clashed often with those of his peers. His membership of the Third Order of Saint Francis did generate a great interest in sacred music and Liszt devoted himself to developing such a curriculum for the Academy. And controversially he would assert that "all Semites and Romani lack inherent creativity," and that "Hungarian music had been perverted by the melodies of gypsies." Such pronouncements met with sometimes violent language from his peers in the arts.
In spite of the personal demons and idiosyncrasies, his pupils had nothing but praise for him. He did not segregate on the basis of favoritism and respected raw talent. His racial pronouncements notwithstanding, while in the classroom he recognized pure skill and took in pupils of all classes and ethnic backgrounds and gave them the same instruction in strength, precision and feeling in playing. This, he said, was the basis for being able to take liberties with the text of a score and being comfortable enough to feel the pulse of an audience. Thus the performer could adapt the performance given to them to further their delight. This was achieved with Liszt giving very little technical advice. He wanted to bring out the individual styles of this students and wished not to create carbon copies of himself in them.
Outside of the classroom, Liszt never tired of giving charity concerts to fill the coffers of the Academy to the brim with donations. Out of habit he would begin by playing his own Polonaise No. 2 in E Major, "to show the right way to play a dreadfully overplayed piece" and then spend the rest of the time performing his core repertoire, while intermixing comments on his many travels throughout Europe. While his own musical interests had begun to drift away from what those of the 1860s found entertaining, he did not hesitate to revisit his past and through his students and teaching peers he could relive happier, more carefree days as he went about helping the next generation of performers come into their own.
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CANADIAN AFFAIRS (I)
Regarding the BNA Loan to the Intercontinental Railroad and the Required Upkeep of the Colony
Mr. Gregory:Regarding the BNA Loan to the Intercontinental Railroad and the Required Upkeep of the Colony
...wished to ask the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies, Whether any engagements have been made by the Imperial Government to guarantee the interest on a sum of money to be raised for the construction of the Intercolonial Railroad and the improvement of public health; and if so, whether all papers connected with any such engagements will be laid before the House?
The Rt Hon. Chichester Fortesue, Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies:
the hon. Friend would find the greater part of the information which he desired in certain papers that were laid before Parliament in the course of the last Session upon the Motion of his hon. Friend the Member for London. He would there find a despatch which was written by his noble Friend at the head of the Colonial Office, who declined to accede to a request from the British North American provinces for direct assistance by way of subsidy towards the construction of an intercolonial railroad and funds for the sanitary welfare. But in the course of last year the Government expressed their willingness, on certain terms, to lend the credit of the Imperial Government to the Provinces of British North America to assist them in raising a loan for carrying out that project. Since the last Session of Parliament there had been some further correspondence of no material consequence. A visit had also been made to England by certain Members of the Governments of Canada, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia, as delegates, to make arrangements with Her Majesty's Government on the subject. Those gentlemen had now returned to America in order to introduce into the Legislatures of the several colonies measures which should form a basis for the carrying out of the project. The further correspondence would, when completed, be laid upon the table in continuation of that which was produced last Session.
A statement from President Abraham Lincoln on the sacking of Major General George Brinton McClellan.
as transcribed by John Hay, and later paraphrased, in a more formal manner, for official circulation.
The War Department has provided the good General with all that he has ever required to effect the end of this conflict and restore peace and amity between Americans. Where he has ninety-thousand souls, with all the cannon and shot and powder and food he should require, and stands against fifty-thousand, some of whom lack shoes, have not had a proper meal in several days' time, and perhaps are lower on ammunition than they would like, he shall claim the enemy has thrice that number, and, if not reinforced with one hundred-thousand more souls, he shall be destroyed. Have you ever heard such language before? From an officer of the background of General McClellan? It is truly remarkable.
I cannot stand for this war to persist while the brave men of the Army of the Potomac, for all their suffering, are told instead to dilly-daly and await the next bloody engagement with General Lee. We must have results if we are to restore this Union; we have not been provided with the results we need. While I cannot question the good General's intents, nor his dedication to this Union -- for he has done a remarkable job in restoring confidence to the Army of the Potomac -- he has done very little in the way of what he was tasked with accomplishing. Jeff Davis resides in Richmond and laughs, no doubt, at the actions of our army! It is humiliating, but perhaps worse, it is a failure. The Union cannot be restored when the Army sits and does nothing. General McClellan was given his mission, and he has not delivered. But I hold no ill feelings toward the man, as he loves his country as any patriot should. We shall simply have to find another.
Wesselényi's Legacy and the growth
of Habsburg "Nationalisms"
Baron Miklós Wesselényi
of Habsburg "Nationalisms"
Baron Miklós Wesselényi
As the rest of Europe rushed towards towards the constructing nation-states the Habsburg Monarchy steadily moved towards creating a multinational state out of its many nations. Aside from being ruled by the Kaiser in Vienna there was little to naturally bind the empire together. German, Hungarian, Polish, Czech, and Croatian all had nearly equal language share, followed along by Ukrainian, Romanian, Slovak, Serbian, Slovene, Rusyn, Italian, and Yiddish. Ethnic boundaries refused to correspond to administrative boundaries. The "Great Reform" granting local rule was a foundation upon which a complete solution would have to be built. While the principle of defense, foreign policy, trade, and administration of justice being the exclusive responsibility of the national government had been accepted, the status of localism overall in Hungary began to be examined in detail as by a historical quirk of fate the Hungarians had multiple nationalities living within their lands. As one Ruthenian commentator would note, the Magyars dominating half a dozen other ethnic groups within the lands of the Crown of St. Stephen was untenable in the long-run.
As the 1860s moved along the writings of the Hungarian Baron Miklós Wesselényi again came into vogue. Wesselényi entered politics in 1818, taking minor positions at numerous county Diets. He went on a grand tour of Western Europe with his friend, Count Stephen Széchenyi in the 1820s. Realizing their Hungary's need to catch up with the development of other European states, they become leading figures of the progressive opposition in the Upper House, promoting a program of reform and economic and national development. The Habsburg government, fearing unrest and independence efforts, took increasingly oppressive measures to curb the nationalist movement.
In the 1834 he became one of the political leaders of the opposition in the Diet. He held several speeches on current topics attacking feudal institutions, and printed and distributed the minutes of the Diet in order to give publicity to the debates. For these activities, the government took him to trial for inciting unrest, operating a printing press without royal permission, and also for one of his speeches, where he called for general land-redemption. Sentenced the three years in prison he would eventually expire a martyr of Hungarian localism.
As the government created by Great Reform seemed to be holding together the topic of the coffee houses and cafes of the empire shifted to what would the next stage of reform look like. In Wesselényi's work Szózat a magyar és a szláv nemzetiség ügyében, published in Hungarian in 1843 and in German in 1844, he proposed both social reforms, such as the elimination of serfdom, and reforms of the state structure of the Empire. He aimed to replace the centralized empire with a federation of five states: a German state, a state of Bohemia and Moravia, Galicia as a Polish state, and the state of historical Hungary. The Great Reform had indeed divided the country into various localities with powers of local rule but the results were still incomplete.
While Austrian Germans, Bohemians, Italian Venetians, Poles, and Ruthenians all enjoyed self-rule along with Magyars, it was in the Hungarian portions of the empire that the problems of nationalism began to fester. It is was with some measure of irony that Wesselényi's words were headed the least among his fellow Magyars. Within the Kingdom of Hungary, the Hungarian population was only in the majority by virtue of plurality. Various Slavs such as Serbs and Slovaks lacked local diets of their own and the Romanian population of Translyvania subject to an informal but government backed process of Maygarization. Only the Croats due to historical considerations had a local diet of their own, the Sabor, but its powers were restricted by the Hungarian Diet in Buda.
As tensions declined outside of the lands of the Crown of St. Stephen as a result of the gains of localism, tensions began to build within those lands subject to the Hungarian Diet. Pressure groups formed along ethnic lines in Hungary to demand the extension of Habsburg localism to Hungary proper. The goals of those objecting to the monopoly of the Diet at Buda took on many forms; on the extreme end some wanted a one-for-one copy of localism in non-Hungarian lands which would lead to the de facto partition of the kingdom, towards the middle some wanted local Diets on the model of the Croatian Sabor but which could still be subject to the Diet in Buda, at the other extreme end some wanted a reapportioning of the Hungarian Diet to seat all ethnicities on basis of actual population, which would have the effect of throwing Magyars out of automatically assuming leadership of the Hungarian government.
Liberals such as Ferenc Deák were open to the idea of having forms of ethnic localism accepted in Hungary to reduce ethnic tensions. Conservatives such as Gyula Andrássy wanted the Magyarize the ethnic minorities and subsume them into the Hungarian identity. Centrists such recently returned from exile, ethnic Serb, Sebő Vukovics tried to ignore nationality entirely and opted towards expanding the franchise to give subjects a greater voice irrespective of nationality. Such differences split the usually solid Hungarian front in the Imperial Diet, much to the delight of Austrian Germans and their Bohemian allies. The Hungarian factional split would open the door to greater freedom of movement for the national government but at the same time cause worry among the Kaiser's inner circle; if improperly handled the ethnic stresses within the Crown of St. Stephen could become too larger for the local government in Buda to handle intelligently. This would create the prospect for intervention the Imperial government did not wish to see added to its plate as it contemplated the future of larger reforms to the military and governing apparatus at the national level.
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Greek Constitutional Assembly of 1862
While some would argue the constitutional assembly had begun with the following declaration on the fifteenth of March 1862, reaching first foreign embassies in Athens, then the rest of the nation, then the world, it would not until the twenty-seventh of April 1862. Those who had written up the declaration had been little more then men of the Greek houses of parliament, some ministers that had switched sides and the now captive prime minister, Athanasios Miaoulis, who was forced to sign.
DECLARATION OF LIBERATION FROM THE TYRANNY OF KING OTHON
WHEREAS HIS MAJESTY KING OTHON OF GREECE HAS PROVEN GROSSLY INADEQUATE AND AUTHORITARIAN AND IS NO LONGER ABLE TO CONTINUE HIS POSITION AS KING OF GREECE, EVEN AFTER THE 1844 CONSTITUTION OF GREECE
IN THE SPIRIT OF DEMOCRACY AND FREEDOM AS PROMULGATED BY THE GREEK CONSTITUTION
WE DO HEREBY DECLARE THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT OF GREECE, A PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT TO RULE THE GREEK NATION AND ITS PEOPLE UNTIL A NEW MONARCH HAS BEEN CHOSEN BY THIS ASSEMBLY, AS THERE CAN BE NO KINGDOM WITHOUT A KING. THEREFORE, UNTIL A NEW CONSTITUTION FURTHER GUARANTEEING INALIENABLE GREEK FREEDOMS, BOTH ANCIENT AND RECENT, IS PROCLAIMED BY THIS ASSEMBLY AND THE SELECTION OF A NEW MONARCH, WE DO DECLARE AS SUCH.
SIGNED, DIMITRIOS VOULGARIS, FOR THE CONSTITUTIONAL ASSEMBLY FOR THE KINGDOM OF GREECE.
SIGNED, ATHANASIOS MIAOULIS, PRIME MINISTER OF THE KINGDOM OF GREECE
WHEREAS HIS MAJESTY KING OTHON OF GREECE HAS PROVEN GROSSLY INADEQUATE AND AUTHORITARIAN AND IS NO LONGER ABLE TO CONTINUE HIS POSITION AS KING OF GREECE, EVEN AFTER THE 1844 CONSTITUTION OF GREECE
IN THE SPIRIT OF DEMOCRACY AND FREEDOM AS PROMULGATED BY THE GREEK CONSTITUTION
WE DO HEREBY DECLARE THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT OF GREECE, A PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT TO RULE THE GREEK NATION AND ITS PEOPLE UNTIL A NEW MONARCH HAS BEEN CHOSEN BY THIS ASSEMBLY, AS THERE CAN BE NO KINGDOM WITHOUT A KING. THEREFORE, UNTIL A NEW CONSTITUTION FURTHER GUARANTEEING INALIENABLE GREEK FREEDOMS, BOTH ANCIENT AND RECENT, IS PROCLAIMED BY THIS ASSEMBLY AND THE SELECTION OF A NEW MONARCH, WE DO DECLARE AS SUCH.
SIGNED, DIMITRIOS VOULGARIS, FOR THE CONSTITUTIONAL ASSEMBLY FOR THE KINGDOM OF GREECE.
SIGNED, ATHANASIOS MIAOULIS, PRIME MINISTER OF THE KINGDOM OF GREECE
Before the convention would even be properly held, the soon to be former prime minister, due to the lack of a king, issued elections to be held, while on the same day the voting law was amended to include all Greek males, where previously only the upper classes would have been allowed to vote. With the necessary groundwork laid out, those eligible and willing to vote did so on the second of April 1862, turning in 110 seats for the Russian Party, 40 for the British Party and 50 for the French Party out of the 200 seats. It mattered little, as Dimitrios Voulgaris, once a fighter in the Greek war of independence assumed control of the government and effectively put parliament out of power. The Constitutional Assembly now ruled Greece, pending the yet to be discussed Greek King.
In the name of the Holy, Consubstantial and Indivisible Trinity. One of the many links to the Orthodox Church that was maintained from the 1844 constitution.
When the twenty-seventh of April 1862 did come, things turned out differently then expected. Instead of building a wholly new constitution, as declared over a month earlier, the 1844 constitution was instead studied intensively and several reforms were proposed and discussed by the Assembly. Noteworthy is that of the 327 delegates, 39 were from yet unredeemed Greek lands outside of the greek states, representing yet distant lands such as Constantinople and Cyprus, whereas the rest hailed from the now free Greek people. At first, voting rights were discussed by the Assembly. Most had agreed to the recent (and as it turned out to be, last) actions by Prime Minister Athanasios Miaoulis, yet there was some discussion on what detailed a Greek male. Liberals, mostly members of the French and British factions inside parliament, argued for the most inclusive meaning, while those aligned more with the Russian factions argued for those of only Orthodox confession. A compromise was reached, which would prove disastrous for those of the Mohammedan faith inside Greece, as they saw their right to vote stripped from them, with only Orthodox and Jewish confessioners being allowed that hallowed right, being essentially the first step of being branded a foreigner by the Greek State.
The Senate, an institution only established in the years leading up to the crowning of King Otto, was next to be under scrutiny. Many French supporting and British supporting delegates leaned towards abolishing it, with only the more Russian supportive delegates wishing to either maintain it in its current form or reform it. This would be the one time where the Russian faction truly used its influence (both in the houses and the Assembly )quite openly and kept the Senate in place, even if its powers were greatly diminished and its function changed. From now on, all Senators were required to be faction and factionless, and half were appointed for life by the king from the clergy and the aristocracy (35% for the clergy, 15% for the aristocracy) while the other half would be indirectly selected by the people, whose provincial governments would be allocated a certain amount of candidates, decided by proportional representation of voters. It became common across Greece for the mayors of larger towns and cities to become especially powerful, and in the late 20th century, before the Senate was once again reformed, being the Mayor of Athens usually was a first stepping point for any Athenian wishing to enter politics. The number of Senators was also pinned to 75, and from now on the Senate could only amend, not propose legislation, with its primary function being to scrutinize proposals by the National Assembly of Greece, checking their constitutionality and validity. Lastly, it was proposed and widely accepted by all sides, that when finally a building is constructed of proper statue for the Houses of Greek Parliament, the National Assembly is given priority over the Senate in housing (A bit of a humiliation for the Russian Faction, as it clearly established the National Assembly as superior over the Senate, in prior times the instrument of power for King Otto)
The Assembly was however yet to come to their most important work, the powers and title of the monarch of Greece. The British and French factions argued for maintaining the current title, King of Greece, as to not offend the Ottoman Empire, still holding sway over many Greek speaking subjects. The Russian faction appealled for King of the Hellenes, as for Greece is destined to rule over all Hellenes once more. A passionate speech by Dimitrios Voulgaris, noting that to not claim to be ruler of Greeks would be an insult to those that fought in the war of Greek independence and those still fighting for their rightful state. This speech would get more moderate British and French supporters to cross the line for a moment, and eventually, it was decided to adopt both titles, the royal style being, from now on, King of Greece and the Hellenes.
Royal power was curtailed greatly, the King from now on not being allowed to refuse legislation exept if abdicating immediately afterwards. His Majesty (Salic Law was retained) could have the houses resign and call for new elections, but only if countersigned by the Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Greece and at least one other minister from the incumbent cabinet. During the formation of a new governing coalition, His Majesty appoints a Ενημερωτής (Literally informer) who seeks out a ruling coalition in the National Assembly, which is elected via the Jeffersonian method of proportional representation, thus making majority governments basically impossible with a single party. He then reports to His Majesty, who then appoints the διαμορφωτικός (Former) who becomes the new Prime Minister. Usually, that is the leader of the biggest party, but at times it has been the junior party leader that would become Prime Minister, if his counterpart or counterparts were too controversial or not to His Majesties liking. The Monarch appoints the members of Cabinet at the Prime Minister's suggestion, and all in cabinet, Senate and Assembly are required to swear an oath of loyalty to be seated. Repeated from 1844 was as well that the cabinet is responsible for the actions of the monarch, and His Majesty has the immunity befitting a sovereign. His Majesty can declare war, though not without assent from the Prime Minister. His Majesty can issue pardons and is commander-in-chief for the Greek Armed forces. Any honourary orders are created and lead by His Majesty, and peerages are given out at his behest.
Last, but not least, the National Assembly was increased to 150 seats, and it was urged that the government take immediate action to secure proper housing for the National Assembly. With this in place, the Constitutional Assembly dissolved itself and gave back power to the National Assembly upon passing the new Constitution of 1862, which it did on the fourtheenth of August 1862. Dimitrios Voulgaris, leader of the Russian Faction, became Prime Minister, and set up new elections to be held in March 1863, as per the new system. Until this day the fourteenth of August is celebrated as Constitution Day in Greece.
Events of the World: 1862
North America
It was a year of expansion and turmoil across British North America. In the far west colonies of British Columbia, Vancouver Island, and the Queen Charlotte Islands, Governor-General James Douglas spent much of the year battling inefficient bureaucracy and a burgeoning population (fueled by a desire to strike it rich in the ongoing gold rush). The Stikine Territory was formed, bordering Russian North America, as men flocked to the northern reaches of the region to try and strike it rich panning for gold. New Westminster, the capital of British Columbia, saw its population increase by over a thousand, as American immigrants, be it escaping the war or the desolation of Maryland, made their way into the city to try and start anew.
With New Baltimore appearing over the course of the year, to quickly become Canada’s second largest city, disaster was looming on the horizon. The settlement of Kingston to the south had seen itself eclipsed in size and consumed by operations to assist the city to the north. New Baltimore had one road, the rest were crude paths cut into the countryside. Houses stretched from Loughborough Lake to Inverary and Collins Lake, and a railway line and telegraph ran from Kingston north to New Baltimore Courthouse. The rail link quickly became a vital lifeline between New Baltimore and the rest of British North America. The year saw New Baltimore’s infrastructure explode from a single road and a few homes to a bustling city and railyard. The major problem the citizens faced was the harsh winter the region felt, with temperatures dropping to -30C at a time. Hundreds fell ill and died from the cold, as many of the homes were hastily built and not able to withstand the brutal temperatures.
Former American (and now New Baltimore resident) actor John Wilkes Booth completes his most recent set of performances in Toronto and Ottawa, and is convinced to return to his native United States to put on a series of plays there as well. The return of Booth was widely celebrated in the United States, putting on tours from Boston to Washington. Large crowds gathered to watch him, including the Vice President.
General Robert E. Lee received some of the best news of the war by far. The Confederate War department was moving around men and material and funneling it to him, giving him a fighting chance of attacking the Union army invading his state. While camped in Fredericksburg, Lee formulates a new command structure, dividing his army into two Corps, one commanded by Maj. Gen. Thomas Jackson and Maj. Gen. James Longstreet. News of Lee’s reorganisation had reached the new Union commander, Bvt. Maj. Gen. William Rosecrans. George McClellan had been relieved of his duties and his slow, and methodical, method of advancing into Virginia was not fast enough for Lincoln. Rosecrans decided to seize the initiative, and ordered an assault against the Confederates at Fredericksburg, Virginia.
Lee know of Rosecrans’ new appointment, and understood that he would attempt to differentiate himself from the cautious McClellan. Lee’s plan was to set up a trap for the Union, have them cross the Rappahannock River and take Fredericksburg, but set up defenses on the outskirts of town. The gambit worked, Rosecrans arrived along the Rappahannock in the middle of October, the two forces skirmished before the Confederates withdrew into the city and blew the bridges behind them. Rosecrans had pontoon bridges hauled down and placed across the river under cover of night, with his men marching into the city to little resistance. The move had baffled the Union leadership, but they had surmised that it was Lee withdrawing from the battlefield, unable to fight against the Union forces, so they pressed on.
The Union men looted the city of Fredericksburg, much to the dismay of the local citizens. Lee and his men had set up on the outskirts of the city, along the fortified ridgeline of Marye's Heights, along a sunken road behind a stonewall. Rosecrans ordered an assault against the stonewall, seeking to dislodge the rebels from the field. The Confederates were well entrenched, and Rosecrans ordered his men to launch assault after assault, and each time they were beaten back. One Confederate lieutenant wrote home to his family that, “It was like they simply walked up the slope and accepted death, coming again and again and again.”
[-425 Regulars from the United States. -12,781 Volunteers from the United States. -1,147 Regulars, -3,208 Volunteers from the Confederate States.]
Rosecrans was finally persuaded that capturing the heights was not going to happen, and disengaged his men, suffering one of the most lopsided battles in the entire war. He had been resounding defeated, and began to retreat northward. Lee, emboldened by Rosecrans defeat and his reinforcements, marching first to Culpepper and linking up with Jackson’s Corps. Before giving fight to Rosecrans once again at Warrenton, Virginia. Rosecrans was again forced to retreat to the east, entering Manassas and then Alexandria, before returning to Washington in no better position than McClellan had been. But Lee did not stop here. He moved his men north to Aldie and continued north, entering Leesburg on November 1st, 1862. Part of Longstreet’s men crossed White’s Ford into Maryland, where the Army of Northern Virginia played the tune “Maryland, My Maryland,” to inspire Maryland’s citizenry. Western Maryland was where the least amount of Confederate sentiment existed, so instead many of them simply stayed in their houses, fearful.
Rosecrans moved his men to Gaithersburg, believing a Confederate attack was coming to the capital. It was not, and the Army of Northern Virginia entered into Frederick, Maryland on November 4th (election day), and occupied the town. Maj. Gen. D.H. Hill and Maj. Gen. Ewell depart for Boonsboro and occupy two gaps in the terrain, Turner’s and Fox’s, while Longstreet’s entire Corps moved to Burkittsville and then into Crampton’s Gap. General Jackson marched into Harpers Ferry and cut the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, and forced the surrender of the small Union garrison there. The Army of Northern Virginia had done battle with several units of the Department of Maryland (although the majority of the men were in eastern Maryland), and won victories each time. Seeing as there was an invasion of Maryland underway and this was not an attack on Washington, Rosecrans moved further north, splitting the Army of the Potomac into two, one moving towards Frederick and the other to Burkittsville.
The first major engagement of Lee’s invasion of Maryland took place between Longstreet’s II Corps and the Union V Corps under Maj. Gen. Philip Kearny, Jr. and the IV Corps under Henry Slocum. Longstreet was positioned along the sides of Crampton’s Gap, and simply rained bullets down upon the two men, forcing them to disengage under heavy fire. Rosecrans himself attempted to dislodge Hill and Ewell’s men from Boonsboro, but again they held firm. The Confederate victory at the Battles of South Mountain were crushing for the Union, as Lee had ordered them to entrench themselves there as J.E.B. Stuart’s cavalry raided as far north as Cashtown, Pennsylvania. Williamsport, Hagerstown, and Sharpsburg were all under control of the Confederacy, and there was even rumours that Lee would soon strike it to the east and capture Baltimore, but they were unfounded. Lee’s plan was to ensure a large victory on Union soil to show that they were worthy of recognition. Rosecrans could do nothing more than attack again after regrouping. The Second Battles of South Mountain saw The I Corps under Maj. Gen. Baker and the VI Corps under Bvt. Maj. Gen. Hooker breath through Ewell and Hill’s men at Boonsboro, but the majority of the Confederate army had already moved south to Crampton’s Gap and Sharpsburg, where they intended to spend the winter. A sharp cold and an unseasonably heavy snow hampered the Union movements until late November into early December, where little more than skirmishes took place. The Union delays allowed Lee to fortify his position and to establish a supply train. The year would end with the Army of Northern Virginia firmly planted on Union soil.
General Skyes makes limited action in western Virginia during the late autumn against Charleston, no no success, but he is able to push off Garnett’s men who made a feint to charge north, but the two sides settle into their respective battlelines, engaging in nothing more than scouting against one another and limited skirmishing. Many of Garnett’s men were removed from the field and transferred to the South, as Garnett himself began to dig into Charleston, forming the bulwark of the Confederate defenses in western Virginia. General Skyes was able to take control of many counties west of the Shenandoah mountains, just in time for the fall elections to be held. The Confederate military railroad along the New and the Kanawha Rivers was completed, and freight and military service commenced. This made Charleston a much more important city, as well as preventing the Union from capturing the city easily, given the reinforcements that could arrive for them within a few days.
The CSS North Carolina made its way to South Carolina early in the year, where she picked up Raphael Semmes as her commander, giving him his first true command in quite some time, and getting him away from Richmond where he had been functioning as an administrator along with Stephen Mallory. The North Carolina remained in Charleston for several days before meeting with some auxiliary ships and several transportation ships. The ships leave Charleston and steam north to Hatteras Inlet, where the North Carolina surprised Union ships bringing more men to the forts to try and reinforce them. The North Carolina hove into view and engaged in combat against the USS Juniata, who was being supported by the USS Cayuga. The North Carolina pummeled the two Union ships, destroying them as they were unable to penetrate her armour. The USS Vanderbilt disengaged and made her way north, hoping to escape the North Carolina, due to the fact she was laden down with several hundred men who were supposed to garrison the Hatteras Inlet forts. The fleet of ten ships ended up surrendering to the North Carolina, but not before the Juniata and the USS Cambridge had been sunk. The Confederates under Brig. Gen. Trapier recapture Hatteras Inlet, find the forts useless for the continued defense of the Confederate coast, and order them razed. He moved to the south, shoring up defenses of other batteries and forts which might come under fire from the Union.
The North Carolina moved north, entering the Chesapeake Bay and getting past the newly reinforced guns of Fort Monroe and Fort Patterson by steaming at full speed in the middle of the night. The North Carolina and the Virginia both made their way into the Chesapeake, where they discovered the wounded Monitor having been found on the Choptank River, in a floating drydock. The Virginia engaged the floating drydock holding the vessel, and sunk the drydock along with the Monitor inside of it, which was in the middle of having her armour plating repaired. The Virginia and the North Carolina then moved north and steamed up the Patapsco River, dropping anchor outside the gun range of Fort McHenry, and saluting the city. Thousands of men cheered the Confederate ships, who then slipped back into the Chesapeake and back south to Norfolk. Three Union monitors steamed their way into Hampton Roads, and gave battle to Confederate ships. The Virginia engaged them, but fighting was once again inconclusive. The North Carolina slipped back into open waters, to escape the new Monitors, which she could easily be sunk by. By sheer numbers, the Union was able to shutdown shipping in Hampton Roads, neutering the Virginia’s effectiveness.
The North Carolina was seen once again engaged in operations against a Union assault against Fort McAllister, where she drove off a Union invasion force before being forced to move back to Charleston. The Union saw limited success with General Ben Butler, moved from his command at Fort Monroe, in operations against Port Royal. Bombardment from the shore, along with a massive landing of men, assaulted the forts and were able to capture them after three waves of assaults. Butler’s men had taken the fort, but the cost was incredibly high, which caused him to call off any further actions in the year.
[-1 Sail Frigate, -1,265 Volunteers from the United States]
The Army of the Kentucky and the Army of the Ohio merge to form the Army of the Tennessee, Bvt. Major General Nathaniel Lyon commanding. The force was over forty thousand men strong, opposing it was General A.S. Johnston’s Army of Tennessee, just over thirty-seven thousand men strong. Johnston had been beaten back, but he had not been totally defeated. In the late autumn fighting which took place for Nashville, Johnston displayed some of the genius tactics that garnered him such an important position in the first place. He knew that General Lyon had been as of yet undefeated, and that Nashville and Memphis were under assault by a combined force that was one and a half time more powerful than his own.
Defensive points were established in Jackson, Tennessee and along the Tennessee River, protecting the rail link between the two cities. Communication was the key, and Johnston declared that he would maintain the line across the state and prevent the invaders from capturing either. The Confederate Mississippi River defense fleet, located in Louisiana, steams its way north, making dock in Memphis. Over sixty ships strong, it would do battle with the Mississippi River Squadron, which began to penetrate south to attack Memphis. The Confederates carried almost every battle, despite heavy losses, as each time the Mississippi River Squadron kept moving north back to Cairo in order to resupply and for repairs. Bvt. Gen. Sheridan takes his Army of the Mississippi down along the river, and began to siege the city of Memphis. Opposing him was Brig. Gen. Edmund K. Smith, who would prove himself to be an able foe for the Union. Smith was able to secure reinforcements from Louisiana and Arkansas, all of which came into Memphis via the river. With his forces bolstered, he sent out cavalry raids on the Union lines, preventing them from severing the vital railroad which led to Nashville. With Sheridan bogged down for the winter, it was up to Lyon to try and secure a victory in central Tennessee.
No such victory was coming, however. General Lyon, under clear orders from the leadership in Washington, and eager to smash into Nashville before the November elections came, he ordered a full-scale engagement of Nashville across the Cumberland River. He first actions were to capture Clarksville to the north, shutting down riverboat production which could threaten the Ohio and the invasion of Nashville. He then kept to the north bank of the Cumberland, and would then assault Nashville over the river and hopefully defeat Johnston back even further into Tennessee, or perhaps into Mississippi and Alabama.
Several bridges crossed the Cumberland river into Nashville, and none were more important than the one which carried the Louisville and Nashville R.R. over. It was the widest, and control of it could potentially mean the Union could load their men on a train and cross the river to engage in urban combat, a phenomenon not unknown to soldiers in the Western Theatre. General Johnston placed the III Corps under General J. Johnston to defend the bridge, setting up on the south bank of the river and constructing some defenses on the bridge itself. A regiment, the 16th Alabama of Ruggles’ Division, was also dug in on the north bank of the river, ready to attack the oncoming Union forces.
When Lyon’s men came to attack Nashville, he did not have any pontoon bridges to build, so he was forced to rely in the bridges already extant. The Confederate blew a footbridge up to the north of town, preventing any type of crossing there and made it so that the Union army would have to capture the railroad bridge if they wanted any chance to fight inside the town. Lyon’s cavalry had been harassed the entire time he was marching into Tennessee by the Confederate cavalry of National Bedford Forrest, who reconnoitered Lyon’s entire army and relayed the information back to General Johnston. Forrest’s men made hell on the Union rear, destroying supply trains, blowing bridges in Kentucky and cutting communications where possible. Forrest didn’t limit himself to unsettling Lyon, he also rode all the way across the state to string Sheridan. Both Union commander’s cavalry couldn’t touch Forrest, who was beginning to obtain a reputation of his own, and increasingly found himself in the good graces of General Johnston.
The Assault on Nashville began on October 28th, as General Lyon wanted the city before November. He had outrun his supplies by a few days, but stated that it was no matter, Johnston only needs to be pushed to give up the town. Only he was quite incorrect. Johnston was dug in and had no intentions of leaving such a good position, which forced the Union to have to cross the river to attack them. Lyon had also underestimated Johnston’s forces, thinking more were west in Memphis to defend that city. He ordered his men to take the city, by crossing the bridges and establishing a bulkhead, by which then the Army would march in before sweeping through the entire city.
The Union was victorious on the first day of fighting, forcing all of the Confederates out of their positions on the north bank of the river, with the exception of the 16th Alabama. At dawn of the 29th, Lyon’s men slammed against the 16th Alabama and began to cross the bridges into the city, taken the easternmost one with ease as it buckled and allowed a few regiments to march into Nashville, but they then had to fight with the Confederates waiting at the otherside. The 16th Alabama lasted all morning and finally ordered the retreat shortly after eleven, having been fighting for nearly four hours in the cold mud. The Union then began the march down the enclosed bridge, to what would become a slaughter. At the other side of the bridge was Cleburne’s Division of men. They aimed their cannon down the bridge, loaded it with grapeshot, and fired. The bullets tore through the Union line, and his men unloaded their weapons from all directions on the Union soldiers. Lyon ordered several charges down the main bridge, capturing it was vital to the capture of Nashville. After nine assaults, the Union still had not even reached the end of the bridge. After the battle was over, it was remarked the bridge had been coloured red, from the blood of the fallen soldiers. The bridge became known as “Cleburne’s Bridge” for his defense of the vital passageway into the city.
“Cleburne’s Bridge” over the Cumberland into Nashville
The battle was a humiliating failure for Lyon, who had prided himself on his reputation in Missouri and had believed he would sweep the rebels from Tennessee. The staggering amount of men he lost assaulting the railroad bridge was sobering, and caused his retreat to Clarksville to be incredibly somber. Brig. Gen. Patrick Cleburne won fame for him and his Division, with the papers lavishing praise upon him and his men for their daring tenacity in the face of all opposition. Maj. Gen. Joseph Johnston, who commanded Cleburne’s Division from his III Corps, was the recipient of an official Congressional Letter of Thanks, passed unanimously by the Confederate Congress. Given that the Confederacy had no medals, it was one of the highest honours a General could receive.
[-178 Regulars, -8,116 Volunteers from the United States. -1,225 Regulars, -3,198 Volunteers from the Confederate States.]
In Kansas, Benjamin McCulloch and his men withdraw from the state, leaving behind a garrison of men in the various forts and move east, diving into Arkansas and making it to Little Rock to commence operations against the Union Armies attempting to drive down the Mississippi river. The only action McCulloch sees during the last three months of the year were skirmishes between his army and portions of Halleck’s men who had been moving into northern Arkansas to scout the strength of the Confederate forces. General Curtis also makes some gains, but much of southern Kansas remains in the hands of the Confederates. The Confederacy is able to sign treaties with the Seminoles, Kiowa, and other Plains Indians, enter them into an alliance with the Richmond government. They would receive supplies and money from the Confederacy (along with recognition of their independence and sovereignty as opposed to the United States), so long as they engaged in combat against the Union forces.
One of their first targets was Fort Wise in southeastern Colorado. A raiding party attacked it, killed several soldiers and took some supplies before they rode off. For the Confederates, it was no longer necessary to deploy a large field army to the region, their connections with the natives were more than enough to keep the Union forces busy, which opened many possibilities for Confederate strategy, with some believing their ultimate goal was the capture and acquisition of gold from Colorado and Nevada.
Far north in Minnesota, General Henry Sibley, the former governor of the state, was given command of the Department of Minnesota, and immediately did battle with the Dakota. His goal was to expel the Dakota from Minnesota, and responded to any attacks with overwhelming force. With the cold settling in, there were only a few engagements during the year, but he was victorious in every single battle he engaged with the Dakota, who were reeling from the brutal assaults that the Union was sending at their forces.
Fighting in Arizona is mostly limited to operations between the Union and the Navajo. Baylor and Sibley remained where they were, entrenching themselves further and allowing the Navajo usage of their supply lines to harass the Union men. General Slough led an attack on Fort Secession, which was repulsed. The Navajo engaged in quick hitting actions against the Union forces, and many were armed and well supplied with Confederate weapons, causing even more trouble for the Union generals. General James Carleton escaped one engagement barely alive after he had been captured and beaten by Navajos before his cavalry rescued him from the retreating Navajo. Increasingly, the Union generals in the far west were less concerned with the Confederates and much more concerned on the natives. So far had this come, that the latter half of November and all of December’s correspondence between the Generals was focused solely on the natives, the rebels had not been mentioned since November 17th, where Baylor’s men had engaged in a skirmish with a small detachment of Carson’s men.
The Revenue Act of 1862 was passed, introducing a progressive income tax on all incomes of $750 and above, with a rate of 6.5% on incomes of $10,000 and above. Excise taxes were raised across the board, and applied to a much broader range of items. The Revenue Act of the previous year was repealed, and paper currency, dubbed “Greenbacks” were made legal tender and forced to be taken as currency nationwide. The State of California declared this act illegal, and would not accept Greenbacks as currency for any debts and payments, instead demanding gold currency be used. In an effort to influence the Californians, the Pacific Railroad Act of 1862 was passed, laying out a route for a Transcontinental Railroad from Omaha, Nebraska to Sacramento, California.
President Lincoln’s cabinet saw several changes, with Gustavus Fox becoming the Secretary of the Navy, and Simon Cameron being removed with charges of corruption hanging over his head. Replacing Cameron was Edwin M. Stanton, who was put in charge of a War Department that was in disarray, and given the unenviable task of attempting to subdue the rebellion that was looking increasingly powerful. Fox, who had been acting Secretary for some time, eased well into his new position, getting contracts made with many shipyards which would see the Union Navy expand at a rapid rate, to try and ensure that there was no rebel breakout on the high seas, and to finally impose the naval blockade of the rebel states.
Union disasters of 1862 and the growing anti-war mood of the country proved disastrous for the Republicans in the fall elections. The Unionists had seen their support collapse, losing all of their seats across the country. A new growing faction of anti-Administration Republicans, called the Independent Republicans, win five seats across the country, one in Illinois and two in both Missouri and Pennsylvania. The Democrats won a total of 85 seats, the Republicans 90. The Independent Republicans captured 5 seats, and 11 were considered vacant, from Virginia and Kentucky. Kentucky had sent nearly a full slate of Democrats to Washington, with the exception of a lone Republican from Louisville. There was talk that they would be barred from taking their seats, thus securing the Republican majority. Such a proposition did not come around, and the Republicans, along with a few of the Independent Republicans, elected Schuyler Colfax as Speaker of the House. The Republicans held exactly half of the seats needed to pass legislation, and they needed to court the Independent Republicans in order to pass legislation. The emboldened Democrats attacked the Republicans for what they were increasingly called a farce of a war.
Results of the U.S. House Election of 1862
[+45,450 Volunteers to the Confederate States]
General A.S. Johnston issues an order calling upon the states of Arkansas, Tennessee, and Mississippi to bring up their state militias and to furnish them for usage under his stewardship as the commander of the Western Department. Mississippi Governor John J. Pettus resisted the move, informing the General that Mississippi would defend itself. Tennessee and Arkansas did respond, giving Johnston seven thousand men to allocate for the defense of Tennessee.
[+7,255 Volunteers to the Confederate States]
With the loss of Paducah hurting the Confederacy’s ability to threaten the northern Mississippi and Ohio, the Confederate Congress passes new legislation that authorised more funds for the Confederate Navy Department, aimed at producing a sizeable river fleet to protect the Confederacy’s vital waterways. A flourish of construction began at the Gosport Shipyard in Norfolk, as well as in New Orleans. The Bureau of River Defense was formed in the summer of 1862, and the Confederate Navy had sizeable operations on the Mississippi, Tennessee, and Cumberland Rivers.
[+42 Minor Vessels to the Confederate States]
In the British-occupied territories of Mexico, Don Agustín Jerónimo de Iturbide y Huarte announces a proclamation of the Empire of Mexico, with himself as Emperor Agustín II. There is much pomp and fanfare with his announcement, and the Conservatives of northern Mexico rally to his cause. The Emperor is supported heavily by the British and French in consolidating his control and territory. The French, for their part, maintain coastal access and do little more than collect port duties, going so far as to still do business with the government in Mexico City, despite the British having recognised and openly supporting the new Empire.
All was not well for the Empire, as hundreds of thousands of Mexicans were against his reign and the attempts to splinter their country and replace it with an Empire. Farmers and city labourers came out in droves, protesting the invasion and signing up for the armed forces. The Mexican Army’s ranks more than tripled during the year, as opposed to the Emperor’s small spattering of forces. Where it not for the British, Emperor Agustín II would have been crushed within a short period of time.
The British force in Mexico “officially” was delegated to the occupation of the coastline, but British officers and British soldiers marched under the Mexican Imperial banner, doing battle against the forces of Benito Juárez across a wide swath of land from Monterrey to Torreón. The Mexicans (Republicans) put up quite the fight, engaging a smaller force at Monterrey and defeating it, but withdrawing due to coming reinforcements. The Coalition (British/Imperial Mexican/French) then moved to Torreón, which they captured with little resistance.
The largest battle of the year took place at Matamoros, where Mexican guerillas fought against Coalition forces, before the Mexicans committed to the battlefield fully. The smaller Mexican force was a mixture of cavalry and infantry, and crushed the Coalition, capturing several high commanders of the Emperor’s Army and General Francis Cockburn from the British Army. The defeat was humiliating for the Coalition, which had their supply lines harassed as they attempted to retreat back to the safety of Mexico’s northeast. The coalition would remain bottled up in Monterey, as the Mexicans sent out requests for aid to any country that they believed would be interested in helping, although none did.
South America
The Brazilian Chamber of Deputies passes legislation aimed at the formation of the Imperial Coast Guard. The measure was aimed at ensuring both the security of Brazil’s shores, along with the safety of domestic and foreign flagged vessels within Brazil’s waters, with an aim to try and limit incidents such as the one which occurred off the coast of Rio Grande do Sul the previous year. Brazil’s coastline was vast, and to protect it would be no small feat. Ships were ordered and laid down in both Brazil and European shipyards to accommodate the daunting task, and was expected to be operating at full capacity (albeit, that was limited given logistical concerns) by the 1863.
[+32 Minor Vessels to Brazil]
After years of attempting to maintain a Conservative government, Dom Pedro announces the dissolution of the Chamber of Deputies in the late spring of 1862, and pledges he will accept the outcome of the election. The three main parties contesting the election were the Liberal Party (Partido Liberal), the Progressive League (Liga Progressista) and the Conservative Party (Partido Conservador). The Liberals and the Conservatives were the main parties competing for power in Brazil, but the Progressive League was an alliance of moderates from both parties. The election results shocked many. The Liberals took a commanding majority, 155 seats out of 285. 37 were won by the new Progressive League, and the Conservatives won 93.
Results of the Brazilian Chamber of Deputies elections, 1862
With the victory of the Confederation’s forces over Buenos Aires the previous year, much work was needed in order to bring the country together and to function as a cohesive unit. The government brings forward several tough measures, suspending the constitution among the worst, in order to quell the rebellious factions within the country. The provincial militias had their command structures gutted, with members of the national army placed into the leadership, giving the national government more control over the militias. All civil servants, even if they worked for a state and never dealt with the Confederation's government, were forced to swear and oath of allegiance to the Confederation, breaking it was punishable by death. The country was swelling with discontent, but the authoritarian measures undertaken by President Derqui and his administration saw little in the way of rebellion or resistance.
Europe
The Admiralty sets aside funds for the formation of a special commission to study the recent activities in the American Civil War. Ideas ranging from ramming and breech-loaded weaponry to combat ironclad armour were discussed and plans drawn up for potential naval reforms and new ships to be built. Of particular note was the HMS Wivern, which was destined to be sent to the Confederate States. Her sister ship, the CSS North Carolina was operating in American waters, and her strengths and weaknesses could be studied and observed and compared to the Wivern to see how the British could improve upon the design.
Victor Hugo publishes Les Misérables in Paris, which highlights much of the social ills that comes with living in Paris, along with it being a commentary on the history of France, and the general mood of the people. One Paris newspaper declared that it would be one of the most read books in History, others compared it to Uncle Tom’s Cabin, saying that it would have the same momentous effect on the French society as the latter book had on the United States. The Government decided to seize upon the initiative, with some ministers declaring that they would work towards fixing the problems in the Empire and make it a place worth living. France would be at the forefront of Europe, and reforms would be the vehicle by which she arrived to that position.
The reforms came in a flurry, all supported heartily by the Emperor. The franchise was expanded to more men who might not be as wealthy as before, and restrictions on holding office in the legislature were relaxed. A new political party began to operate in the Empire, opposed to the Bonapartists, but one that ostensibly did not support republicanism. Adolphe Thiers emerged once again as a major political figure, applauding the small steps taken towards liberalisation. He viewed the new party, Les réformistes, as too complacent with the monarchy. It was his view that a Republic was France’s only way forward.
Many had believed Thiers would not be long for France, but still he remained. Emperor Napoleon III responded by allowing more reforms to the press to pass, to which Theirs established a new paper to fight the monarchy’s government. Again, the newspaper remained open much to the surprise of France’s liberal community and of Thiers himself. For every measure of restraint that the Emperor showed, along with his continued support for reformist legislation, brought him the admiration of thousands of Frenchmen, and did great damage to the republican cause.
[+1 Administration Level to France]
The French army undergoes a series of training during the year, with a number of drills and simulations taking place of a Prussian invasion and an Italian invasion. There was no military member exempt from these drills, with the Imperial Guard and the zouaves also participating. The regular army obtained the most from this training, as they discovered some flaws within the command structure in matters of communication, and the lack of infrastructure should a rail link be cut off from an army operating in the northeast. The previous year’s expansion of the railroads had proved to be a boon to the Empire, as it was estimated that the defensive units in the trials would have prevailed had they been in operation and used to shift reinforcements around. The French Army even established its own Railroad Department, studying the use of rails in a military capacity.
[+1 Army Level to France]
French zouaves pose for a picture during Operation Bonaparte in 1862
While the fight between the reformists and the hardliners dominated much of the year, Jews were allowed back into Spain for the first time since 1492. The measure was condemned by the hardliners, saying that they had been expelled and banned for a reason, and it was nothing more than a worrying trend of reform that would bring the country into chaos and destruction. Jews were still banned in some localities where the local noblemen had enough power to block their return, but it was estimated that very few had re-entered Spain at all.
In Berlin, the Military Scientific Institutes is formed with the intentions to bring together the greatest weapons experts in the country and from abroad. They were tasked with designing a new weapon to be adopted by the military. Prussia was one of the few countries that had not sent observers to the American conflict raging across the sea, and thus they were without the valuable information that other armies were receiving from it. The one major accomplishment of the year was a large, smooth-bore cannon that could be used for city-based defense and if moved properly, could be set up to siege. Present at the firing demonstration was Minister of War von Roon. Calamity struck when the weapon was loaded and exploded, sending bits of metal and shot into the watching crowd. One of the men struck was von Roon, who had his left arm blown off and his left leg severely crippled. He survived, but resigned from his position, no longer able to direct Prussia’s military.
Better news for the Kingdom was the announcement of a new government-sponsored programme of industrial production. The government would directly subsidise and give funds to prominent factories, the most notable being those owned by the Krupp family. Tax revenue collapsed due to Prussian directive to lower overall tax burden on factories by 20% if they invested a large amount of money into the the Ruhr valley. Companies that were on the verge of going out of business were also propped up with generous loans. The new loans would give the Prussian government a stake in the company, and mandated that they would follow Government directives would it be needed in times of war.
A Krupp factory operating in the Ruhr valley
The Imperial-Royal State Railways also noted, with input from Bernhard von Wüllerstorf-Urbair, the hubs of commerce in the German-speaking lands an in Hungary. The main line that was approved in the Diet’s bill would be the major trunk line of the Empire, with Vienna and Buda being considered the hub cities, all railroads in their respective parts of the Empire would point back to these cities, and one standard gauge was mandated Empire-wide, to ensure rolling stock and engines were compatible no matter where they were. The smaller passenger line would be mandated to conform to the new gauge when their leases expired. The Ganz Works in Buda was contracted to provide the new rolling stock which would bring goods up and down the line, and the rails were contracted to various other shops and iron works. The entire adventure was funded by the issuance of bonds, ten years to mature at a higher interest rate than was normally offered by the government. The lucrative bonds were quickly bought, and money was no issue for the rail expansion. Many observers saw the interest rate as a concession to the nobility (who bought the bonds) as a way to placate them with more money in exchange for not plunging the country into chaos in opposition to the liberal reforms.
[+1 Infrastructure level to Austria every year until 1865]
The previous year had seen a seismic shift in the structure of the military command in the Habsburg Empire, in how they promoted and obtained their officers, and many of these new men were silently pushing behind the scenes for reforms to the Empire’s military. Strategic promotions and encouraged retirements saw some of the most outspoken opponents voices silenced. No majority for support yet existed, the entrenched interests still dominated the army, but a huge crack in their power had been formed, with the new moderate faction rising, one that could agree with both sides of the issue, and most importantly - one that could be swayed to support either side. The moderates also took a monumental stance, the Army should see changes, it could not remain stagnant forever, but they could never, and should never, rush into reforms and disaster. In order to accomplish their goals, they must take a measured and cautious approach, and the reforms, should any worthy of being completed come up to bear, should be phased in over a period of time. The opposition still opposed any reform, but the moderates were a growing faction within the Imperial Army. Many Conservatives saw this as a lamentable occurrence, with some even whispering that a liberal takeover might be coming.
Similar to her northern neighbours, the Kingdom of Italy undergoes its own infrastructure project. The Ricasoli Government sets aside a substantial sum of money from the budget, along with the issuance of bonds and the temporary increase of small appropriation taxes to engage in a nation-wide building project. The project would commence in three phases. The first phase would see the nascent railways connected with each other, and to form an organised network of rail. Usage of the lines would be leased to private companies in exchange for government shares of those companies in question, forming a quasi public-private ownership of rails and companies in northern Italy. The second phase, which would begin once the first phase was completed, believed to be in 1863, was one that would finish many of the railways started in the former Papal States. They would also be connected with the lines in Piedmont and Lombardy. The third phase was the most ambitious phase, the expansion of the rail network into southern Italy. This phase would only commence if the other two had gone without any major problems, and if private companies would agree to ventures with the government to back up the function of passenger (and more importantly) freight services.
[+1 Infrastructure of Italy per year until 1864]
It was no secret that northern Italy was the country’s industrial powerhouse, and it was even less of a surprise that the major textile interests had a large amount of influence within La Destra (Italy’s ruling party). As an extension of this, the government gives generous loans and subsidies to the textile firms and industrialists in order to expand production and increase the economic might of the country. The major issue with much of this plan was the uncertainty of their supply of cotton, the majority came from the self-styled Confederate States of America, and a general cotton panic was still rippling across Europe, with prices being driven higher and higher (much to the advantage of Confederate planters). Should the United States blockade of their rebel states ever be put into place, the shock would decimate Turin and the textile industry of western Europe. The government gambled on Confederate victory (despite Giuseppe Garibaldi fighting for the United States), and a new textile boom was unfolding in the valleys of northern Italy. The government also lends her support to ventures to discover new waterfalls and resources in the southern Alps. Engineers and industrial experts were called up and given ample funds to work with industrialists who were interested in future development.
One nation which was focused on the uncertainty of cotton was the Russian Empire. A trial crop was planted west of the Caspian Sea in April and it was harvested in October. The high costs of transporting it to Russia’s textile industry in the west was still cheaper than depending on Confederate cotton, and the Tsar personally ordered food crops to be shifted over to cotton the next season, with token amounts of compensation offered to farmers that followed this order. Government estimates believed that the production wouldn’t match the needs of Russia’s industry demand, but it would limit the amount it would need to import. The government offices were also bewildered when reports of cotton production worldwide was not increasing, the only appreciable increases being in Egypt and in Russia itself, while cotton production heftily declined in North America, due to the war and some shift to food crops.
Under the guidance of Minister Milyutin, a new series of reforms was coming to the administrative infrastructure behind the army’s operation. The move was highly applauded, it did not change the leadership, tactics, or strategy of the army at all, but what it did do was apply a more logical basis for how the army was raised and deployed. The Military District Reforms of 1862 brought a shift away from an old system of defending the Empire to one that would allocate resources and men to defend a specific district, to which they would be solely responsible for making sure the district would be defended. They were all not formed just for the purpose of defense, some districts would be considered centres of manpower, others would be centres of production (be it clothes, weapons, or heavy industry), and thus given more attention to defend should the Empire seek victory in any invasion. Other districts would be a communication and logistics hub, where men would be marshalled out and sent to the field. By the end of the year, thirty-six districts had been formed, covering a vast swath of territory in the Empire. They needed a bureaucracy to run and manage them, and government hiring went into overdrive, offering positions to both the nobles and the higher ups in the military, ensuring the districts would be staffed by those who do know the function of the military.
The Donets coal basin in the Donbass was the centre of government investment in the year, with railroads being expanded and extended to try and connect them with other cities in the Empire. The newest major line was a direct line from Lugansk to Tsaritsyn, and then it continued on to Saratov. A major goal was to connect the vast empire with rails and to allow for industrial production to take place with the country’s vast interior along the Volga river. There were also plans to expand the railways to Moscow and St. Petersburg, though this expansion would take quite some time. The task would be daunting, considering the vast swath of space between the Volga and the Gulf of Finland.
[+1 Infrastructure to Russia every year until 1863]
The Romanian government authorises a seismic shift in policy, proclaiming that as a secular state, there was no need for the Church to own such a vast amount of arable land that was undeveloped and not useful for the country as a whole. A bill is passed that secularized all monastic estates in Romania, much to the grumblings of both the Liberals and the Conservatives. Support for the measure came from the Ottoman Empire and the public as a whole. To sooth relations with the Patriarch, the Romanian government offered compensation for the land seized, which he refused outright, and wouldn’t even negotiate with the Romanians, demanding that the lands should return to the control of the church.
The former Cotroceni Monastery and its estate in Bucharest
In Constantinople, the Interior Minister Münuf Pasha confers with the Grand Vizier, Mehmed Emin li Pasha, for the discussion of a new language reform for the country. The goal was to have one standardised, uniform way of writing and understanding written Turkish. The move would also seek to make the written language more connected with spoken Turkish, making it easier to learn. The year was spent formalising a new language, based off the Latin alphabet to make printing it easier, but most of it was simply an attempt to adopt new standards and move to a new alphabet. It would be a generation before it was fully adopted across the Empire, as there would be resistance still among the general population. The new written language would be the official and only used language in all government capacity by 1864, and the only one allowed to be taught in schools by 1866. In order to adopt the new method as fast as possible, students who were still in their first few years of school would be prohibited from using the old system. The shock from changing systems was felt within the Empire, with economic activity taking a hit as some confusion hit and resistance from switching from the old alphabet was felt.
Road construction behinds in much of the more rural areas of the Ottoman Empire, with the stated goal of easing the speed of transportation of men and goods from the rural zones to the larger population centres. Macadam roads were to be the favoured form of construction, with the labour hired locally. The confusion and chaos from the shifting of the language made logistics difficult, procurement of labour went slow and some didn’t even show up because of confused and jumbled orders. Little in the way of work was completed during the year, leaving many local Ottoman administrators incredibly frustrated with Constantinople and their decision to shift the written language.
Asia & Africa
With the complains of French merchants heard loud and clear in Paris, Emperor Napoleon III releases government funds for purchase shares of the canal zone, giving the French government a larger stake in the canal, and giving French merchants that were no longer interested in holding them a way out without selling them to the British, Ottomans, or Egyptians. The French also took control of shipping to the canal from France, and it was heavily subsidised, allowing the French private interests still in operation to use the French supplies, instead of needing to rely on the British. It was clear the Emperor saw the Suez Canal region as a vital point of interest for the Empire, and would dedicate significant national resources to ensure Frenchmen would remain there unmolested.
In Central Asia, the Russian Army continues its slow advance down into the region, capturing smaller towns and wells, and defeating sporadic forces that had opposed them. The two major conquests of the year was the capture of Tokmok and Pishpek, where a fort was quickly constructed to prevent a counterattack from Kokand. The Kokandis attempted to attack through another pass, but failed in their attempt. The nominally administered Chinese territory was openly used by both sides for transporting materials and men, to which the Chinese were powerless to stop them. Bukhara and Kokand still attempted to stand up against the Russians, but they were defeated soundly at several battles.
The British administration in India continues the process of reforming the control over the vast territory. The paper currency which had been authorised the year prior had all but replaced the various methods of trade and exchanged used previously. The move made the collection of duties and taxes much easier, and India became an incredibly profitable venture for investors. A few problems arose in attempting to administer the territory, with hundreds of millions of people. Few could claim that India’s governance was modern, but it was competent and the most important factor, it was extremely profitable for the British government and those who invested in the subcontinent.
The Tokugawa shogun, dealing with enough pressure from foreign governments as it was to open up to more trade – the terms of which almost always fell squarely in favor of the whites – decided, in his youthful wisdom (he was just sixteen years of age), to continue debasing the shogunate's currency. Pressure from the daimyo and from members of his court to debase the state currency to mitigate the effects of white traders taking advantage of currency exchange rates. Inflation, already a major problem facing the bakufu, was made even worse. Coupled with recent weak crops, the price of basic goods and food skyrocketed and discontent among the commoners increased significantly. A series of rural disturbances and rebellions sprouted in the countryside, but were quickly put down by soldiers loyal to the shogunate. Disturbances and anti-government sentiment rose sharply after the Namamugi Incident of September, in which several British nationals, despite being protected under extraterritoriality laws, were attacked, and one killed, by the father and regent of the daimyo of Satsuma domain. Relations between Edo and the western daimyo continued to deteriorate as a result – with Satsuma refusing to compensate or apologize to the British – while Britain now had a dead subject of Her Majesty, his body defiled by repeated stab wounds, rotting in the dirt in Japan.
[-173 regulars to Japan]
The Namamugi Incident of 1862
With the full weight of Qing economic and military power being brought to bear, the Taiping finally began to reel from the scale of battles and destruction wrought in the countryside. Viceroy Zeng Guofan, already in command of the Xiang Army, was made the superior of General Frederick Ward, commander of the foreign-led and -supplied Ever Victorious Army. Ward was discontented with the decision from the court of Peking, though he trusted Zeng's administrative and martial abilities. Zeng himself disapproved of the appointment, to an extent, and largely left the Massachusetts man to his own devices. Ward's Army, by now three-thousand strong and repeated victor over the Taiping in the various battles fought around Shanghai, was given the somewhat vague order to pick off and destroy smaller portions of the Taiping army in a push up the Yangtze toward Nanking. In the west, Zeng rallied his commands and pushed hard from the West. In July a fierce battle erupted around the city of Bengbu, with General Li Xiucheng, the famous "Loyal King", putting up a fierce resistance. The Huai River provided a very natural defense against Qing assaults, which was augmented by the general's tactical brilliance. Only after seven separate offensives, and the arrival of portions of the aptly-named Huai Army, under General Li Hongzhang, that Li's defenses crumbled due more to high casualties after weeks of fighting than anything else. Viceroy Zeng pushed further southeast but found the going especially rough as Li rallied to his command fresh recruits. While Zeng had made notable progress toward the Taiping capital, rebellion continued to cause widespread famine and death across the land.
To the east, Ward's Ever Victorious Army made steady gains against the Taiping. He did as he had been ordered -- attacking smaller Taiping villages, and maintaining strict discipline among his men to prevent looting or rape -- but found his job increasingly difficult the further away from Shanghai he went. While smaller Taiping garrisons were being destroyed, larger forces continued to harry him and threaten the city directly, and so he was unable to venture very far from the port city. In August, shortly after Zeng's bloody victory at Bengbu, General Tan Shaoguang, the King of Mu, attacked Ward's significantly smaller force about five miles southeast of Suzhou. Fighting ran along the shore of Dianshan Lake and the marshland around, restricting the Taiping's use of superior numbers against Ward's force of some five-thousand infantry and ten guns. Still, the American was driven back, and his disciplined Han troops gave a good account of themselves, withdrawing in order to the next defensive position as Taiping troops, armed with swords and spears, charged and charged again. Around 6pm during the final Taiping assault, after Ward had repositioned his army along a portion of the Dianpu River, he was mortally wounded, passing command to his lieutenant, Henry Andres Burgevine. Ward's men mourned his loss; Viceroy Zeng, aware of Burgevine's racist attitudes and the friction he caused among Qing officers, formally petitioned London to promote Major Charles Gordon and allow him to command the Ever Victorious Army. After brief debate Parliament approved the appointment and promoted him to Lieutenant Colonel.
[-10,375 regulars, -42,488 "volunteers" to Qing, +62,000 volunteers to Qing]
Qing troops crossing the Huai River in the final stage of the Battle of Bengbu.[/I][/CENTER]
Other Events
- January 1 – The United Kingdom annexes Lagos Island in modern-day Nigeria.
- January 31 – Alvan Graham Clark makes the first observation of Sirius B, a white dwarf star, through an eighteen-inch telescope at Northwestern University.
- March 31 – Publication of Victor Hugo's epic French historical novel Les Misérables begins.
- May 2 – The California State Normal School (later San Jose State University) is created by an Act of the California Legislature.
- May 24 – Westminster Bridge is opened in England. This new bridge designed by Thomas Page had replaced the old bridge.
- July 1 – The Russian State Library is founded as The Library of the Moscow Public Museum.
- August 21 – The Vienna Stadtpark opens its gates.
- September 10 – Francisco Solano López is appointed 2nd President of Paraguay.
- September 22 – Otto von Bismarck becomes prime minister of Prussia following refusal by the country's Landtag to accept the military budget
- September 29 – Prussian prime minister Otto von Bismarck delivers his Blood and Iron speech to the Prussian Landtag.
- October 9 – The Transvaal Civil War breaks out following Stephanus Schoeman’s unconstitutional ousting of the acting President of the Executive Council of the South African Republic.
- October 24 – Ramón Castilla loses the Presidency of Peru for a second time.
- December 2 – The first United States Navy hospital ships enter service.
- December 17 – General Order No. 11, which expels all Jews from his military district, is issued by General Nathaniel Lyon. This order is rescinded just a few weeks later.
- December 26 – William D. Duly hangs 38 Dakota Sioux Indians in Minnesota.
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1863
Argentina
Government: Constitutional Federal Republic
Leader(s): Santiago Derqui
Population: 1.664 m. 1.38% Growth
Gross Domestic Product: $2,153 m. 3.42% Growth ($1,293.90 per Capita)
Trade: $ 254.96 m.
Infrastructure: Poor (8/25) [+1 in 2 turns]
Administration: Average (14/25)
Government
Balance: -$ 11.62 m.
Receipts: $ 77.22 m. (5.76% Average Tax Rate)
Expenditures: $ 88.84 m.
Treasury: -$ 369 m.
National Defence
Army: 15,500 Regulars, 3,151 Volunteers, Poor (10/25) Equipment & Training
Reserves: 100,222 Able bodied men
Navy: 4 Sail Frigates, 6 Minor Vessels, Poor (7/25) Equipment & Training
Player: Rolman99
Austrian Empire
Government: Semi-Constitutional Autocratic Monarchy
Leader(s): Kaiser Franz Joseph I
Population: 34.091 m.- 0.15% Decay
Gross Domestic Product: $47,083 m. 2.42% Growth ($1,381.12 per Capita)
Trade: $ 8,564.47 m.
Infrastructure: Average (12/25) [+1 per year until 1865]
Administration: Average (12/25)
Government
Balance: -$ 14.49 m.
Receipts: $ 2,149.81 m. (6.67% Average Tax Rate)
Expenditures: $ 2,164.3 m.
Treasury: -$ 10,700 m.
National Defence
Army: 240,000 Regulars, Average (15/25) Equipment & Training
Reserves: 2,195,059 Able bodied men
Navy: 4 Ships of the Line, 12 Sail Frigates, 5 Steam Frigates, 26 Minor Vessels, Poor (10/25) Equipment & Training
Player: Cloud Strife
Empire of Brazil
Government: Constitutional Monarchy
Leader(s): Emperor Pedro II
Population: 9.157 m. 2.03% Growth
Gross Domestic Product: $6,759 m. 3.27% Growth ($738.07 per Capita)
Trade: $ 852.27 m.
Infrastructure: Failing (5/25)
Administration: Poor (10/25)
Government
Balance: -$ 34.49 m.
Receipts: $ 182.15 m. (4.31% Average Tax Rate)
Expenditures: $ 216.64 m.
Treasury: -$ 575 m.
National Defence
Army: 28,650 Regulars, Poor (7/25) Equipment & Training
Reserves: 625,440 Able bodied men
Navy: 6 Ships of the Line, 6 Sail Frigates, 13 Steam Frigates, 50 Minor Vessels, Failing (5/25) Equipment & Training
Player: Ab Ovo
Eyalet of Egypt
Government: Eyalet
Leader(s): Muhammad Sa'id Pasha
Population: 6.729 m. 3.87% Growth
Gross Domestic Product: $4,255 m. 1.22% Growth ($632.28 per Capita)
Trade: $ 705.42 m.
Infrastructure: Poor (7/25)
Administration: Poor (9/25)
Government
Balance: -$ 48.42 m.
Receipts: $ 185.62 m. (6.58% Average Tax Rate)
Expenditures: $ 234.04 m.($41m a year to the Ottoman Empire)
Treasury: -$ 2,484 m.
National Defence
Army: 23,514 Regulars, Poor (7/25) Equipment & Training
Reserves: 457,128 Able bodied men
Navy: 4 Sail Frigates, 3 Steam Frigates, 18 Minor Vessels, Poor (6/25) Equipment & Training
Player: Kho
Qing Empire
Government: Absolute monarchy
Leader(s): Tongzhi Emperor
Population: 367.488 m.- 1.51% Decay
Gross Domestic Product: $209,666 m. 1.03% Growth ($570.54 per Capita)
Trade: $ 18,115.12 m.
Infrastructure: Failing (4/25)
Administration: Failing (5/25)
Government
Balance: -$ 1,789.43 m.
Receipts: $ 5,692.32 m. (4.67% Average Tax Rate)
Expenditures: $ 7,481.75 m.
Treasury: -$ 82,640 m.
National Defence
Army: 254,817 Regulars, 654,236 Volunteers, Poor (6/25) Equipment & Training
Reserves: 25,340,058 Able bodied men
Navy: 4 Sail Frigates, 1 Steam Frigates, 29 Minor Vessels, Failing (4/25) Equipment & Training
Player: Olligarchy
Confederate States of America
Government: Constitutional Federal Republic
Leader(s): President Jefferson Davis
Population: 10.245 m. 1.85% Growth
Gross Domestic Product: $17,470 m. 2.67% Growth ($1,705.24 per Capita)
Trade: $ 1,282.32 m.
Infrastructure: Average (13/25)
Administration: Poor (10/25)
Government
Balance: -$ 3,167.31 m.
Receipts: $ 497.47 m. (4.97% Average Tax Rate)
Expenditures: $ 3,664.79 m.
Treasury: -$ 7,027 m.
National Defence
Army: 39,411 Regulars, 187,893 Volunteers, Good (16/25) Equipment & Training
Reserves: 909,023 Able bodied men
Navy: 1 Ironclads, 7 Sail Frigates, 4 Steam Frigates, 162 Minor Vessels, Average (14/25) Equipment & Training [+4 Minor Vessels/month from New Orleans & Selma]
Player: Noco19
French Empire
Government: Unitary Constitutional Monarchy
Leader(s): Emperor Napoleon III
Population: 38.175 m. 1.13% Growth
Gross Domestic Product: $69,866 m. 2.06% Growth ($1,830.14 per Capita)
Trade: $ 9,452.84 m.
Infrastructure: Average (15/25) [+2 in 2 years. +2 in 4 years.]
Administration: Good (18/25)
Government
Balance: -$ 595.45 m. (+$15m from Vietnam)
Receipts: $ 3,032.21 m. (6.46% Average Tax Rate)
Expenditures: $ 3,627.66 m.
Treasury: -$ 19,348 m.
National Defence
Army: 302,101 Regulars, Good (20/25) Equipment & Training
Reserves: 2,424,700 Able bodied men
Navy: 10 Ironclads, 32 Ships of the Line, 42 Sail Frigates, 17 Steam Frigates, 68 Minor Vessels, Good (16/25) Equipment & Training [+2 Ironclads per year]
Player: etranger01
Kingdom of Greece
Government: Parliamentary Constitutional Monarchy
Leader(s): King George I/Prime Minister Dimitrios Voulgaris
Population: 3.438 m. 0.92% Growth
Gross Domestic Product: $2,964 m. 2.22% Growth ($862.25 per Capita)
Trade: $ 377.67 m.
Infrastructure: Poor (8/25) [+1 Infrastructure in 1 turn]
Administration: Poor (7/25)
Government
Balance: $ 6.81 m.
Receipts: $ 151.43 m. (6.85% Average Tax Rate)
Expenditures: $ 144.62 m.
Treasury: -$ 2,615 m.
National Defence
Army: 32,391 Regulars, Poor (10/25) Equipment & Training
Reserves: 213,181 Able bodied men
Navy: 3 Sail Frigates, 14 Minor Vessels, Failing (5/25) Equipment & Training
Player: DutchGuy
Kingdom of Italy
Government: Constitutional Monarchy
Leader(s): King Vittorio Emanuele II
Population: 26.925 m. 1.49% Growth
Gross Domestic Product: $40,041 m. 1.61% Growth ($1,487.11 per Capita)
Trade: $ 4,660.78 m.
Infrastructure: Good (17/25) [+1 per year until 1864]
Administration: Poor (10/25)
Government
Balance: -$ 182.07 m.
Receipts: $ 1,382.99 m. (5.61% Average Tax Rate)
Expenditures: $ 1,565.05 m.
Treasury: -$ 7,623 m.
National Defence
Army: 182,391 Regulars, Average (13/25) Equipment & Training
Reserves: 1,740,850 Able bodied men
Navy: 3 Ships of the Line, 3 Sail Frigates, 12 Steam Frigates, 34 Minor Vessels, Poor (8/25) Equipment & Training
Player: oxfordroyale
Tokugawa Shogunate
Government: Feudal stratocracy
Leader(s): Emperor Kōmei / Shogun Tokugawa Iemochi
Population: 33.822 m. 1.14% Growth
Gross Domestic Product: $23,067 m. - 2.32% Decay ($682.00 per Capita)
Trade: $ 1,213.32 m.
Infrastructure: Poor (6/25)
Administration: Failing (5/25)
Government
Balance: -$ 149.93 m.
Receipts: $ 485.49 m. (3.83% Average Tax Rate)
Expenditures: $ 635.42 m.
Treasury: -$ 3,273 m.
National Defence
Army: 12,181 Regulars, Poor (7/25) Equipment & Training
Reserves: 2,403,703 Able bodied men
Navy: 3 Sail Frigates, 1 Steam Frigates, 11 Minor Vessels, Failing (3/25) Equipment & Training
Player: Korona
United Mexican States
Government: Federal constitutional monarchy
Leader(s): Emperor Agustín II
Population: 8.572 m. 0.73% Growth
Gross Domestic Product: $5,867 m. 2.27% Growth ($684.40 per Capita)
Trade: $ 484.61 m.
Infrastructure: Failing (5/25)
Administration: Poor (8/25)
Government
Balance: -$ 5.94 m.
Receipts: $ 193.4 m. (5.68% Average Tax Rate)
Expenditures: $ 199.34 m.
Treasury: -$ 1,903 m.
National Defence
Army: 658 Regulars, 3,665 Volunteers, Poor (8/25) Equipment & Training
Reserves: 607,997 Able bodied men
Navy: 3 Sail Frigates, 6 Minor Vessels, Failing (5/25) Equipment & Training
Player: Fingon888
Ottoman Empire
Government: Absolute Monarchy
Leader(s): Sultan Abdülaziz I
Population: 25.563 m. 1.16% Growth
Gross Domestic Product: $21,894 m. 0.73% Growth ($856.50 per Capita)
Trade: $ 2,922.9 m.
Infrastructure: Poor (8/25)
Administration: Poor (10/25)
Government
Balance: -$ 62.04 m. (+$41m from Egypt)
Receipts: $ 828.43 m. (5.68% Average Tax Rate)
Expenditures: $ 890.48 m.
Treasury: -$ 5,228 m.
National Defence
Army: 131,624 Regulars, Poor (10/25) Equipment & Training
Reserves: 1,694,278 Able bodied men
Navy: 4 Ships of the Line, 3 Sail Frigates, 6 Steam Frigates, 11 Minor Vessels, Poor (7/25) Equipment & Training
Player: KeldoniaSkylar
Kingdom of Prussia
Government: Absolute Monarchy
Leader(s): King William I
Population: 22.617 m. 1.00% Growth
Gross Domestic Product: $38,271 m. 3.81% Growth ($1,692.16 per Capita)
Trade: $ 4,316.93 m.
Infrastructure: Average (11/25)
Administration: Average (13/25)
Government
Balance: -$ 245.73 m.
Receipts: $ 1,430.1 m. (6.07% Average Tax Rate)
Expenditures: $ 1,675.83 m.
Treasury: -$ 5,065 m.
National Defence
Army: 198,681 Regulars, Average (15/25) Equipment & Training
Reserves: 1,416,784 Able bodied men
Navy: 4 Sail Frigates, 4 Steam Frigates, 8 Minor Vessels, Poor (7/25) Equipment & Training
Player: Mikkel Glahder
United Principalities
Government: Constitutional Monarchy
Leader(s): Domnitor Alexandru Ioan Cuza
Population: 3.256 m. 1.38% Growth
Gross Domestic Product: $3,074 m. 2.97% Growth ($944.09 per Capita)
Trade: $ 234.86 m.
Infrastructure: Failing (5/25)
Administration: Poor (10/25)
Government
Balance: $ 7.92 m.
Receipts: $ 115.03 m. (5.86% Average Tax Rate)
Expenditures: $ 107.11 m.
Treasury: -$ 266 m.
National Defence
Army: 22,318 Regulars, Poor (7/25) Equipment & Training
Reserves: 210,266 Able bodied men
Navy: 2 Sail Frigates, 4 Minor Vessels, Failing (5/25) Equipment & Training
Player: Arrowfiend
Russian Empire
Government: Absolute Monarchy
Leader(s): Tsar Alexander II
Population: 78.478 m. 3.14% Growth
Gross Domestic Product: $78,772 m. 3.85% Growth ($1,003.74 per Capita)
Trade: $ 8,909.1 m.
Infrastructure: Poor (9/25) [+1 per year until 1863]
Administration: Poor (8/25)
Government
Balance: -$ 3,531.35 m.
Receipts: $ 2,819.42 m. (5.81% Average Tax Rate)
Expenditures: $ 6,350.78 m.
Treasury: -$ 20,669 m.
National Defence
Army: 328,621 Regulars, Average (14/25) Equipment & Training
Reserves: 5,276,975 Able bodied men
Navy: 1 Ironclads, 21 Ships of the Line, 34 Sail Frigates, 9 Steam Frigates, 24 Minor Vessels, Poor (8/25) Equipment & Training
Player: jacobl-Lundgren
Principality of Serbia
Government: Principality
Leader(s): Prince Mihajlo Obrenović
Population: 1.259 m. 1.82% Growth
Gross Domestic Product: $1,100 m. 0.87% Growth ($873.92 per Capita)
Trade: $ 124.41 m.
Infrastructure: Poor (6/25)
Administration: Failing (5/25)
Government
Balance: $ 7.44 m.
Receipts: $ 55.99 m. (4.27% Average Tax Rate)
Expenditures: $ 48.55 m.
Treasury: -$ 472 m.
National Defence
Army: 9,682 Regulars, Poor (7/25) Equipment & Training
Reserves: 80,228 Able bodied men
Navy: 2 Minor Vessels, Failing (2/25) Equipment & Training
Player: Watercress
Kingdom of Spain
Government: Constitutional Monarchy
Leader(s): Queen Isabella II
Population: 15.856 m. 0.53% Growth
Gross Domestic Product: $21,297 m. 3.82% Growth ($1,343.17 per Capita)
Trade: $ 3,254.24 m.
Infrastructure: Poor (10/25)
Administration: Poor (8/25)
Government
Balance: -$ 452.5 m. (+$5m from Vietnam)
Receipts: $ 941.26 m. (5.93% Average Tax Rate)
Expenditures: $ 1,393.76 m.
Treasury: -$ 22,182 m.
National Defence
Army: 156,561 Regulars, Average (12/25) Equipment & Training
Reserves: 976,019 Able bodied men
Navy: 2 Ships of the Line, 8 Sail Frigates, 6 Steam Frigates, 43 Minor Vessels, Average (12/25) Equipment & Training [+4 Ironclads in 1 year]
Player: stormbringer
United Kingdom of Great Britian and Ireland
Government: Constituional Parlimentary Monarchy
Leader(s): Queen Victoria / Prime Minister Palmerston
Population: 23.728 m. 1.53% Growth
Gross Domestic Product: $81,584 m. 4.37% Growth ($3,438.26 per Capita)
Trade: $ 14,742.25 m.
Infrastructure: Good (20/25)
Administration: Good (18/25)
Government
Balance: $ 96.53 m.
Receipts: $ 4,752.11 m. (5.81% Average Tax Rate)
Expenditures: $ 4,655.58 m.
Treasury: -$ 78,048 m.
National Defence
Army: 185,825 Regulars, 52,184 Volunteers, Average (11/25) Equipment & Training
Reserves: 1,456,872 Able bodied men
Navy: 5 Ironclads, 65 Ships of the Line, 60 Sail Frigates, 27 Steam Frigates, 93 Minor Vessels, Excellent (21/25) Equipment & Training
Player: KingHigh99
United States of America
Government: Constitutional Federal Republic
Leader(s): President Abraham Lincoln
Population: 21.421 m. 1.97% Growth
Gross Domestic Product: $50,113 m. 3.66% Growth ($2,339.46 per Capita)
Trade: $ 4,815.86 m.
Infrastructure: Average (12/25)
Administration: Average (12/25)
Government
Balance: -$ 3,451.15 m.
Receipts: $ 2,841.55 m. (9.49% Average Tax Rate)
Expenditures: $ 6,292.7 m.
Treasury: -$ 8,765 m.
National Defence
Army: 11,969 Regulars, 270,205 Volunteers, Average (15/25) Equipment & Training
Reserves: 3,348,645 Able bodied men
Navy: 3 Ironclads, 9 Ships of the Line, 84 Sail Frigates, 76 Steam Frigates, 191 Minor Vessels, Average (13/25) Equipment & Training [+6 Minor Vessels/month from St. Louis.]
Player: MastahCheef117
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