The Age of Brass: A Spanish AAR

[RossN]

King Ferdinand VII of Spain.​

Prologue: The Reign of Ferdinand VII

Few kings died as unmourned as Ferdinand VII of Spain. Few reigned as poorly.

Spain in 1833 was a country both exhausted and angered. The struggle against Napoleon and his brother, the would-be ‘King José’ had seen bitter hardship but also great heroism by the long suffering people of Spain. They would never forget that they had been the ones who first broke the invincible legions of the Emperor, that Spanish courage and cleverness and sheer stubbornness had ground away the proudest and greatest army in Europe.

The twenty years after that heroic age had brought only disappointment. Ferdinand, whose throne countless sons of Spain had bled to restore proved himself a tyrant and a fool. No one perhaps could have won back the territories in the Americas as they blossomed into revolution but the monarch turned probability into certainty. At the very least he turned revolution abroad into revolution ay home. The liberal constitution of 1812, created by those who had fought Napoleon had made Spain a constitutional monarchy. As soon as he could Ferdinand had abandoned the constitution and ruled by personal decree. The result was that in 1820, less than a decade after revolt had restored him Ferdinand became a prisoner in his own country.

In 1823 the French invaded again, this time to rescue Ferdinand from disaster and defeat. The Spanish king, restored to power by the bayonets and musket fire of the French had promised to treat properly with the rebels should he be freed. Characteristically he broke his word and the reprisals so shocked the comte d'Artois, the future Charles X of France – no sympathiser with the liberals – that he refused military decorations from the restored Ferdinand.

The ‘ominous decade’ that followed the French invasion saw the King continue his reign in the manner of the despot. Liberals were exiled, as were those more conservatively inclined who fell afoul of the monarch’s whim. Spain was no stranger to absolutism, but Ferdinand would have been a bad ruler in any century and the century he lived in was one that had in many cases abandoned the style he preferred. The collapse of French absolutism in 1830 was a sign that Ferdinandism had little future.

And yet perhaps there were those who would miss what Ferdinand represented even if they did not miss the man himself. The great aristocrats and the Church, those pillars of Old Spain looked anxiously at the liberals in France and elsewhere. They feared for their privileges but it was not privilege alone that motivated them. The Terror was within living memory. Who was to say Spain would long remain stable under the constitution of 1812?

There was also at least one area of Spain where the people would champion Ferdinand against the liberals. The Basques had not supported the constitution of 1812 which had ignored their ancient freedoms in favour of centralised state. For these people the ascendance of the liberals was a sincere threat.

Queen Maria Christina of the Two Sicilies, widow of Ferdinand VII and mother of Queen Isabella II.
​

Matters came to a head in 1830. That year Ferdinand published the Pragmatic Sanction, abandoning the Salic Law that restricted the throne to males. Ferdinand had not seen the children of his first three marriages live to see their first year. Personal tragedy was averted and the future of Spain changed forever when his fourth wife, Maria Christina of the Two Sicilies gave birth to a daughter in October 1830, followed by a second in January 1832. Both the elder the Infanta María Isabel Luisa (soon to be Queen Isabel II of Spain) and the younger the Infanta María Luisa Fernanda would live to see old age. By traditional Spanish law neither girl stood to inherit the throne for their uncle the Infante Carlos, conde de Molina stood ahead of them in the succession. Or at least he had before the Pragmatic Sanction.

Don Carlos was as absolutist as his brother, though other than his arch conservative views he was generally reckoned a far better man than Ferdinand. When Maria Christina, pushing the rights of her older daughter pressured the dying Ferdinand to make Carlos swear allegiance to Isabella as Princess of Asturias the conde de Molina refused. Unlike Ferdinand Carlos was too pious and honourable (or too stiff necked depending on one’s views) to abandon what he regarded as his divine rights. To Carlos it was not so much that he wished for the throne himself (his supporters were far more forthright than the prince himself) as that he had a duty to uphold the law of both God and the land. For his stubbornness Carlos was politely exiled to Portugal.

Ferdinand VII died on 29 September 1833, his last months a misery of gout. His wife Maria Christina moved swiftly, declaring herself regent and her two year old daughter Queen. Maria Christina had two immense advantages over Don Carlos; she was in Madrid and he was abroad and she was in sympathy with the liberals. That half of Spain that had longed to be free of Ferdinand were cautiously willing to embrace his daughter and widow and soon the exiles began to return.

Don Carlos had moved nearly as fast as his sister-in-law, declaring himself King of Spain. Unfortunately for the would-be monarch when he tried to enter Spain he found his path blocked by armed forces loyal to the Regent and her daughter. He was forced to remain stranded in Portugal, itself undergoing a civil war between rival claimants to the throne until 1834 when he escaped to England and thence to France before finally returning to Spain after various adventures. Once there he established a rival court to Maria Christina in the north of the country.

Less than two years after the death of Ferdinand VII Spain had drifted from turmoil into outright civil war. On one side stood Queen Isabella II and her mother, supported by most of the army and the navy along with the liberals and even many conservatives looking for a compromise between the Spain of 1812 and that of Ferdinand. On the other side was Don Carlos, backed by much of the Church and the old guard of the aristocracy along with the Basques and those who personally questioned Maria Christina's fitness to rule. The other great powers largely supported Maria Christina, hoping for a swift victory and a stable Spain though time would tell if those hopes were realistic.

At the start of 1836 Spain stood impoverished within, diminished abroad and in the process of tearing herself apart. The road back to power, prestige and peace would not be a straight one, if such a road existed at all...

Infante Carlos, conde de Molina (King Carlos V to his supporters.)​

 

[RossN]

Spain in Europe.

Cuba & Puerto Rico.

Spanish Guinea.

The Spanish East Indies.

Spain in 1836

Head of State: Queen Isabella II (monarch) / Queen Maria Christina (regent)
Head of Government: Sr. Juan Álvarez Mendizábal (President of the Council of Ministers) [1]
Ruling Party: Parti Moderato (Conservative)
Rank: #8
Population (inc. colonies): 16.95 million.
Allies: None.
Sphere of Influence: None.
Army: 25 regiments (20 in Spain, 5 overseas)
Navy: 27 ships (9 Clipper Transports, 9 Frigates, 9 Man o'war.)


1. Historical at the beginning of 1836.

 

[RossN]

The Battle of Pamplona (11 to 13 February 1836), the key battle of the war.​

Chapter One: The First Carlist War

1834 and 1835 had seen some bruising clashes between the Carlists and the forces of the government in Madrid, known variously as the Isabelinos (after the Queen) or the Cristinos (after her mother.) The brilliant and ruthless General Tomás de Zumalacárregui had proven himself the very reincarnation of Quintus Sertorius. A grave and disciplined Basque with a religious faith like tempered steel he more than anyone had turned the isolated and disorganised supporters of Don Carl into a potent army and a serious threat to the liberals. Even with all the advantages the Cristinos possessed from control of all Spain's key cities to the financial and in some cases military aid of the foreign powers the so-called "Wolf of Las Amezcoas" held the conflict in the balance. Had he lived the Carlists might have won the war outright but the soldier died in strange circumstances on 24 June 1835, after from botched surgery on a minor war wound by a local quack doctor. His death allowed Queen Maria Christina to breathe a little easier but still left thousands of Carlist troops in the North.

The fighting over the previous two years had been grim even by the fierce standards of Spanish war. Neither side recognised the other as legitimate, by definition could not. The practice of execution by firing squad swiftly became routine and grew so pronounced that the British government became involved and attempted to broker a regulation treating prisoners of war. With so much of the fighting in the hands of irregulars and hastily rounded up conscripts there were many longstanding local grudges that could be settled under the cover of war. Added to all this were the dark spectre of rural poverty and religious strife. Though the vast majority of the Cristinos were not anti-religious there was a pungent whiff of anti-clericalism to some, a feeling returned in gusto by those on the other side eager to match the traitor with the atheist.

At the beginning of 1836 the government appointed General Joaquín Baldomero Fernández-Espartero y Álvarez de Toro as commander of the national army. General Espartero was a natural born leader, unflinching in the face of war. He was a dashing and splendid officer, a great partisan of the young queen. He was a an able general in pitched battle, siege or guerrilla warfare. He was a champion of the liberal cause and fiery hero for reform. He was all these things and deservedly a legend in his own lifetime. He was also shamelessly, ruthlessly, brilliantly ambitious. In Espartero Spain had found her Caesar.

With the key Carlist army besieging the Cristino stronghold of Pamplona Espartero immediately marched the thirty thousand men of the Ejército Cristino del Centro [the Cristino Army of the Centre] north. The government had troops already present in northern Spain but the fifteen thousand men of the Ejército del Norte were encircled in Barcelona, not immediately threatened and well supplied by sea but not available for an offensive without risking Spain's second city to the enemy. Given the known desperation of the Carlists to acquire a seaport Espartero refused to take that risk. That left one other army on Spanish soil. The Ejército del Sur, also fifteen thousand strong was far to the south. Ordered north they would arrive too late to fight at Pamplona, though not to participate in future battles.

The position of the Carlist and Cristno (government) armies, January 1836.
​

Pamplona itself was an old fortified city that lay in a rounded valley on the banks of the River Agra. Cooler and wetter than Madrid the city was still hot and dry enough to avoid snow and ice, a small mercy for the soldiers when the Carlists and Cristinos clashed in February. The Carlist commander was General Agustín Acuña, perhaps their finest general after the late Zumalacárregui and with advanced knowledge of Espartero's approach he chose his ground well. The Carlist forces at some twenty one thousand lacked the numbers of their enemy and had neither cavalry nor artillery but they were seasoned and determined fighters. Beginning on the afternoon of 11 February and lasting until the evening of 13 February the two armies struggled outside the city. Espartero employed his cavalry to devastating effect; though the first charge was pushed back with sharp losses from the crackle of Carlist musketry a second strike to the flank backed up well placed artillery. Slowly the stubborn Carlist lines began to bend until suddenly morale snapped and they were in flight.

Esperartero had won a great victory and probably broken the strength of the enemy but it had come at cost. With nearly ten thousand men dead, wounded or missing he was not about to send his weary troops into a goose chase hunting down the remnants of Acuña's command in the Cantabrian Mountains. Instead he made camp at Zaragoza, waiting for his soldiers to recover sufficiently to march on the Carlists ringing Barcelona. The freshly arrived Ejército del Sur would instead track down Acuña, finally defeating him for good at the Battle of Bilbao on 22 April. Meanwhile Esperartero achieved impressive victories at Tarragona (21 to 22 March) and Lérida (8 April), allowing the once 'trapped' Ejército del Norte to break the final Carlist field army in the north east at Gerona on 11 April. As the Carlist front collapsed thousands of rebels surrendered or deserted.

The Battles of Pamplona and Tarragona, February and March 1836.​

By May 1836 it seemed as if the Carlist cause had collapsed completely. Don Carlos himself was still not captured and much of his court remained free but as an organised force the Carlists had simply ceased to exist. The mood in areas of Spain that had supported the pretender, above all the Basque countryside appeared sullen but resigned. Esperatero and the Ejército Cristino del Centro returned to Madrid and a heroes welcome from the government (in public; in private there was a sharp degree of fear about so gifted and popular a general.) The war had been won, or so it was assumed. Over the course of the next year the military supply budget would be drastically cut. By a minor miracle and a ferocious tariff wall Spain had survived the civil war with her finances intact. To keep it that way and to reduce the crushing burden elsewhere the government retreated from a full war footing, slicing at spending for the military stockpile. As with so much else that seems sensible at the time it would prove a dreadful mistake [1].

The first sign that Carlism was simply dormant and not dead would not arrive until December 1837 with almost simultaneous uprisings at Bilbao and the Aragonese town of Teruel. Neither city fell to the enemy but the countryside surrounding each was rife with rebels. The Carlists were a mix of tough old soldiers, the survivors from the defeated armies of the previous years bolstered by wily peasant recruits, especially in the Basque regions. They were not well equipped, but then neither were the Cristinos.

General Nicolás Acuña (no relation to the Carlist commander of the same name) was a rising star in the Spanish Army who had won a reputation for dauntlessness during the early fighting [2]. At the end of 1836 the then forty two year old officer from Seville had been promoted to command of the Ejército del Norte. In early January 1836 he wrote candidly to his brother, also in the Army though not on the front lines:

'The problem is not courage Raoul. The men abound with it. Nor is it leadership; even those soldiers who have never seen him look upon the commander [General Esperarto] with adoration.... the problem is supplies. We are starved of powder and shot and my soldiers must resort to the bayonet often. My cannon are useless after the first volley... worse though is the food and clothing. Four or five soldiers sharing the same lice riddled blanket itself unfit for mountain warfare or winter warfare let alone both. Meals of hard bread and scraps of cheese, washed down by wine like vinegar or sour water. As much as the men hate the enemy they hate the quartermaster more - yet what can be done?'

Esperato, with a larger army under his direct command had to worry about warhorses on top of everything else as the Ejército Cristino del Centro had three brigades of cuirassiers in his ranks. They were crack troops as they'd proved at Pamplona, Tarragona and Lérida but they were a logistical nightmare. Though Bilbao was perhaps more at risk - the fall of the city could cause a general Basque rising - Esperato moved on Teruel first, crushing the rebels on the evening of 10 January 1838. He directed Acuña to delay as long as he dared before advancing on the Carlists in the north west. The commander reasoned that either the weather or Acuña's supply situation or ideally both would improve before the clash came. Esperato was not driven by humanitarianism, as least not directly, but by the coolheaded logic that a army fought better when it did not have to worry about freezing to death overnight or half the men were sick from the brackish water they'd been forced to drink.

The Ejército del Norte finally reached the vicinity of Bilbao on 13 February. There followed a two day battle between the two General Acuñas that saw the Cristino emerge triumphant, though not without losses. The Carlist survivors retreated to Santander were Nicolás Acuña eventually forced their surrender on the evening of 28 February.

The Carlist uprising of December 1837 (the 'Christmas Uprising'.) Esperato commanded government forces in Madrid, Acuña those in Barcelona.
​

For the second time the war appeared to be over. However unlike in May 1836 the mood in the newspapers both foreign and domestic was cautious, even pessimistic. Very few believed that Don Carlos had a chance of reviving his fortunes after two military defeats but the resiliency of the Carlists had surprised and frightened many, drawing back to uncomfortable memories of the relentless guerrilla war of the Napoleonic era. Was this now to be the Spanish future, an eternity of rebels hiding in the mountains? Don Carlos did not have the affections of most in the Kingdom of Spain (save perhaps in the Basque country) but those who followed him were committed and ruthless. Though Queen Maria Cristina and the Cortes had gone so far as to strip the pretender of his rank and titles and condemn his a traitor it seemed very unlikely that the government had seen the last of 'Carlism'.

In truth the uprisings of late 1837 and early 1838 were not great threats to the government. Even with the paltry flow of supplies the situation had been far more grave in 1836 when Barcelona might have fallen to the enemy and the fear of the Carlists sweeping towards Madrid was on everyone's lips. The damage done by the Carlists of December 1837 was more subtle, and more far reaching than their dismal military performance. The government in Madrid, especially Maria Cristina who was both the symbolic and real centre of power were embarrassed by the affair. The blame was perhaps unfair. It was too easily forgotten that most observers concluded the war was over in May 1836 and in those circumstances trimming spending on muskets, rifles and new artillery pieces was not just sensible it was necessary to keep the fragile Spanish economy afloat. The government, desperate to avoid the mire of foreign loans as much as possible had behaved with caution. It was bad luck that their caution proved misplaced.

For Baldomero Espartero, already feted as the hero of Spain the late uprising had further gilded his reputation. Many saw him as the man who had snatched victory from the defeat of Maria Cristina's ministers. Those most desiring reform were especially besotted as Espartero more than any civilian politician became the 'face' of liberal Spain. Maria Cristina ordered the general to remain in the north, ostensibly to make sure the rebels who had gone to ground would not reform into units but also at least partially to keep him out of Madrid lest he perform a coup d'état. He would finally be recalled early in 1839, arriving to a grand procession in Madrid and many honours. He was styled El pacificador de España, was made a grandee of the first class, and received two dukedoms. Very soon after Maria Cristina was forced to accept him as President of the Council of Ministers [Prime Minister].

With the Carlists (temporarily?) removed from the field the true battle for control of Spain now lay between the regent and the war hero. Matters would come to a head in the general election of 1840.

General Baldomero Espartero.​

​

Footnotes:

[1] Among other matters I ruthlessly slashed the Military and Naval stockpiles after the war was (apparently) over.

[2] Nicolás Acuña is a fictional (game generated) general with 'Rising Star' and 'Dauntless'. Espartero was obviously a real person and is generated by the NNM mod with 'Natural Born Leader' and 'Unflinching'.

 

[RossN]

Isabella II, Queen of Spain, circa. 1838.​

Chapter Two: The Election of 1840.

The Cristino (or Isabellino) faction that now controlled Spain was made of 'liberals' but though the Carlists would see them as interchangeable they were far from a monolithic bloc.

The largest faction supporting the government were the Partido Moderado or Moderates. The Moderates were indeed 'liberal' in the sense that they were opposed to absolute monarchy but their instincts and beliefs hewed more to the conservatism of the Tories of Great Britain and Ireland than the more radical reformers. This was the faction of the landowner and the traditional Army officer, the clergy than shrank from the support of Don Carlos and those elements of the middle class who feared the total overthrow of tradition that their more left wing rivals seemed to represent. They tended towards protectionism and interventionism in the economy. The Moderate leader was Francisco de Paula Martínez de la Rosa y Berdejo, a dramatist and intellectual thrown rather against his will into the seat of power. As President of the Cabinet during the reign of Ferdinand he had earned the thankless nickname of Rosita la Pastelera ['Rosie the cake maker'] for his doomed efforts to steer a middle course between Reactionary and Radical.

Recalled to serve his young queen Martinez de la Rosa had held office in 1834 and into 1835 before resigning in the face of the ongoing war. His successor, also of the Moderates, was the Conde de Toreno. That grandee enjoyed the confidence of Maria Cristina but in the charged politics of the time his government felt apart before the end of the year. The Conde de Toreno was followed (briefly) by General Álava (a Basque but a loyalist to the queen and her mother.) After mere days Álava would go and Juan Álvarez Mendizábal became President.

Thus far the civilian political leaders had been men who had all been exiled at one point during the reign of Ferdinand and who all supported the Constitution of 1812. The difference between the Moderates and the Partido Progresista or Progressives, the party of Mendizábal, was that the former saw 1812 as a goal in itself while the latter saw it as a stepping stone to greater reform. The Progressives looked back fondly to the brief period known as the 'Trienio Liberal' from 1820 to 1823 when King Ferdinand had been a prisoner of a radical government created by an uprising. They were a movement supported mainly by intellectuals, ambitious elements of the middle class, Army officers from less grand backgrounds and, at least in theory, most of the urban poor (in theory as the poor and for that matter the vast bulk of the middle class lacked the franchise.) There was a strain of anti-clericalism within the Progressive faction but there liberal theologians as well and few wished to entirely strip Spain of her Catholic identity. When it came to the economy they believed in free trade and a laissez faire approach by the state. Mendizábal himself did not last long in office, having failed to bring a swift end to the Carlist revolts but he did revive Progressive ambitions.

Last and technically least there were those who sympathies for Don Carlos were scarcely hidden. Not every believer in the absolute monarchy or the local freedoms or the inviolability of the Church had picked up musket and sword and there remained a stubbornly reactionary streak peppering the ranks of the Cortes.

The political parties in Spain, 1836 to 1840.​

In 1834 Maria Cristina had published a Royal Statue, restoring some though not all of the constitution of 1812. The reborn Spanish legislature - the Cortes - was composed of an upper house appointed by the monarch (or the Queen Regent in this case) from the nobility, aristocracy and the rich and an elected lower house in the manner of the British parliament. Very few Spaniards actually possessed the vote under this system and even the Moderates found it limiting but it was certainly a step away from the days of 'Ferdinand the Felon'. The Moderates were prepared to work with the Royal Statute. Not so the Progressives. Soon the sense of bitterness ebbed and the active intrigues began.

On 13 August 1836 while the bulk of the Army was still returning from the north Progressive sympathizing soldiers at the Palacio Real de La Granja de San Ildefonso mutinied. La Granja located some fifty miles from Madrid was the summer palace of the Royal Family, a lovely Baroque building famous for it's surrounding gardens. The Queen Regent's life was not imperiled but she was obliged to concede the promise of a constitution to the mutineers and to name a government dominated by Progressive ministers. This ministry led by José María Calatrava y Peinado published a new constitution in 1837. The Constitution of 1837 restored further aspects of that of 1812 but retained a wealth qualification for the vote, in practice restricting the franchise to five percent of the population.

The problem faced by the Progressive leaders like Mendizábal and Calatrava was though they were radical the Cortes was not. Every ministry between 1834 and 1840 was functionally a coalition of everyone who was not a Carrlist. Mendizábal had led a government full of Moderates and Caltrava, forced on the Queen Regent by a near coup of Royal Guard sergeants was also marooned in a parliament far more conservative than he. Hence the compromises of the new constitution.

Maria Cristina had another problem beyond the incessant struggle for power in Madrid. The Queen Regent possessed a secret that could and eventually would destroy her. She had taken a lover. Or, more accurately, she had taken a husband. Don Agustin Fernando Muñoz y Sánchez, an officer of the Army and a Royal bodyguard had been the Queen Regent's constant companion since the death of her husband. Had this handsome gentlemen remained simply her favourite then their acquaintance would have been little more a delicious tang to ever flowing motions of court gossip; after all it was well known that the mother of Britain's young queen was engaged in similar affairs. However Maria Cristina had gone further, secretly marrying Muñoz in December 1833, mere months after the passing of Ferdinand. Ultimately she would bear him seven children.

Madrid in 1840.
​

Somehow, despite the fragile nature of the Spanish government and the perversely self destructive temper of some of its members it managed to remain functioning during the four years between 1836 to 1840. The apparent end of the war had seen a modest increase in the fortunes of the state. The Kingdom of Spain was not a rich country, still lacking in any serious industry and relying on agriculture and the output of dedicated artisans but, through the heavy use of tariffs and slicing the Army and Navy stockpiles, money could be found to increase the education budget, provide modest encouragement for entrepreneurship and begin building railways. The state investment in railways was one of the few things that Moderates and Progressives could agree on; both factions were deeply invested in raising the economy (though they disagreed about many of the particulars) and in centralising Spain and creating a web of lines across the country served both. The ambitious plans raised under Calatrava's ministry proved optimistic, but by the end of the decade the locomotive would become a familiar sight to many Spaniards.

The Carlist resurgence of December 1837 saw a brief but sharp shock to the economy as the government was forced to buy up supplies for the Army, often at inflated cost. Still, Spain was in a reasonably healthy state by 1840.

Above everyone - Maria Christina, her daughter, Álava, Mendizábal, Calatrava, everyone - was General Baldomero Espartero. Like Goya's El Coloso he towered above his country. The Queen Regent was not the only one who feared his popularity and control of the Army and Maria Cristina kept him away from Madrid as long as possible. By January 1839 that possibility had faded away. The 'Duque de la Victoria' (one of Espartero's newly won titles) stepped from the general's tent to the prime minister's office, replacing the well meaning but relatively weak Caltrava.

Objectively Espartero was a fine choice. Spain had not been blessed by strong premiers. Espartero was iron willed, charismatic and lionised by many. Though a Progressive in what was still a Modetate dominated Cortes the desire to hold together an anti-Carlist coalition was strong enough to waive away opposition (at least in public.) Most importantly though if the Duque de la Victoria was not granted what he (and much of the kingdom) saw as his due there was a strong chance the Army would seize it for him.

For a year and half the dance continued in Madrid. A foreigner, a woman and the widow of the least loved king in Spain's history the Queen Regent's personal support had never been great. Had it been there would have been no Constitution of 1837. Her own sympathies were towards reform, at least compared with Ferdinand and Carlos but Maria Cristino would have been other than human if she was not resentful of the politicians who intrigued against her and regarded her with open disdain. For all her theoretical power Maria Cristino was never her own agent, rather she was attempting to preserve her daughter's throne and the integrity of her daughter's kingdom. As the news of her clandestine marriage became public even those who had previously supported her began to abandon her.

The election held across the Spring and early Summer of 1840 brought a heady mix of anxiety and hope. The Moderates, a majority in the Cortes even if they had bowed to a Progressive ministry were hoping to keep their numbers. The Progressives, having delivered a constitution in 1837 and having kept the country economically stable believed they would be rewarded.

The results of the 1840 election.

The concentration of the vote.
​

By the time the final results were counted on 1 July 1840 the Progressives were left reeling. In every part of Spain the Progressive cause had faltered. The countryside, save in those places where the devotees of Don Carlos held sway had proven solidly conservative, sullen and suspicious of the grand reforms promised. However it was the cities that had provoked the worst shock. Here indeed the Progressives had done far better and almost all their deputies were brought in by the urban vote. Yet the Moderates had performed well even here. In the universities the more conservative academics and theologians had found much to dislike in the Progressive platform while the traditional trade guilds had suspicions about rapid industrialisation.

The scale of the Moderate victory caught that faction by surprise too. Out of two hundred and fifty eight deputies elected to the Congreso de los Diputados one hundred and fifty three were Moderates, sixty one were Progressives and forty four belonged to neither party (ie. they were Carlists in all but name.) The worst humiliation and most frightening aspect for the Progressives was that this defeat had taken place under a constitution published by them.

Despite the scale of the Moderate victory the political situation in July 1840 immediately worsened. The Progressives now had every reason to fear that the Moderates would role back the recent reforms. Worse they suspected the Queen Regent would now have every reason to seek another compromise, this time not with the left but with the Carlists. Even before the end of the Summer Progressive across Spain, particularly in the cities would be rioting as the situation began to rapidly unravel.

In theory the most rebellious Progressives - however loud their voices in the newspapers, however ill tempered their crowds in the plazas, whatever resolutions adopted by the scores of townhouse juntas they set up - were only a small minority of the Spanish people. Had Maria Cristina been able to trust the Army she could have easily ignored the tumult, or swept it aside with the drawn sabre of the soldiers. Unfortunately for her Maria Cristina could not trust the Army, not with Spain's Caesar present. Espartero's popularity was far greater than his faction and even those officers and men who leaned to his right would hesitate to disobey the great war hero. With little choice in the matter the Queen Regent turned to the general to quash the riots before they turned into a true revolution.

Espartero did end the rioting - by taking control of Spain. The end when it came was bloodless but no less bitter for that. On 12 October 1840 Maria Cristina resigned the regency. Her parting words to her successor (and usurper) were 'I made you a duke, but I could not make you a gentleman.' Then she and her husband departed for exile in France, feeling perhaps that at least now they could openly live as man and wife.

The war hero was now Regent, in charge of a fragile kingdom, a ten year old Queen and a Cortes with a conservative majority in both houses [1].

General Baldomero Espartero, the Duque de la Victoria, Regent of Spain.

​

Footnotes:

[1] The fall of Maria Cristina and the rise of Espartero is historical (more or less - I simplified things for clarity) rather than an in-game event. It is hard to model stuff like the Revolution of 1840 where Spain went from a quasi-constitutional monarchy to a semi-constitutional monarchy with a different regent. Likewise the Royal Statue of 1834 and the Constitution of 1837 are both still HM Government in game terms.

 

[RossN]

The Empire of Mexico, early 1841.​

Chapter Three: American Adventures

While Spain had been distracted by internal turmoil her former colonies across the Atlantic were suffering in their own way. South America was a cauldron of conflict as war blazed between Bolivia and all her neighbours save the Empire of Brazil, which was trapped in her own desperate battle against her rebellious southern provinces. Here there was perhaps some potential for Spanish economic and political influence with Argentina and Chile wooed into the sphere of Madrid but until the region was more stable the potential would have to remain just that, potential.

Further North the República Federal de Centroamérica ['Federal Republic of Central America'], also known as the Provincias Unidas del Centro de América ['United Provinces of Central America'] had collapsed in the late 1830s, bequeathing the world a collection of squabbling statelets. Their giant neighbour to the North had fared only fractionally better. The shock of the successful secession of Texas had brought down the Mexican government and ignited a civil war in the former New Spain.

The government in Madrid under Maria Cristina was not blind to all this, but until 1841 there was very little Spain could do to so much as peek beyond her own borders. However the period after the elections and the bloodless coup of Baldomero Espartero left Spain relatively stable, with a leader prepared to look abroad. Fortunately for Espartero he had a counterpart elsewhere who had similar ambitions for his country.

The country that became Mexico had a fraught birth even by the standards of the Latin American nations. After a long armed struggle against the Spanish the Treaty of Córdoba in August 1821 had created an independent Mexican Empire. Initially it was hoped that the Mexican throne would go to King Ferdinand VII, in a form of personal union where Mexico was otherwise entirely left to its own devices. Unfortunately while the Spanish representative in Mexico was prepared to favour such an arrangement the government in Madrid was not and the result was a total rupture between the two countries and the brief existence of a Mexican monarchy under Agustín de Iturbide before that too crumbled away. Unexpectedly the events of the 1830s revived that question.

Antonio López de Santa Anna had fallen from grace with the shocking defeat at the hands of the Texan rebels and in his place other ambitious men vied for power. With Santa Anna in (as it turned out) temporary exile Mexican conservatives, anxious to keep the liberal faction out of power began to consider reviving the monarchy and late in 1840 the conservative dominated Congress declared that Mexico would again become an empire. The late Emperor Agustín had a son and heir, but Don Agustín Jerónimo de Iturbide was not a man which much of a following of his own and few could forget the fate of his father. Instead General Nicolás Bravo Rueda, who now ruled Mexico turned to a foreign monarch. But whom?

Comayagua, capital of Honduras.
​

At this stage the delicate courtship began between the Mexican regent and his Spainish counterpart. Bravo, returning to the abandoned Treaty of Córdoba proposed that Queen Isabella II become Empress of Mexico. Espartero found the idea intriguing. In and of itself the move would restore Spain's enfeebled foreign name and create a lasting alliance with the second most powerful nation in the Americas. However the ambitions of Spain's Caesar did not end there.

The two powers that really controlled access to the New World were Britain and the United States and at another time Espartero would be justifiably wary of antagonizing them. However during the early 1840s the international situation had shifted in Spain's favour. Britain was heavily involved in her conflict with China (the so-called 'Opium War') and would not seek war with Spain over intrigues in Central America. As for the United States, the surprise re-election of Martin Van Buren in November 1840 left a man relatively sympathetic to Madrid in the White House. Certainly an America still trying to decide what to do about Texas had sufficient foreign problems on her plate already.

Espartero's plan was to split the former territories of the Federal Republic of Central America (now the independent republics of Guatemala, Nicaragua, Honduras, El Salvador and Costa Rica.) The Mexican Empire would directly annex Guatemala, the largest and most northerly of the states with Spain initially occupying Honduras before turning South. El Salvador would be held in a form of joint sovereignty.

From the beginning Espartero's scheme was highly ambitious but had Mexico remained stable it might well have worked. In December 1841 however the first sparks of what would eventually become a three way civil war erupted in Guanajuanto north-west of Mexico City. The initial uprising was composed of rival reactionaries to Bravo, men who agreed in principle with the Mexican monarchy and for the most part even with the hypothetical Empress Isabella but who would not settle for Bravo pulling the strings. Soon these 'White' rebels would be joined by Mexican Jacobins - liberals hoping to restore the republic [1].

Though for most of 1841 and 1842 a victory for Bravo appeared likely Espartero knew he would have to act without Mexican aid. Events back home [2] forced the grand design to be pared back still further and meant the Spanish would have to rely on their forces already based in the West Indies. Now the target, at least in the medium term, had shrunk simply to Honduras.

Though Guatemala was larger (in population terms) Honduras was a significant prize. Home to nearly a third of a million people the state offered ports on both the Atlantic and the Pacific and stretched across the great isthmus linking both Americas. In the northeast the country was dominated by nearly impenetrable tropical jungles and marshes, the haunt of the mosquito and the supposed site of fabulous lost cities whispered about in legend since the days of Cortés. To the west and south things grew more civilised dominated by savannas and mountain ranges. Independence had not greatly changed the place since the days when it had been part of the Capitanía General de Guatemala [Captaincy General of Guatemala.]

The other aspect that made Honduras the most appetizing target in the region was that she was internally divided. General Francisco Ferrera, the Honduran president was a dictator and perhaps the people would prove just that fraction less invested in fighting for his title.

The Honduran public condemnation of Spain in August 1842 created much international attention.
​

Unfortunately for Espartero just getting to war proved harder than might have been expected. The easy part was in Madrid; both Moderates and Progressives (and Carlists for that matter) favoured a move to reassert Spain abroad and the Regent proved himself a shrewd propagandist at home.

The trouble came through a bizarre series of events that repeatedly saw Spanish naval officers try to slip into Trujillo in Honduran uniform in order to spy on the enemy and perhaps cause 'incidents' to push the countries closer to war [3]. These unusual events which seemed to have been planned by local military leaders in Cuba rather than in Madrid proved as humiliating as they were counter productive. The worst such incident came in July 1842 when a boatswain of the 80-gun ship Héroe (part of the Armada de Cuba) proved himself a greater romantic than a spy and visited the house of a charming lady of Trujillo carrying key letters in the pocket of his uniform. The military secrets thus exposed were minor indeed but they allowed the Honuran government to prove to the world that the Spanish were very much the aggressors.

More serious was the number of men and ships available. By January 1843 Espartero was unable to guarantee any reinforcements from Spain proper meaning the war would have to be waged by the three brigades of infantry based in Cuba and Puerto Rico, and the three ships of the line and three frigates of the Armada de Cuba. This was not quite as bad as it sounded; even with limited forces the Hondurans were outnumbered and outgunned both at sea and on the land. The Spanish men, many of them coming from Cuba were experienced in the climate of the Caribbean.

Command of the Ejército de Cuba (two infantry brigades) fell to general de brigada Raimundo Cabrera. General Cabrera, a tall, glowering forty three year old from Valencia was not a popular man in Cuba, his name associated with the tang of disgrace over some unsavory business connected with a former friend's wife - the former friend in question ending up dead in a duel at Cabreara's hand. Even in his professional life he had a brutish quality, though at least he directed this mostly towards the enemy. His junior (though also a general de brigada) was Carlos Fernández, a gangly forty one year old cavalry officer from Oviedo. General Fernández commanded the Ejército de Puerto Rico (one infantry brigade) and had acquired the nickname 'Sabueso' from his troops, partially for his famous persistence and partly for his impressive aquiline nose - a joke in the ranks was that no one could tell if Fernández had the mustache favoured by Spanish officers or if his upper lip was simply 'permanently in shade.'

The third Spanish commander was Contraalmirante Alfonso Barradas. Barradas, the oldest of the three was a fifty six year old from Cadiz with an intellectual, even professorial air that hid a sharp streak of defiance. Barradas knew he was unlikely to meet much resistance from the tiny Hondouran Navy but as the man with actual experience fighting in the Americas - for he was a veteran of the wars of independence - his local knowledge made him a font of wisdom.

The initial invasion, October 1843.
​

On 13 October 1843 the Spanish finally, officially, declared war on the Republic of Honduras. The soldiers, assembled over the past few weeks in Cuba crossed the vivid blue waters of the Caribbean to land at Puerto Lempire. Had the Empire of Mexico been in fit state to join the war La Ceiba would perhaps have been the preferred landing sight but with Mexico in chaos Barradas was very reluctant to approach British held Belize and perhaps prod the lion into wakefulness.

If Cabrera and Fernández had hoped for a decisive battle in the field they were doomed to disappointment. The Honduran defenders at once reverted to the practice of guerrillas, fighting through ambush and sabotage, at night and from cover. For the next year and a half Cabrera and Fernández would be battling shadows and mosquitoes. Fortunately that latter combatant at least was less of a murderous foe than in previous wars; the Spanish Army could not cure malaria but they could blunt the worst of the suffering and far fewer men perished from illness and infection than might have been the case [4].

Surprisingly the key large scale fighting did not take place in Central America at all, but in Europe. Even before the official outbreak of war the Hondurans had sent a naval squadron to raid the Spanish coast, hoping entire to inspire international opinion with such a show of spirit or strike such a humiliating blow at the Spanish government that Espartero would fall. It was a marvelously quixotic gesture that did catch the Spanish offguard and even landed a force on Menorca under the intrepid General Benjamín Vasconcelos. The expedition enjoyed a few weeks worth of success before being crushed at the Battle of the Balearic Island on 27 September 1844. Vasconcelos and most of his men were forced to surrender and his ships sent to the bottom of the sea, either turned into blazing wrecks by Spanish cannon fire or scuttled by their own crews.

The absurd yet audacious Battle of the Balearic Islands, 27 September 1844.

​

The Vasconcelos expedition succeeded in making newspapers around the globe, but it did not persuade any power to intervene in the affair. Likewise while it may have offended Baldomero Espartero's dignity it did not fatally undermine his government, to a great extent because it was already imploding due to domestic affairs. Before the end of the war he had pushed so hard for Espartero would be forced to abdicate his Regency.

Espartero's counterpart in the New World might have considered the Duque de la Victoria fortunate - at least Espartero got to retire to estates and dream of a return to glory. General Nicolás Bravo Rueda was forced to watch as his Second Mexican Empire crumbled away. The irony was that the Mexican conservatives, most of whom either supported or at least acquiesced to the monarchy were the most numerous section of the population, but unable to unite they had bled themselves dry and allowed the liberal republicans to advance. In February 1844 the Empire collapsed completely as the republicans took Mexico City. Bravo survived with his life but faced a wandering exile with little hope of return to his native country.

The Empire of Mexico had always had a certain unreality to it and the magnificent dream of crowning Isabella II as Empress had never advanced beyond rhetoric; indeed as late as October 1843 as the civil war was imperiling any survival of the monarchy in Mexico Bravo had written to Espartero hinting that the Congress was considering other candidates. This may have been an unsuccessful attempt to get military aid from Spain, but if so Bravo was asking for something Spain could not give. Quite apart from the lingering Carlist threat at home Spain could not provoke the United States by landing an army at Veracruz. A blind eye might be turned to Spanish activities in Honduras; it could not be turned to such intervention in Mexico. The triumph of James K. Polk in the 1844 election, replacing the much more accommodating Van Buren and the subsequent alliance between the restored Mexican republic and the United States ended any Spanish hopes of retaining influence in North America.

Even with so much swept away - Espartero, Bravo, the Empire of Mexico itself - the war continued in Honduras and here, at least, Spain saw some achievement. On 9 April 1845 the last Honduran strongholds at San Pedro Sula surrendered to Cabrera. After more than two decades Spain again had a foothold on the American continent.

Spanish possessions in the Americas circa 1845: Cuba, Puerto Rico and Honduras.
​

Footnotes:

[1] Mexico had to deal with two separate rebel groups at the same time - the 'Whites' and the Jacobins. Presumably had the Whites won Mexico would have shifted from HM Government to an Absolute Monarchy. I think in-universe the comparison with the Carlist Wars would not have been lost on Spanish observers!

[2] Of which more in the next chapter.

[3] I got hit by the 'Mission to _' event four times.

[4] My second technology researched (after "Experimental Railroad') was 'Medicine', so my attrition was surprisingly low during the war.

 

[RossN]

The Duque de la Victoria, 1844.​

Chapter Four: The Election of 1845

Strange as it may seem General Baldomero Espartero likely had the Carlists to thank for allowing his regency to last as long as it did.

The December 1837 rising, though it scarcely shook Spain showed that the followers of Don Carlos had not been entirely beaten. Similar risings would happen in later years and, at least for a time Espartero was able to parlay these irregular insurgencies into his image as Spain's protector. The regent enjoyed strong support in the Army, even among those who would not otherwise agree with his reformist views and as long as he retained the confidence of the Army Espartero was Spain.

Beginning in January 1841 the government began investing in the military stockpile. This was very costly but past experience had shown that the supply situation could not be left wanting if rebellion was a realistic chance. Though the Army did not numerically grow in the early 1840s it did become a better disciplined, better equipped force. This would prove vital both at home and abroad in the coming years.

In August 1841 fresh Carlist revolts took place in or around Biblao, Pamplona and Lérida. The risings in Pamplona and Lérida were paltry affairs, composing perhaps six thousand devotees of Don Carlos between them. It can be considered a minor miracle that they took up their muskets, swords and tattered banners at all. Too many defeats had drained the enthusiasm of the ordinary rebels. Much more formidable was the rising around Bilbao; here the indefatigable General Agustín Acuña had drawn twelve thousand men from the seemingly bottomless well of rural Basque's ready to take up arms in defence of their King and against the Madrid government.

General Nicolás Acuña, who still led the Ejército del Norte was tasked with relieving Pamplona and Lérida. He wrote again to his brother on the campaign trail:

'[The Carlist] officers seemed severely disappointed to have been taken prisoner by me rather than the Regent, whose name graces and stains their lips with a mixture of awe and fear. A reputation like that is worth a hundred cannon on the field!'

On 26 September 1841 Espartero crushed Acuña's forces at Bilbao. Once more the spectre of Carlism was exorcised, but it would have taken an optimistic Spaniard indeed to assume they were banished for good.

The Isabellino victory at the Battle of Bilbao, 26 September 1841.
​

The Cortes elected in 1840 was dominated by the most conservative of men. Among them was Luis González Bravo y López de Arjona, unrelated to General Bravo of Mexico. Luis González Bravo, an intellectual and newspaper magnate well represented the forces of 'new' Spanish conservatism embodied in the Moderates: a belief in monarchy, a strong centralised state and the rule of law. Unfortunately for his supporters and himself, Bravo's position and views made him a natural rival of Espartero. Ignoring the Moderate majority the Regent restored Mendizábal to the office of President of the Council. It was a provocative appointment; Mendizábal was an open advocate of nationalising Church property - the so called Desamortización Eclesiástica.

The desire to claim lands held by the Church did owe something to anti-clericalist thought and it is no coincidence that it was the liberal Progressives who pushed the policy. Nevertheless true anti-clericalism was a far weaker force in Spain than it was in France and beneath the rhetoric of God and Mammon that pour liberally from the mouths of politicians on all sides was the simple fact that Spain was financially fragile. The Progressives saw the ecclesiastic holdings, some of the finest land in Spain, as land that could be sold to enterprising small farmers.

Perversely, in the short term Mendizábal (and more significantly Espartero) would be helped by an economic slump from 1842 to early 1844. The crisis had global roots and humbled the economies of the Ottomans and the Russians among others but Spain, preparing for war in the Americas was particularly hard hit. With the treasury dwindling into nothing before their eyes the Moderates in the Cortes were forced to grit their teeth and and accept the policy.

​

The Desamortización was a great victory for the Progressives and staved off an imminent economic catastrophe but it came at great cost to Espartero's hard won prestige as a war hero. The Regent had taken advantage of a desperate moment and pushed hard. Espartero had not conjured the global slump but his policies had perhaps made it worse in Madrid. Already irritated by the arrogance of the general the Moderates were now bitter and resentful.

Mendizábal's confiscation laws, reluctantly passed by the Cortes in January 1844.​

Central America was not the only foreign concern for Madrid in this period. In the early 1840s two separate crisis over the ailing Ottoman State had threatened to plunge Europe into war. The Aegean Islands were stripped from the Sultan's grasp after much bitter diplomacy and intrigue in the chancellor's of the great powers. A similar turmoil over the reaction of a sovereign Albanian principality ultimately to the status quo being maintained, at grave cost to the prestige of both Saint Petersburg and Constantinople. So damaged were the Ottomans in fact that from 1843 on few international observers counted them as even the least of the Great Powers. Instead that honour went to the Netherlands, a kingdom swiftly recovering from the loss of Belgium.

Spain was only tangentially touched by these great events, but they revealed how vulnerable a power without allies could be. Espartero's intrigues with the Empire of Mexico had received support in the Cortes even from his bitterest opponents and the alliance was initially seen as a masterstroke. The idea of crowning young Isabella 'Empress of Mexico' was so tantalizing more pragmatic reports about the instability across the Atlantic were ignored. That Espartero had managed to simultaneously improve relations with the United States was much to his credit.

The strong focus on the Americas over other concerns closer to home was partly because it seemed more prestige could be won there, but it also reflected a less palatable fact. Spain had no obvious friends in Europe. Portugal, her neighbour, was still recovering from a civil war of her own and in any case was a minnow. Spain had reasonably good relations (but no influence) with the Italian states. Britain, still the strongest power on the globe was hostile. The Spanish could not forgive the British for their meddling in the revolts in the Americas while for Britain Spain was still the land of the Inquisition and the slaver. There could be no obvious relationship there beyond brooding suspicion and the revival of Spain in the New World only made matters worse.

Then there was France. For centuries France and Spain had lived an intertwined existence, though the days when Spain was an equal partner or rival, let alone a superior were very distant. Twice within living memory the French had invaded to impose a king on the Spanish throne, the first a foreigner, the second loathed by his own subjects. There were extremely good reasons to hate (and fear!) the French. On the other hand France was rich and powerful and her system of government under King Louis-Philippe was similar to that of Isabella's Spain. The Citizen King had a strong personal stake in ensuring Don Carlos remained off the Spanish throne. Unfortunately while the government of Espartero was a gallant suitor Marianne would not be wooed: Louis-Philippe's genial feelings towards Spain did not translate into a true alliance [1].

The failure to find a friendly power in Europe forced the Regent to stress the Mexican realignment even more than he might have done. In some respects the Empire of Mexico really was more important than the conquest of Honduras. Taking Honduras proved what Spain could achieve with her muskets and bayonets. Winning Mexico proved what Spain could achieve on diplomatic clout alone.

The Cortes Generales.​

​

The first cracks in the regime become obvious in early 1844, not long after the Desamortización. Though there was now money in the treasury Spain continued to run a deficit. The war in Honduras remained popular but the news from Mexico grew ever worse. General Espartero was frequently away from the capital, with the bulk of the Army in the North. Objectively this made some sense. The Carlist strongholds were all in Northern Spain. However there were other less noble reasons that could be read into Espartero's extended absences. Though the Regent's prestige outshone any of them Spain was richer in generals than she was in anything else. The prospect of an ambitious rival leading his forces on Madrid was all too real, not least because Espartero himself had done.

​

Despite (or perhaps because of) the Regent's paranoia there were no great Army rebellions on the scale of the Carlist risings. Instead there were numerous lesser adventures and mutinies. In March 1844 there was an attempt by General Leopoldo O'Donnell to seize the thirteen year old Queen and proclaim her of age to rule, ending the Regency. O'Donnell, an officer from one of Spain's most prestigious military families and the direct descendant of Irish princes was obliged to flee into exile when the coup collapsed. His confederate, General Diego de León, the Conde de Belascoaín was executed by firing squad for his part - a death that rattled minds across Spain and shocked the Army. Diego de León had been a war hero in the fight against the Carlists [2].

By a hundred such brutalities Spain's Caesar saw his popularity drain away over the course of 1844. His great foreign policy achievement, the enthronement of Isabella on the Mexican throne dissolved in the face of liberal revolution across the Atlantic. Even his much admired adroitness in winning the friendship of the United States now seemed diminished with the disappearance of Van Buren. President Polk was courteous enough to the Spanish minister in Washington D.C. but he made it clear there could be no Spanish military expedition in Mexico. The Americans, distrustful of monarchy, proud and ambitious not only believed the Mexican republicans would triumph, they actively desired it.

On 3 October 1844 the Regent returned to Madrid to find the capital in sullen mood. News had arrived the previous evening of the defeat of the Honduran raid on the Balearic Islands, a victory true but one that came laced with the humiliation of the raid happening at all. The election campaigning had been underway for several weeks with the poll itself set for New Year's Day and already there had been clashes in the streets between partisans of the Moderates and the Progressives. And constantly, ever present in the background, passed from speaker to speaker were the angry words: 'remember Diego de León.'

Espartero was no fool. For a man used to being greeted as a hero and the father of his nation the sour faces of the people as they lined the streets to 'welcome' him was a shock. At some point he became aware that he could not continue to hold on without plunging Spain into a civil war. When Generals Acuña and Asensio declared a pronunciamiento on the Queen's fourteenth birthday the Duque de la Victoria was ready to graciously resign and depart for Cadiz and from there England and exile.

The results of the 1 January 1845 election.
​

So suddenly had Espartero surrendered his power that the Spanish government was left momentarily paralyzed. With the teenage monarch declared of age there was obviously no regent, but caught in the throes of an election campaign there was no true functioning Cortes.

To general relief the Progressives, the Moderates and the Army agreed to wait on the results of the elections. Only once Spain had a functioning parliament again would the ship of state be righted. The fact was that even with Espartero's fall in popularity no one in Spain save the Carlists wanted a civil war.

The election of 1845 [3] was conducted under strained circumstances with the future deeply uncertain. The Queen, hitherto a pawn in the hands of others would now be an active monarch. The Honduran situation would soon be decided and that state reintegrated to Spanish rule. Then there was the Army. Even with the Regent gone there was an unease that they had perhaps acquired a taste for power. When the results were tallied in January 1845 it turned out that the Spanish people had scarcely changed their minds in four and a half years. Once again the Moderates were swept in.

Had the great events that had transpired between 1840 and 1845 left no mark on the bulk of the people? Or was the seeming conservativism of the vote a sign that they had deeply marked, and now wished only for stability and prosperity?

The concentration of the vote.
​

Footnotes:

[1] I have warm opinion ratings with France but they are, alas, uninterested in an alliance.

[2] This happened in real life though in 1841 rather than 1844. Most of the details about Espartero's fall are adaptations from real life. In game terms none of these events were rebel spawning revolts but the economic situation really was poor and I really did loose my only ally when the Mexican government collapsed.

[3] The election campaign was fought in late 1844 but voting day itself was on 1 January 1845 so I decided to call it the election of 1845.

 

[RossN]

Queen Isabella II of Spain.​

Chapter Five: The Venetian Crisis

The strange events that would see Spain at war with Britain, the Netherlands and Prussia by April 1848 have their roots far from Madrid. The crisis was born in Venice, Vienna, London and Berlin.

After the final defeat of Napoleon in 1815 Klemens von Metternich was the great statesman of Europe. Though his influence could be exaggerated by rival and admirer alike Prince Metternich was the organiser and overseer of the system that had kept Europe (mostly) at peace for decades under the rubric of conservative monarchy. Unfortunately even this master magician's powers were growing weaker as the 1840s began. His rivals Graf von Kolowrat-Liebsteinsky and Archduke Ludwig had a measure of ascendancy over the epileptic Emperor Ferdinand I. The Austrian Chancellor had become the personal foe of Lord Palmerston, the belligerent British Foreign Secretary.

At the heart of the current crisis lay the historic city of Venice and her hinterland. The 'Kingdom of Lombardy–Venetia', which also included Milan, was one of those legacies of the Napoleonic Wars that had left two of the grandest Italian cities under the Hapsburg monarchy. From 1815 on the attitude of the Italians was sulfurous but it grew actively revolutionary in the 1840s. The disastrous potato blight of 186, though it struck Spain harder than Italy (and Ireland harder even than Spain) had pushed the price of food to dizzying heights, which in Hapsburg Italy fused with liberal anger at the high handed and conservative Austrian rule. Throughout the Summer of 1847 there were near daily riots in Venice proper along with Belluno, Padua, Rovigo, Treviso, Udine and Vicenza (Verona, a heavily garrisoned fortress city was quiet if sullen.) Daniele Manin, a Venetian jurist of Jewish ancestry (which did nothing to increase his popularity with the Austrians) became a leading voice for Venetian concerns.

Though the trouble in Venice was embarrassing for the Austrians it was well within the capabilities of the Hapsburg Army to crush discontent should riot mutate into revolution. Unfortunately for Vienna it was at this point the Prussians chose to interfere. On 6 October they called for Venice 'and her traditional sovereign territory in Italy' to be made into an independent duchy [1]. That of all powers it should be ultra-conservative Prussia that should champion the cause of Italian republicanism seemed incredible and newspapers from New York to Saint Petersburg expressed disbelief. However there was method to the madness if it can be recalled that Prussia had not called for the resurrection of the Serene Republic but for a monarchy in her place. Even this should be taken with a pinch of salt for what it truly might have been however, a diplomatic tactic in the long running rivalry between the Prussians and the Austrians over the future of Germany. Had Britain not intervene it is unlikely that matters would have gone further.

The British had little interest in the relative fortunes of Hohenzollerns and Hapsburgs in Germany but they cared a great deal about Italy and the Mediterranean. They had observed the frighteningly swift decline in Ottoman power. Even though the Ottomans had succeeded in holding off the threat of Muhammad Ali's Egypt it had come at the cost of a bankrupt treasury and waves of internal discontent. In April 1847 Sultan Abdülmecid I had been forced to abrogate the constitution he himself had introduced less than a decade before. The collapse of the Turkish state was becoming a real possibility, or even worse her subordination to a rival Great Power. With Turkey in perhaps terminal decline the British Government had to seek an alternative policy in the region. Venice was that policy.

A 27 April 1847 editorial in the Madrid based La Correspondencia de España explains the Ottoman difficulties.
​

The slowly developing crisis that began in Venice and was threatening to drag in all Europe would have raised mere eyebrows in Madrid had the Spanish government not, by a quirk of fate, been committed to Austria.

The personal rule of Queen Isabella II had begun with foreign policy masquerading as marriage negotiations in the old style of royalty. The monarch had not, unfortunately, turned out to be a great beauty but Isabella was still the young ruler of a great state and the choice of her husband mattered a great deal [2]. Predictably the British and French had become involved with the mutual agreement that Isabella should not marry a French Bourbon. Unfortunately, having agreed to that the two powers disagreed over the prospective grooms. Eventually the French backed Francisco de Asís María Fernando de Borbón proved the chosen candidate. 'Francis of Assisi' as the English newspapers inevitably dubbed him was eight years older than his bride (who was also his first cousin) and considerably shorter and slimmer. Styled the Duque de Cádiz before his marriage Francisco became King-Consort of Spain in October 1846.

From the beginning the match pleased few, least of all the Queen who found her new husband effeminate in the extreme. Isabella had much favoured Francisco's younger brother, Enrique, the Duque de Sevilla. Where Francisco was of delicate constitution and widely believed to be a homosexual the Duque de Sevilla was a dashing and fiery officer who had served in the Navy during the war against Honduras. Unfortunately for Isabella the heroic Enrique was a partisan of the Progressive cause, suspected of holding sympathy towards the Freemasons. The Moderate dominated Cortes led by Luis González Bravo and the Marquesado de Miraflores had persuaded the reluctant Queen that she should choose the apolitical Francisco and uncharacteristically she had given way. Unfortunately the hoped for alliance with France still did not materialise due to domestic problems in Paris.

At this point Spain still had no significant allies, outside Chile and Argentina which were more like minor trading partners than alliances between equals [3]. When the Austrians offered an alliance it came as a surprise but one the Spanish were quick to grasp. Prince Metternich, frustrated in his attempts to mend fences with the British had seen the Spanish as a wild card, a nation with no particular enemies that could buttress the conservative position in Europe. For Queen Isabella friendship with Austria offered strong recognition of her regime. If even the Hapsburgs recognised her as the rightful ruler of Spain it undermined the Carlist argument.

Critics of the Queen on both the right and the left would later blame her for allowing Spain to sleepwalk into a major war in which she had no interest. The charge was never fair. It was true that the young monarch, anxious to stamp her authority on Spain and by nature imperious and impulsive interfered with politics. Isabella played favourites and wrote personally to Vienna and Paris without consulting her government but the alliance with Austria had been welcomed by almost everyone in Spanish politics and there was little appetite among either the Moderates or the Progressives for abandoning Spain's lone ally. In practice the Austrian alliance had meant little to the Spanish government in its first year or so. There were so many domestic intricacies demanding attention that neither the Queen nor her ministers focused on foreign policy. It was therefore only with glacial speed that the seriousness of the Venetian problem became clear.

Archduke Louis, Prince Royal of Hungary and Bohemia and Prince of Tuscany, Regent of Austria.
​

As the crisis deepened in the Winter of 1847 Archduke Ludwig lost confidence in Prince Metternich and the aging Chancellor was pressured to step aside in favour of Kolowrat. It proved a fatal blunder; even in decline Metternich remained immensely respected beyond Austria and if anyone could have pulled the powers back from the edge of war it would have been him. Instead Kolowrat stiffly insisted on Austria maintaining her position. Ludwig and Kolowrat were not solely concerned with the foreign perception of Austria. The Hungarians were growing restless and the fear in Vienna was that any retreat from the most hardline position in Italy would cause open revolt in Budapest.

In Madrid the Marquesado de Miraflores resigned in November. Bravo, perhaps the most sincerely royalist of Spanish politicians accepted the presidency but warned the Queen that Spain would have to choose in the near future between abandoning Austria or joining her in a war. The only solace he could provide was that the Tsar and King Louis-Philippe were also inclined to support Austria. In a fashion that the Spanish neither desired nor predicted they would finally have their alliance with France.

Tsar Nicholas was a devout believer in autocratic monarchy and he held a particular horror of revolution so his support of Vienna came as no surprise. Louis-Philippe on the other hand was forced by circumstance to conduct a more complicated foreign policy. The French had technically 'won' the diplomatic war over Queen Isabella's husband but the cost had been a rupture to Anglo-French relations and disarray in Paris. The King had alienated many of the pro-British faction in politics and found himself having to take a far harder line against Britain than he might have wished, which in turn pushed him into the Austrian camp. What Louis-Philippe needed almost as much Archduke Ludwig and Kolowrat was for Prussia to back down without the sabre being drawn.

To his credit Bravo worked very hard to postpone war. He presumed, correctly, that Queen Victoria and King Wilhem personally favoured peace. However he found that the foreign governments were trapped by their most bullish factions. In Britain the blood was up among the Whigs who saw Austria and Russia as bastions of despotism and the involvement of France and Spain only hardened the pro-war mood. In Prussia 1847 had seen Wilhelm forced to enact a constitution and though he nominally wielded immense power he was in many respects a prisoner of pan-German nationalists who had convinced themselves that humbling Austria was a necessary first step on the road to unifying Germany.

Prussia declares war on Austria, 7 April 1848.
​

On 7 April 1848 King Wilhelm of Prussia, under immense pressure from the most radical elements in Berlin, declared war on Austria. Over the following week all the other European great powers were dragged into the conflict.

In Madrid Bravo knew his duty. In his next audience with the Queen he implored her to send for Baldomero Espartero and make him President of the Council. It was a moment of personal dismay for the Moderate leader. Circumstances had compelled him to join a war that Spain had no interest in and could have little hope of gaining anything from even should the Austrians and their confederates triumph. Perhaps worse he was now suggesting to his Queen that the hated Espartero be recalled to power.

Bravo would have been other than human if he had not felt bitter. However he was in the end a patriot. He knew Spain in 1848 was poorly equipped to fight a war against other Great Powers. Her armies were relatively small, though the experience of the men and officers, many of them veterans in the Carlist War was good. The Navy was in far worse shape, starved of supplies during the lean economic years and grossly inferior to Britain. Spain only possessed three ships of the line and three frigates in European waters with over half the fleet in the West Indies or the Philippines. Worse Spain had no great factories to rapidly produce weaponry, shot and all the other minutae of modern war.

Therefore Espartero. Despite his flaws he was Spain's finest living general. Isabella agreed and on 16 April the Queen formally requested the the Duque de la Victoria return to Madrid.

Europe at war, April 1848.​

Footnotes:

[1] Venice had in fact been a nominal duchy between 1797 and 1805 under Emperor Francis II so the idea of an independent monarchical Venice was not entirely the stuff of Prussian fantasy.

[2] Though it is ungallant to say so much contemporary opinion seems to have held Isabella II to be an acquired taste at best.The international intrigue over her marriage was real and did damage relations between Britain and France and perhaps hurt Louis-Philippe's standing.

[3] Chile and Argentina are in my Sphere of Influence.

 

[RossN]

Spanish soldiers of the Austro-Prussian War.
​

Chapter Six: The Spanish Front

Spain was unfortunate to be at war at all, but her location and her relative military weakness were not entirely without compensations. Had the Armada Española still been the great force it had been in the previous century the British might have diverted their attentions to the Iberian peninsula. As it was, the government of Lord Stanley focused on the greater strength of France leaving Baldomero Espartero some breathing room.

The Duque de la Victoria, now comfortably returned to his stately townhouse in Madrid and possessing both the Presidency and the War Ministry was an Army officer, but he knew that in this war Spain's greatest danger lay at sea. Specifically it lay with the Royal Navy. The Dutch Navy, though formidable, was unlikely to leave its home waters and the Prussians scarcely had a fleet at all. Whether the British landed men at Gibraltar, or some strip of Spanish coastline or even bullied Portugal into allowing the passage of an Army Espartero was confident Spain could win on land, but the very fact that the British might land soldiers anywhere meant Spain had to be strong everywhere.

Equally galling, if less dramatic was the possibility of a naval blockade cutting off the Spanish ports from the outside world. The tactic used to such damning effect against Napoleon's France was just as deadly against Isabella's Spain. On the advice of Admiral Nicolás Barradas, Spain's most senior naval officer Espartero ordered the construction of three new frigates and a man'o'war to bolster the Armada Española in home waters [1]. The squadrons in Havana and Manilla would have the, in many ways easier, tasks of seizing British and Dutch merchant shipping respectively. Such warfare would not bring either power to her knees but it was something, and every lost shipment would be another blow to the enemies resolve.

Meanwhile Espartero also had preparations to manage on land before the first shots were fired. In April 1848 the Ejército del Sur ['Southern Army'] was under the command of General Francisco Javier Álvarez de Toledo widely held to be the single worst general in Spain. Álvarez's special gift was to unite strands of political opinion against him, so that Progressives like Leopoldo O'Donnell and Moderates like Nicolás Acuña held him in equal disdain. General Acuña's aptly if impolitely summed up Álvarez as a 'pisspoor madman.' Unsavory stories followed General Álvarez wherever he went, like the scent of a wound run to gangrene. He was said to have whipped a stableboy to death for not brushing his horse to the standards befitting a Grandee. His knowledge of strategy was dismal, his knowledge of tactics horrendous.

In fact the only reason Álvarez had reached the rank he had was due to favouritism of the Queen. The Álvarez de Toledo family included some of the greatest nobility in Spain and the General himself was titled the Vizconde d'Alcántara. More importantly his wife was a member of the Queen's inner circle. It took a lot of delicate court diplomacy before Isabella could be persuaded to replace Álvarez (a well traveled joke in Army circles in later years was that the 'Battle of Madrid' was Espartero's most difficult clash during the war.

General Carlos Ortega y Joyes, later Marqués de Vigo.​

The man who replaced the Vizconde d'Alcántara was a forty six year old Galician of modest country gentry. General Carlos Ortega, tall and Roman nosed was initially presumed to be a Progressive due to his appointment by the Duque de la Victoria. Actually it was precisely Ortega's supreme disinterest in politics, beyond general royalism that made him acceptable to all, a compromise between a liberal leaning leader and a staunchly conservative government. Ortega had been too young to fight in the Napoleonic conflict but in the Carlist Wars he had displayed great boldness and a rapid rise through the officer corps. When it came to tactics Ortega had great faith in the bayonet, or rather he had great faith in the Spanish soldier wielding it.

Ortega was tasked with reducing the British fortress of Gibraltar. The heavily fortified town had been in British hands for almost a century and a half, resisting all attempts to reduce it. Privately Ortega, not a man given naturally given to doubt, wondered if it could be taken while the Royal Navy controlled the waters. Nevertheless he set about his work aggressively. On 14 April 1848 the Ejército del Sur began its siege which would run until September.

The armies of the Austro-Prussian War did not greatly differ from those of their predecessors half a century before; in many cases the same weapons were being used and more than a few generals had won their spurs against Napoleon (or with him in the case of the French Army.) The embryonic railways that crisscrossed Spain did make it slightly easier for Ortega to handle his own supplies and the more advanced military hospitals cut into the savage rate of deaths from disease but war was still recognisably the same as a century before, waged with smoothbore muskets, bayonets and sabres.

Espartero and Ortega expected the British to try and break the siege, but with news of large scale British attacks on Calais the Spanish commanders supposed the enemy lacked the resources to be strong at both places at once. It was therefore a terrible shock when dawn came on 20 September and officers of one of Ortega's artillery battalions, posted highest in the Spanish lines, saw sails emerge from the haze. Many sails. The Royal Navy was out in force and even as they opened up cannonfire on Ortega the first boats were making for land, their hulls low in the water from the weight of the Redcoats crammed into them.

Though the Ejército del Norte under General Benito Asensio marched as soon reports of the British landings came they were too distant to reach Ortega in time. The Spanish fought valiantly but they were badly outnumbered and the enemy under General Sir Francis Windsor had a far greater preponderance of artillery than the few mountain guns available to Ortega. On 28 September Ortega was forced to retreat under heavy losses to Málaga. The victorious Windsor did not give chase but instead marched on Cádiz.

The news from Gibraltar plunged Madrid into gloom. The Rock itself was strategically useful in a wider sense but it's main valuable was symbolic. Not so the now threatened Cadiz which was the single most valuable harbour in Spain and a major city in her own right. If the British took Cádiz they could mount a true invasion of Andalusia.

Espartero was far to the North, having gone with the Ejército del Centro to aid the French, at the time battling the English along the Normandy coast. News of Gibraltar reached him in the field and the Duque de la Victoria was forced to turn his army around and march back over the Pyrenees. He also decided to mobilise the military reserves, a move he had been reluctant to make before owing to the parlous state of the economy and the shortages of gunpowder, uniforms and sundry other vital supplies.

Cádiz did fall in spite of a valiant sortie by the Armada Española in November in a bitter two day battle in the Gulf of Cádiz. The clash of warships saw the Royal Navy lose the giant HMS Royal George (120-gun) against two converted Spanish brigs [2] but Admiral Barradas was still forced make a break for open water and ultimate shelter along the Galician coast. On 10 November the garrison at Cádiz surrendered and the redcoats marched in. The British had a major port in Spain.

The fall of Cadiz, November 1848.​

Having allowed his exhausted, dispirited soldiers to recover at Málaga, General Ortega moved to consolidate a position at the city of Córdoba where he was continually reinforced by fresh troops. Ortega wanted to attack as soon as he achieved numerical parity with the British force (now numbering about thirty thousand) but Madrid held firm and he was forced to wait until deep into December but taking the field once more.

The British meanwhile, now under the command of General Bernard Havelock, moved on Seville in the middle of December. Seville was the fourth largest city in Spain and her loss would shake the kingdom to her foundations which may have made the British overconfident. Havelock, keen and a natural leader was not a man to wait if he had any choice and marched rather than wait on support - though in fairness with the British committed elsewhere it was not clear there were many more available redcoats left to send.

On a gloomy Christmas Day the two armies clashed on the banks of the River Guadalquivir, immediately South of the city. The advantages lay heavily with Ortega who not only had artillery and horse but superior numbers. Even so Havelock, having arrived earlier took up a strong defensive position and it was only with difficulty that he was pushed back. Later in his memoirs Ortega paid tribute to the resiliency of the redcoats and the skill of their commander: 'The British strategy failed in Spain. The courage and skill of the men did not fail.'

Havelock retreated in good order back to Cádiz but Ortega could move fast when he had the chance and he caught the British in battle on 11 January. Ortega's men braved the British artillery with a bayonet charge that broke the enemy line, inflicting a decisive defeat on the enemy. Havelock retreated to Gibraltar and from there after another defeat (25 January) to Málaga. There the four and a half thousand redcoats still capable of fighting surrendered on 17 February.

The Battle of Cádiz, 11 January 1849.​

The Battle of Málaga did not quite mark the end of the fighting in Spain. Gibraltar would undergo a second siege with the fortress finally yielding to the Spanish at the beginning of July. Though the British did not try another landing in Spain the Dutch launched an expedition of their own, landing eighteen thousand men at Gerona in December. This quixotic affair, launched perhaps to encourage the Carlists to take the field (though they needed little encouragement) ended with their defeat by Ortega both at Gerona itself and then at Foix on 8 January 1850 as Ortega pursued the fleeing Dutch over the border into France.

Nevertheless and though the war continued until June the conflict was largely over for Spain. There were a few light clashes at sea but with the Royal Navy still too strong and the death of Admiral Barradas at the Battle of Finisterre Bay in June 1849 most Spanish ships in European waters were left floating at anchor in their home ports. The squadrons in Havana and Manilla achieved several audacious captures of British and Dutch shipping, which played well in the neutral newspapers particularly in the Americas, but they never faced enemy warships in a major battle.

Much of the debate inside Madrid in the first half of 1850 was whether Spain should send troops to the Prussian front to help their allies. Queen Isabella, wishing both to boost Spanish prestige and honour Spain's duties to her friends, wanted to send such an expeditionary force. Espartero was reluctant. Prussia and the Netherlands were on the verge of total collapse so the Spanish presence was unnecessary and expensive.

There were two other reasons why the Duque de la Victoria successfully dragged his heels on sending troops abroad. The less worthy reason was that Ortega was beginning to rival Espartero as Spain's great war hero. Even Isabella who had so opposed Ortega's initial appointment had been won over by the general's victories and had made him Marqués de Vigo. Ortega was still no politician ('his head is empty but for the roar of cannonfire' remarked a jealous General Acuña) but his popularity was genuine and it would have been very difficult to send a different commander.

The more worthy reason was fear of internal trouble. The Carlists had not been entirely quiet during the war; with much of the Army abroad how much worse could they be. Espartero did not have to look far to see what internal discontent could achieve during wartime. Spain's allies, Austria, Russia and France won the war but none of them had been left untouched by the fighting and two of those powers ended the war under different leaders than they began it [3].

The Armistice of 11 June 1850.​

Footnotes:

[1] At the start of the war the Armada Española in Cadiz had the San Raimundo and San Pablo (both 74-gun ships) and the Héroe (80-guns). The frigates in Cadiz were Ceres, Gloria, Nuestra Señora de Asunción, Nuestra Señora de Atocha and Santa Sabina (all with between 34 and 44-guns.)

[2] Clipper transports, thankfully empty at the time.

[3] Events outside Spain will be covered in the next update.

 

[RossN]

British (Scottish) soldiers in battle, 1849.
​

Chapter Seven: The Great Powers At War

Only one of the Great Powers escaped the Austro-Prussian War entirely and the United States of America did not spend these years at peace. President James K. Polk had bloodlessly annexed Texas and the shockwaves that move generated set the Americans on the course for war with Mexico. On 14 August 1848 Polk declared war, just five years after Van Buren had signed treaties of friendship with the new republican government in Mexico City.

The day to day progress of the Mexican-American War of 1848 to 1850 was understandably little followed in Europe, though the Duque de la Victoria, with a touch of optimism saw in it the possibility of a post-war Mexico being wooed once more to the Spanish orbit. Mexican defeat seemed probable from the outset, with the luckless nation recovering from a violent civil war less than a decade previously and weaker in industry and population than her Northern neighbour. Additionally, Mexico lacked allies; prior to the break caused by the acquisition of Texas the government had been essentially a client state of the United States.

As fierce as the fighting in North America was it simply could not match the Napoleonic scale of the battles across the Atlantic. For the other Great Powers - Britain, France, Prussia, Austria, Russia, Spain and the Netherlands the conflict in Europe dominated everything for two years. The Prussians, who had begun the war, were faced with the unenviable task of going on the defensive in both the West and the East and focusing their forces on Austria. It was the best option available in the dismal circumstances; if Vienna cracked then Saint Petersburg, Paris and Madrid would stop fighting. For a time at least it almost worked thanks to the Hungarians. The revolution that had been bubbling under for years finally erupted in Buda and Pest in November 1848 and on 7 December an independent Hungary was proclaimed by Lajos Kossuth and other firebrands.

Hungary in revolt, December 1848.
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The leaders of the Hungarian revolt had used the excuse of the abdication of the incapable Emperor Ferdinand in favour of his eighteen year old nephew Franz-Joseph. The Diet of Hungary refused to acknowledge the new monarch as King of Hungary and, initially at least, proclaimed Ferdinand as continuing to reign in Hungary. At this stage most of the Hungarian nationalists wished to maintain some link with Austria and hoped to use the threat of withdrawal from the war, or even changing sides as a method to bludgeon concessions out of the government in Vienna.

Unfortunately for the Hungarian nationalists the vast bulk of the 'Hungarian' soldiers in the Hapsburg ranks remained loyal [1]. Even with the bulk of the Army on Prussian soil and a second rebellion in Lombardy the Austrians were able to crush the Hungarian rebels by the end of July 1849. Kossuth fled into exile while others, including Count Lajos Batthyány were executed. The Milanese rebels would face similar treatment before the end of the year. Oddly Venice, the cause of the entire war and the state the other Great Powers nominally dueled for would remain quiet throughout the conflict.

The Austrians were not the only power that ended up fighting on multiple fronts. The French had to deal with the Prussians on the Rhine, the Dutch and the British. "La Royale" inevitably suffered the brunt of the Royal Navy and the Navy with scores of French ships of the line being left ablaze in the fierce battles in the Channel and off the Breton coast. The French sailors were as skilled and brave as any other but they were hopelessly outnumbered. Once the fleet was swept from the waves or left stranded in their own ports the British launched an invasion of Normandy. At various points over the course of 1849 the redcoats came with thirty miles of the outskirts of Paris and they were firmly established in Caen until late in the year.

In Paris King Louis-Philippe was faced with an extraordinarily difficult situation. The war had become very unpopular and the monarch attracted much of the blame. Louis-Philippe had made much of his close relationship with England and the conflict and the support of the unpopular Hapsburgs had undermined his pre-war standing. As in Austria malcontents proved willing to use the crisis as a means to an end and Louis-Philippe found himself facing constant attacks in public from republicans. Most alarmingly the aristocracy which had held its nose in supporting the 'Citizen King' now began to desert to other factions: a few to the republicans, more to the so-called Legitimists or the Bonapartists.

The collapse of the 'July Monarchy' in March 1850.
​

Ironically Louis-Philippe was overthrown at a point when the war had decisively turned in favour of France. The British had been steadily driven back after their initial success. By January 1850 the redcoats had been driven out of Northern France (aside from a smattering of attacks along the Normandy coastline) and the French having overrun Westphalia and the Lower Rhine were invading the Netherlands from the south-east. Indeed the absence at home of so many gifted officers, many of them of Orléanist sympathies, almost certainly aided the revolt in Paris. On 8 March 1850 Louis-Philippe abdicated and went into exile in Belgium.

The sudden collapse of the French monarchy profoundly shocked France's allies but did little to change the course of the war. Jacques-Charles Dupont de l'Eure, the elderly career politician who became head of state hastened to assure the Austrian, Russian and Spanish ministers in Paris that France was committed to the fight. Espartero who was in diplomatic contact with Alphonse de Lamartine, the French Foreign Minister, informed Queen Isabella that there was 'near universal' belief in Paris that the only thing preventing Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte from attempting to seize power was fear of looking unpatriotic while the French people were at war.

No nation was more dismayed by events in France than Russia. The Emperor Nicholas I had never concealed his disdain for Louis-Philippe but even a mockery of a monarch was better than no monarch at all [2]. The Russian ruler exerted his iron will over every aspect of the Russian war effort, treating his generals as little more than junior officers jumping at the commands of their superior.

For Russia even more than France the war constituted two different stories. On the battlefield, despite heavy losses due to fighting and attrition during the cold winters of 1848, 1849 and 1850 the Russian armies had proved themselves again and again, breaking the formidable Prussian lines in East Prussia and taking Königsberg and Danzig before pushing on to the West and linking up with the Austrians in Silesia in 1849. In doing so they won some of the largest and most impressive battlefield victories in Russian history.

Emperor Nicholas I of Russia.
​

Unfortunately the war was not solely waged on the battlefield. The Russian economy had been fragile in 1848 and the strain of the war combined with the impact of a blockade by the Royal Navy from mid-1849 on had hollowed out the great empire. Mercifully Russia was spared the potato blight that struck Spain, the Netherlands and Ireland but harvests declined sharply during the conflict and with so little food coming in from abroad the civilian populace suffered starkly. In turned this spurred on rather ugly incidents as the Russian Army on Prussian soil confiscated as much of the enemy harvest as they could, increasing the spectre of famine across Europe.

By early 1850 Russia then had become a giant with a glass jaw; a military colossus teetering on the edge of bankruptcy and the possibility of revolt in the Motherland. The Russian foreign minister, Karl Robert Graf von Nesselrode disliked the French republican government as much as his master but he also advised the Emperor to conduct a peace as swiftly as possible rather than continue an exhausting war for minimal gains.

Prussia had begun the war in 1848 but it is fair to state that she had never imagined it developing beyond an, at worst, local conflict between Prussia and what was believed to be a rapidly crumbling Hapsburg regime. In both senses the government in Berlin had misjudged matters. The entrance of the other Great Powers and the resiliency and competence of the Austrians had proved decisive.

Had she been fighting solely for herself Prussia might have sued for peace as early as July 1849 once it became clear that the Hungarian revolution had collapsed. Fortunately (or not) the alliance with Britain kept the Prussians in the war. With the Royal Navy controlling the sea there was a steady flow of material, food and credit throughout the war until the final few months when even the Pomeranian ports faced invasion from the advancing enemy armies. Long after the prospect of a military victory on land vanished the government in Berlin hoped for the intervention of British troops on Prussian soil. Instead the British had preferred to fight in France and (more dubiously) Spain.

Graf Adolf Heinrich von Arnim-Boitzenburg led the Preußische Nationalversammlung throughout the war. A moderate conservative he was a compromise won by King Frederick William IV over an aggressively liberal and pan-German minded revolutionary assembly. Like the King, Arnim had opposed the war but had been unable to resist public sentiment. In January 1850 he privately begged the King to sign a peace with the Austrians. Frederick William admitted he wished to do so but could not agree to a separate peace without British approval - in a very real sense the financial sinews of London were the only thing keeping Prussia afloat at all.

The Peace of Breslau, June 1850.​

On 8 June 1850 the Mexican government signed a peace treaty with the United States of America. The Mexicans surrendered vast stretches of admittedly thinly populated land, overnight increasing the territory of the United States by approximately a third. President Lewis Cass, who had inherited the Mexican War from his predecessor James K. Polk immediately declared war on Great Britain. His stated aim was the annexation of British Columbia.

The Americans had poor relations with Britain since the Oregon Question had nearly led to war in the 1830s and the Democrat-dominated legislature in Washington D.C. had grown jingoistic during the recent war but the main reason Cass acted when he did was the assumption that the British would remained mired in their European war. In this he was incorrect: within days of the American declaration of war Lord Stanley's government in London was urging his counterparts in the Netherlands and Prussia to accept peace terms.

Predictably Austria and her allies imposed no terms on Britain. With the Royal Navy battered but still the greatest in the world there was simply no way to enforce any concessions on the British, though Espartero made a nominal claim on Gibraltar for form's sake. Prussia and the Netherlands on the other hand were faced to the peace table. The Dutch escaped relatively lightly all things considered, forced to host a military parade of the victors through the streets of Amsterdam. The Prussians were forced to pay reparations for a period of five years and faced restrictions on the size of their Army and Navy.

Intriguingly no territory exchanged hands, a deliberate decision by Franz-Joseph and Nicholas. Both emperors feared that slicing away territory from either vanquished state could result in a revolution and they were still uneasy about the French republicans, even though France remained their nominal ally during the treaty negotiations at Breslau in the Autumn of 1850. Lamartine, who was representing his government insisted that France had no territorial ambitions in Europe and no intention of spreading republicanism at bayonet point. Espartero, representing Spain at the same negotiations, wrote to Isabella that the French minister was sincere but likely to be replaced 'the moment Bonaparte takes power.'

Surprisingly Bonaparte did not take power. In the presidential elections of November 1850 General Louis-Eugène Cavaignac won narrowly over Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte. The Spainish ambassador in Paris, Salustiano de Olózaga y Almandoz, privately decried the result as rigged, a sentiment universal to foreign observers (and presumably many in France.) 'The name that resounds in every village is Bonaparte,' wrote one newspaper editorial. Nevertheless Cavaignac had 'won' and it seemed the Second Republic was here to stay [3].

As 1850 drew to a close it saw an exhausted Europe at peace, content to rebuild and let the British and Americans war over distant wilderness.

Europe at the end of 1850.​

Footnotes:

[1] Many 'Hungarians' in the Austrian Army were in fact members of other ethnicities that lived in Hungary as against Magyars.

[2] In contrast Nicholas welcomed the accession of Franz-Joseph in Vienna as the re-institution of strong government in the Austrian Empire.

[3] The 'Rig the Election' event fired for France, much to my disappointment. I'd have enjoyed seeing Napoleon III around.

 

[RossN]

Spanish and Mexican soldiers clash at Puerto Lempira, April 1853.​

Chapter Eight: El Salvador

The re-conquest of Honduras had left Spain with a permanent presence in the mainland of the Americas. Even with the end of Don Baldomero Espartero's fanciful dreams of a Mexican Empire in perpetual union with the Spanish Crown, the spectre of painting Central America gold on the map retained its allure in Madrid. Obviously the war in Europe had prevented such ambitions from being realised, but before the negotiations at Breslau had even come to a close the government was drawing up plans for an invasion of El Salvador.

The principle architect of renewed intervention in Central America was the Duque de la Victoria. Espartero remained as President of the Council until December 1850 to negotiate the peace of Breslau with the other allies. After that and at the request of the Queen he stepped aside from the premiership which was retaken by Luis González Bravo. Espartero retained the war ministry and the enormous influence the war had restored to him. The seemingly pointless carnage in Europe and the frightening events in Paris had convinced Espartero that Spain was best served rebuilding her colonial empire through a mixture of cautious warfare and economic and diplomatic pressure. With the United States and the British preoccupied with each other it was hard to imagine a better time to expand in Central America.

Though Espartero was undoubtedly the visionary of restoring Spanish authority in the region the general mood was with him. The restoration of Spanish fortunes seemed so clearly tied to recovering the lost provinces. Reasons of prestige, common blood and culture and economics all made Espartero's proposals attractive even for a war weary people.

El Salvador immediately bordered the now Spanish owned Honduras and though smaller in size was more densely populated. The capital city of San Salvador was the second largest city in Central America (after Guatemala) and though landlocked gave access to the fine deepwater port of Acajutla on the Pacific Coast [1]. The young republic was primarily a coffee exporter though the beginnings of a clothing industry had sprung up in the capital. In the early 1850s El Salvador was a conservative democracy, the presidency and general politics in the hands of a class of rural oligarchs.

In military terms El Salvador was a dwarf with a small standing army. Her navy was surprisingly potent for El Salvador's size but being based on the Pacific Coast would have limited use against an invasion from Spanish Honduras. More concerning was the El Salvadorian alliance with neighbouring Nicaragua and with the more distant but much stronger Mexico. However even this was not so great a deterrent to Spanish ambitions. Nicaragua had a smaller army than her neighbour. As for the possibility of Mexican intervention the attitude in Madrid was sanguine.

El Salvador & Spanish Honduras, February 1852.
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Mexico had suffered through a truly miserable decade. The loss of Texas, the rise and fall of the monarchy, the civil war and then the defeat by the United States had left the nation reeling. Few foreign observers believed that the Mexicans would be able to act on the global stage for many years; most believed that the future of the former New Spain would be one haunted by coups and internecine warfare. Even Espartero, one of the few in Spain who retained an abiding interest in Mexico felt that she was essentially finished as an independent power. Unfortunately for the Spanish one man would prove that view wrong. After the end of the Mexican-American war Santa Anna returned to his native land. Though his actual position would fluctuate throughout the decade, sometimes holding the presidency, sometimes merely commanding the army for most of the 1850s Santa Anna was the true ruler of Mexico.

Santa Anna resisted the temptation to begin a war of revenge against the United States. The shrewd general and politician saw that even should the United States lose her conflict with Britain she would still be far stronger than Mexico. Rather Mexican interests were best served building her own empire (in the non-monarchical sense) in Central America. His reasoning was strikingly similar to that employed by Espartero, albeit laced with the self serving rhetoric of opposing Spanish imperialism.

As much as the war of 1852 to 1854 was anything it can be understood as a clash of will between the Mexico's Napoleon and Spain's Caesar.

On 22 February Spain declared war on El Salvador. Initially the campaign went as well as might have been hoped. Most of the twelve thousand soldiers available to General Carlos Fernández had seen long service in Honduras. Some, especially in the officer corps were veterans of the Honduran war and knew the conditions of the Central American peninsula well. A regiment of local artillery raised in recent years from loyalist families complemented Fernández's superior numbers with superior guns.

General Fernández defeated the El Salvadorians in the field on 5 March and began a siege of the enemy capital, diverting some of his forces towards San Miguel. San Salvador was a well defended city and even with his artillery Fernández expected the war would last until at least October. It promised to be a miserable experience for the Spanish forces, facing a perpetually hot climate and for the beginning of May the promise of daily thunderstorms. The possibility of earthquakes added another element of misfortune to both sides though mercifully no major tremors would strike that year.

Mexico had declared war on Spain as soon as the invasion began and the Havana based naval squadron was ordered to patrol the Gulf Coast. The Spanish fleet consisted of the elderly Censeur (74-guns) and three sail frigates [2]. Once it became apparent that the Mexican fleet was more formidable than expected reinforcements would be sent from Cadiz but though the warships of both sides plundered merchant shipping with abandon and the Spanish bombarded Vera Cruz a great naval clash never transpired (though the Spanish would fight the Nicaraguan fleet when the latter made a daring raid on the Balearics in 1854.) The Spanish-El Salvadorian War would soon pass in nostalgic nautical mythology as the last conflict involving a Great Power where all participants replied on sail power alone for their navies but this isn't entirely true. Though the backbone of the Armada Española remained the ships of the line three steam frigates had entered service very recently [3]. Outnumbered by their sail powered sisters and outshone in the public mind by the stately men o' war the three vessels performed efficently but their star turn would have to wait for a later war.

The Spanish naval blockade in the Gulf of Mexico.​

In so much as Mexican opposition had been expected at all Madrid had supposed it would come at sea. What had not been foreseen was that Santa Anna would bully the government of neutral Guatemala into allowing the passage of Mexican troops. In late July 1852 while Fernández was still besieging San Salvador a twenty thousand strong Mexican army under Martín Guerrero crossed into Spanish Honduras at San Pedro Sula. Though the outnumbered Spanish forces managed to defeat Don Martín twice in November the torrent of fresh Mexican troops continued to flow across the border and Fernández was defeated decisively at San Salvador on 18 December. Retreating to San Miguel he was surrounded and forced to surrender on 27 December.

The collapse of the Spanish Army in Central America left the whole of Honduras open to a counter-invasion by the Mexicans and the Nicaraguans. In the first third of 1853 most of Honduras would be overrun, including the capital of Comayagua.

News of Fernández's surrender severely weakened Espartero. The Duque de la Victoria's great personal prestige with the public and the Army allowed him to cling on to the war ministry but his hold over the government was broken. In a sign of the times the Queen simply overruled his choice for the Central American command (Benito Assenio) with her growing favourite and Espartero's nemesis, Don Carlos Ortega, the Marqués de Vigo.

In fact both generals would serve with distinction. Assenio arrived with fifteen thousand men in April and managed to break the Mexican/Nicaraguan march on Puerto Lempira. With that victory Spain retained a foothold on the mainland and a viable port but it was not till General Ortega arrived after in August 1853 with another fifteen thousand troops that the war began to swing back towards Madrid. The slow, painful process of first recovering Honduras and then pushing back into El Salvador was complicated by a local rebellion.

Broadly speaking the Hondurans had at least acquiesced to Spanish control after the war of 1843 to 1845. Those old enough to recall the old authority of Madrid or from families with traditions of royalism welcomed the return of Spain, as did some who had experienced only disruption and dictatorship during the intervening years. The majority were prepared to keep their head down. Tomás Barrios and Jesús de Cárdenas were not willing to behave so meekly. In August 1853 the two hotheaded patriots launched rebellions in La Cebia and San Pedro Sula aimed at restoring an independent Honduras.

The Honduran Rebellion of 1853 revealed how complicated the war was becoming as Barrios and Cárdenas were willing to turn their muskets on both Spanish and Mexican garrisons. Mexico, for all her grandiose rhetoric of freedom from European tyranny was (in the eyes of Honduran nationalists) every bit as imperialistic as Spain. In the end they probably caused more damage to the Mexicans, as more than one siege of Mexican forces would be 'inherited' by General Ortega after driving off the rebels. The last of the Honuran rebel forces were defeated at San Pedro Sula in the dying days of 1853.

The war in December 1853; Assenio has defeated a Mexican/Nicaraguan force at Puerto Lempira while Ortega has liberated La Cebia.

​

In April 1854 the last Nicaraguan garrisons around Comayagua surrendered and with all Honduras finally back in Spanish hands Ortega marched into El Salvador.

Back in Spain there was a growing desire to end the war as quickly as possible. The outside world had not remained idle. In August 1853 the United States had been forced to sign a peace treaty with the British handing over the slice of the Oregon Territory north of the River Columbia [4]. This defeat had humiliated the Americans and had lead to the landslide victory of the Whig Millard Fillmore in the 1852 presidential election ending two decades of Democrat dominance. The Americans had reasonable relations with Spain but with their defeat in the North it seemed likely they would seek to throw their weight around in Central America. Luis González Bravo even informed the Queen that should the United States push to broker a 'fair peace' it would difficult for Spain to refuse.

On 5 October 1854 San Salvador finally surrendered. The government had fled to San Miguel, which held until 21 December. On that morning, having finally abandoned hope of reinforcement from Mexico or Nicaragua they surrendered to Ortega. Technically speaking the war did not end then as Spain would remain legally in conflict with Mexico for several more weeks until a peace treaty was signed but there was no additional fighting.

Though a success the El Salvadorian War had been a far harder conflict than Spain had anticipated. The Army had expected and prepared well for the hard conditions of fighting in Central America and on a purely technical level the troops had done well. The use of mountain artillery, modern muzzle loading rifles and quinine all met with success and had the war happened a decade earlier casualties might have been double those actually suffered. The problem was that the Government in Spain had gone into the fight believing it would be over quickly, that Mexico lacked both the ability and the determination to intervene in any significant way. Almost three years of bloody fighting and several humiliating defeats had proven just how flawed that idea was.

In the future, if Spain was interested in restoring more of her lost American territory she would have to fight planning for a large war, one that required men and guns from Europe rather than small colonial forces at hand. It had been a sound strategy to wait until the United States had been occupied but after facing Mexican grapeshot and bayonets Madrid would have to be careful about her other rivals in the region.

Spanish possessions in the Americas as of the end of 1854.
​

Footnotes:

[1] In games terms the province of 'San Salvador' has a a port which I am presuming to be Acajutla.

[2] While I did get to battle the Nicaraguans I'm disappointed I missed battling the surprisingly impressive Mexican navy - it would have made an impressive battle for the fading days of the Age of Sail.

[3] The Alcalá Galiano, the Almirante Antequera and the Almirante Ferrándiz.

[4] Ie. The modern state of Washington.

 

[RossN]

Madrid circa 1850.​

Chapter Nine: Isabella and her Ministers

Even her many critics would have to admit Queen Isabella II of Spain was an improvement on her father. Whatever the troubles of her early reign the Spain had not been invaded by a foreign power or shaken to pieces by wars of independence or even gone bankrupt.

The Queen's flaws and weaknesses were very real but in her defence it may be said none of them were rare among the monarchs of Europe and had she been male it is likely she would not have been slandered so viciously. The Spanish monarch was a fickle sybarite, indulging herself in a parade of handsome favourites. Like her sister queen Victoria of England, Isabella celebrated the private pleasures of the boudoir; unlike the fortunate Empress of India Isabella's marriage was loveless. Francis was a notoriously poor match for the robust and fun loving Isabella. The King was slight and strikingly effeminate, depending on which court gossip one listened too was either impotent or willing but uninterested in women. Rumours swirled over the true parentage of 'their' children.

Had the Queen simply been a mindless libertine her reputation among some in Spain (and overseas) would have remained poor yet essentially uncontroversial, but Isabella actually took a strong interest in politics. Per the 1837 constitution the Spanish monarch had defined limits to his or her powers and it was understood that true national control had shifted to the Cortes. This did not render Isabella a mere figurehead - even a parsimonious reading of the constitution allowed the monarch strong vetos among other prerogatives - but it left a willful Queen liable to butt heads with her governments. The Queen interfered and both her stubbornness and her haughtiness grew as she reached her late twenties. The travails of the El Salvadorian war had robbed the Duque de la Victoria of his aura of power and in December 1854 he departed politics, seemingly for good. Relations between the monarch and Don Baldomero Espartero had never been fine and she took his departure from the scene with undisguised glee.

Despite her own preferences in personal pleasures the monarch was partial towards the conservative and clerical factions of the Moderates over the liberal and secular Progressives. In itself this was unproblematic as the Moderates enjoyed such crushing success at the elections of 1850 and 1854 that it had sometimes seemed the Duque de la Victoria carried all Spanish liberalism on his back. However the Queen's opinions were not restricted to factions but carried over to individuals and policies.

The most loyal servant of the Crown in the Cortes and, after the now twice fallen Duque de la Victoria the dominant politician in Spain was Luis González Bravo. Several times in the decade after the El Salvadorian War the philanthropist and journalist would hold the presidency and it was a rare year when he was not at least in the Cabinet. With his dapper mustache and penchant for sarcasm (he had founded several newspapers and enjoyed an early career as a playwright) Don Luis was a true and faithful royalist and one of the few who was neither military officer nor clergyman who could gain the Queen's ear. It was on his advice that Spain stood aloof from world events for several years after annexing El Salvador. Don Luis was an experienced diplomat but he and most of his fellow Moderates stressed the need for Spain to avoid foreign entanglements while her economy and military recovered from the two most recent wars.

Don Luis González Bravo.
​

The gravest difficulty Don Luis experienced in his otherwise good relationship with his monarch was how to deal with France. Isabella had been nineteen years old when the monarchy of Louis-Philippe collapsed. The Spanish Queen had not been overly fond of her French counterpart, though they were related distantly via blood and more closely via marriage. Isabella's own sister the Infanta María Luisa Fernanda had married the Duc de Montpensier, Louis-Philippe's youngest son. Unfortunately family relations between the branches were consistently fraught.

Even given Isabella's coolness towards the 'Citizen King', Louis-Philippe's fall had shocked her to the core. Since 1830 the French monarchy had served as a ready comparison for Spaniards, an example of a parliament and monarch cooperating. If that system had proven so brittle and fragile then did it mean Isabella's own throne was in danger, and not simply from the Carlists?

A glance at the composition of the Cortes throughout the 1850s suggested little cause for paranoia. If the conservative deputies elected in 1850 and 1854 harboured any republican desires they played their cards close to their chests. The conditions that made politics so bitter in France with a large and passionately engaged middle class simply did not exist in Isabella's Spain, still an overwhelmingly rural country. True, Spain had gradually grown more industrialised with lumber mills in Nueva Castilla, paper mills in Valencia and a clothing industry in San Salvador and the government invested heavily in the railways. However there were no true skilled factory workers comparable to those in New York, London, Paris or Berlin. The Spanish middle classes were little different from those that had existed in the previous century - artisans, bureaucrats, military officers, clergymen [1].

The seemingly innate conservatism of Isabella's Spain rendered overt republicanism unlikely. Yet unlikely was not the same as impossible and Isabella who had spent almost her entire life as a ruling monarch had witnessed how her own mother had been toppled and how even Isabella herself had often been a pawn in the games of ambitious generals and politicians nominally on her side. The Queen played her favourites but the men she could trust where not common. Hence the incalculable value of Bravo, a man capable and loyal.

Christophe Léon Louis Juchault de Lamoricière, second President of the French Republic.​

For Don Luis, Republican France remained a power to be coddled even when, or perhaps most because, Spain maintained an isolation from such great events as the Crimean War of 1853 to 1855 that saw Russian ambitions in the east thwarted and a new kingdom of Romania born. France under President Louis-Eugène Cavaignac had been the decisive power in the war, surprising many foreign observers who had assumed the new liberal republican government in Paris to be weary of war. What no one had counted on was that M. Cavaignac, keenly aware that questions abounded about his election had seen the war as an opportunity to unite the quarreling strands of French opinion under his authority. French liberals loathed the autocratic Russian regime, French conservatives were determined to preserve the authority of France in the Holy Places.

Cavaignac himself did not remain in office till the end of the war, his four year term expiring in November 1854. Nevertheless Don Luis had shrewdly supposed General Christophe Léon Louis Juchault de Lamoricière would win the subsequent election and continue Cavaignac's policy of muscular liberalism.

​

Don Luis did not seek an alliance with France. Not only would such a diplomatic move betray his policy of caution in foreign affairs it was highly unlikely even he could persuade the Queen on such a move. Nor was he blind to the fact that France remained an economic and political rival, especially in Morocco where Spanish delegations tended to be given the run around by the Sultan. Abd al-Rahman ibn Hisham, the canny ruler of Fez was in the French pocket and the indignities of Spanish merchants in Tangier was a daily torn in the side of the Madrid government.

Still, France was the strongest power on the continent and had invaded Spain twice in living memory. Good relations were a necessity. On 6 April 1856, after a minor defeat in the Cortes Don Luis stepped aside and asked the Queen to be sent as ambassador to Paris. There he could smooth over relations with the French and keep his political antennae twitching [2].

Bravo departs as Vigodet enters.
​

Most had expected Bravo's successor as President of the Council to be one of Spain's towering generals. The obvious candidate was General Leopoldo O'Donnell, the cagey and ruthless Hiberno-Iberian aristocrat who had filled the vacuum created by the retirement of Spain's Caesar. Ambitious and clever the general was a dangerous man to leave out of power but Isabella, recalling the days when she had been little more than Don Baldomero Espartero's puppet looked elsewhere.

The man the Queen asked to form a new government on 10 April 1856 was a sailor. Captain General Casimiro Vigodet y Garnica [3] was an admiral and recently a Minister of the Navy. As a very young man he had the misfortune to fight at the Battle of Trafalgar. Captain General Vigodet was a surprising choice in many ways as the Navy did not traditionally provide many national leaders but he reflected Isabella's mind in three key ways. First and most importanly he was loyal and of no particular personal ambition. Second while Don Leopoldo had many rivals in the Army, Don Casimiro Vigodet was much admired in the Navy. Finally the Spanish Navy was in serious need of reform and the recent annexations in Central America and the war with Britain had reminded the government how vital seapower was.

Unfortunately for Vigodet he scarcely had time to settle into office before events across the Atlantic flared into crisis. On 9 September 1856 Juan Manuel de Rosas, the pro-Spanish caudillo of Buenos Aires and de-facto dictator of Argentina was overthrown. Rosas had never been a beloved ally in Madrid, but he had been prepared to acknowledge the Spanish sphere of influence and Isabella was for war and his restoration at bayonet point. Alarmed, Vigodet managed to talk the monarch away from such a choice, stressing that Spain had already created much unease in both North and South America by annexing Honduras and El Salvador and a declaration of war now would turn the wary into the outright hostile. He further stressed that the Army and Navy would be both be taxed by such a war far beyond the paltry gains that might be seen if Rosas was restored. With ill grace the Queen relented.

The September 1856 rebellion in the Antilles.​

A far worse crisis came later that same month with the eruption of revolts in Cuba and Puerto Rico.

The Antillian (or Carribbean) Rebellion of 1856 and 1857 was a movement led by and composed of Creole landowners hoping to reform the state of Puerto Rico and Cuba. It was not a true nationalist revolt in the sense of being an independence movement and it was certainly not a slave revolt by any stretch of the imagination [4]. The leader was Gonzalo Rojo, a Puerto Rican-born writer, newspaper editor and diplomat. At his trial in 1858 the Spanish authorities would publish private correspondence from Rojo to several of intimates that revealed the rebel leader and a 'perverse' side but at the time he was seen only as a dangerous demagogue whose austere and lean appearance was at odds with the thunder of rhetoric.

Fortunately for Spain, Rojo was a better speaker than he was a war leader. Though he succeeded in raising an army of twelve thousand men in Puerto Rico (with his disciple Eduardo Varela raising three thousand more in Jagua in Cuba) the rebels had little knowledge in how to actually fight a war. For five months Rojo would terrorise the countryside of Puerto Rico and lay siege to the city of Puerto Rico de San Juan Bautista but he was unable to overrun the loyalist garrisons. At the start of February 1857 the Marqués de Vigo (Carlos Ortega) landed with an army of fifteen thousand and in a bloody battle routed the enemy.

The Battle of Puerto Rico, February 1857.
​

The Spanish enjoyed superior numbers, discipline and equipment but the difficulty of landing such a force on a small contested island and the sheer tenacity of the rebels left the Marqués de Vigo with over four thousand casualties on his side. Fortunately for the thousands of rebels taken prisoner Don Carlos Ortega had a rather old fashioned sense of honour and respected boldness in others. Though the ring leaders, Rojo among them, would be shipped back to Spain for trial and the noose the Spanish commander was more lenient with the rank and file. In any case he could not remain in Puerto Rico indefinitely. Within only a few days he and most of his men would sail for Cuba to crush the far smaller rebel force there.

The revolts in Puerto Rico and Cuba were put down fairly swiftly but that they had happened at all inspired others. In October 1857 Honduran nationalists, drawing from the tactics if not quite the goals of Rojo rose in Comayagua and Puerto Lempira. In total they numbered perhaps twelve thousand men, but split in two groups and outnumbered by the twenty thousand Spanish troops stationed in Central america they were quickly crushed. By late November the last of the rebels had fallen or surrendered. Loyalist casualties were fewer than in Puerto Rico as the Spanish commander General Cristobal Alcalá-Zamora possessed and used with satisfaction two brigades of artillery.

Ultimately the revolts of 1856 and 1857 did not seriously threaten Spanish control anywhere. Even in Puerto Rico, home to the bloodiest fighting the rebels had been quickly defeated. Still, it did suggest that both Luis González Bravo and Casimiro Vigodet had been right to caution their more excitable monarch. Spain was a Great Power, but she was also the least of the Great Powers and had to play her game carefully and cleverly. The Spanish government - any Spanish government - would have to keep in mind how fragile the state was compared to Britain, France or Austria.

Don Casimiro Vigodet.​

Footnotes:

[1] I will go into this further in a later update but essentially Spain has no Clerks in a game sense.

[2] In game terms my 'Diplomat' First Minister departed and a 'Lord Admiral' First Minister arrived. As Bravo actually was an ambassador in real life (albeit to London) sending him to Paris seemed the logical move. While not allied with them I have been increasing relations.

[3] A 'Captain General' in this naval context is an admiral. Historically Spain switched to the later usage in the 1860s.

[4] The revolt in Puerto Rico and Cuba was Jacobin rather than Nationalist so it made more sense to see it as a push for liberalism and autonomy than seperatism.

 

[RossN]

The Spanish steam frigate ('commerce raider') Alsedo.​

Chapter Ten: From Sail to Steam

For most of the Age of Sail the Armada Real Española had been one of the largest and most powerful navies in the world. As recently as the Napoleonic Wars Spain had possessed the third greatest fleet afloat. Unfortunately the end of the Eighteenth Century and the opening decades of the Nineteenth had not been kind to the once proud Spanish Navy. War with Britain, France and her own rebellious subjects in the Americas had left the state with a bare handful of aging warships.

The nadir of Spanish sea-power had come in the 1840s during the Austro-Prussian War. In clashes with the Royal Navy and their allies the Spanish sailors had fought bravely but with limited success and after a few bloody clashes the fleet was confined to ride at anchor. The war had also seen the death in combat of Nicolás Barradas, perhaps the most far sighted and dynamic admirals in Europe in the 1840s who had argued strenuously to rebuild and reform the Navy throughout his career. His loss was a severe blow to a force suffering from public and government indifference.

There had been a few brighter moments during the conflict of 1848 to 1850. In the Caribbean the Armada de Cuba had proved effective at raiding British and Dutch merchantmen and after the war, the Navy making a virtue of a necessity, encouraged publication of stories of semi-piratical derring-do in the tropics. It amused the public to learn their own sailors had stolen the tricks of privateers from centuries gone by and turned them back on the old enemies.

With the war against El Salvador launched just two years after the peace in Breslau there had been scant time to reorganise the Navy. At least during this war the Spanish Navy was not faced with overwhelming odds, though had the war fleets of Mexico, El Salvador and Nicaragua combined their efforts effectively the ordeal at sea might have been a more close run thing than the government in Madrid cared to admit. Fortunately the small but finely equipped El Salvadoran fleet remained on the western side of the great Central American isthmus. The Mexican navy, bold and patriotic raided Spanish merchants and bombarded the coast of Cuba, though to the dismay of both sides there was never a great battle sea. Surprisingly it was the Nicaraguans, the least powerful of the three that would prove the most troublesome, raiding the Gulf of Valencia before being brought to battle on 8 August 1854. The clash of fleets saw the Spanish sink two frigates and a clipper and capture the 74-gun Nicaraguan flagship Audaz, though she proved too fire damaged to remain afloat long.

By the mid-1850s the Spanish Navy had gained some much needed recent experience of both naval battles and merchant raiding. These experiences would prove invaluable going ahead, though some different often conflicting lessons were drawn from them.

The Battle of the Gulf of Valencia, August 1854.​

The middle decades of the Nineteenth Century had seen a lot of uncertainty in the world's navies. Broadly speaking in the years immediately after the Napoleonic Wars there were two major kinds of warship afloat. The ship-of-the-line or man o' war was the Queen of the Seas, a huge two- or three-decker wooden fortress bristling with cannon. The far smaller and more nimble frigates were the martime equivalent of cavalry, the scouts, raiders and protectors of lumbering merchant vessels. Obviously these labels are simplifications and ignore a whole swathe of smaller ships consigned to coastal waters and lakes but, essentially, they composed the heart of every modern navy.

In the decades since Trafalgar some men o' war had grown mighty indeed. Mahmudiye completed in 1829 for the Ottoman Empire boasted 128-guns, though her sheer expense and manpower left her a white elephant for the Sultan's cash-strapped fleet. It was France and Britain that truly led the world in warships however and with Valmy (120) in 1847 the French were pushing against the technological and design limits of the classic man o' war. Increasingly the French and the British were thinking in terms of steam, at least as an auxillary to fully masted vessels. Smaller steam warships had existed for a generation by the 1850s. Initially the paddle steamer had been the almost universal design, though it had begun to be fall out of favour with the development of screw propellers. Among other advantages screw propellers made steam men o'war viable, as the gun decks were left with a clear line of view. From the start of the decade on France and Britain would build full masted, all wooden two- and three-decker warships with screws.

Things were different for Spain (and the United States, the Netherlands, Austria and the other sea faring powers who did not have the limitless budgets and vast expertise Paris and London could call on.) Don Casimiro Vigodet, who had served as Minister of the Navy before becoming President of the Council was an intelligent, hard working man but he was not a radical. Nor were many of his subordinates. The Spanish Navy was a conservative institution. Even the current commander of the main fleet Don Genaro Pavía, an uncommonly young officer for his rank - when first appointed in 1850 he was the youngest senior admiral in Europe - and famously irate had expressed his suspicion of steam by letter to Vigodet shortly before the Battle of the Gulf of Valencia:

'A sailing ship may travel anywhere, may remain at sea for months, may find provisions at any friendly port... a steamship devours coal every moment of every day she is in motion, she is bound to a network of coal stations which may or may not exist, should her engines break she is struck by disaster... [at this point the letter diverts into a colourful if highly personal diatribe about the government and the Naval Budget]'

After the war Pavía, having read reports from clashes at sea between the British and Americans, was prepared to grudgingly accept the need for steamships for strategic reasons but he still felt that for the moment Spain should retain a large sail powered fleet. The new President of the Council agreed. Under Don Casimiro Vigodet would continue to build both sail only men o'war and steam and sail commerce raiders for the remainder of the 1850s. A force of sail only frigates remained but their numbers would not be added too, save in a crisis situation where inexpensive rapidly constructed war vessels would be needed.

Three new men o'war - Aquílies, Argonauta and Buen Consejo (all 80-gun ships inspired by the much admired French Bucentaure class warships) were built in 1855 and early 1856. On 18 September 1856 they officially joined the main fleet at Cádiz. The occasion, attended by the Queen and the King (who was of course also Duque de Cádiz) was a magnificent affair. Thousands of onlookers thronged shorelines along the the Bay of Cádiz to watch the majestic ships at sail, an occasion marked by pennants and celebratory cannonades. Similar if smaller ceremonies would greet the arrival of their slightly larger sisters Conquistador, Firme and Glorioso the following September. By the end of 1857 the main fleet at Cádiz could boast ten splendid men o'war.

Less public enthusiasm and prestige greeted the arrival of the new steamships. Between 1856 and 1859 Spain would build five steam frigates paddle steam frigates, all for the Cádiz fleet. Vigodet had considered screws over paddles but chose the conservative option, feeling it was better to go an older but still viable engine many in the Navy knew how to handle than a still exotic, expensive and poorly understood new system. It would not be until 1860 than Spain finally turned to the new engines [1].

The Armada Real Española had grown in size but its expansion was not (merely) a vanity project to increase national prestige. Both as a minister and head of the government Vigodet had been forced to do battle against the generals of the Army, perpetually jealous of any real spent on sailors and ships rather than soldiers. Vigodet stressed to the Queen that whatever the opinion of the generals Spain's influence in the wider world rested with the fleet. Short of a war with France or Portugal (scenarios any Madrid government would try to avoid) foreign threats would have to come from overseas making the Navy the first line of defence. Should the war be pursued by Spain a large fleet would blockade the enemy coast and sink their merchantmen and in either case the ships would be needed to protect Spain's growing merchant marine.

Glorioso (86) in harbour at Cartagena.​

Though Don Casimiro Vigodet refrained from mentioning any potential enemy by name in the Naval Bills he pushed through the Cortes in 1857 and 1859 all present could think of potential candidates. Britain, the United States, France and the Netherlands all had larger navies than Spain, though the Spanish were gaining on the Dutch. Of these it was the Americans and the Dutch that Spain was 'building against'. The Dutch were traditional foes and had been a wartime foe as recently as the previous decade. In the Caribbean and the Pacific Spanish and Dutch colonies brushed uncomfortably close. As for the Americans they continued to take an interest in Central America, to the dismay of Madrid. No one wished for a war there but it was all too possible to see a clash in the future.

On 6 January 1859 the Mexicans declared war on Guatemala. Félix María Zuloaga Trillo, at the time the dominant force in Mexican politics [2] had made much hay about Mexican rights to the Chiapas region controlled by the Guatemalans. Reaction in Madrid was divided. Some on the furthest Right in the Cortes who saw all Central America as territory to be restored to the Spanish Crown were furious with Mexico. Others greeted the war with equanimity, or even support. Even the most hardline elements in Spanish politics (mostly) did not seek another war with Mexico. Some in the Moderate ranks in the Cortes wished to resurrect the Duque de la Victoria's plan of Mexican alliance, with some going so far as to openly hope for a revival of the Mexican throne in union with Spain. Within days all this debate was thrown into chaos when the United States issued an ultimatum to Mexico, demanding that the Mexicans immediately sign a peace treaty with Guatemala. When Zuloaga ignored President John Charles Frémont's demand the Americans declared war.

The American intervention inspired a wave of anger across Spain at all levels. The Queen had to be talked down from summoning the American ambassador on the spot for fear her temper would get the better of her and Washington DC would recieve a declaration of war. Even with cooler heads prevailing the Cortes bristled with anger - and panic. If the Americans had come to regard Central America as so much their sphere of influence they would go to war over Guatemala, a small far-off place they had few interests what did that mean for Spain? Would Spanish moves against Nicaragua or Hispaniola provoke similar American aggression? In the febrile atmosphere of 1859 lurid rumours spread easily among the population that the Americans had supplied arms to the rebels in Cuba and Puerto Rico in 1856.

Don Casimiro Vigodet was better informed than most and knew there was some truth to all this. Various elements in the United States, albeit concentrated in the opposition Democrats rather than President Frémont's Republicans had made no secret of their interest in Cuba. He also knew from naval reports that smuggling into Cuba and Puerto Rico and likely Honduras was being conducted by private American individuals. Nothing individually or even in combination made the case for war against so mighty a power as the United States but beneath the surface courteous relations anger and uncertainty bubbled.

Had Spain adopted a more consistent policy towards Mexico would the United States have intervened as she did? It is hard to tell. Under both Bravo and Vigodet the Spanish government had been building up trading status and political influence in South America to the extent that Peru and even the Empire of Brazil (a state bigger and wealthier than Mexico) had drifted into the Spanish sphere. A similar policy might have worked with Mexico and possibly disinclined the United States from war. However that would have required Madrid to have a single common goal in Mexico. Between those that saw Mexico as a rival and those that saw her as a monarchy to be won again for the Bourbons and those who could live with an allied, conservative republican Mexico the only common stance was interest.

With few other options Vigodet decided to build up the Navy in the Caribbean. Whatever happened next Spain would need to show a strong hand in the region.

Mexico & Guatemala, 1859. The disputed Chiapas region is marked in red.​

Footnotes:

[1] In terms of game mechanics obviously there isn't any difference between a man o'war with an auxiliary engine (like HMS Duke of Wellington) and a traditional man o'war and likewise there isn't any difference between a paddle steamer and a screw steamer. In both cases though I wanted to go with what would fit a conservative, underbudgeted navy. Also paddle wheel warships (which in our time line saw extensive use deep into the 1860s ) and they just look cool.

[2] As I noted before the presidency of Mexico tended to swap hands every few weeks, generally because the leader at the time resigned to lead a field army. At this point in time Zuloaga is the dominant political force in Mexico regardless of whether he is currently president or not.

 

[RossN]

John Charles Frémont, President of the United States of America, 1857 to 1861. ​

Chapter Eleven: Anarchy in the Americas

The United States went to war in 1859 in order to avoid a far worse war. President John Charles Frémont, the victor in the closely fought November 1856 election was a Republican and his triumph at the polls appalled many in the South who saw in the romantic explorer and adventurer an ardent foe of slavery. For two years the United States slid closer and closer to the abyss until relief appeared from the unlikeliest of directions. The Mexican invasion of Guatemala allowed Frémont and an at the time not unwilling Democrat opposition to rally around the flag. Mexico made a terribly convenient enemy and General Zuloaga could be easily cast as a dictator.

Unfortunately no one in America realised or cared about the reaction overseas. The opinion of Spain has already been noted, but American actions caused a similar outcry in Britain. The Earl of Derby, the Conservative Prime Minister had been negotiating trade and border policy with the Mexican government and had supported Zuloaga's claims on Chiapas in return for a favourable treaty regarding Belize. The sudden intervention of the Washington government. in Central American politics alarmed the London Government. Even so it would likely have led to little more than a diplomatic quarrel had it not been for lingering sentiment over the Oregon Territory (or Columbia District to the British [1].) The war of 1850 where the Americans had turned on a distracted Britain permanently damaged relations between the two Anglophone states. Even though that conflict had resulted in a favourable peace for Britain there had been voices even at the time to go further and teach 'Brother Jonathan' a lesson.

Throughout the first half of 1859 both Washington and London would be unsettled by the growing crisis. Mutual misunderstandings and personality clashes compounded the issue. Frémont, wrestling with the titanic task of keeping his country together and running the war was not a natural observer of foreign affairs and even if Derby was no warmonger he was being pushed by an opposition led by Viscount Palmerston. Lord Palmerston, the Liberal leader was an adept judge of the public mood and realised that Britain was in an especially bullish frame of mind. Newspaper editorials and music hall songs alike pressed for war with few voices calling for moderation. An exception was Ireland where many newspapers pushed for a mutual understanding with the Americans. However this attitude was more than compensated by jingoistic sentiment in British North America. The profits to made from the fur trade were at this point in decline but British settlers along the Pacific Northwest still believed that land below the River Columbia was worth taking.

Finally in October Britain moved to outright conflict. The actual casus belli was a border dispute between overeager locals along the Oregon/Columbia border that in more reasoned times would have resulted in a few drunks spending a week in gaol and a salvo of editorials in frontier newspapers but in the strained times and under intense pressure Derby requested Queen Victoria declare war on the United States. The British now claimed the entirety of the Oregon Territory.

For the Spanish government the British declaration of war sent further faultlines through an already cracked picture. Whatever the current anger against the United States in Spain, Britain was hardly a friend. Indeed there the open greed of the British almost made the Americans sympathetic in some quarters. This was not hypocrisy. Most Spaniards and a vast majority of politicians and military officers saw Central America as an area Spain had an abiding presence and history in. The Spanish government had a far better claim to Honduras than the British had to Oregon. The difference was one of three centuries of settlement.

Unfortunately the rest of the world did not necessarily see it that way and in many respects Spain was still living with the international odium of annexing El Salvador at the end of the decade [2]. Both Don Luis González-Bravo and Don Casimiro Vigodet had pursued a cautious foreign policy in the years since, not only in Mexico (where as noted Spanish opinion was far from united) but in the other Central American republics. For the hawks in Madrid who pushed for (at a minimum) the eventual annexation of Guatemala, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and the great island of Hispaniola the cautious approach was enough to drive them to fury. What possible time could be better than now with the United States fighting on two fronts? Still Vigodet pursued a reactive cautious strategy.

To be fair to Vigodet the Spanish president was also being distracted by events in Europe. From Paris Bravo had sent multiple reports about the secret deals the French were conducting with the Piedmontese. The Conte di Cavour, the Italian intrigant and writer had reached a secret agreement with French president M. Michel Goudchaux at Plombières in November 1859, wherby the French Republic would back Sardinia-Piedmonte in a conflict against Modena. Such a conflict would inevitably draw the Austrians into a war with France. On 1 January 1860 that was exactly what happened: France declared war on Austria (and Modena).

For Spain it was hard to think of a more dreadful outcome. Austria was Spain's ally, her only truly significant ally and Queen Isabella regarded the Emperor Franz-Joseph as a friend and supporter (the two monarchs were of similar age.) The Moderate dominated government also had pronounced personal sympathies for the Hapsburgs and regarded the arrogant and jingoistic French Republic with unease and distaste. None of that changed the fact the war with France was an affair no government in Madrid could contemplate without fear. Vigodet had no intention of provoking a third French invasion in his lifetime and with a show of ruthless pragmatism the Austrian ambassador was informed that Spain could not fight because of 'the imminent threat to our holdings in the Americas.'

The Franco-Austrian War breaks, 1 January 1860.​

The 'imminent threat' was a half-truth at best but it was a fact that Spanish attention was riveted on events across the Atlantic, especially once the bonds of alliance with Austria had been tactfully evaded. The Mexicans rapidly overran Guatemala in 1859 and the opening months of 1860 but had found in their turn that the Americans had pushed across the Rio Grande in force. The British, advanced slowly in both the Pacific Northwest and New England and thousands of Redcoats were pouring into British North Americ via the port of Halifax on the Atlantic. The bulk of the action, at least between the British and Americans took place at sea however. Those men o'war with auxiliary engines and steam frigates experienced their first full war. To their credit the United States Navy, outnumbered and lagging in technology, put up a stubborn fight all along the Eastern Seaboard (fighting off the California coast was limited.) The maritime warfare of 1859 to 1861 would swiftly be recognised as the greatest single series of sea battles in history up until this point. Everything for sail alone men o'war to the most modern steam frigates saw action during this conflict.

Unlike prior duels between the Americans and the British privateering had fallen out of use. The British had signed the Paris Declaration Respecting Maritime Law in 1856 by which most of the significant sea powers (Spain included) had outlawed letters of marque. The United States had not signed but the Frémont government was wary of licencing privateers for fear of the reprisals the Royal Navy would enforce against 'pirates' and the reaction overseas. This did not stop some enterprising individuals of New England turning to buccaneering (and often a short if violent career) but by the middle of 1860 far more profit was to be found in blockade running. The Royal Navy, albeit with heavy losses, had swept the American warships from the open sea and with frightening speed the blockade of the American seaports began to bite. However by that point the United States had even worse problems to deal with.

British warships bombard an American coastal position, late 1859.​

When the British had declared war in October 1859 the Democrats in Congress had laid the blame at President Frémont's feet. A majority of representatives from the Southern United States had attempted to impeach Frémont that December but with the aid of Republicans and (reluctantly) Northern Democrats the president managed survive. The whole bitter affair stretched the wartime alliance between the abolitionist North and the slave owning South to snapping point. An inaccurate, but widely believed, rumour that Frémont intended to annex muck of Mexico as 'free states' (ie. states were slavery was banned) swept across the South in January.

On 6 March 1860 the states of South Carolina, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia and Louisiana seceded from the Union, forming the Confederate States of America (C.S.A). Within days they would be joined by Texas, Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee and North Carolina. The end of the month would see Kentucky join with Kansas finally joining on 9 April - a surprise to all as it had been believed that Kansas would stay loyal to Washington while Missouri would secede, the opposite of what occurred. The territories of Oklahoma, New Mexico and Arizona also joined the Confederacy. By the mid-Summer the Confederate States had a capital (Richmond) and a president (Jefferson Davis) and was at war with the Washington government, though not Britain or Mexico.

Even acknowledging the bitter internal relations in the United States few in the North had imagined the South would actually secede during wartime. With most of the Army in Mexico and the remainder fighting the British Frémont found himself in a desperate situation.

Across the Atlantic the birth of the Confederacy was met with mass confusion in the chancelleries of Europe. It was no secret the United States had divisions but the secession of thirteen states and nearly two fifths of the populace went beyond mere 'division.' In Madrid the general feeling was that the United States would seek peace with Mexico City and London as soon as possible to fight against the real enemy. If the Confederacy succeeded in establishing herself as an independent nation then the future of the Union as a great power was far from clear.

By late Spring of 1860 different factions had emerged in the Spanish government on how to handle the American crisis. At the most cautious extreme was the policy advocated by Don Alejandro Mon y Menéndez, the finance minister. Mon wishes to avoid any further military entanglements at all in the Americas (at least in the immediate future) in favour of winning over the Central and South American states through economic clout and cultural soft power. As Mon could point out both Brazil, by far the greatest power in South America and Peru were now in the Spanish sphere of influence, with friendly governments and open economies.

On the face of it Mon's proposals entailed the least risk and least expense for Spain. However that did not mean no risk. Both Argentina and Chile had been in the Spanish sphere in the previous decade and both had gone through revolutions that the Madrid government had backed away from confronting, at the cost of losing face in international opinion. Would the same thing happen if pro-Spanish governments were toppled in the future?

A more proactive policy favoured by General Leopoldo O'Donnell was direct military intervention in Mexico. General O'Donnell had carved out a political party of his own before the June 1858 elections. The Unión Liberal, a broadly conservative movement in between the Moderates and the Progressives and numbering discontented followers of both factions was in favour of laissez-faire policies and confiscating church land. Under O'Donnell however it quickly distingushed itself as an advocate for a strong foreign policy. Resurrecting an old of dream of Baldomero Espartero, General O'Donnell proposed landing a force in Mexico and installing a pro-Spanish monarchist regime in Mexico City. This government would offer the Mexican imperial crown to Isabella, uniting the Spanish and Mexican crowns. O'Donnell admitted his plan was bold but stressed that Mexico was on the verge of total collapse and that even in the event of a quick peace with the Americans civil war between the conservatives and liberals was inevitable. Faced with such a disaster O'Donnell believed that many Mexican conservatives would welcome Spain [3].

The most radical proposal however came from an unapologetic reactionary; Ramón María Narváez y Campos, the Duque de Valencia. A tough and ruthlessly military man the Duque de Valencia thought that Spain would never have a better opportunity to hobble her rival in the Americas. Simply put he proposed an alliance with the Confederate States of America. It was true that there was little reason for either power to love one another, even if they both practiced slavery. Catholic, monarchist Spain and the Protestant, republican Confederacy would make uneasy bedfellows. Those American voices most hostile to Spain - the ones who advocated annexing Cuba - had consistently come from the now rebel states. Yet the Confederacy had no other allies and permanently weakening the United States would be much to Spains advantage. The disadvantage of course was that Spain would have to actually fight the United States, and even with the Union weakened by war with Britain that was no minor problem.

Vigodet's policy was instinctively cautious and based around the slow growth of power in Central America and by nature his views would have aligned with Alejandro Mon. Now however he found himself under pressure from across the political spectrum to take a gamble. Queen Isabella, fretting over her powerlessness during the Austro-French war was another force pushing for a show of Spanish strength before the world.

North America, April 1860.​

Footnotes:

[1] Essentially the OTL states of Washington and Oregon. The British annexed what would have been Washington in the previous war.

[2] As I mentioned before my 'Justify War' against El Salvador was discovered almost instantly, leaving me with a great deal of Infamy to work off.

[3] Essentially O'Donnell's proposals if successfully carried out would recreate the Empire of Mexico with Isabella as Empress, represented in Mexico City by a local regent. Nominally Mexico would be an independent monarchy linked by a common crown but in real terms Mexico would be a puppet/satellite of Spain.

 

[RossN]

Soldiers of the Mexican Civil War, 1861.​

Chapter Twelve: Where and when to intervene?

The first of the three wars wracking North America to end was that between Mexico, the United States and Guatemala. Even with the crisis on the other side of the Rio Grande the blue uniformed soldiers of the Union Army had pushed deep into Mexico. With half his country occupied General Félix María Zuloaga was anxious for peace terms, a sentiment he correctly supposed was shared on Washington. As humiliating as a return to the borders of 1858 would be it was better than surrendering land or a huge indemnity to the Americans.

1860 was an annus horribilis for Mexican conservatives. Though the liberals had intermittently enjoyed power the story of Mexico in its first forty years as an independent state had been dominated by powerful generals and strongmen (the Caudillos.) By no means had all of these figures been truly conservative and some like Antonio López de Santa Anna had begun as liberals but had turned conservative with age but broadly speaking the traditionalist right had been in the ascendant from the late 1840s on. The Mexico that had begun the war against Guatemala in 1859 was a centralised republic with the Roman Catholic Church strongly ingrained in law and culture. Though not a true dictatorship Mexico might perhaps be fairly called an oligarchy of military officers.

The catastrophic intervention of the Americans threatened this status quo. Though Mexico had been on the losing side of the El Salvadorian War (when she herself had played a similar role to the Unite States in 'standing up' for a small Central Amercan republic), that conflict had not seen any fighting in Mexico proper and even relations with Spain were restored swiftly. The United States on the other hand had repeatedly annexed territory from Mexico. Even the general public who mostly agreed with Zuloaga's goal of a Mexican hegemony in Central America were inclined to blame him for not striking a deal with Washington before attacking Guatemala.

With most of the Mexican Army in the south there had been limited large scale fighting with the United States throughout 1859. That changed in early 1860 with a string of defeats suffered by hastily assembled conscript regiments. Zuloaga, his position steadily weakening was forced to abandon his field command in Guatemala and resume the Mexican presidency in February 1860, with only his presence in the capital delaying an outright collapse of morale and a probable coup d'état. Though the birth of the Confederate States of America the following month saw a surge of optimism in Mexico Zuloga and most of the rest of the Army realised that the United States would likely defeat the Confedrates and then enact a terrible revenge on Mexico. A white peace was humiliating but it was probably the best result Mexico could expect [1].

On 8 April 1860 the Mexican government, acting through the intermediaries of the French embassy in Washington reached a deal with the United States for an armistice. Though a full treaty was not agreed to, and in fact would not even be negotiated until after the American Civil War for all intents and purposes Mexico and the United States agreed to a white peace and a return to the pre-1859 border, with the implicit understanding that Mexico would have no diplomatic contact with the Confederate States. Technically speaking it could have been far worse. Mexico did not cede a foot of her soil, was not faced with ruinous reparations and did not lose control of her foreign affairs. Zuloaga would spend the rest of his long life stressing to all and sundry that it was thanks to his negotiation that the United States did not demand more. Few, outside his inner circle believed this either later or at the time and before the end of April he would be gone into retirement and ultimately exile in Brazil. His successor was another conservative general, Miguel Gregorio de la Luz Atenógenes Miramón y Tarelo. This time however the public response was one of fury. The conservative clique that controlled Mexico was blamed by many for the woes of the country. Mexican liberals like Benito Juárez became popular figureheads, less due to agreement with their causes as because they alone were untainted by defeat and disgrace.

For over a year between April 1860 and May 1861 Mexico would simmer with the threat of civil war. Though large scale violence had not yet broken out there were at least two, perhaps three competing governments. Juárez, a civilian lawyer and skilled politician led a coalition of genuine liberals and those simply disenchanted with the existing regime based in Vera Cruz. Conservatives republicans were led briefly by Miguel Miramón (until his return to command the Army in the field in June 1860) and subsequently by José Ignacio Pavón. For most of the oncoming Mexican Civil War this conservative government continued to control the capital and to possess international recognition [2].

The Spanish government was aware of events in Mexico and alarmed at the possibility of the 'legitimate' (conservative) government of Mexico collapsing. Don Miguel Miramón was pro-Spain, perhaps even vaguely monarchist and he (and his successors) seemed positively eager to welcome Spanish support. The same seemed highly unlikely to be true of a Benito Juárez led Mexico. Still, Spain were initially unable to devote their full attention to events happening there. The other civil war in North America was also of great interest to the Madrid government.

The so-called 'Pettigrew Loans' to the Confederate government, first delivered in 1860.
​

President Jefferson Davis was a man desperate to find foreign recognition and he was to suffer constant disappointment. It might be supposed that the British would have recognised the Confederate States at once, but anti-slavery sentiment in Britain left the London government unwilling to contemplate an association with Davis even at the height of their own war with his enemy. The Empire of Brazil, a significant slave owning power (indeed it had a higher population than the Confederate States and was not substantially less wealthy) briefly seemed like an ally but Dom Pedro II was rightly suspected of abolitionist sentiment and perhaps more importantly Brazil tended to follow Spain's lead on foreign affairs.

Spain herself remained divided over what to do in North America beyond the feeling that she do something. After much bitter debate in the Cortes Don Casimiro Vigodet was persuaded that Spain could - discretely - supply loans to the Confederate government. It was a measure that managed to displease everyone; for those who wanted outright intervention it smacked of providing too little to ensure Confederate survival. Alejandro Mon was especially critical on this, pointing out that if the Confederate States lost, which still seemed likely, all that Spanish silver would have been for nothing. On the other side those who didn't want to support the Confederates at all could point to the anger of the government in Washington.

The Confederate 'man on the ground' in Madrid was Colonel James Johnston Pettigrew, a young lawyer from North Carolina who during the second half of 1860 became the unofficial Confederate minister to the Spanish government. Colonel Pettigrew was a linguist and a Hispanophile who had authored a travel book, Notes on Spain and the Spaniards not long before the war. Though he had (very briefly) served with the Confederate Army it was quickly realised he would be more use in Madrid. It was largely through his agency and the clandestine deals with sympathisers in Spain that money finally began to flow into Confederate coffers (though functionally speaking most of this would be spent in Europe on supplies, blockade runners and commerce raiders.)

Of course Pettigrew could not be formally acknowledged without breaking relations with the United States and with an American minister in Madrid (Carl Schurz) all this was conducted with the upmost secrecy.

On 21 February 1861 the British government signed a peace treaty with the United States in Boston. The terms came as a shock to outside world with London not simply demanding Oregon (where the British had a weak claim) but also Idaho. The sheer greed of the London government almost made the Americans walk out of the negotiations but the desperation to deal with the Confederate States was too strong. Signing the Treaty of Boston was one of the last official acts of John C. Frémont, whose melancholy presidency reached its exhausted end in March with inauguration of his successor. Frémont had declined to run for a second term in November 1860, leaving his Vice President William L. Dayton to win a plurality at the polls against a divided opposition.

President Dayton could at least now focus on winning the Civil War. The United States, weakened and wearied from her struggles with Britain and Mexico was still more powerful than the Confederate States. In every respect from manpower, industry and trade the government in Washington had a great advantage. If anything this superiority was even greater when it came to the military situation. Most of the standing regiments of the Army had stayed loyal to the Union and the Navy, previously confined to port while the Royal Navy dominated the sea could now blockade the long Confederate coast.

North America in late February 1861, after the Treaty of Boston between the United States and Britain.
​

The peace between Washington and London was expected in Madrid, even if the exact terms seemed harsher than most had foreseen. The British audacity at annexing Idaho had weakened antipathy towards the United States in the Cortes - the land grab was so unjustified it was now difficult to present the Americans as worse warmongers than their cousins across the Atlantic. The radical hawks led by the Duque de Valencia who positively hungered for war with the United States were furthered marginalised by a Naval report in May. The report had been commissioned by Vigodet to study the impact of the war between Britain and the United States and it made for grim reading. Though battered by the Royal Navy the Union fleet remained the second largest in the world and possessed many primarily steam driven ships [3]. Admiral Genaro Pavía was blunt in his assessment: the Armada Real Española would find it an immense struggle to defeat the United States Navy.

The Naval report and the peace with Britain poured cold water over the likelihood of Spain directly intervening in the American Civil War. However perhaps such an effort would not be needed. Though foreign supplies shipped to the Confederate States dwindled after the Treaty of Boston enough had got through beforehand that Richmond was staying solvent. Spanish silver might perhaps have proved decisive after all. In late June 1861 Washington D.C fell to the Confederate Army. President Dayton and his government fled first to Philadelphia, then to New York.

The Fall of Washington did not end the war, or even reduce the natural advantages of the United States with its greater manpower and industry. Washington itself was economically of little significance and due to its location had always been strategically vulnerable. Still, coming so soon after defeat at the hands of the British it was a hammer blow to the North's morale. There now seemed a chance that the Confederate States might win the war. At the very least it seemed the fighting would continue for the foreseeable future. No foreign government was ready to officially recognise Richmond, but unofficial envoys and clandestine talk between governments grew rapidly.

Washington D.C. falls to the Confederate States, 28 June 1861.
​

Six months later another capital would fall to rebels. The Mexican Civil War had exploded into outright violence in May 1861 and despite the financial support of the Spanish government [4] the conservatives were driven from Mexico City in January 1862. Miguel Miramón and José Ignacio Pavón would continue to lead a rival government in the North of Mexico for months more, but in April they would finally be forced to surrender. The liberals had won and Benito Juárez was now President of Mexico.

Juárez would never have been looked on kindly by the Spanish government no matter how he came to power. He was seen as too liberal and anti-clericalist and he was fiercely against the influence of foreign governments in Mexico. The Civil War had made that mutual mistrust far worse. Spain had signed several economic treaties with Mexico under Miramón and Pavón that had left Spain the favoured trading partner among many other rights. Juárez swiftly abrogated these deals to the fury of Madrid. Nor was the reaction one of anger alone, for Don Casimiro Vigodet and Don Alejandro Mon both suspected Juárez protested too much and that he had every intention of seeking the protection of the United States. A Juárez-led Mexico was therefore a threat in every respect to Spanish interests in the Americas.

Miramón had gone into exile in March and sailed for Spain. In late April he had arrived in Madrid where the Mexican general was welcomed in many conservative circles. At the urging of some of his new friends among the Spanish elite he wrote to Queen Isabella stressing (indeed exaggerating) the monarchist credentials of his leadership. That letter was intercepted by the civil service before it reached Her Majesty's hands but Isabella was well aware of the dashing young military officer professing his royalism throughout town and insisted on an audience. Vigodet, knowing that the Cortes was growing more anti-Juárez by the day agreed. Predictably the Spanish monarch and the Mexican general got on very well.

How monarchist the Mexican conservative exiles actually were was very debatable. Zuloaga had been content to rule a conservative republic and if Miramón and Pavón had made sympathetic statements about Spain and Isabella while in power their actions had stopped far short of ever challenging the constitution. Now however it suited both sides to pretend that the Mexican conservatives had been gallant cavaliers (or rather caballeros) in a splendid war against the revolutionary mob. Though perhaps this is unfair; many Mexican leaders had begun as loyalists to King Fernando before making the journey to their current positions. There had been genuine royalist sentiment in Mexico in the recent past.

Whatever the exact portion of ingredients the anti-Juárez mood in Madrid had become a potent cocktail by April 1862 and Vigodet was beginning to look at declaring war to reinstall pro-Spanish sentiment in Mexico City - whatever that entailed.

The collapse of the conservative Mexican government in April 1862 (Spanish reaction highlighted in red.)​

Footnotes:

[1] At no point during eight to nine weeks that the United States was simultaneously at war with Mexico and the Confederate States was there any significant contact between the governments in Richmond and Mexico City. The reason was partly long standing grievances and cultural differences with the Texan Revolution well recalled by both sides and partly sheer practical dfficulty. The entire Mexican/Confederate border was under Union military control and the Gulf coast was under naval blockade.

[2] In game terms a Jacobin (liberal) revolt broke out in Mexico and subsequently toppled the conservative government. They seem to fit with Juárez quite nicely.

[3] Though not ironclads or monitors (at least in game terms). Ironclads don't appear until 1860 at the earliest and with the possible exception of Britain no one has them yet.

[4] That is to say they were in the Spanish Sphere of Influence. I'll go into what exactly that means in a future update.

 

[RossN]

General Benito Asensio, commander of the Spanish forces in the Mexican War.​

Chapter Thirteen - Peace in North America

The Spanish-Mexican War of 1862 to 1864 was the most exhausting foreign struggle Spain had been through since the original Spanish American Wars of Independence. In terms of pure casualties and cost the Venetian War had perhaps been even more destructive but the sheer duration of the Mexican adventure and the grueling fighting it involved left its mark long after the muskets and cannons had fallen silent.

To begin with the government in Madrid did not declare war the moment Benito Juárez took power. The new Mexican president was already a hate figure across the Atlantic but it was not until he reneged on the very pro-Spain trading deals his predecessor had set up that outright conflict became inevitable and it was only after weeks of debate in the Cortes over the exact terms that Spain officially declared war on 4 June 1862. The naval squadron in the Caribbean, a Havana based force of half a dozen warships would be the first to inflict a blow on the enemy, raiding enemy merchant shipping and conducting lighting strikes at coastal forts. Most of the Spanish ships in port at Havana were older men o'war and sail frigates but the newly built Cadarso was much more modern. A screw-engine steam corvette based off the recent French warship Dupleix she was the most advanced ship in the entire Armada Real Española and in the coming war would live up to her designation as a 'commerce raider' being a zealous and successful maritime predator. To the disappointment of many in the Navy their Mexican counterparts would play little part in the war with the enemy fleet based at Acapulco on the Pacific coast.

Unfortunately while the blockade wore down enemy morale the war could not be won at sea alone and the Spanish would have to land substantial forces in Mexico to force a surrender. The initial site for landing troops was the Yucatán Peninsula. Though far from Mexico City and not especially good terrain for armies - the area was largely devoid of above ground rivers - it did have the benefit of being close to both Cuba and Honduras, and thus easy to supply. There was also a, perhaps optimistic feeling that given the long history of Yucatán feuding with the Mexican national government there would be some pro-Spanish (or at least anti-Mexico City) feeling to be found among the locals.

Most of the initial Spanish strength was made up of those regiments that had seen service in Honduras and El Salvador. Not only was it felt that these soldiers would be better able to handle the climate and terrain it was far cheaper to ship them across the Caribbean than across the Atlantic. From Spain proper would come eight cavalry regiments. The troops chosen would prove controversial as rather than the more elite cuirassiers, dragoons or hussars Madrid sent unspecialised, lance and sabre wielding light cavalry [1]. Though the Army had fairly sound reasons for keeping the elite regiments at home, such as the possibility of a renewed Carlist rising the main reason was once more cost. The lighter troops were simply less expensive.

A Spanish light cavalryman of the mid-Nineteenth Century.​

The original assumption in late 1861 when war with Mexico had first been discussed was that General Leopoldo O'Donnell would lead the Army in the Americas. He was the man who had most championed intervention and with the disappearance from public life of Baldomero Espartero the Hibernian-Hispanian officer was the strongest military man in Spain. However an election was due to be held at the end of the year and O'Donnell as leader of the Unión Liberal Party was unable to take up a field command. When the election was actually held on New Years Day 1863 the Unión Liberals would come second behind the moderates and O'Donnell would be offered and accept the Ministry of War.

Meanwhile in Mexico the invasion force, led by the colonial veteran General Benito Asensio faced the Mexicans in the field for the first time at Bacalar on 22 September 1862. The hard fought victory provoked mixed feelings in Madrid. It was a success by any means but it had not been expected than the Mexicans, defeated in two recent foreign conflicts and just recovering from their own civil war would be able to field such formidable armies. Don Benito Asensio's combined force at Bacalar had been hastily assembled from three different field forces (hence the preponderance of cavalry.)

Bacalar was eye opening though it would be a mere foretaste of a far greater battle the following year. From 12 to 16 August 1863 the Spanish and Mexicans would fight at Campeche. In the days of Spanish rule Campeche had been a bustling seaport and it had been one of the first true cities in south-eastern New Spain but independence had been unkind and the city was in decline. Still, it was a key strategic point between the Yucatán Peninsula and the rest of Mexico and the two sides struggled savagely. The Mexican Army employed nearly every piece of artillery they could lay their hands on, many old guns available from the then recently concluded American Civil War. Fortunately for the Spanish, who were doing the defending, poor weather and the used condition of the cannon prevented the massacre the Mexicans had been hoping for and General Asensio's masterful use of cavalry allowed him to encircle the bulk of the enemy army. By the time General Escobeda manage to withdraw tens of thousands of men and guns had been left behind, captured by Asensio.

The Battle of Campeche was a victory for Spain, but one that almost lost them the war. Most of the horrifying casualty rate represented the wounded rather than the dead but thousands were in no condition to continue the campaign. Many surviving cavalrymen now found themselves without horses, all but negating what had been a great mobility advantage to the Spanish armies. Even though Asensio had effectively broken the Mexican military he wrote back to O'Donnell that: 'I need either thousands of reinforcements or ten years to bring the Mexicans to peace.' Neither were obviously available.

The Battle of Campeche, 12 to 16 August 1863.​

On 6 April 1863 the United States of America and the Confederate States of America signed an armistice. Though full details would not be ratified until the Treaty of Philadelphia in August the de facto terms of the armistice would remain unaltered. The United States effectively recognised the rights of seceding states and territories to leave the Union. It was not quite full recognition of the Richmond government as a foreign nation and the Washington government would prove reluctant to move beyond the absolute bare essentials but essentially the Confederacy had won the war and her independence.

A Confederate victory was not something many had predicted to be possible in 1860 and though President Jefferson Davis waxed lyrical about the glories of Dixie manhood in the struggle and the patience and stoicism of the civilian people the reality was that it had been a very close run thing and Spanish silver had been at least as vital as the generalship of Robert E. Lee. The Confederate dollar was backed by the peseta and the national bank was in debt to the government of Spain. The general public of the Confederate States was not fully aware quite how much they owed to Spanish loans or that without them the state would likely have collapsed during the war but they did have some inkling that Madrid had aided them in their hour of need. Now it was time for that debt to be honoured.

Colonel Pettigrew had been recalled from Madrid in April 1863; though he had been successful there was a feeling in Richmond that someone more senior should represent the Confederate States at Queen Isabella's court. William Preston, a congressman from Kentucky and brigadier general during the war who had some diplomatic experience was sent as a replacement. Even at this stage the international status of the Confederate States existed in a kind of limbo; diplomatic relations had been established with most of the major and many of the secondary powers but full legal recognition was very slow in coming. Don Casimiro Vigodet was sympathetic but candid that the Confederate States needed to prove they could stand as a stable state before recognition could be granted, and also reminded Preston that many nations maintained greater trade with the North than with the South.

After the Battle of Campeche General O'Donnell began to lean heavily on Vigodet to bring the Confederate States into the war against Mexico. With a huge border stretching across the thinly defended North of Mexico the Confederate States could all but march in parade formation across the Rio Grande. The Spanish War Minister personally doubted the Confederates would need to use more than nominal force to create a panic in Mexico City and force the Juárez government to the negotiating table.

The Spanish president was less confident. Not of the military situation - Vigodet fully agreed with O'Donnell that the intervention of the Confederates could shave a year and thousands of lives off the war. Rather he doubted the Confederates, bone weary of the life and death struggle of the Union would be willing to enter another conflict so swiftly. The economy of the rebel states lay in ruins and the population in many areas was not far from famine. Nevertheless, as O'Donnell pointed out, the Confederates were almost entirely dependent on Spain at the moment. That dependence would decrease over time as the merchant marine was rebuilt and factories in Virginia, Kentucky and Texas began to return to civilian production but even then the Richmond government would need to repay her loans.

In fact would take almost a year and the dispatch of the former prime minister Don Luis González Bravo to the Confederate capital as the new Spanish envoy to persuade the Davis government to enter the war against Mexico. Bravo was a skilled diplomat and brought a certain Old World charm to the role, with his known association with Queen Isabella most attractive to the more aristocratically inclined members of Dixie's elite but it was hard work. Twice - in late 1863 and then again in January 1864 it seemed the Condeferate States were willing to pledge to a Spanish alliance. Twice the alliance died in Congress [2]. Throughout his ten months in the Americas Bravo was being bombarded by letters and telegrams, from Casimiro Vigodet and Leopoldo O'Donnell and more than once from the Queen. He steadily ignored O'Donnell's urging to use the 'stick' of financial coercion against the Confederate government, preferring the carrot of a 'prosperous, stable Mexico, tied to a friendly government.' In his negotiations Bravo targeted not simply Davis but also the Confederate Vice President and the man being widely spoken of as the next candidate for the presidency General Robert E. Lee.

Very slowly the Confederate states were pushed and pulled into the position Madrid wanted. In March 1864 Richmond withdrew diplomatic recognition from the government of Benito Juárez, citing his diplomatic relations with the Union [3]. The following month Congress voted by a very thin margin for war with the 'Mexican Republic' to 'restore good government in the long suffering lands of our neighbour.' Nominally the Confederate States declared war on their own initiative but the rest of the world saw it for what it was, bowing to Spanish requests.

Though proudly independent the Confederate States was very much in Spain's debt.
​

While diplomacy was at play in Richmond and Madrid the war proper had ground on. Both General Benito Asensio and his Mexican counterparts had grown wary of pitched battles, instead running a campaign of siege and counter siege. The Spanish gradually pushed towards Veracruz, staying on the coast and thus easy supply by sea. The Mexicans, pushing to the South attempted to liberate the towns in the Yucatán Peninsula, some of which had been in Spanish hands for over a year and a half. Neither side possesed the strength to deliver a single hammer blow.

The Confederate intervention naturally depressed morale in Mexico City but at first it seemed as if that was the worst that would happen. The small standing Confederate Army was in North Carolina and the Confederate States was sluggish in calling up reserves. Taking a gamble Juárez ordered an army North, hoping to win a quick battle that would shock the war weary Confederates into pulling out of the war. It proved a fatal miscalculation. At the Battle of Laredo in July 1864 General Robert Hood defeated General Juan Almonte. In scale Laredo was no Campeche and Almote withdrew with most of his men in good order but the impact of the clash was precisely the opposite of Juárez's hopes. The Confederate public, shocked out of their apathy by having to fight on their own soil now began to respond much more aggressively. In August Hood and his army invaded Mexico proper.

On 7 November Veracruz fell to the Spanish and with a major port in his hands Asensio persuaded Madrid to send another five regiments. That would dangerously lower the forces available at home if the Carlists revolted but Asensio felt victory was close enough to take the risk. In fact none of the fresh soldiers would be needed. A week after the fall of Veracruz Juárez was overthrown in a bloodless coup in Mexico City. As the liberal Mexican leader fled into exile in the United States his successors, a coalition of conservatives who had played little part in the war sued for peace. On Christmas Eve 1864 the acting-Mexican president Rómulo Díaz de la Vega signed an armistice with both the Spanish and the Confederacy.

The Treaty of Veracruz which would be drawn up early in 1865 disappointed the more romantic hawks in Spain. The question of a Mexican monarchy in personal union with Spain was left in limbo with a pious sounding clause recognising: 'the personal link of Her Most Catholic Majesty Queen Isabel II of the Spains and her heirs with the people of Mexico' but very little on the exact form such a link should take in practice. This was quite deliberate and not just because to refute it would mean prolonging the war; Vigodet believed that short of Spanish troops remaining in Mexico forever the only way of gaining a pro-Madrid government was by leaving the matter to Mexican conservatives. Indeed the bulk of the treaty, other than the aspects which guaranteed favourable trade concessions to Spain and the Confederate States was based on talks regarding Spanish investment [4].

The end of 1864 saw peace descend on North America for the first time since January 1859. The balance of power in the continent had been completely overturned and not entirely to Spain's liking. Though the United States had been gravely humbled and the Confederate States and Mexico were in the Spanish orbit the wars had seen a truly frightening growth of British power. Indeed Perfidious Albion had continued her aggressive foreign policy elsewhere while Spain was preoccupied in the New World.

The new borders of North America, 1864.​

Total:

[1] Just 'basic' Cavalry in game terms. I know they are inferior troops but they are very cheap and used mostly to take land rather than fight.

[2] The Confederate States are in my Sphere of Influence and agreed to my request for alliance, though it took three attempts before they accepted my call to war.

[3] Mexico did ally with the United States. Fortunately they were not involved in the war and at least for the moment have been knocked out of the Great Powers.

[4] The peace restored Mexico to my Sphere of Influence. I am definitely going to go into spheres and satellites in an uncoming update.

 

[RossN]

The White House of the Confederacy in Richmond, Virginia.​

Chapter Fourteen: Two Elections

The United States presidential election of 1864 was a grim business, waged against the background of defeat and shock. In New York, the temporary capital until the Confederate Army evacuated Washington D.C in June William Lewis Dayton, the ill-starred Republican president elected in 1860 had presided over two lost wars that between them had seen almost half of the territory of his nation stripped away. Depressed and suffering from rapidly declining health (he would not live to see the end of 1864) Dayton declared he would not run for a second term, avoiding an almost certain defeat at the polls. This left the race open - though more than one newspaper wondered who would seek such a thankless post.

Initially Dayton's Vice President Abraham Lincoln seemed the obvious choice. Shrewd, respected and hard working Lincoln was by far the most popular member of the departing government. However he was also a man feared by many. The Vice President had been an out spoken hawk during the latter stages of the war with the Confederate States and he had disagreed strongly and publicly with the decision to seek an armistice. Much of Lincoln's hardline stance was thought to be linked by his roots in Kentucky (since 1863 literally a foreign country) and his longstanding opposition to slavery. The fear among many was that if elected he would quickly resume the war against the South, if not by force of arms at least by embargoes and treaties. Lincoln had also been vocal about sending substantial loans to the Benito Juárez government in Mexico, and the last thing most people in the Union wanted was a war with Spain [1].

Instead the close fought Republican primary in early 1864 would see Senator Simon Cameron of Pennsylvania win the party nomination. Senator Cameron was himself a controversial character having been a member of three different parties in his life. He also possessed an unsavory aura of corruption, and the rumours that had dogged him for years may have been the reason both John Charles Frémont and Dayton had kept him at arms length throughout their terms. Nevertheless Cameron possessed numerous advantages; he was a successful businessman as a newspaper magnate and railroad baron and he built up a very powerful political machine in his home state. Hailing from Pennsylvania was itself an advantage; the second largest state in the Union had suffered directly during the war and the desire for someone other than a 'hawk' - and that was one charge that could not be thrown at Cameron - was very strong. To help improve his image and gain a little traction with those voters still furious at the peace Cameron chose the Governor of West Virginia (itself a newborn state) Francis Harrison Pierpont as running mate.

Despite the disaster of 1863 it was hardly possible that anyone other than a Republican would triumph at the polls. Still the Democrats and the Radicals ran candidates. The Democratic Party was still fractured between 'War Democrats' and 'Peace Democrats' (sometimes incorrectly called the 'Southern Democrats' though in fact their appeal extended across the Union) with most Democrats rallying behind New York Governor Horatio Seymour. Governor Seymour was considered a moderate force whose personal popularity might rescue the shattered Democrats from the doldrums. Unfortunately for him the 'Southern Democrats' backed Ohio Representative Alexander Long, a vocal advocate of slavery and a fierce opponent of the war with the Confederacy.

The Radical Party nominated the outspoken Senator Benjamin Franklin "Bluff" Wade, also from Ohio. Senator Wade was a ferocious foe of reactionary politics, a firebrand for abolitionism and the extension of suffrage to women. He hoped to win votes from former soldiers embittered at the armistice with traitors.

Finally came the Socialists. There was as yet no 'Socialist Party' as such but early organised labour movements like the National Labour Union contested the election under a wide variety of different 'local' candidates, the most significant of them being William Sylvis of Pennsylvania. The American left was very much based around strongholds of immigrants, with many of its intellectual leaders and practical fixers being German speakers. This reliance on a key group gave the Socialists a 'heartland' to draw upon, but it may also have hurt them a national level. The tenor of the United States in 1864 could not be called immigrant friendly.

Electoral votes of the 1864 election. [2]
​

The election of November 1864 proved an easy triumph for Cameron. Even with all the mud thrown at him and accusations from every editorial and pulpit the Pennsylvania Senator proved unbeatable by the heterogeneous collection of idealists and malcontents thrown against him. Cameron won 1.28 million votes (approximately 52.8% of votes cast) and carried every state, most by very healthy margins. Only in Massachusetts, Minnesota, Montana, South Dakota, Nevada and California did the Republicans fail to win an absolute majority of the vote and only in California (where Cameron won 8,755 votes to Seymour's 7,569) could the result be honestly called close. Seymour who won slightly under 566,000 votes nationally suffered the humiliation of losing his home state by a twenty point margin.

Why had Cameron triumphed even in the midst of a defeat that foreign observers might have felt would turn the nation against the Republicans? Partly he had been helped by the fact that the Union was effectively a one party state on every level above the rank of local sheriff. The Republican Party was not universally popular - as noted above nearly half the country voted for other candidates in 1864 - but it was the only organisation that could maintain an efficient party machine across the length and breath of the nation, something the canny Cameron with his personal experience in Pennsylvania used to great advantage, employing the train and the telegraph to drown out his competition. In some local areas the old Democratic Party machine still functioned but not enough to confront the advantages available to the Republicans. It must also be said that the Republicans proved skilled hands at the propaganda war, promising peace, prosperity and recovery while slandering their foes as 'cowards' (the Democrats), 'traitors' (the 'Southern Democrats') and 'malcontents' (the Radicals and Socialists.) Given all that most voters held their nose and went for the corrupt but affable businessman.

President Simon Cameron & Vice President Francis Pierpont.
​

The Confederate States had held a presidential election in February 1861 to confirm the authority of Jefferson Davis but it was effectively an uncontested affair. Only in February 1865 with the war behind the young country would the first real election take place. President Davis had declined to run for an additional term, leaving the field wide open. In total contrast to the Union the Confederacy did not have a single dominant party. Though the vast majority of Confederate politicians drew their roots from the old pre-war Democrats the politics of the Confederate States had quickly begun to fracture; with all sides agreed (or at least officially neutral) on the all important positions of 'States Rights and Slavery' the monolithic nature of Southern politics rapidly gave way to diversity.

It became clear even before the war ended that the most popular political party in Dixie would be the aptly named 'Populist Party'. The Populists, formed early in 1863 in Richmond were a mix of politicians without a clear platform other a generally liberal approach (outside of slavery) an a fervent desire to avoid war. If any Confederate political party could be called friendly towards the North it was the Populists who optimistically called for reconciliation with Washington and a sharp reduction in military spending. Throughout 1863 they had annoyed Spain by voting against war with Mexico in Congress.

Meanwhile the old Democratic Party having split in two in 1863 once 'normal politics' resumed soldiered on. Most of the more moderate Democrats in the Confederate Congress had defected to the Populists. The remainder, retaining the Democrat label, shared many of the same views as their former colleagues but advocated a much more robust, even jingoistic military policy. Having taken the rhetoric of 'states rights' and distrust of powerful government to heart the Democrats were the only significant party in the South to push for full free trade while everyone else, mindful of the fragility of Dixie's economy and her dependence upon Spanish loans preached protectionism.

Ironically the Whigs, who had displayed the most dismay at secession could not afford the degree of reconciliation preached by the Populists. It was one thing to speak of brotherhood and friendship with the Union if one was a war hero or a strident patriot (as many Populists were), it was quite another to do so when one was on record as having tried to stop the war. The Whig party from 1863 had a tricky road to walk, largely clinging to similar positions as the Populists (if perhaps a shade more conservative) and trying to advocate a middle path on the military budget. They were deliberately less than vocal about foreign affairs.

The New America Party was the descendant of the Know-Nothings, primarily a reactionary anti-immigrant faction and anti-Catholic with limited interest in the slavery question, though with the Confederate States established as an independent entity it swiftly became brayingly patriotic. The fifth Confederate political party were the Brothers of the Revolution, a far left group radicalised by the war and as with their counterparts in the North made up and appealing to a disproportionate strand of immigrants. Naturally this made them a particular enemy of the New Americans.

Vice President Alexander Hamilton Stephens, who had been elected (with Davis) as a non-party figure in 1861 began courting the Populists as early as November 1863. To Stephens chagrin the Populist leaders in the Confederate Congress were more enamored by the young and charismatic Senator John Cabell Breckinridge of Kentucky. Rather than face the humiliation of a defeat in the Populist Party primaries Stephens quietly withdrew the feelers he had made towards the Populists and instead approached the Whigs, his original political home. He would end up being their candidate in 1865. The Democrats nominated the former Secretary of War LeRoy Pope Walker of Alabama. Walker had been an early and active proponent of secession which endeared him to the hardline 'hawks', though some questioned his level of ability shown during the war and the fact that he had been replaced by Davis, supposedly for health reasons.

The New America Party rallied behind former Know-Nothing Congressman Humphrey Marshall of Kentucky. Marshall was personally relatively moderate but in campaigning he tapped into a vein of anti-Catholicism that decried the Confederate dependence on Spain - a shock for those in Madrid who felt the Confederacy only existed as a nation thanks to Spanish silver. Almost as bad (from the Spanish point of view) was the slim possibility of a revolutionary socialist presidency, though mercifully the Brothers of the Revolution failed to agree on a single nation wide candidate.

Perhaps the most fiercely fought campaign was not the election itself but the choice of a running mate. None of the major candidates were war heroes or career soldiers, though Marshall had served as a Brigadier-General. That was a problem and independently all the parties would decide on a 'war hero' on the ticket. Even the Populists who were running on a programme of demilitarization were anxious to appeal to the patriotic zeal still strong in the public. In the second half of 1864 an almost farcial race broke out between Breckinridge, Stephens, Walker as they all independently courted Robert E. Lee (Marshall was content to rely on his own wartime laurels.) Unfortunately for them all Lee, elderly and in poor health declined all offers leaving the parties to search elsewhere.

In terms of rank and experience the winner would perhaps be the Populists as Breckinridge persuaded James Longstreet to join his ticket. However Longstreet's personal qualities that made him attractive as a candidate - reliability and political moderation made him less glamorous than some other candidates. One such would be John Bell Hood, the young and flashy (others would say reckless) commander who had won wounds and glories aplenty in the war. Walker was delighted to have such a gallant knight of the Confederacy as his vice presidential candidate, though even many newspapers supportive of the Democrats expressed concerns about his ability for the post.

Meanwhile Stephens had approached Jubal Early and convinced the Virginian to join him on the Whig ticket. From the start it was not a happy relationship; Stephens had seen Early as not simply a military asset but also the key to winning Virginia the key state in the Confederacy. Unfortunately for them both neither man liked much about the other and the relationship quickly grew acrimonious.

Much unlike the North the Confederate election of 1865 truly was an open race. Initially many newspapers believed Walker would triumph but he proved a disappointing and muddled speaker at many public engagements and even the glamour of Hood worried some that the leadership of the Confederate States would be left to 'an empty head and a hot head' as an editorial put it. Slowly the winds began to turn back in Breckinridge's favour. Even so it was not until the votes were counted that the results were clear.

Electoral votes of the 1865 election. [3]
​

Breckinridge's solid win in the Electoral college belied quite how narrow the popular vote had been. The Populists had won just over 330,000 votes (about 28.4% of the total vote) but the Democrats had won 254,000, the New America Party only slightly fewer (Marshall had very nearly won Virginia and done well in Tennessee and Arkansas) and the Whigs had come a respectable fourth with over 200,000 votes.

Fortunately for Breckinridge the vagaries of the first past the post system had delivered a Senate and a House where the Populists held narrow but real majorities. In slight consolation to Stephens and the rest of the Whigs the second biggest party in both chambers were the Whigs, reflecting their regional strength and the less organised electoral machine of both the New Americans and the Democrats.

The Populist triumph at the polls was greeted with relief in Spain. While Madrid would, perhaps, have preferred Alexander Stephens as President of the Confederate States Breckinridge was a stable figure, not given to radicalism and keen to maintain good relations with the Spanish. Even his earlier opposition to the Mexican War that had so irritated Spanish observers was not due to any Hispaniaphobe tendency but a fear that the weak economy of the Confederacy would collapse under the pressure of war. At peace Breckinridge seemed a man Madrid could work with.

President John C. Breckinridge & Vice President James Longstreet.
​

Footnotes:

[1] Given Dayton's death in December 1864 Lincoln did briefly occupy the Presidency in the period before Cameron's inauguration. Mindful of the in-coming President's mandate Lincoln's short tenure proved uneventful.

[2] The colours used here indicate the in-game political ideology of the political parties. The Republicans (yellow) are liberal and support protectionism, laissez fFaire economics, pluralism, full citizenship and have a pro-military policy.

[3] As with the Union the colours indicate ideology. The Populists (yellow) are liberal and support protectionism, laissez faire economics, pluralism, residential citizenship and have an anti-military policy. The Democrats (gold) are anarcho-liberal and support free trade, laissez faire economics, pluralism, residential citizenship and have a jingoistic war policy.

 

[RossN]

Spheres of Influence in Europe, January 1865.​

Chapter Fifteen: The European Dimension

In January 1863, even as war still raged across North America the Spanish electorate had gone to the polls. The result had been a triumph for the centre-right in the Cortes and the retention of Don Casimiro Vigodet as President of the Council of Ministers but it had also seen movement in Spain's hitherto solid political consensus. The Unión Liberal party, formed by General Leopoldo O'Donnell out of those disastified with the extremely conservative administration of the Moderates had won more than a quarter of the seats in the Cortes, to the chagrin of the Progressives who now found themselves pushed into third place. It would be this strong showing in the election that gave General O'Donnell a strong hand in negotiating with the government, and, as we have seen the War Ministry.

By any measure both the Moderates and the Unión Liberal were conservative parties. Very broadly the Moderates primarily appealed to rural conservatives and traditionalists, including those who but for their personal loyalty to the Queen might almost have been Carlists such as the Marqués de Viluma who openly pined for the enlightened absolutism of the Royal Statute of 1834. The Unión Liberal party was more modern and urban in approach, with a stronger presence among Spain's thin middle class and (ironically for a 'broad church' party) was more "muscular" in appropriating high quality land from the ownership of the Roman Catholic Church to sell off. Even so it would be impossible to call the Unión Liberal party anti-clericalist in any meaningful sense and they were certainly royalist (anti-clericalism and republicanism were policies of the furthest fringes of the Progressives and the tiny - and in 1863 new - Partido Socialista.)

The Unión Liberal party was if anything even more of an advocate for foreign adventures than the Moderates. Inevitably their attention was firmly on the Americas and between 1862 and 1865 the Spanish government was only a haphazard and reactive observer of concerns in Europe and elsewhere. In early 1863 while eyes in Madrid were focused on Mexico City and Richmond the Great Powers of Europe had been brought to the brink of all out war by a crisis in Russian Poland. Of the Great Revolt of Warsaw and the quixotic gallantry of Count Andrzej Artur Zamoyski Spain was only dimly aware but by May 1863 it was becoming obvious even in the shadows of the El Escorial that Europe was on the brink of immolation over 'the Polish Question'. Only adroit diplomacy by Lord Stanley, the British Foreign Secretary at the Congress of Amsterdam in May saved Europe from war, created a limited independent Poland and a humiliated Russia.

Madrid was very much in two minds over the strange rebirth of Poland. On the one hand there was some sympathy for the fellow Catholic Poles. Queen Isabella in particular wished to send a telegram of congratulations to the Polish people. Most of the government were much more uneasy. Not only was this yet another display of British interference in European affairs uncomfortably reminiscent of Prussia's championing of Venice two decades before it posed grave possibilities for Spain. Separatism in the Spanish regions had generally found itself subsumed with Carlism but the thought of the Great Powers deciding for their own reasons to champion an independent Basque 'Kingdom of Navarre' or a Catalan 'Kingdom of Aragon' sent shivers down numerous spines in Madrid.

Queen Isabella II in the early 1860s - the Spanish monarch exercised a strong (if fickle) opinion on foreign affairs, often to the dismay of her government.
​

The negotiations over which monarch should be appointed in Warsaw did not, directly, concern Spain, with perhaps the only potential candidate linked with the Spanish royal family (Isabella's brother-in-law Don Antonio de Orleans, the Duc de Montpensier) vetoed by the French Republic. Paris had been nervous about the prospect of a son of Louis-Philippe gaining a throne, even in small and distant Poland. The Austrian and Prussian nominees of Archduke Maximillian von Hapsburg and Leopold, Prince of Hohenzollern were likewise vetoed by the other powers for what must be obvious reasons. In the end the young Infante Augusto, Duque de Coimbra and brother of King Luis of Portugal took the Polish throne with the backing of the British and with some personal reluctance.

The Polish affair had ended peacefully, even if some predicted it would store worse troubles for the future, but it did suggest there was a price to be paid by looking away from Europe. Indeed by June 1863 and the Congress of Amsterdam the Spanish had already begun to consider how to end the Mexican war swiftly, though as as been shown that was a goal that would take time to accomplish.

Unfortunately for the Spanish government it was far from clear what direction their foreign policy should take. The terms of the Congress of Amsterdam had revealed what the Crimean War had previously hinted at; Russia was a stagnant power, especially in the face of Britain. A Spanish alliance with the Tsar did not seem promising, especially as it had a high possibility of leading to conflict with Britain, something Madrid feared almost above any diplomatic outcome. The one thing that they feared more, the consistent cornerstone of Spanish foreign policy in Europe was avoiding a war with France.

There were some pragmatists in Madrid who believed Spain should try and build an alliance with France. Don Luis González Bravo, who had spent much time in Paris during the days of the Citizen King still maintained links with more conservative elements of the current republican regime. Though he of all people knew that an alliance with royalist France had proved elusive he still felt that Spanish interests demanded an accord with Paris. Even Tsarist Russia, a state more conservative and monarchist even than Spain had sought alliance with the French, driven by their mutual fear of Britain.

However the Francophile faction in Spain was dwarfed by the far larger faction from the Queen on down who regarded the republican state beyond the Pyrenees with distaste laced with fear. While attitudes towards Isabella herself varied there was simply little appetite in the country for the kind of radical reform the French had undergone. In many circles there was considerable sympathy for the family of the fallen Louis-Philippe (who had enjoyed rather more popularity since his overthrow and subsequent death than he had as a reigning king.) France was a economic rival in North Africa where Spain struggled to retain influence in the palaces of Morocco and Algeria and frequently found her envoys barred by the whim of the local commissaire résident général. There was also the fact that France had proven herself almost as aggressive in Europe as Britain had everywhere else, and a succession of militaristic presidents had seen little issue with intervening in Italy in support of the Sardinians - and perhaps might do so again.

Piedmont-Sardinia herself had seemed poised to unify the rest of Italy in the early years of the decade but by 1865 she was in an alliance with her rival the Two Sicilies, to the deep disappointment of Italian nationalists. The Franco-Austrian War of 1860 had given the Sardinians regional leadership in her peninsula and if her population was only slightly higher than the Two Sicilies her economy was far more robust. For a brief period Piedmont-Sardinia would even be ranked among the great powers, though the recovery of the United States (at least financially) would leave the government at Turin merely one of the second rank states. In early 1864 the Sardinian prime minister the Conte di Menabrea had approached the Spanish about a possible alliance.

The Sardinians were less ideologically difficult state for conservative Spain. The structure of government in Turin was not terribly different from that in Madrid even if King Victor Emmanuel II struck a rather different figure than Queen Isabella II. However they came with concerns of their own. Piedmont-Sardinia was in opposition to the Austrian Empire and if Austria was not currently a military ally of Spain, the Hapsburg state was still the most sympathetic major power in Europe. Siding with the Sardinians, even without the prospect of war provoked some feelings of guilt in the Spanish government. A more serious problem was that the Spanish royal family and more conservative Spanish leaders were much more connected to the regime in Naples than the one in Turin. King Francis II of the Two Sicilies was Isabella's first cousin. The Spanish monarch was aghast at the idea of allying with her cousin's great rival and it was only with great reluctance (and the promise that Madrid should not involve herself in a war with Naples) that she was persuaded by Vigodet, O'Donnell and Bravo to agree to a treaty with Victor Emmanuel.

By the beginning of 1865 Spain would have her ally in Europe but remained detached from the power blocs that dominated the continent [1]. In some respects this was a blessing as it allowed Madrid a chance to stand aside from any great war on the Continent and General O'Donnell advocated exactly such an isolationist stance with a Spanish focus overseas. Napoleon's taunt that 'Europe ends at the Pyrenees' infuriated many in Spain but the truth was that the Spanish state, poor, weak in industry and underpopulated (compared with Britain, France and Austria at least) had few options if she wished to exert her authority at home. A minnow like Belgium, blessed with natural resources, the friendship of Britain and canny leadership had managed to parlay her position into a voice in European affairs but short of becoming France or Austria's lackey that was not something Spain could accomplish - and perhaps was too proud to accomplish [2].

The Baile de Capellanes by Ricardo Balaca - a depiction of a masqued ball in Madrid.
​

Madrid was not one of the largest cities in Europe in 1865. This was not necessarily an indication of modernity; King Francis II ruled the poorest, most backward state in Europe and Naples was still fourth behind London, Paris and Prague. Still well into the middle of the 19th Century Madrid remained a city of the previous era. The Spanish middle class was small and self contained; a clique dominated by clergymen, bureaucrats, military officers and artisans rather than the clerks that so dominated urban life in Paris and New York. Industrialisation had occurred slowly but there were vanishingly few educated and skilled workers in the factories. While this prevented the kind of great and rapid expansion experienced by other global cities it gave Madrid a more stable character.

There was a certain diversity and glamour to be found in the Spanish capital, challenging the staid image Spain could hold abroad. The early 1860s had seen the city linked to the rest of the peninsula by extensive railways and the transformative effects of widespread gas lighting had made Madrid safer and more attractive to well heeled foreigners. With Paris trapped in republican austerity and London held in disdain by much of the Continent many European aristocrats had decamped to Madrid. The Comte de Paris maintained a court in exile in the city. In 1864 he had married Queen Isabella's niece the Infanta María Isabel and by the following year Spain had unofficially become the home of Orléanists (to the discomfort of Don Luis González Bravo and the official French embassy.) A glittering constellation of French notables led an elite international coterie that also included a strong Brazilian presence from Spain's close ally across the seas and increasingly visitors from the Confederate States of America. And then there were those from the Spanish colonial empire. The Philippines and the dashes of land in Africa. The street life, cafés and ballrooms of Madrid were heady and lively centres during this period.

Much of the character of the Spanish capital was due to her monarch. Queen Isabella was neither a great beauty or blessed with effortless charisma but despite her otherwise conservative views she enjoyed fine living and the appearance or unexpected of some handsome blue blood in Madrid sent waves of delighted gossip around the wider social set. The knowledge that the King was impotent was the second worst kept secret in Europe and a popular social past time was attempting to guess the true parentage of the Queen's children. Isabella's fickleness and favouritism did not please everyone in Spain of course, but with a consistently conservative and monarchist Cortes it was hard to see what the malcontents could do. Having reigned for over three decades the Queen was still only in her mid-thirties and could expect to reign thirty more.

Madrid in the 1860s enjoyed a new sense of wealth, glamour and sophistication.​

Footnotes:

[1] As of 1866 Spain's allies are the Confederate States of America, the Empire of Brazil and Sardinia with the first two also in her Sphere of Influence.

[2] Belgium is one of the Great Powers with the Dutch (!) and Ottomans (!!) in their sphere. King Leopold I of Belgium is evidently every bit as much the canny statesman and ruler in this timeline as he was in ours.

 

[RossN]

Don Fernando Fernández de Córdova, the Marqués de Mendigorría.​

Chapter Sixteen: The Talambó Incident

As 1865 had drawn to a close Spain had suffered a severe influenza outbreak that forced the government to spend thousands of pesetas on mitigating the worst of the disease. The money involved overran that in the Treasury and the state was forced to borrow from the Banks of France and the Banks of Prussia - the latter of which transitioned into the Bank of the North German Federation, which formed in this period out of Prussia and her client states. Don Casmiro Vingodet was not badly wounded by this temporary setback; the admiral could not command and control the spread of illness any more than any other mortal man. Rather it left him inclined to consider his own future and stepping away from active politics. His period in office had been exhausting for a man still more inclined to a life at sea than behind a desk. In April 1866 he handed in his resignation to the Queen, though he retained the Naval Office for now.

Don Casmiro Vigodet's eventual successor would be Don Fernando Fernández de Córdova y Valcárcel, the Marqués de Mendigorría. Mustachioed and elegant, a Grandee of Spain and a long serving military officer the Marqués de Mendigorría had served on three different occasions as Minister for War before his rival General Leopoldo O'Donnell claimed that position permanently as his own. Indeed many had expected Don Leopoldo to become President of the Council. Yet the general was unpopular with most of the Cortes and the Queen preferred the aristocrat. The Hibernian descended general was instead sent as Captain General of Honduras [1]. This was not quite the gilded exile it might have seen which may have been why the general left for the Americas without a fuss - Don Leopoldo knew that the Marqués de Mendigorría was drawing up plans for war with Nicaragua in which case the Spanish ruler in Central America would be a vital man indeed.

In the unofficial battle for political influence in Madrid between the 'Americans' and the 'Romans' - that is between those who favoured a foreign policy focused on Spanish America and those who looked to Europe - the Marqués de Mendigorría was an 'American'. That statement was true literally as well as metaphorically as the new President of the Council had been born in Buenos Aires in 1809. Though some of his rivals would attempt to paint Don Fernando as a monomaniac lusting after the re-conquest of his homeland this does the man a disservice. Rather he had concluded that given Spain's weakness in Europe her focus was better suited to rebuilding herself across the Atlantic and at least initially he was flexible about achieving this. Don Fernando shared the common belief that all Central America should fall under direct Spanish authority, but south of the isthmus he was content that Spain should merely be economically dominant. His stance would only be shaken by an unexpected incident in Peru that pushed Spain into a war she had not sought.

In the early Summer of 1866 a Spanish Naval delegation had been on a goodwill tour of seaports along the Pacific Coast of North America. Beginning as far north as Alaska (which had recently been sold to the United States) the Spanish visited Portland, San Francisco, San Salvador and finally the Peruvian port of Callao, which was where the commanding officer Admiral Luis Hernández Pinzón became involved in an ugly local incident.

The 'Talambó Incident' the lead to war between Spain and Peru (the Spanish reaction is highlighted in red.)​

The exact rights and wrongs of the case quickly became unimportant. What mattered was whether the Spanish government would stand by their officer. Public opinion in Madrid, urged on by the newspapers demanded the Lima government be brought to heel. The Queen, never one to let an insult rest was in sympathy with the hawks. For the Marqués de Mendigorría, still adjusting to his position and in the middle of the Nicaraguan situation [2] the matter was far more delicate. Broadly speaking Spain would have loved to win back the lost colonies in South America but the effort of doing so was seen as far outstripping the gain to say nothing of the intervention of other powers. Even with the United States humbled the British and French had interests in the southern continent and would be unlikely to stand idly by if Madrid began annexing land en masse. Contrary to his portrayal in some quarters (notably the gutter press of London and New York) as a man frothing at the mouth to reconquer Peru, the Marqués de Mendigorría held views entirely in keeping with other Moderates. In 1866 it was very much a case of him being pushed into war.

It was one thing to declare war but quite another to enforce it. Peru was a small country, at least demographically, but her location and natural geography made her a much more difficult prospect than she might have seemed on paper. The closest Spanish naval squadrons of any strength were in Manila and Havana and though the Armada Real Española could confidently be expected to triumph over the old fashioned sailing warships of Peru it would take months before any sizeable force reached enemy waters. Then the Spanish faced the daunting prospect of landing sufficient troops to establish a foothold on a hot and rocky coastline ill-suited for supporting large bodies of men before marching into the Andes and in probability fighting at altitude. It made the invasion of Mexico appear almost trivial in comparison.

Furthermore as Summer shifted to Autumn and then early Winter and the Spanish prepared their expedition (which for various reasons could not be launched until early 1867) there were disturbing signs that Peru might not be fighting alone. In September the government of Ecuador, not previously involved in either Spanish or Peruvian affairs sent a blunt protest to the Madrid government. The language of the 'Ecuadorian Note' stopped short of a declaration of war but it was an ultimatum all the same. Similar language would come from Bolivia in October and then Argentina in November. None of these countries had been actively allied with Peru but they did signal the level of fear that a Spanish intervention in South America provoked.

The 'Ecuadorian Note' of September 1866, followed by near identical protests from Bolivia and Argentina.
​

The response in Madrid was a dramatic hardening of the hawks in the Cortes. Previously the Moderates and Progressives had been in favour of the war with Peru now that it started but eager to forestall it spreading and even the Unión Liberal (the most jingoistic political force in Spain outside Carlism) had believed in confining the fighting to Peru seeing the whole affair as a distraction from Central America. The antagonism of three of Peru's neighbours shocked and angered almost everyone in Madrid. At best, even if Ecuador, Bolivia and Argentina remained neutral the prospect of peacefully winning those three countries to the Spanish Sphere of Influence had greatly receded.

It was only now that the Marqués de Mendigorría abandoned his early caution. He re-called Don Leopoldo Leopoldo O'Donnell from Honduras to take the War Ministry, reasoning that it was better to have the rival general where he could be seen and useful than nursing a grievance across the Atlantic (it was now obvious that Nicaragua would have to wait.) Though he did not yet talk of war with any of Peru's neighbours the Marqués de Mendigorría confirmed in private to the Queen that the war 'could expand' and that the outbursts from Quito, La Paz and Buenos Aires had 'strengthen international feeling in our favour rather than the reverse.' In other words Don Fernando suspected, accurately, that Britain and France feared instability more in South America than they did Spanish hegemony - especially as they likely held a more accurate view of Spanish power than the exaggerated feeling across the Atlantic. The British in particular, still crowing over the creation of an independent Poland were not keen to see the balance of power tilt abroad. If Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia and Argentina actually united the resulting state would be potentially be a threat to their own interests. The same newspapers in London that had depicted a cruel and rapacious Spain stalking a defenceless Peru were by the end of the year cheering Spain on as the continental policeman bringing order to a collection of petty dictatorships.

Fortunately for Marqués de Mendigorría Spain did have two allies in the conflict who would do more than debate his character in editorials. The more powerful of the two was the Hapsburg monarchy which had in 1866 reformed itself into a true dual state - the Austro-Hungarian Empire. During the waning weeks of Don Casmiro Vingodet's time in office Vienna had offered, and Madrid had accepted, an alliance. Austria-Hungary had a reasonably impressive navy but her key importance was as a counterweight to any other power in Europe who might take advantage of Spain's distraction. An alliance with Austria-Hungary meant the potential abandonment of Sardinia but no one in Madrid believed that Franz-Joseph would seek to intervene in Italy once again and even the prospect of an Italian War (that is to say one between Turin and Naples) seemed less likely. An alliance with Austria-Hungary had once again become attractive, much to the delight of the Queen who enjoyed a close friendship with her opposite number in Vienna.

Even more important was the Empire of Brazil. Though obviously less powerful than Austria-Hungary Brazil was the strongest nation in South America by an order of magnitude. By 1866 she had been a close ally of Spain for two decades and her trade was strongly tied to that of Spain. One recent uncertainty that had risen between the two powers was the slavery question. The Emperor Pedro II had recently abolished the institution in his country (to international acclaim) but it was still legal in Spain's overseas possessions and of course Spain's other friend in the Americas had a full quarter of her population in bondage. Don Fernando would have to continuously assure the Brazilian envoy in Madrid that no matter what the peace settlement Spain would not re-introduce slavery into South America. The Spanish leader was able to point to the fact that neither in directly controlled Central America or in Mexico (whose status remained hazy) was slavery legal. As for the Confederate States the Spanish did not intend to call them to war. Aside from the increasingly delicate slavery question which was slowly pushing Brazil and the Confederate States apart the Confederate Navy was still very small and the Marqués de Mendigorría doubted they would accept being called into war so soon after the Mexican intervention.

The key question brought up in dialogue with the Brazilians was what Spain actually wanted from a victory. The universal opinion in Madrid was that Peru should recognise Spanish authority and there was an acceptance, grudging in some quarters, that full annexation was impossible. Between these two options lay a contested area. Mexico had been left internally independent but linked in some vague fashion with the Spanish Crown and in a much more robust fashion linked with the Spanish economy. Peru was almost the exact opposite. Prior to the war Spanish economic interests in the region had been negligible, with Brazil being a far more significant trading partner. Now the idea of reviving the royal link with Peru began to gain traction.

Part of the problem with Mexico had been the grandiose nature of the title. Mexico had - briefly - enjoyed an imperial existence of her in the Nineteenth Century and during the tortuous negotiations surrounding the Treaty of Veracruz in 1865 Isabella had always been referred to in such a context as 'Emperatriz de México' [Empress of Mexico], at least by her partisans. It would have been unthinkable to settle for anything lesser and in the end rather than settle for a compromise designation the issue had been avoided, especially as the Queen, encouraged by some of her more optimistic favourites had been openly speaking of an imperial coronation in México City [3]. In contrast the old Viceroyalty of Peru had become a republic (several republics in fact) and it seemed safe to imagine that a Peruvian monarchy might 'merely' be a kingdom (and thus not something the sovereign would cross the ocean for.) Should that prove a success... well perhaps it might be attempted again in South America. It might even prove important in Mexico.

Of course to achieve anything Spain still had to win her war Peru [4].

South American attitudes towards Spain, January 1867.​

Footnotes:

[1] In this case the entirety of Spanish Central America, not just 'modern' Honduras. The original pre-independence region was all part of the Captaincy General of Guatemala but Guatemala, at this time, remains outside Spanish control.

[2] In game terms I'd been trying to justify a war of conquest against Nicaragua during this period.

[3] Inevitably once war began this led to political cartoons in the British and America press about the 'Two Emperors and Their Better Half' displaying Isabella flanked by Dom Pedro of Brazil and Franz-Joseph of Austria-Hungary.

[4] In game terms I am at war with Peru with a 'Make a Puppet' war goal. I have the 'Make a Puppet' casus belli on Argentina, Bolivia and Ecuador but am not currently at war with any of the latter three.

 

[RossN]

General Mariano Ignacio Prado Ochoa, President of Peru (1865 - 1868.)​

Chapter Seventeen: An Imperial Throne & Another War

Peru had been a Royalist stronghold during the wars of independence and though that era was forty years in the past there was still a certain optimism that a pro-Spanish streak remained in the country. As the Times of London noted in January 1867: 'whatever else it has been republican governance of Peru has not been marked with outstanding success.'

Regardless of sentiment in Peru the Spanish would have to rely on their Brazilian allies for aid. Though this chafed with some more bullish members of the Army the fact was that Brazil shared a border with Spain and it would have been taking pride to the point of foolhardiness not to rely on such a useful ally. It was also felt that the presence of Brazil on the battlefield would deter the Bolivians, Argentinians and Ecuadorians from going to war against Spain. Therefore the earliest exchange of blows on land in the 'Spanish-Peruvian War' would involve no Spaniards at all, at least unless one followed the sentimental argument that the Peruvians were Spanish subjects in revolt.

It would not be until the naval battle of Guayaquil Bay in June 1867 that the Spanish and Peruvians fired upon one another. A Spanish squadron had successfully landed soldiers at Piura in the extreme north of Peru in May and it was while sailing back that Admiral Eduardo Millán-Astray was intercepted by the full might of the Peruvian fleet. Millán-Astray, brash and amateurish had allowed himself to be trapped against the coastline by his opposite number Admiral Juan Antonio Rebolledo of Peru. Throughout the day and evening of 19 and 20 June Spanish soldiers besieging Pirua were able to hear the dull thunder of cannon and glimspe the hazy glow of distant warships in flames. Morning brought the grim news of a defeat and a retreat with Millán-Astray losing five of his nine ships, including the men o'war Alerta and San Fernando (both 80-gun warships) for the cost to the enemy of two armed transports. The luckless Spanish Admiral was forced to flee with his fire damaged, listing ships, hugging the coast until he could gain safe harbour in Colombian waters - Colombia was one of the few South American states to have a pro-Spanish tilt.

Guayaquil Bay had been an embarrassment to the Spanish and it prevented more soldiers being shipped from Central America but it did little to impact the overall course of the war. Twelve thousand Spanish cavalry had successfully landed in the North and they would eventually take Pirua which despite its symbolic importance - it had been founded by Pizarro and was the oldest city of European origin in Peru - could not be defended while the Peruvians were fighting the Brazilians in the east. Likewise victory at sea in the North did not prevent the Spanish landing eighteen thousand men, including an artillery regiment and a hussar brigade at Antofagasta in August. This southern force under the venerable General Carlos Ortega began their long and successful trek up the coast of Peru. Even Peruvian local naval dominance proved short lived as the bulk of the Armada Real Española arrived off the coast several weeks later leaving the Peruvian ships bottled up in port or risk destruction.

Meanwhile the 1867 elections had taken place in Spain. The vote came before word of the naval defeat arrived but it would probably not have changed much. The results confirmed the conservative ascendancy of the Moderates and the Unión Liberal though the fact that the election took place in war cast at least the shadow of a question mark over the outcome. In any case the Marqués de Mendigorría chose to view the returned Cortes as a mandate for continuing the war.

Throughout the second half of 1867 the Spanish and Brazilians pushed deeper into Peru, taking the country town by town. At the beginning of the war General Mariano Ignacio Prado Ochoa, the military strongman who ran Peru had ordered an invasion of Brazil in a hope to convince Dom Pedro to abandon his alliance with Queen Isabella and/or persuade the other South America powers to intervene. Unfortunately for Peru the result had been two defeats, at Tabatinga in September and Pucallpa in October which between them effectively ended the Peruvian Army as a field force. For almost a year the enemy would hold out in the form of garrisons and partisan attacks along mountain trails, but the end of the war was now inevitable. Ecuador, Bolivia and Argentina maintained their protests over Spanish actions and were even joined by Chile but they remained unwilling to match their outrage with their rifles.

While the war progressed in South America matters of equal significance were occurring in Central America and North America. The most immediate cause of dismay in Madrid was the declaration of Nicaragua of an alliance with the United States of America. Even humbled by the disasters of recent years the United States remained a formidable force and few in Spain wished to challenge her directly. While the Madrid government had (in their opinion) a valid casus belli on Nicaragua based on the latter sheltering Honduran malcontents and a hundred and one other insults even the most hawkish politician and general in Spain doubted Nicaragua was worth a war with Washington [1].

The formal Spanish-Mexican alliance of May 1868.​

A much more optimistic picture was developing in Mexico. Though the nation was still slowly recovering from the war she had benefited from Spanish investment in the form of generous funding to develop railways. Between 1864 and 1867 Spain had done her best to woo the Mexican government. This was a more complicated situation than it sounds. Per the Treaty of Veracruz the 'State of Mexico' (Estado de México) - a deliberately opaque designation as Mexico remained in a limbo between republic and monarchy - was economically dependent on Spain but internally almost completely free. The only soldiers Spain possessed in Mexico were the honour guards at the embassy and consulates and in practice Spanish levers of control resided more in finance than in bayonets. Naturally this worried some in Madrid and for three years a procession of diplomatic functionaries and two different ambassadors had arrived in México City trying to improve relations between New Spain and Old.

Fortunately for Spain the Mexican government was firmly in the hands of conservatives, whose own power base made it advisable to cooperate with Madrid. Rómulo Díaz de la Vega, the conservative acting-president of Mexico who had signed the Treaty of Veracruz had stepped aside in favour of a triumvirate under the generals José Salas and Juan Almonte and Archbishop Antonio de Labastida. The three men were not, necessarily pro-Spanish (rather they all regarded themselves as proud sons of Mexico) but they were convinced continued republican government in their country spelled economic disaster, mob rule and the fetid spectre of anti clericalism. Ironically the involvement of Spain in Peru, by making the notion of Spanish armed intervention in Mexico even less likely made it easier to portray the Madrid government as friend rather than ogre. With some truth Mexican conservatives could point to the fact that it had been unrepresentative liberal revolutionaries who overthrew the legal Mexican government in 1862.

In January 1868 the triumvirate formally abandoned the 'State of Mexico' designation and publicly declared Mexico a hereditary imperial monarchy (Imperio Mexicano). Five weeks later they issued a formal invitation to Queen Isabella to take the throne as Empress to reign in personal union with her Spanish throne. On the advice of her ministers in Madrid Isabella accepted. On 29 May the Spanish and Mexican governments, now under a single head of state, signed an alliance [2].

The reborn Mexican Empire was a strange creation in many respects that ironically confirmed the limits of Spanish authority in Mexico. Under the new constitution Isabella (and her heirs) enjoyed very similar rights and duties that the monarch held in Spain. However with the Empress resident in Madrid these functions would be maintained by a Viceroy, who per Mexican insistence would always be Mexican by birth and appointed by vote of the Mexican congress. This last rule would disappoint many a hopeful Castlian general or nobleman cooling his heels back across the Atlantic [3]. Still, if the Mexicans were acting out of enlightened self interest it would be wrong to say the recreation of the Mexican monarchy was entirely cynical. As noted above for many Mexicans republicanism had failed and there remained in places a certain sympathy for the Borbóns. The street celebrations that greeted the announcement of Isabella's assent owed something more than the click of an accountants abacus.

If Mexico was waxing the Confederate States were waning, and entirely due to a self inflicted wound of such brazen idiocy it could have been born in the pages of a penny dreadful. The election of President John C. Breckinridge in 1865 had been widely seen as a shift towards pragmatism and moderation in Dixie. Unfortunately Mr. Breckinridge had not proven as strong a leader as might have been hoped and the Populist Party had found themselves at a distinct disadvantage in Congressional elections, pushing both chambers towards the more bellicose Democrats and New Americans. From April 1867 on a distinctly jingo note had begun to emanate from Richmond though it was generally ignored in a Spain that had other matters to deal with.

The Spanish Foreign Minister in the late 1860s was the Duque de Valencia. The aging aristocrat and soldier had earlier championed the cause of the Confederacy as a way to hobble the United States and the presence of this proud and glowering figure may have given the Confederate government a far too sanguine view of their Spanish alliance. When the Breckinridge administration found itself dragged towards a confrontation with the North over the state of Missouri they appear to have simply assumed the Spanish Army and Navy and Spanish silver would follow their drumbeat.

The state government of Missouri had remained loyal to the Union during the Civil War but she had been divided almost evenly between Union and Confederate sympathies. Putative measures against Dixie sympathisers ranging from the closing of newspapers to boycotts against shopkeepers with the occasional worse crime had outraged many in the South. In truth there was very little going in Missouri that was not being directed against pro-Union citizens in, say, Kentucky but for a populace still heady with victory they seemed intolerable provocation and on 9 April 1868 the Confederate States officially declared war on the United States.

The Confederate declaration of war. The Spanish response is highlighted in red.
​

Even at the best of times the decision of Richmond to declare war over Missouri would have been greeted by astonishment in Madrid. These were not those times. By unlucky coincidence the Duque de Valencia had died on 23 April and his replacement at the Foreign Ministry, the Marqués de Roncali was still settling in. It is highly unlikely that even the Duque de Valencia would have pushed for war with the United States but he might have softened the blow. As it was the response of the Marqués de Roncali, and the Marqués de Mendigorría was a stiff refusal, laced with barely hidden disbelief that the Confederates should so misjudge the situation.

By the beginning of Autumn the international picture was mixed for Spain. The war was drawing to a close in Peru were the Peruvian government would sue for peace on 5 September, under terms that left country in personal union with Spain (with Isabella as 'Reina del Perú'.) Peru would like Mexico have internal self government, though her level of autonomy was noticeably less [4]. Mexico was an increasingly firm partner and though the situation was still too dangerous to attempt a coronation in México City it was an event the Queen and her court could at least begin to plan for.

As terms were being drawn up in Lima and pesos bearing the likeness of 'Emperatriz Isabel' were being minted in Mexico the government in Madrid was determining what to do next. A small faction wished to join the Confederate side after all, whether out of a quixotic sense of honour to one's allies or for fear that the United States would devour the entire Confederacy. Most though felt that at worst the Confederate States would lose some marginal territory - Arizona perhaps, or New Mexico [5]. There was frankly limited sympathy for Richmond and for Breckinridge, though the Marqués de Mendigorría (though bitter about the 'stupidity and greed' of the Confederates in private) was prepared to consider war subsidies.

War Minister General Leopoldo O'Donnell acknowledged the serious situation in North America but stressed that Spain should remained focused on South America. Spain had thiry thousand men in Peru, a force stronger than any Army on the continent save Brazil. She had a measure of international sympathy against the posturing and ramshackle goverments of the South American republics. Now was they very moment to force a settlement on Chile, Ecuador, Argentina or Bolivia. Or perhaps on more than one...

The Kingdom of Peru, September 1868.
​

Footnotes:

[1] Spain has a 'Conquest' CB with Nicaragua, but unfortunately they have since allied with the United States.

[2] I've been trying to increase opinion in Mexico since the end of the war, but more recently they started trying to increase my opinion. Relations are now quite good and I chose to envisage the alliance as representing a breakthrough on the monarchy question.

[3] Functionally Mexico is in my Sphere of Influence and an Ally but otherwise independent. I decided this was enough to justify a loose Irish Free State-esque approach to ties with Spain. There actually isn't a way short of editing to change a country to your type of government so in game terms Mexico is a 'democracy' even if I am treating her as a constitutional monarchy for the purposes of the story.

[4] Again as with Mexico I'm treating Peru as a monarchy for story purposes even if she technically isn't in game terms. Peru is both in my Sphere and a Satellite of Spain so I assume in real terms she has far less autonomy - certainly no equivalent of the Mexican veto over a Viceroy appointment.

[5] I've checked and the United States does not have active claims on Confederate land, though if the war goes well for them I can certainly see them snatching a Territory or two from Richmond.

 

[RossN]

Peru & Bolivia in May 1871.​

Chapter Eighteen: From South to North

The late 1860s and the first half of the 1870s were crucial ones for European affairs, but while Spain played a significant role in these events her primary focus throughout this era was drawn irresistibly to the Americas in conflicts that would see her engaged both in the South and in the North [1].

With Peru defeated the Spanish forces in South America turned their attention to Bolivia. The landlocked state was ruled by General Mariano Melgarejo, a particularly brutal and unsavory dictator. The Bolivians had no great love for the Peruvians, who had defeated them in a war two decades before and annexed what had been Bolivia's route to the sea but it is probably fair to say the popular feeling in the country was against Spanish interference in South America. War with Bolivia automatically meant war with her ally Chile, and to this combination might also be added Ecuador (not an ally of Bolivia or Chile but a thorn in the Spanish side all the same.) With the Brazilians once again allied with Spain the majority of the continent was involved in one way or the other. Argentina and Paraguay were neutral but fiercely anti-Spanish while Colombia under the conservative government of President Mariano Ospina Rodríguez was also neutral but openly pro-Spanish.

For the Marqués de Mendigorría, the continued struggle in South America owed much to his political alliance with General Leopoldo O'Donnell. The Spanish prime minister was scarcely adverse to restoring Spanish control to what he and most conservatives (and many liberals) perceived to be illegitimate revolutionary regimes but he remained anxious about events both in Europe and in North America were predictably the Confederate States were already running into trouble even with generous war subsidies from Madrid. Don Leopoldo O'Donnell on the other hand stressed that if Spanish authority in South America was to last her reconquista must be as swift as it was decisive. There might not be another opportunity to achieve victory without a piecemeal conflict.

In fact it would take more than three years for the wars to draw to a close. Bolivia, though militarily the strongest of Spain's enemies would be overrun earliest. With the Brazilians invading from the East and a decisive Spanish victory at Santa Ana on 22 February 1869 Bolivia crumbled quickly, though actual peace would be delayed until the Spanish and Brazilians defeated Chile conclusively. That would not be achieved until the Second Battle of Valparaíso on 10 April 1871 [2]. The war in Ecuador meanwhile would last all the way until April 1872. The difficulty Spain faced in this war was not the strength of the enemy - Ecuador had no standing military to speak of and her conscript soldiers, though often gallant and patriotic were poorly trained and equipped. Nor was it truly the nature of the fight - the exhausting war in the Chilean Andes with its jagged rocks and bitter winter snows had taken a graver toll on Spanish soldiers. It was simply the lack of resources Spain had available to annex Ecuador. For one thing the Brazilians were not at war with Ecuador. Technically Brazil was in alliance with Ecuador and while the government in Rio de Janeiro certainly favoured Madrid over Quito Dom Pedro was a man of his word and so maintained a strict neutrality in this clash (the Spanish, sincerely grateful for Brazilian aid elsewhere did not press the point.) With Spain faced with more 'important' wars elsewhere the Ecuadorian front remained in play for a long time and towards the end of the conflict the comparatively small Spanish forces present would be assisted by a brigade of soldiers from the Ejército real del Perú ['Royal Army of Peru'] in the first example of one of Spain's New World "dominions" coming to her aid.

In all three countries eventually forced to the peace table the outcome resembled that conducted with Peru. Bolivia, Chile and Ecuador all became quasi-independent satellites, in common union with the Spanish Crown and under a much greater degree of Spanish oversight than Mexico but still largely autonomous within their internal borders. The Viceroy(s), representing the monarch, were appointed by Madrid. In practice there was strong incentive for these men to work with the local elites to keep the peace in South America and they did not possess the sorts of dictatorial sway unsympathetic foreign observers sometimes accused them of. The events of the 1820s and 30s had proven all too well that Spain could not control half a continent with musket and bayonet alone. The promise of Spanish funding and access to Spanish markets was, at least in theory, the carrot to the military stick. Unfortunately at least in the early years scant money was available, for reasons that shall soon become clear.

The borders between the United States and the Confederate States after the armistice of April 1869.​

To no one's surprise the Confederate States were swiftly brought to the negotiating table, suing for peace on 4 April 1869, after a year of fighting. The United States demanded and received the Arizona Territory (which it had occupied during the war.) In some respects the results could have been far worse; Arizona was poor and sparsely inhabited with most of its people Spanish speaking Roman Catholics or Navajo Indians and neither group held much loyalty or love for Richmond (or Washington for that matter.) It could even be said, with a certain degree of rose tinted spectacles, that by their peace treaty of 1869 the United States legally recognised the Confederate States as a sovereign power for the first time. Still there was no way to see the surrender as anything other than a humiliating defeat. President John C. Breckinridge, concious that the Confederacy was losing the war had declined to run for a second term in the 1869 presidential election leaving his former Vice President James Longstreet to win a very narrow victory that February and face the thankless task of running the country in peacetime.

Reaction in Spain to the Confederate defeat had been muted, save perhaps for relief that the peace had been so mild. Reaction in Mexico was much more alarmed. The government in México City had assumed that their neighbours to the North would be preoccupied for a period of years. The Mexicans had never lost their desire for the portion of Chiapas still held by Guatemala. Unfortunately, Guatemala was an ally of the United States and even the currently humbled United States was more formidable than the Empire of Mexico.

The Viceroy of Mexico at this time was General Miguel Miramón. Don Miguel Miramón was ambitious and charismatic and keen to stress that Mexico was an equal partner with Spain. At a certain point Miramón had decided that Mexico would go to war against Guatemala, even at the risk of fighting the United States. He knew Mexico would not fight alone.His genius was in recognising that the government of Madrid that had refused to rescue the Confederates from their own folly would have no choice but to aid Mexico should she go to war. Isabella was Empress of Mexico and the Viceroy who had a shrewd measure of his nominal monarch's mind knew that she could not remain aloof if her throne was under threat.

The Mexican leader planned his campaign of wooing the Empress with as much strategy as overseeing the war itself. From September 1869 to January 1870 Don Miguel was in Madrid, paying a state visit, officially to help plan the future coronation of Isabella in México City. While there he took the opportunity to ply his charisma on Isabella. There is no evidence that things went further than public flattery and in any case the Viceroy had no desire simply to become a royal favourite but he did make a strong impression. For a further year he would bombard the Empress with affectionate and flattering letters from his position across the Atlantic.

Miramón was playing a dangerous game and for all his cunning patience was not his strong suite. Ideally he needed the Spanish to have finished their wars in South America but still retain their troops there. However he also had to contend with his own political rivals in Mexico, and knew that the earlier he struck the better it would be for his own position. Events to his North also played a part. The November 1868 election in the United States had seen Simon Cameron win re-election largely due to the unwillingness of the electorate to abandon a president in war time but he remained corrupt and indolent. Miramón had no desire to go to war in 1872 and see Mexico become a issue during another American election, perhaps even seeing a hardline figure triumph in Washington. Early 1871 was as late as he was prepared to wait.

On 25 February 1871 the Congreso in México City voted for war with the Republic of Guatemala, citing the same demand that they had made in the last war: the surrender of the portion of Chiapas still controlled by the Guatemalans. Very properly Miramón, as Viceroy, sent a telegram to his monarch in Madrid rather than declaring war outright.

Miramón's fateful telegram of 25 February 1871.​

The result was exactly as Don Miguel had foreseen. The Spanish government was desperate to avoid a war with the United States but the Mexican leader had so well cloaked the steps he had taken towards war that the first the Marqués de Mendigorría and General Leopoldo O'Donnell knew of it was the arrival of Miramón's laconic telegram. The monarch made her views known at once, tartly informing her ministers that of course they must support Mexico. Not only was Mexico in the right - and it had been a longstanding Spanish position that Mexico owned all Chiapas - but to abandon the Mexican government now would send a shockwave throughout Spanish America. At the very least it would mean the end of the Empire of Mexico (at least with Isabella on the throne.) Very possibly it would destroy the system of viceroys being put into place in Peru and soon to be begun in Bolivia, Chile and Ecuador.

The Marqués de Roncali, the Spanish Foreign Minister privately informed the Marqués de Mendigorría that should Spain fail to support Miramón all Spanish foreign policy for over a decade would be for naught and that in all likelihood the United States would install a pro-Washington puppet republic in México City. As furious as he was at being forced into this position by the Mexicans the prime minister went to an audience with the queen. In this terse encounter he advised her that she should declare war on Guatemala, both as Empress of Mexico and Queen of the Spains.

Spain was at war with Guatemala, and thus her allies Nicuragua, Costa Rica and the United States. But being at war did not mean the same thing as fighting. Spanish military forces in North America were negligible in 1871 and O'Donnell refused to contemplate moving men out of South America until Bolivia and Chile at least surrendered. This would take another three months of hard fighting in Chile before the war drew to a close there.

There was relatively little doubt in Spain that, if she threw all her resources at the matter, the United States could be forced to the negotiating table (Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Guatemala herself were seen as insignificant in the greater scheme of things.) The problem was that Spain was poorly positioned to fight such a massive war across the Atlantic and the help that had enabled her to fight the far more minor powers of Peru and Bolivia was absent. Of her allies Brazil would remain aloof until Ecuador was defeated [3]. Colombia, though friendly towards Spain had a treaty with both Costa Rica and Nicaragua which prevented her from joining the war. And as for Spain's most powerful friend in North America...

The defeat of 1869 had left the Confederate States sadder and wiser and many were prepared to understand why Spain had remained out of the war. The war subsidies had drawn much of the sting from Madrid's neutrality and in October 1870 the Longstreet administration had approached the Madrid government about renewing the Confederate-Spanish alliance, a move welcomed by the Marqués de Mendigorría. However the Mexican declaration of war on Guatemala and the rapid embroilment of Spain in a war with the United States confused and frustrated many in Dixie who had a hard time understanding why Spain (apparently) was willing to fight the Yankees over a slice of Central America but not for Missouri. Part of the confusion was that the relationship between Mexico and Spain and Isabella's position as Empress of the former and Queen of the latter was poorly understood by many in Richmond, not helped by the absence of a Mexican ambassador to President Longstreet and the reluctance of the Spanish ambassador to admit the tail was wagging the dog.

With the Brazilians, Colombians and Confederates all neutral - at least for the moment - Spain would have to hope Miramón had not misjudged his gamble and could hold on alone for at least a few months more.

Don Miguel Miramón, Viceroy of Mexico and architect of the Spanish-American War.
​

Footnotes:

[1] In other words it will have to wait for another chapter.

[2] The First Battle of Valparaíso was a Brazilian victory over the Chileans.

[3] Unfortunately Brazil (which otherwise would certainly join the war against the USA) can't until Ecuador is defeated because Ecuador is technically their ally. The Confederates would also probably join my war but are locked into a truce with the United States until 1874.