The Legacy of the Glorious

[Milarqui]

Hi! I hope that you are awaiting for the next chapter of this story. I have received the first draft for King Leopold's War, chapter 2 of The Legacy of the Glorious. To satisfy your needs for some story in here, I present you a small story which is held during the last chapter, to be specific, the meeting between Manuel Ruíz Zorrilla and Ambassador Mercier de L'Ostende. There are going to be short stories for every chapter, at least one: while Linense works on the history at a high level, I am going to write history from the point of view of the people, through letters, book extracts and other things.

Enjoy!

Extract from Manuel Ruiz Zorrilla's autobiography “From El Burgo de Osma to San Jerónimo” [1]

We had just reached the desserts when L'Ostende asked, as if he was speaking about the weather:

“How is President Prim? I suppose that the search for your new King must be very hard."

“He is very tired. I met him this morning and he is still not recovered."

“Tell me, did he find an answer to his problem?”

From the start, I had known that this meeting was not one of pleasure, or one of diplomacy, but even then the Ambassador's audacity surprised me. I wondered who had taught him the art of trying to get answers that others do not want to tell him, but whoever did it, it was clear he was not very good.

“The President has... found several candidates that will surely be of the liking of both the members of Congress and the population."

“Such as... Montpensier, perhaps?”

I snorted. It was unavoidable.

“Monsieur, believe me when I tell you that we did not expel Queen Isabella only to put her sister and brother-in-law in the throne. He is a buffoon, and at most he will receive a few votes from his staunchest supporters in the Liberal Union.”

“Then, surely you know if there is a candidate the President prefers over the others. After all, you are a man of his confidence.”

I nearly told him about the Prussian candidate, Leopold, just so that he shut up. I realised on time that doing it would be the end of his candidacy: the French would have not wanted to be surrounded by their then enemies, the Prussians, as history would prove later. I remembered then that Prim had sent Madoz to Italy so that negotiations could be continued with the Italians, with the objective of convincing Amedeo di Savoia to become the King of Spain if Leopold were to withdraw his candidacy, so that was something I could tell him.

“The President likes Amedeo di Savoia, and we restarted the negotiations to see if he would be interested now.”

It was not a lie, but it was not the whole truth, either.

L'Ostende seemed to be satisfied, and some time later he said goodbye. Little did we know that soon this gentle relationship would turn as bitter as hemlock.

[1] Ruíz Zorrilla was born in El Burgo de Osma, Soria, and the Spanish Congress of Deputies is in the Carrera de San Jerónimo street in Madrid.

 

[Dr. Strangelove]

Here's looking forward to Hohenzollern Spain invading the USA again!

 

[Linense]

The Hohenzollern's War, Part I: Casus Belli

[FONT=Times New Roman, serif]The proclamation of Prince Leopold zu Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen as the new Spanish King by the Constituent Courts also fully hit the main chanceries of all Europe.[/FONT]

For example, in Italy and Portugal the news were received with great relief, as it seemed that the Spanish succession affair would definitely end, so it was expected that soon Spain would be again a politically stable country, at least within the parameters expected for Mediterranean Europe. Also, both countries expected an improvement in bilateral relations with the new Spanish crown, as the Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen were related to the Braganza twice over (late Peter V of Portugal had married one of Leopold's younger sisters, and Leopold himself was married with a Portuguese infanta) and the Prussian Hohenzollerns had supported the Italian cause against Austrian imperialism, as the Austrians had boycotted the unifying processes led from Turin and Berlin. Also, both governments were happy that Prim would stop pressuring them to get a member of their respective dynasties to accept the Spanish crown, in spite of the Portuguese Iberists (one of whose members, the Duke of Saldanha, was Portugal's Prime Minister) and Victor Emmanuel II of Italy's ambition to place his son Amedeo in the Spanish throne.

Portuguese Prime Minister, the Duke of Saldanha.

The British government of liberal William Gladstone saw with good eyes the establishment of the Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen dynasty in turbulent Spain, as the British believed that Spain would now be able to become a prosperous, liberal and capitalist nation and that they could become a great trade partner for the industrialized United Kingdom, due to free trade policy of the new Spanish government. Furthermore, in this way the French influence over Spain would be significantly reduced, clearly dominant since 1846, when it broke in fact the Quadruple Alliance of 1834 (An alliance between United Kingdom, France, Portugal and Spain to consolidate the liberal regimes established in the Iberian Peninsula and fight against absolutist movements led by Michael I of Portugal and the Infante Carlos) after Louis Philippe I imposed the marriage of his younger son to Isabella II's younger sister.

Other European chanceries took this news as acceptable, like the Scandinavian monarchies (although Denmark would have preferred any dynasty except the Hohenzollern, after they were defeated by Prussia and Austria during the Second Schleswig War in 1864) and those new nations that had rebelled against the Ottoman yoke, like Romania, where Leopold's younger brother ruled under the name of Carol I.

However, the news that a Hohenzollern would be the Spanish king were not as well accepted in other European capitals. For example, the absolutist regimes that ruled both Russia and Austria-Hungary (who were sympathetic to the Carlist rebels) were worried about the replacement of Isabella II by a constitutional monarchy of democratic features led by a Hohenzollern. This latter detail especially worried Franz Joseph I, Emperor of Austria, who after the defeat in the Prussian-Austrian war of 1866 had lost the role of main German nation to Prussia, who was already encouraging the unification of Germany around itself.

British Prime Minister, William Gladstone.

Few were surprised that the greatest opposition in Europe came from the Second French Empire. Napoleon III, French Emperor, felt indignant and frightened when the news reached the Tuileries Palace, not through the diplomatic way, but through the press. The French cabinet had suspected that Spain had arranged negotiations to have a German prince sit in the Spanish throne, but never they would have imagined that the chosen one would be a member of the Prussian Hohenzollerns, who were challenging the French predominance in continental Europe.

The possibility that France would be surrounded by the Hohenzollern made Napoleon III realize that, if Leopold was crowned in the Royal Palace of Madrid, the most probable choice his government would pick was declaring war against Prussia to end forever the continuous Prussian provocations, in spite of his personal opposition to a war since he was busy with the consolidation of the constitutional monarchy after the April 20th referendum.

Thus, when the appointment was made public, the French ambassador in Madrid, Mercier de L'Ostende, went to protest before President Prim, but he refused to meet with him and he had to resign himself to protest before the new Home Affairs Minister, Progressive Práxedes Mateo Sagasta, who received him with little sympathy in a meeting that lasted just a few minutes and whose minutes were never found.

The Tuileries Palace, official residence of the French imperial family.

The version that has been accepted by History as the most credible was the one in which Sagasta initially tried to reduce French indignation by reminding the ambassador that, while Prince Leopold was a Hohenzollern, he was also a kin of the French Emperor (Leopold was the grandson of Marie Antoinette Murat, the niece of General Joachim Murat, Napoleon III's uncle-by-law after he married one of Napoleon Bonaparte's sisters), so the neighbour nation should not worry about the presence of a German dynasty in Spain. Also, Sagasta stated that the new regime was a democratic monarchy, where the king would only exercise a ceremonial and symbolic power, and that Leopold's appointment was the best choice for the European political balance, as well as avoiding options that were harmful to Napoleon III, such as the Duke of Montpensier or the establishment of a republic that would exacerbate the fervent French republicans.

However, the French ambassador asserted with arrogance that the Emperor would accept the Duke of Montpensier before a Prussian, even if he was distant kin, so the Spanish minister answered, with no courtesy, that Spain had already spoken through its representatives and that they would not accept any more foreign interferences in such an important matter as the choice of a new king, whose vacancy was provoking instability that could end in the final derailment of the Glorious that had toppled Isabella II, due to the internal fractures in the Government coalition and the hard opposition by Republicans, Carlists and Isabelines (The Spanish government remembered all too well the recently failed nomination of the young Duke of Genoa).

The ambassador warned that such a position would bring serious consequences, and Sagasta replied reminding him the Peninsular War, where Napoleon I tried to place his brother Joseph as the Spanish king with no consideration towards the Spaniards, which was the start of the end of the European tyrant; if France were to make the same mistake again, it was very possible that the Bonaparte would lose again the Imperial throne, perhaps forever.

French Minister of Foreign Affairs, the Duke of Gramont.

When L'Ostende sent a telegram with the summary of his meeting with Sagasta to his superiors in Paris, the Minister of Home Affairs, Duke Antoine de Gramont, claimed in the Corps Législatif (the lower chamber of the Napoleonic Parliament) on July 8th that the interests and honour of the great French nation were in danger. The official position of Napoleon III's government added that the French people could not tolerate that a foreign dynasty placed one of its members in the Spanish throne, upsetting the European political balance (of course, the Napoleonic government did not pay any attention to the hypocrisy of such declarations, as they were trying to do the same thing they were accusing Prussia of) while the people claimed on mass demonstrations for a war against Bismarck and Prim.

The French heat caused an unexpected double effect, which was contradictory by itself: on the one side, it provoked the reemergence of Prince Leopold's and King William I's doubts about putting the former in the throne, and, on the other side, it strengthened General Prim's personal stance to bring Leopold (in spite of many internal critical voices, which said this could end in the collapse of the Spanish new regime) as Prim was, over all, a fervent Spanish nationalist that wished to eliminate foreign interference in Spain, especially French. That was why he had tried to find a candidate that was not liked by Napoleon III, with the only exception of Fernando de Coburgo.

This French-hating stance was greatly influenced by Prim's personal experience, as the general had led the Spanish expedition to Mexico, in collaboration with France and United Kingdom, to force the Aztec nation to pay its debts, which derived in the failed French adventure to place Maximilian of Habsburg as Emperor of Mexico, which Prim never supported, getting his troops out of Mexico as soon as they paid their debts with Spain (a choice also influenced by his Mexican-born wife, who had important contacts in the Republic of Mexico).

That was why, on July 9th, Prim's Government announced to the Spanish Courts, in a secret session, that a general mobilization was decreed, through conscription, while he brought out the continuous French insults towards Spain.

King Ludwig II of Bavaria.

Meanwhile, the news about the appointment cheered the Prussian Chancery up, as it would allow them to take a faithful ally from the vain French, who would surely give them the war Bismarck wanted, and with which he hoped to torment the French as if he had a red cap, and thus give the definite impulse to German unification. This would be the last step in the road that started with the Second Schleswig War of 1864 and continued with the Austro-Prussian war of 1866, after which the Northern German Federation (NGF) was formed, replacing the Austrian-created German Confederacy, although in reality the NGF was more like a federal state controlled by Prussia.

With that entity, Bismarck had not managed to attract the Southern Catholic states (the Kingdoms of Bavaria and Württemberg and the Great Duchies of Baden and Hesse), which distrusted Protestant Prussia, although thanks to the latter they felt freer from the Austrian imperialism that had dominated them since the 1815 Vienna Congress, which had designed post-Napoleon Europe. That was why Bismarck had put everything behind the formation of a secret defensive alliance with those four states, so he now needed for France to be the aggressor in this war: it was the only way to receive the Catholic states help, whose inhabitants, despite their strong national identity, still heard about the Napoleonic hordes' historical brutalities from 60 years before. Bismarck hoped that the war would create a popular Pan-German euphoria after the victory and the people would push for integration in Bismarck's project for German unification.

Bismarck's diagnosis was correct. Both the French people and government reacted angrily when Sagasta's answer reached Paris, so Gramont decided to end such claims from its origin, while the French government was pressured by the different Bourbon branches that aspired to rule Spain. Gramont ordered the French Ambassador in Berlin, Count Vincent Benedetti, to speak with the Prussian King and get a verbal and written guarantee that would vet his relative's candidacy to the Spanish throne (as King of Prussia, William I had to give his permission so that any subject accepted foreign commitments), as well as the promise that such a claim would never be resurrected.

Count Juan Antonio Rascón, the Spanish Ambassador in Berlín.

With this hard objective, the French diplomat went to the Ems spa, where the Prussian Royal Family was resting. On July 9th, the count met William I, and asked him to speak with his relative to force him to renounce the Spanish crown if he wanted to avoid war. Three days later, Prince Karl Anton told the ambassador that his son renounced to the crown with sadness, but that if that was the only way to avoid war, he would do it. Both Bismarck and Count Rascón felt upset, but decided to wait for the French reaction and William I's official answer before informing the Spanish government, to see if it was yet possible to save the candidacy. And, by awaiting, they stroke gold.

Despite the Prussian concessions, the French, especially the anti-liberal elements of the Imperial government (led by Gramont and the Consort Empress, who were trying to raise the Emperor's falling popularity, which had led to the April 20th referendum through which Napoleon III had been forced to give up some power to avoid a potential Republican or Orleanist rebellion), were not satisfied and asked for more, so the same night of July 12th they ordered Benedetti a written confirmation, with William I's royal seal, that the Prussian candidacy would never be taken up again. Also, the French Minister for War, Marshal Edmond LeBoeuf, ordered the general mobilization of the French Army for any eventuality.

That was why, on July 13th, the French Ambassador met again with the Prussian king in the Ems spa, presenting him the request, but the old King answered that he had nothing else to say and politely ended the meeting. In the afternoon, William I sent, through his diplomatic advisor Heinrich Abeken, a telegram from Ems to Chancellor Bismarck, who was at Berlin, retelling the encounter with Count Benedetti. That telegram (known as the Ems Telegram) arrived that night to the Berliner Wilhelmstrasse Palast, where Bismarck was dining with General Helmuth von Moltke. When he read the telegram, Bismarck shrewdly saw the chance to spark the long-awaited war, so he took his quill and wrote a communication, condensing the telegram's text in such a way that it transformed a cordial meeting between William I and Count Benedetti into an order of the French ambassador and a blunt royal answer before the ambassador's offensive manners, with which he hoped both Prussians and French reacted angrily.

Such a genial maneuver had the reward Bismarck anticipated, because when the communication was made public, Napoleon III gave an ultimatum in which he demanded immediate apologies for such falsity and the confirmation that no Prussian would be candidate to the Spanish crown ever. Other news that struck the newspapers were that the Carlist pretender, Carlos María de Borbón y Austria-Este (named Charles VII by his followers, in accordance of the Carlist succession line) tried to gain the Imperial support to reestablish the absolutist monarchy around himself in a personal meeting with Duke Gramont, but in the end Napoleon III supported the Bourbons in the person of Alfonso de Borbón (the old and great friendship between Empress Eugénie de Montijo and exiled queen Isabella II, who were already thinking about joining their families by marrying Louis Napoleon, the French heir, with one of Isabella II's daughters, influenced greatly in this decision) due to the political affinities the Emperor had with young Alfonso, in spite of Alfonsine leader Antonio Cánovas del Castillo's protests.

The Isabelist pretender to the Spanish throne, Alfonso de Borbón.

Of course, both Prussians and Spaniards rejected the French ultimatum, and, given the situation (added to the Prussian order of mobilization from July 15th) and the Prim Government's position of keeping legitimizing Leopold's appointment as the King (this was due to the fact that the Spanish government officially was unaware of Leopold's renounce to the throne, and despite rumours coming from Paris about it, which Prim rejected as French lies) led to the French government's declaration of war against Prussia and Spain on July 18th 1870, with the double objective of teaching the Prussians a lesson (annexing the Rhineland as they passed through) and reestablish the Bourbon monarchy in Spain. Thus began the Hohenzollern's War [1].

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[1] For the Anglo-Saxon countries, as also in the German-speaking states, this war was known by the name of the Hohenzollern's War. Meanwhile, the Spanish people name it as la Guerra del Rey Leopoldo (the King Leopold's War). In turn, the French called it simply as la Guerre de 1870 (the War of 1870).

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First, I apologize to everyone for the huge delay in posting the next update, but I had trouble articulating this part of the alternative history (the damn author blocking). Fortunately, I've finally been able to finish it, especially with the great help that Milarqui has given me in those weeks. He'll write some stories where the History takes place from the point of view of people, including the view of some of the protagonists.​

I hope you enjoy it a lot this last update.

 

[Linense]

The Hohenzollern's War, Part II: Preparing for War

Prussia's Reaction:

Prussia's first reaction, which mirrored Chancellor Bismarck's, was joy: the war would put France into its true place, because Prussia's political and military superiority would be shown, and they would be gaining a faithful ally in Spain. In fact, on July 20th all Europe woke up to an official note in which Prince Leopold definitely accepted the crown of Spain, with the support of William I, and that he would travel to his new country as soon as the danger for himself and his family, danger caused by the French's cocky and defying attitude as they meddled in Spanish-only affairs, ended. Of course, this note did nothing but anger the French even more.

The Krupp six-pound cannon.

The Prussian Armed Forces counted, as well as with the support of the Catholic German states, with two unique elements: a recruiting system based on universal military service and the existence of a military branch called General Staff, which did not exist in other armed forces and which was exclusively dedicated to administration, logistics and planning. Both elements gave them a great advantage, as the Prussians would be able to plan a fast and organized mobilization of the great number of troops required for the battlefield in a short time.

Thus, the German armies managed to mobilize 1,200,000 soldiers 18 days after the start of mobilization, thanks to the existent effective railway network in Germany. Due to this numerical superiority, the Prussian military, led by General Moltke, thought possible to develop a strategy based on allowing the French to enter in Germany (thus rising the Catholic nations' fear respect French imperialism) to then launch massive enveloping movements to surround and destroy the enemy formations, facilitated by the Dreyse needle gun (which had played a decisive role in the Prusssian victory in the Battle of Königgrätz) and the Krupp six-pound cannon (the Prussian artillery's most distinguished weapon, due to its lethal power and its enormous range, an average of 4,500 metres). With these strategies in hand, they expected to fast enter French territory and then besiege or conquer Paris, which would force French authorities to surrender and give up Alsace and Lorraine.

The Dreyse needle gun.

France's Reaction:

On the French side, the Emperor's military advisors assured him that the French Imperial Forces would be able to defeat both Prussia (with its German allies) and Spain in a war with two far-away battlefronts, in spite of the lack of allies: Denmark had learned its lesson after their defeat in 1864; Belgium, Portugal and Italy did not want to fight against two countries that had helped them a lot recently; and the United Kingdom criticized that France was, once more, unearthing the hatchet in Europe, especially pointing out that they were attacking their ally, Spain, which had just chosen the king they thought was best to lead them. Thus, the only ally Napoleon III had was Austria, and that was with the condition that the Southern Catholic German nations supported France, but this was made impossible after the defensive alliance between the NGF and those nations was made public, so Austria-Hungary stated its neutrality on July 20th. This prevented the entrance of the Russian Empire in the war, since a secret pact between Prussia and Russia said that both nations would be allied if Austria-Hungary ever allied with France at any moment.

The Mitrailleuse.

The French had a professional army of about 500,000 soldiers, many of which were veterans from the many wars France had started in the last decades (Crimean War, colonization of Algeria, Second Italian War of Independence, the French Intervention in Mexico), a quantity that could be at least doubled when the forces of the National Guard, a reserve corps created in 1866 (during the military reorganization started after the fast end of the Austro-Prussian War) were added, as well as the French Foreign Legion, which could be counted on to protect the colonies, as well as possibly helping to defend Metropolitan France in the case of national invasion.

Also, the French generals were completely convinced that victory would fall on their side thanks to two technical inventions that had been introduced in their Armed Forces: the Chassepot rifle, a single-shot breechloading rifle with the highest power, accuracy and penetration amongst the existent rifles at that time; and the mitrailleuse, the forerunner of the machine gun. Blinded by their patriotic pride, they were also sure that their strategy (advance into the Rhineland, where they would smash the German forces before they grouped together, while their invasion of Spain would follow the same path as the Hundred Thousand Sons of Saint Louis in 1823 to restore Ferdinand VII's absolutist monarchy) would give them a fast victory.

The Chassepot rifle.

Spain's Reaction:

Meanwhile, Spanish society saw astonished how the election of their new king by their elected representatives had suddenly turned into an international crisis which they were part of. However, and although the Spaniards had hoped to avoid war against their neighbours, when it was known that the French intended to impose 12-year-old Alfonso, Isabel II's eldest son, through invasion, the Spanish people exploded in a never seen wave of French-hating popular nationalism (similar to the one that sparked the start of the Spanish phase of the Peninsular War on May 2nd 1808), inspired by General Prim's government, which had decreed high levels of conscription to face the Napoleonic menace for the second time in a century and was instructing the people about the innumerable French affronts to the Motherland for so much time as they kept that hated Bourbons in the Royal Palace of Madrid (and, with them, the Moderate Party's eternal power) and blocking any Spanish attempt to recover its rightful place in the world, such as the pressure on Spain to sign the Wad-Ras treaty that established peace between Spain and Morocco, a peace that gave to Spain much less than it deserved after its armies' great victory, although Prim conveniently “forgot” that the greatest pressure had come from the United Kingdom, not France.

When it came to the Spanish Armed Forces, General Prim (the Minister for War since The Glorious triumphed) had pretended to eliminate conscription based on the unfair system of quintas, so that he could have a true professional army, similar to the one existing in the United Kingdom and France. However, the ugly situation of the Spanish treasury, the untimely Cuban revolt and the potential Carlist and Republican rebellions, had forced Prim to use conscription to face those dangers. The disproportionate quantity of officers in the army (coming from the Vergara Embrace, which was the end of the First Carlist War and allowed those Carlists that accepted Isabella II as their Queen to join the Royal Army, with their rank in the Carlist army) and the lack of experience in foreign conflicts (save for a few exceptions, such as the African War, the brief re-annexation of Santo Domingo and the First Pacific War) had prevented the complete modernization of the Armed Forces' tactics and resources. This was compensated by the construction of a powerful navy (the fourth in the world) and the use of the Berdan rifle (a weapon better than the Dreyse rifle but worse than the Chassepot) since 1867 as regulated weapon.

The Berdan rifle.

In spite of the hard situation in the Spanish army (with limited economic and material resources) one could not underestimate the fact that, when they were motivated, the Spanish Armed Forces were fearsome, even with everything against them (as the French learned during the Peninsular War). However, all sides thought that Spain's military strategy would be only defensive, to prevent the entrance of French troops across the few border crossings in the Pyrenees that were big enough for military advancement, as they awaited for how events developed in the French-German frontline.

 

[Linense]

The Hohenzollern's War, Part III: Deployment

The French Plans:

French initial plans consisted on deploying a 350,000-strong army between Metz and Strasbourg, personally led by Napoleon III (who would be assisted by Marshals Patrice de Mac-Mahon and François Bazaine), while 75,000 soldiers would be assembled in each Pyrenean border crossing: the army that would cross from Bayonne to the Vascongadas through Fuenterrabía would be led by Marshal François Certain-Canrobert, and the one crossing from Perpignan to Catalonia through La Junquera would be led by General Louis Jules Trochu, as they awaited for the National Guard's complete mobilization.

Their mobilization was chaotic, because the troops were scattered throughout the whole country and they lacked an organizer of the stature of General Moltke. Knowing about German numerical superiority, they tried to rush mobilization to start invading Germany as soon as possible, as each day the attack was delayed was a lost day against the enemy. The rushing contributed even more to chaos, as many troops arrived to their destinations without the required equipment (there were some soldiers who lacked even their uniforms) while other soldiers were trapped in the stations due to delays.

Marshal Edmond Leboeuf, French Minister of War.

Another important factor was that most French officers had served in Algeria, which influenced much in the command method, as ambushes were very common there. Thus, the French armies established lines of defensive fortresses between Metz and Strasbourg (to keep control of the Lorraine region's coal deposits) while they did the same in the cities near the Pyrenees' border crossings. They were helped in the latter task by some Spanish military officers that had been exiled with Isabella II, such as the Marquis of Novaliches (who had lost the Battle of Alcolea Bridge) and the Marquis of La Habana (head of government between the start of La Gloriosa and the takeover of Madrid by the revolutionaries).

Meanwhile, the French Navy was ordered to block the German ports, given the limited opposition the small Prussian Navy could give, as well as to protect the French coast from the Spanish Navy. The chance of bombarding an important Spanish port, such as Barcelona, Bilbao, La Coruña, Cartagena or Cadiz, was left for the subsequent consolidation period.

The Prussian Ploys:

No one but General Moltke would have guessed that, 18 days after Kronprinz Friedrich Wilhelm read the mobilization order to the crown gathered in Postdam on July 15th, there would be already 1,200,000 soldiers in the army, and 475,000 of them on the border. To arrange such mobilization without problems, the General Staff Communication Department and a civilian-military committee worked together to secure the railways in war times. Moltke was deeply worried about the details of the mobilization and supplies, which contributed to the German success. The Germans still suffered some problems of transport, given the high number of soldiers and supplies required, but they were never as serious as the ones the French had.

Prussian General Helmuth von Moltke.

Moltke divided the forces in three great armies, led by General Karl Friedrich von Steinmetz, Prince Frederick Charles and the Kronprinz. These armies dispersed after 300 kilometers and then separated as they met different mountain ranges. The German plan was to allow the French armies to invade German territory and then use their advantageous positions to envelop and destroy them, to later invade enemy territory.

The Spanish Daring:

Three weeks after the mobilization order was given, and thanks to the peninsular railway network and a somewhat good organization, General Prim could count on having around 100,000 soldiers in each border crossing. Prim himself, after temporarily delegating the Presidency of Government to Minister Sagasta, took command of the troops defending the La Junquera crossing, while he was covered by a squadron led by Admiral Topete (who, in spite of preferring the Duke of Montpensier, he volunteered to defend his nation and his new King).

Spanish Admiral Luis Hernández-Pinzón.

The other border crossing, in Fuenterrabía, would be protected by troops led by the Regent, General Serrano, and placed in the Cantabrian coast and the Vascongadas, with the support of Admiral Luis Hernández-Pinzón squadron. Serrano would also count on an unexpected help: several groups of Carlist requetés. The news that Charles VII had asked for Napoleon III's support to establish the Ancien Régime after France invaded Spain had divided Carlism in twain, as they compared Charles VII's action with the humiliating Bayonne Abdications. The majority, formed by the moderates, decided to side with the legitimate government, and one of its leaders, veteran General Ramón Cabrera, publicly declared from London “We prefer to serve the foreigner loyal to Spain before the traitor and afrancesado [1] Spaniard”.

The Spanish Royal Navy, which had just acquired several armoured frigates and was considered the fourth best in the world, was in great shape, and would have several missions: besides supporting the troops' defense of Spain, they would also have to protect Spanish waters and attack the most important French bases, like Brest, Marseilles, Toulon, Oran and Algiers.

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[1] The afrancesados were the Spaniards and Portuguese that supported the French invasion of Iberia and the appointment of Joseph Bonaparte as King of Spain in 1808, hoping that he would lead Spain away from the Enlightened absolutism of the Bourbons. The defeat of the Napoleonic troops in the Peninsular War led to the exile of most of them and the persecution of anyone that was suspected of collaboration with the French (even those that were offered the choice but rejected it), persecution that lasted for many years after the end of the war. Amongst them were famed painter Francisco Goya and dramatist Leandro Fernández de Moratín.

 

[Linense]

The Hohenzollern's War, Part IV: The War

War between France and the German-Spanish Alliance started properly on August 2nd, when the French armies crossed the border with Germany and occupied Saarbrücken after a victory owing to the Chassepot rifle's superiority and the city's isolation from the rest of Germany. However, victory had been sung too soon, because Moltke had managed to place three armies in the region and soon managed to expel the French from the Saar, after two hard victories in Wissembourg (August 4th) and Spicheren (August 6th).

Meanwhile, the French had also crossed the Pyrenees. They had expected an easy victory, similar to the one in 1823, but to their surprise they were soon in the middle of a series of bloody battles in which Prim's and Serrano's armies did their best to prevent a large-scale invasion of Spain. Serrano was defeated in the Battle of Fuenterrabía (August 3rd-6th), which paved the way for the French towards San Sebastián, but Prim managed to stop the Gauls, first in La Junquera (August 3rd) and then in Figueras (August 10th). While Trochu's troops were forced back into Perpignan, Canrobert entered San Sebastián and sent his troops to take Bilbao, Vitoria and Pamplona, a job that turned difficult due to the Carlist requetés constant attacks.

Carlists requetés fighting against the French invaders.

August 12th saw three battles happen nearly at the same time, with a balanced result: the German army led by the Kronprinz smashed Marshal Mac-Mahon's army, the First Battle of Perpignan between Prim's and Trochu's troops ended in a stalemate, and a hurried attack by Serrano on Canrobert ended with the Spaniard's defeat and withdrawal towards Vitoria. Very soon, the city would be besieged with the Regent inside, a siege that lasted for five days with French victory, although Serrano was lucky enough to escape so that he could gather a new army, as Prim was defeated in the Battle of Ceret and had to go back into Spanish territory.

While Serrano was in Vitoria, Prince Alfonso de Borbón returned to Spanish lands, reversing the path taken with his mother and sisters two years before, and ended in San Sebastián. There, the so-called Manifiesto de La Concha [1] was published, in which Alfonso was named King of Spain as Alfonso XII and the restoration of the Bourbons in the Spanish throne was proclaimed, “opposite to the upstarts that confuse popular sovereignty with the Spanish historical sovereignty, declaring themselves the saviours of the Motherland, when they only fill it with blood, pain and tears because of the affronts against the true holders of the Spanish Crown”.

The Proclamation of Alfonso XII as king of Spain in San Sebastian.

This movement, with which Alfonso expected to gain legitimate support in Spain, although it had a few successes such as Alejandro Pidal y Mon or even the Duke of Montpensier (who was already planning the possibility of marrying one of his daughters to the young pretender [2]), it was mostly rejected even by his most faithful followers, who, like the Carlists, were reminded of the Bayonne Abdications. The leader of the Patriot Alfonsines (as they would be later known), Antonio Cánovas del Castillo, famously declared “I will never be a new Godoy!” [3], a sentence that would become part of Spain's history.

Serrano's problems in the Vascongadas stirred the Republican minority up, led by Francisco Pi y Margall and Estanislao Figueras, against the government provisionally led by Sagasta, claiming that the war was a mistake and that Spain had no actual reason to participate in the French-Prussian conflict. This minority became angrier when in August 13th a squadron led by Admiral Pierre-Gustave Roze and with the frigate Guérriere at its head managed to avoid Topete's ships and attack Barcelona (base of the Federal Republican movement) for several hours. This made the Republicans think that the Leopoldine monarchy was finished before it even started, and tried to launch a coup in August 15th with the help of the only high-ranked officer that supported them and was free, General Juan Contreras (the others, amongst them General Blas Pierrad, had been imprisoned after the Republican sublevation of 1869), but it was easily put down thanks to the fast acting of Sagasta and Ruiz Zorrilla on the civilian side, and of the loyal commanders (with Eugenio de Gaminde and Lorenzo Milans del Bosch [4], General Captains of Catalonia and Castile, respectively, at the helm). Its leaders were imprisoned, as they awaited a trial that would not happen till the end of the war.

Cavalry charge led by General Adalbert von Bredow in the Battle of Mars-La-Tour.

August 16th would be later considered the start of the end for France: Bazaine's army was defeated by the troops of Generals Voigts-Rhetz and Alvensleben in Mars-La-Tour, battle in which General Adalbert von Bredow led one of the few cavalry charges that were fundamental in modern war, and was forced to withdraw towards Metz. This defeat was followed two days later by a second one in Gravelotte (where German numerical superiority proved better than French individual weaponry superiority), and the French government ordered Canrobert to send part of his troops to the German frontline.

The lessening on the number of French soldiers in Northern Spain allowed Serrano to gather a new army of 100,000 soldiers, which liberated Vitoria on August 20th, provoking a withdrawal of French troops towards San Sebastián. The next day, Prim won the Second Battle of Perpignan, city that, after two centuries of being under French control, finally returned to Spanish hands. And, between August 24th and August 28th, Serrano obtained a series of victories that nearly completely expelled the French from Spain. On August 29th, Prim advanced into Carcassonne and defeated Trochu, as San Sebastián was freed. Finally, on September 1st, the Battle of Irún ended with French defeat, allowing Serrano to expel the French from Spain, as well as young Alfonso XII.

Spanish reconquest of the city of Vitoria.

Given the situation, the French decided that the only way to counter the constant defeats was to fight a great battle in which victory would be secure for them, raising the falling French morale. Napoleon III decided to take personal command of the troops, assisted by Marshal Mac-Mahon. The army withdrawed towards Sedan, where, after what they expected to be a fast French victory, they would march towards Metz, raising the siege surrounding Marshal Bazaine's army.

Unfortunately, General Moltke managed to take advantage of his withdrawal and moved his troops to make a pincer movement, isolating the French troops in Sedan. This allowed Moltke to leave many troops in Metz to continue the siege of the city.

When the French realised they had fallen in the German trap, it was too late to avoid the pincer movement from isolating them. The generals soon saw that the only option to save the Emperor and the highest possible number of troops was to withdraw. Some officers contradicted that order, and the German artillery started to attack.

A few hours later, seeing the tragic situation that awaited his men, the Emperor ordered General Charles Denis Bourbaki, commander of the Imperial Guard, to save his 14-year-old son Louis Napoleon, so that he could be sent to Paries while he led a cavalry charge against the German troops. In the future, there would be many discussions about whether Napoleon III acted that way to give Bourbaki time to save the prince and later escape himself, or if his only objective was to defend his honour through a battle to death. The only certain thing was that Napoleon III, Emperor of France, died in that charge at the last hours of September 1st 1870.

The Death of Napoleón III, of unknown autorship.

The next day, when he saw he was completely surrounded by the enemy, that his king and commander-in-chief had died and that Sedan could not resist a strong siege without external help (which was believed impossible) and enough moral, Marshal Mac-Mahon surrendered his troops to General Moltke and William I, who had come to the frontline accompanied by Chancellor Bismarck.

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[1] El Manifiesto de La Concha (La Concha Manifest) was called this way both because Alfonso XII's proclamation was done in the San Sebastian's beach called La Concha and because it was the Marquis of La Habana, General José Gutiérrez de la Concha, who proclaimed him King of Spain.
[2] RL Alfonso XII's first wife was María de las Mercedes de Orléans, the Duke of Montpensier's seventh daughter out of the ten children he had, and who died on 1878 without issue. His second wife was Mary Christine of Austria, with whom he would have three children, the latter being his only son, born several months after his father died and who would reign as Alfonso XIII.
[3] Manuel Godoy was Spain's Prime Minister in 1792-1797 and 1801-1808 (it is said he gained the position because he was Queen Maria Luisa's (Carlos IV's wife) lover) and who became infamous because of his dealings with Republican and Napoleonic France, particularly the Treaty of Fontainebleu, that stated that Portugal would be divided in three, with the southern part being given to Godoy. The invasion of Portugal that resulted from this was the start of the Peninsular War.
[4] Ironically, he is the great-grandfather of Jaime Milans del Bosch, one of the 23-F coup d'état leaders, which tried to finish the Spanish democratic system that had surged after Franco's death (he is still dead, by the way). However, each generation of this family of soldiers had a member, at least, that was part of a coup (the first putschists of this family fought for the establishment of a liberal regime in Spain, but the last putschists supported the establishment of dictatorial regimes).

 

[Linense]

The Hohenzollern's War, Part V: End and Consequences

After Napoleon III's death, the Imperial Parliament rushed to crown young Louis Napoleon as Napoleon IV, with his mother Dowager Empress Eugénie de Montijo as Regent, to later send emissaries to the German and Spanish armies to start the peace negotiations, while the Imperial government achieved to abort a Republican coup, planned by Leon Gambetta. However, the French denial to pay the excessive compensations demanded by the allies broke the negotiations, so the Empress felt forced to continue the war with the hope of gaining a peace that was more favourable to France, but Bazaine's surrender on October 30th during the German siege of Metz, followed by Spanish victories on Pau (September 8th), Auch (September 12th), Montgiscard (September 18th) and Muret (September 20th) and the sieges of Toulouse (September 21th) and Paris (September 19th) made the eleventh-hour attempts a complete failure.

French Republican leader Leon Gambetta.

The naval front, save for the attack on Barcelona by Admiral Roze's squadron, had also been a complete disaster for France: even though the Imperiale Marine was bigger than the Spanish Royal Navy and the Marine des Norddeutschen Bundes put together, they lacked the required coal to protect the coast from enemy attacks. The Spanish Royal Navy managed to attack the cities of Marseilles and Oran almost unpunished. The latter would be constantly bombarded while the Spanish Marine Infantry executed a risky landing on September 18th (thanks to Rear Admiral Claudio Alvargonzález Sánchez's (known as the Hero of Abtao after the First Pacific War) ability) that later allowed a whole army, led by General Manuel Pavía y Rodríguez de Alburquerque, who fought against the feared troops of the French Foreign Legion, and won after a hard fight that allowed him to take the city of Oran.

From left to right: Spanish Rear Admiral Claudio Alvargonzález Sánchez, and Spanish General Manuel Pavía y Rodríguez de Alburquerque.

The international situation did nothing but worsen for France. To the lack of military allies the loss of political support was added: the Kingdom of Italy, knowing about the French difficulties, took the chance the Imperial Government served on a silver platter when it called the French garrison in Rome to aid in the defense of the nation and invaded the last fragments of the Papal States, taking Rome on September 20th and finally unifying the whole Italian Peninsula under a same flag for the first time in many centuries. This gave birth to a curious situation in which the Pope decided not to leave the Vatican Palace nor to recognize the rule of the Kingdom of Italy over Rome, so he remained “Prisoner in the Vatican”, a situation that did not solve until many years later.

The Italians were not satisfied only with Rome: soon, many Italian cities saw how great demonstrations were held, demanding the invasion of France to recover what in the past had been Italian land, that is, the regions of Savoy and Nice (which had been given in 1860 after two referendums were held) and the island of Corsica (sold in the eighteenth century by Genoa to France), Napoleon Bonaparte's birthplace.

The open breach in the Porta Pia, Rome.

Knowing that their time was ending, the Imperial government, that had left for Nantes shortly before the German Army surrounded Paris, ordered the restarting of the peace negotiations so that war was ended definitely. Conversations were tedious and very hard, and, on October 24th, a day after Spanish troops entered Toulouse -after a devastating fire caused by the Spanish artillery- and the Germans reached the English Channel after two victories in Villiers (October 1st) and Buzenval (October 19th), the Dowager Empress decided to accept the harsh conditions before Italy allied with Prussia and Spain.

The corpse of Napoleon III, photographed before being buried in Les Invalides.

Thus, on October 31st the initial armistice was signed between France and the German-Spanish alliance, which was ratified eight days later at Versailles, where the French representatives witnessed astonished to the crowning of King William I of Prussia as the first Kaiser of the Second German Reich. The definite peace treaty was signed in the German city of Frankfurt on December 24th 1870 (and nicknamed le charbon du Pére Noel, “Santa Claus' coal” by the French) and stipulated the following conditions:

• France recognises being the only responsible nation for the war that ends with this peace treaty.
• France recognises Leopold of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen as legitimate King of Spain.
• France recognises the foundation of the German Reich, with William I of Prussia as the new German Kaiser under the name of William I of Germany.
• France recognises the following territorial changes:
  • The regions of Alsace (except for the Belfort territory) and Lorraine become part of the sovereign territory of the German Reich.
  • The departments of Eastern Pyrenees (Rousillon) and of Oran (Oranesado) [1] become part of the sovereign territory of Spain.
• The people residing in the regions whose sovereignty has changed will have until January 1st 1873 to decide whether they wish to keep their French nationality and leave for France or remain in the region and become German or Spanish citizens, in accordance to the region. Children will have the same nationality as their parents.
• A suitable frame for the withdrawal of German and Spanish troops from certain zones will be established.
• The Empress Dowager of France, in the name of her son Napoleon IV, transfers his dynastic rights over the Princedom of Andorra to Leopold of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen and his heirs.
• France will compensate, in respect of war damages to both the German Reich and Spain, a quantity of 8,000 millions of francs to each country, along a period of time not longer than 15 years.
• Military occupation of some zones of France by German and Spanish forces will be kept until the payments are satisfied. Costs are to be paid by the occupied country, without attributing those to the demanded compensation.
• The use of navigable channels in connection to European regions lost by France is regularized.
• Trade between France on one side and the German Empire and Spain on the other side is regularized.
• The return of prisoners of war is regularized.

The end of the war brought many consequences to Europe. The establishment of the German Reich and the Hohenzollern monarchy in Spain, as well as the territorial changes in the warring nations finally brought the people the confirmation that everything had changed.

From left to right: French Emperor Napoleon IV, and French General Louis Jules Trochu.

In France, the defeat caused multiple disturbs. Young Napoleon IV never had the chance to replace his mother, Regent Eugénie, as de facto governor of the French Empire, because on February 1st 1871 a bloody Republican revolt toppled the Second French Empire and replaced it with the Third French Republic, with notable Republican Adolphe Thiers as President of the National Council and the support of Generals Louis Jules Trochu and Louis Faidherbe. However, this stirred up the Parisian rebels, who, from the start of the German siege, had established a workers' government that would be later known as the Paris Commune, which defended the restarting of the armed fight against Germans and Spaniards to recover the regions lost in the Frankfurt Treaty.

Adolphe Thiers, President of the French National Council.

The Bonapartes' toppling sparked the immediate mobilization of the German and Spanish armies (February 3rd), once again demonstrating the possibility that France may continue suffering the horrors of war, so the new National Council decided to not continue with hostilities and accept the Frankfurt Treaty. To calm down his warlike neighbours, Thiers was forced to order the Commune's dissolution, but they rejected the order (accusing the Council of selling the motherland to the enemies) and were only toppled by the new French regime on June 1st 1871, after they asked for the humiliating help of the German cannons.

Destruction of the Vendôme Column during the Paris Commune.

Napoleon IV and the Dowager Empress managed to escape, accompanied by the one who for a few days had been Alfonso XII, King of Spain, and his parents and sisters, to the United Kingdom, where they would live and wait for the chance of returning to their original nations, perhaps as new kings or emperors. Duke Gramont did not have the same luck, and was sentenced to death for his role in the diplomatic crisis that had ended in the humiliating defeat against Prussians and Spaniards: the war that had started as an attempt to prevent a Hohenzollern from being crowned in Madrid had ended with another Hohenzollern crowned as German Emperor in the Versailles Palace itself.

Victor Emmanuel II of Italy and republican revolutionary Giuseppe Garibaldi [2] were left without being able to taste victory against France and recover the Italian regions that were ruled by France (an affair Garibaldi felt especially affected by, as he was from Nice), although they could console themselves with the fact that Rome would finally become the capital of the Kingdom of Italy, despite the will of the Holy Father.

Italian King Victor Emmanuel II.

Meanwhile, Spain was living in a completely patriotic jubilation after victory over French troops (which were, a priori, better prepared than the Spanish troops, although the French were fighting in two fronts at the same time), establishing definite international recognition of Leopold as King of Spain, and he brought under the arm Rousillon and the Oranesado, lost two centuries and several decades ago, respectively. Victory dispelled any doubts that remained about the fact that the King was completely unknown, producing a great wave of optimism throughout the whole country that later would be compared by ancient General Espartero to the celebrations that followed the arrival of Ferdinand VII the Desired, before he was revealed to be an absolutist tyrant.

Thus, four months after being elected by Parliament, on November 3rd 1870, Leopold, his family and the Spanish parliamentary delegation that had traveled to Reichenhall (Bavaria) in July to officially notify him about the voting, and which had been stuck there due to the war, arrived to Cartagena from Genoa (a route chosen by Leopold, who did not want to risk crossing the English Channel, in case of a traitorous French attack) aboard the armoured frigate Numancia, which had commanded the attack on Marseilles, being received by Spain's main authorities.

Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen from the port of Genoa.

Before an ecstatic crowd, Leopold gave a speech in perfect Spanish (during the war, Leopold had spent his time to deepen his knowledge of the Spanish language, although his strong Germanic accent would never leave him), in which he praised Spain's great past and the greatness that awaited the nation in the future, as well as solemnly remembering the Spanish war heroes and paying tribute to the fallen. President Prim later gave a well-measured speech in which he established numerous similarities between Leopold and King Charles I of Spain and V of Germany, emphasizing that Leopold's arrival to the Spanish throne would be the start of a new era for Spain, just like Charles I's had been on his time.

Arrival of Leopold I to the Royal Palace of Madrid

Three days later, Leopold, accompanied by the other Spanish main authorities, arrived to Madrid, where he was received by Regent Serrano and by crowds of Spaniards excited about the new king's arrival (although some, such as a group of intransigent Republicans led by Andalusian José Paul y Angulo, who had the intention to attack against the carriage where the King and the General came, but the group attracted the attention of some agents of the Public Vigilance Corps and were arrested) who were able to hear speeches similar to those pronounced in Cartagena. Later, Leopold swore the Constitution in the Courts' Palace and was proclaimed by the President of the Courts, Manuel Ruíz Zorrilla, as King under the name of Leopold I of Spain. Thus started the Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen dynasty in the Spanish throne.

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[1] Rousillon had been part of Spain until the Pyrenees Peace of 1659, and the African city of Oran (capital of the Oranesado) had been property of Spain since 1509 until Charles IV decided to sell the strategical city to the Ottoman Empire in 1797. Ottoman rule over the city lasted until 1831, when the French conquered it.
[2] In real life, the Second French Empire was toppled during the war, and Garibaldi changed from supporting the Prussians to supporting the Third French Republic. Here, the Empire falls a month after the war ends, and so Garibaldi does not feel the need to support the nation that stole his birthplace.

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I hope you enjoyed this new update, and I encourage you to comment your opinions and ideas about this alternate history.

A clue to the future: 1873 will be a year quite turbulent...​

 

[Milarqui]

I sent you a message with a couple of things that have to be corrected, Linense, but altogether it is great!

Now, my second story: this time, it tells the meeting between Minister Práxedes Mateo Sagasta and French Ambassador Mercier de L'Ostende after the latter has heard that the Spanish Congress has chosen Leopold as Spain's King (as told in Part I of Chapter 2: The Hohenzollerns' War).

Extract from Práxedes Mateo-Sagasta y Escolar's autobiography “Between Home and Presidency”
I was calmly sitting down in my office at the Ministry, revising several documents related to our trading relationship with Central America, when the door opened violently. I raised my eyes, and saw how Monsieur L'Ostende, French Ambassador, entered the office without asking for permission, followed by my secretary, who seemed dazed and was trying at the same time to detain L'Ostende without effectiveness and apologising in fits and starts for her inability to advert of the French's presence. I stood up, and while L'Ostende took a seat, I took my secretary and accompanied her out of the office, telling her that she had nothing to fear and that she should return to her seat and calm down.

After closing the door, I returned to my seat and confronted L'Ostende. He looked at me directly into the eyes, and I could see that he was furious and that an irate sneer was in his face.

“What brings you here, Monsieur Ambassador?” I asked him as diplomatically as I could.

“What the hell does this mean, Sagasta?” he asked, furiously, dropping a newspaper over the table and hitting it strongly with his palm. It was an issue of La Gaceta de Madrid, from two days ago, that proclaimed the crowning of Leopold zu Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen as the new King of Spain under the name of Leopold I.

“Is it not clear enough? The Spanish people have chosen their new king through their representatives.”

“France will not tolerate this insult! We will never allow a Prussian to sit in the Throne of Spain!”

“Monsieur, I ask you to calm down. Allow me to remember you that, although our King is a Hohenzollern, he is also a distant kin to His Imperial Majesty Napoleon the Third. Leopold is Joachim Murat's niece's grandson, so you can tell His Imperial Majesty that he has no reason to get overexcited. Also, our Constitution stipulates that the King will only exert a symbolic power, and I think that it is better for France that Leopold becomes the King instead of the Duke of Montpensier or even the establishment of a Republic.”

“Believe me when I tell you that His Imperial Majesty would prefer to see that buffoon of Montpensier as King rather than that Prussian, even if he is kin!”

I knew that, from now on, there was to way back. L'Ostende was insulting our nation, and I had to put things clearly.

“Our nation has already spoken through its representatives in the Congress of Deputies, and what was said is clear. We will not allow any more foreign interferences in such an important affair as the election of our new King is.”

“Should you continue in this position, I can assure you that you will rue the serious consequences that this will cause for you.”

“Allow me to remember you that the Emperor's uncle, Napoleon Bonaparte, tried to impose his brother Joseph as our King during the Independence War, and in the end Joseph was out of Spain and Napoleon was exiled in Saint Helena. I can assure you that, if you try to make the same mistake, it is very probable that Napoleon III will lose his throne, get himself exiled to Cochinchina to avoid the One Hundred Days from happening again and the Bonapartes will be finished forever. Now, please, leave this office.”

I could see how angry L'Ostende was. He stood up, and without a word he left. It was clear that this meeting, for good or bad, was the end of the friendship between Spain and France.

 

[Linense]

Thanks for the warning, Milarqui. These errors have already been corrected.

And I see you've published your the second story, recounting the discussion between Sagasta and the arrogant French ambassador.

 

[Dr. Strangelove]

Good stuff.

Even if I have my doubts about the very sorry state of the spanish army in 1870 allowing the spaniards to put siege to Toulouse.

 

[Cuāuhtemōc]

This is an interesting timeline. I usually don't read Spanish-centric timelines but 'tis a cool premise and from the few updates that you've posted, this will just get better and better and better!

 

[Linense]

Good stuff.

Even if I have my doubts about the very sorry state of the spanish army in 1870 allowing the spaniards to put siege to Toulouse.

As for the doubts that you have mentioned, I think that we should take into account the true role of the Spanish army after Spanish American wars of independence and the disastrous Carlist wars, it is normal to have a rather negative on the ability of the Spanish army in those years (and that without considering the participation of its various leaders in the continuous military coups).

However, the Spanish army has always responded well when it was very well motivated, and a foreign invasion to impose the heir of the queen that the army helped depose two years ago is a good motivation.

But the true factor in Spanish victory should take into account more to over-confidence of the French, as well as they had to attend other front, where in fact the war was decided. Also keep in mind the moral of the French people after the death of their emperor in a great battle, which the French generals had planned to turn the course of the war but where the opossite happened as planned by the French.

This is an interesting timeline. I usually don't read Spanish-centric timelines but 'tis a cool premise and from the few updates that you've posted, this will just get better and better and better!

Although my alternate history focuses mainly about the socio-political development of Spain after the Glorious, this does not mean I'll forget the events of that era in the rest of the World.

Moreover, I said that soon you'll see important events outside Spain, although these naturally affect Spain...

 

[Archangel]

Great updates, Linense!

 

[Linense]

Great updates, Linense!

Thank you very much, Archangel. However, this alternate history could not have come out publicly if not for the invaluable help of Milarqui.

 

[Archangel]

Thank you very much, Archangel. However, this alternate history could not have come out publicly if not for the invaluable help of Milarqui.

I agree.

 

[Anticlimacus]

One original idea: instead of the USA make an attemp on Cuba and is defeated by a combined Spain/Germany alliance, why not make them attempting on the new weak guy in French Guyene and the other french possesions in the Caribbean and the Pacific.

 

[Milarqui]

One original idea: instead of the USA make an attemp on Cuba and is defeated by a combined Spain/Germany alliance, why not make them attempting on the new weak guy in French Guyene and the other french possesions in the Caribbean and the Pacific.

I'd say that, even if France is weaker now, the Pearl of the Caribbean is Cuba. French Guyana and the French Caribbean posessions are small when compared to Cuba/Puerto Rico/Philippines. Also, French Guyana is at the south of the Caribbean while USA is at the north. Cuba is very much nearer to the US compared with French Guyana.

 

[Anticlimacus]

I'd say that, even if France is weaker now, the Pearl of the Caribbean is Cuba. French Guyana and the French Caribbean posessions are small when compared to Cuba/Puerto Rico/Philippines. Also, French Guyana is at the south of the Caribbean while USA is at the north. Cuba is very much nearer to the US compared with French Guyana.

I do not say that the USA would not be tempted, but...

USA expansion to Spanish possesions in the Americas and the Pacific:

Pros: Cuba is richer and closer to the USA.
Cons: Spain is aligned with the German Reich and is seen by the British Empire as an ally.


USA expansion to French possesions in the Americas and the Pacific:

Pros: France is internationally isolated and she has been recently defeated in a war. If this one goes right we may attempt on the Spanish ones later...
Cons: French possesions in the Americas are not as tempting.


If I were the one to take the decission I would make an offer to Spain and go after French possesions.

(Moreover that would make a much more original TL).

 

[Muwatalli']

I have not finished reading yet (you posted already a lot for this is only the second page) but it looks very good. It is a shame you do not have much replies yet.

 

[flo]

Nice chapters!

So Spain joined the war against France. An early alliance with Prussia/Germany may be coming soon. And Spain will have gained a lot of prestige with the victory against France. So it might be that their international standing will improve significantly.

Eagerly awaiting more chapters...