I want peace. If Russia agrees to the neutralization of the Black Sea, I will make peace with them whatever the objections of England. But if, in the spring, it has come to nothing, I will appeal to the nationalities, above all to the nation of the Poles. The war will have as its principle, not the rights of Europe, but the interests of individual states.
If Napoleon’s threat of a revolutionary war was almost certainly empty, his threat of a separate peace with Russia certainly was not. Behind the establishment of direct contact with St Petersburg was the influential party led by the Emperor’s half-brother, the Duc de Morny, a railway speculator who saw in Russia ‘a mine to be exploited by France’. In October Morny had established contact with Prince Gorchakov, the Russian ambassador in Vienna and shortly to become the Foreign Minister, with the offer of a Franco-Russian deal.51
Alarmed by these French initiatives, the Austrians intervened. Count Buol, their Foreign Minister, approached Bourqueney, the French ambassador in Vienna, and together with Morny, who ascertained from Gorchakov what terms the Russians were likely to accept, they worked out a set of peace proposals to be imposed on Russia as an Austrian ultimatum with French and British support ‘for the integrity of the Ottoman Empire’. The Franco-Austrian terms were essentially a rewording of the Four Points, though Russia was now to surrender part of Bessarabia so as to be separated altogether from the Danube, and the neutralization of the Black Sea was to be achieved through a Russo-Turkish convention rather than a general peace treaty. Although the Russians had already accepted the Four Points as a basis of negotiations, a fifth was now added reserving the right of the victorious powers to include further undefined conditions at the peace conference ‘in the interest of Europe’.52
The French and Austrian peace proposals arrived in London on 18 November. The British government, which had merely been informed of the progress of the Austro-French negotiation, was offended at the manner in which the agreement had been reached by the two Catholic powers, Palmerston suspecting that Russian influence had played a part in softening the proposed terms, which he was determined to reject. There was no mention of the Baltic, and no guarantee against Russian aggression in the Black Sea. ‘We stick to the great Principles of Settlement which are required for the future security of Europe,’ he wrote to Clarendon on 1 December. ‘If the French government change their opinion, responsibility will rest with them, and the People of the two countries will be told of it.’ Clarendon was more cautious, as ever. He feared that France might make a separate peace, and that, if it did so, Britain would be unable to fight alone. The Foreign Minister won some minor amendments to the terms – the neutralization of the Black Sea was to be agreed by a general treaty and the fifth point was to contain ‘particular conditions’ – but otherwise he favoured acceptance of the French and Austrians terms. With the help of the Queen, he persuaded Palmerston to go along with the plan, at least for the time being, to prevent a separate Franco-Russian peace, arguing that the Tsar was likely to reject the proposals in any case, allowing Britain to resume hostilities and press for harsher terms.53
Clarendon was almost right. The Tsar was in a warlike mood throughout that autumn. According to a senior Russian diplomat, he ‘was little disposed to make terms with our adversaries’ at a moment when they were about to experience the difficulties of a second winter in the Crimea. Napoleon’s desire for peace suggested to the Tsar that Russia might still have a chance to secure a better ending to the war, if it kept fighting long enough to bring the internal problems of France to a head. In a revealing letter to his commander-in-chief, Gorchakov, Alexander declared that he saw no hope of an early termination of hostilities. Russia would continue with the war until France was forced to sign a peace by the outbreak of disorders, caused by the bad harvest and the growing discontent of the lower classes:
Former revolutions always began in this manner and it may well be that a general revolution is not far away. This I regard as the most probable conclusion to the present war; neither from Napoleon nor from England do I expect a sincere desire for peace on terms compatible with our views and, as long as I live, I will accept no others.54
Nobody was able to persuade the Tsar to back down from his belligerent stance. Seebach came with a personal message from Napoleon urging him to accept the proposals, or run the risk of losing half his empire, if hostilities against Russia were resumed. News arrived that Sweden had finally agreed a military treaty with the Western powers on 21 November – an ominous development for Russia if the allies were to launch a new campaign in the Baltic. Even Frederick William IV, the Prussian king, declared that he might be forced to join the Western powers against Russia, if Alexander continued with a war that ‘threatened the stability of all legitimate government’ on the Continent. ‘I beg you, my dear nephew,’ he wrote to Alexander, ‘go as far as you can in your concessions, weighing carefully the consequences for the true interests of Russia, for Prussia and the whole of Europe, if this atrocious war is continued. Subversive passions, once unchained, could have revolutionary effects that nobody could calculate.’ Yet, in the face of all these warnings, Alexander remained adamant. ‘We have reached the utmost limit of what is possible and compatible with Russia’s honour,’ he wrote to Gorchakov on 23 December. ‘I will never accept humiliating conditions and am convinced that every true Russian feels as I do. It only remains for us – crossing ourselves – to march straight ahead and by our united efforts to defend our native land and our national honour.’55
Two days later Alexander finally received the Austrian ultimatum with the allied terms. The Tsar called a council of his father’s most trusted advisers to consider the Russian reply. Older and calmer heads than the Tsar’s prevailed at this meeting in the Winter Palace in St Petersburg. The key speech was made by Kiselev, the reformist Minister of State Domains, who had charge of the 20 million peasants owned by the state. He clearly spoke for the other councillors. Russia lacked the means to continue with the war, Kiselev argued. The neutral powers were moving to the side of the Western alliance, and it would be imprudent to run the risk of fighting against the whole of Europe. Even a resumption of hostilities against the Western powers was unwise: Russia could not win, and it would result in even harsher peace terms from the enemy. While the mass of the Russian people shared the Tsar’s patriotic feelings, Kiselev believed, there were elements that might begin to waver if the war became prolonged – there was the possibility of revolutionary disturbances. There were already signs of serious unrest among the peasantry, who were carrying the main burden of the war. They should not reject the Austrian proposals, argued Kiselev, but they might propose amendments to uphold Russia’s territorial integrity. The council agreed with Kiselev’s views. A reply was sent to the Austrians accepting their peace terms, but rejecting the cession of Bessarabia and the addition of the fifth point.
The Russian counter-proposals divided the allies. The Austrians, who had an interest in Bessarabia, immediately threatened to break off relations with Russia; but the French were not prepared to jeopardize the peace negotiations ‘for a few scraps of land in Bessarabia!’ as Napoleon explained to Queen Victoria in a letter on 14 January. The Queen was of the opinion that they should postpone negotiations to exploit divisions between Russia and the Austrians. It was sound advice. Like his father, Alexander feared the prospect of a war with Austria more than anything, and perhaps only this would bring him round to accept their proposals. On 12 January Buol informed the Russians that Austria would break off relations six days later if they failed to accept the peace terms. Frederick William expressed his support for the Austrian proposals in a telegraph to St Petersburg. The Tsar was now on his own.
On 15 January Alexander called another meeting of his council in the Winter Palace. This time Nesselrode made the key speech. He warned the Tsar that in the coming year the allies had decided to concentrate their forces on the Danube and Bessarabia, close to the Austrian border. Austria was likely to be drawn into the hostiliti
es against Russia, and its decision would affect the remaining neutral powers, Sweden and Prussia, most decisively. If Russia refused to make peace now, it was in danger of finding itself in a war against the whole of Europe. The old Prince Vorontsov, formerly the viceroy of the Caucasus, supported Nesselrode. Speaking in a voice charged with emotion, he urged the Tsar to accept the Austrian terms, however painful they might be. Nothing more could be achieved through a continuation of the struggle, and resistance might lead to an even more humiliating peace, perhaps the loss of the Crimea, the Caucasus, even Finland and Poland. Kiselev agreed, adding that the people of Volhynia and Podolia in the Ukraine were just as likely as the Finns and Poles to rise up against Russian rule, if the war went on and Austrian troops approached those Western borderlands. Compared to these dangers, the sacrifices demanded by the ultimatum were insignificant. One by one, the Tsar’s officials urged him to accept the terms for peace. Only Alexander’s younger brother, the Grand Duke Constantine, advocated fighting on, but he had no office in the government, and however patriotic his appeal to the spirit of resistance of 1812 may have sounded to their Russian hearts, it lacked the reasoning to change their minds. The Tsar had decided. The next day the Austrians received a note from Nesselrode announcing his acceptance of their peace terms.56
In Sevastopol, the troops had been preparing to spend a second winter in the Crimea. No one really knew if they would have to fight again, but there were all sorts of rumours about being sent to the Danube or the Caucasus or some other quarter of the Russian Empire for a spring campaign. ‘What will become of us?’ wrote the battalion commander Joseph Fervel to Marshal de Castellane on 15 December. ‘Where will we find ourselves next year? That is the question everybody asks but no one can answer.’57
Meanwhile, the troops occupied themselves with the daily business of survival on the heights above Sevastopol. Supplies improved and the soldiers were provided with better tents and wooden huts. The bars and shops at Kamiesh and Kadikoi were always full, and Mary Seacole’s hotel did a roaring trade. There were various amusements to keep the soldiers occupied – theatre, gambling, billiards, hunting and horse racing on the plain while the weather allowed it. Boatloads of tourists arrived from Britain to see the famous battle sites and collect souvenirs – a Russian gun or sword, or a bit of uniform plundered from the bodies of the Russian dead that remained in the trenches for weeks and even months following the capture of Sevastopol. ‘Only the English could have such ideas,’ noted a French officer, who was amazed by the morbid fascinations of these war tourists.58
Towards the end of January, as news of the impending peace arrived, the allied soldiers began to fraternize increasingly with the Russians. Prokofii Podpalov, the young soldier who had taken part in the defence of the Redan, was among the Russians encamped by the Chernaia river, the site of the bloody battle in August. ‘Every day we became more friendly with the French soldiers on the other side of the river,’ he recalled. ‘We were told by our officers to be polite to them. Usually, we would go up to the river and throw across (the river wasn’t wide) some things for them: crosses, coins and so on; and the French would throw us cigarettes, leather purses, knives, money. This is how we talked: the French would say “Russkii camarade!” and the Russians: “Franchy brothers!”’ Eventually, the French ventured over the river and visited the Russians in their camp. They drank and ate together, sang their songs for each other, and conversed in sign language. The visits became regular. One day, on leaving the Russian camp, the French soldiers handed out some cards on which they had written their names and regiments, and invited the Russians to visit them in their camp. They did not return for a few days, so Podpalov and some of his comrades decided to visit the French camp. They were amazed by what they saw. ‘It was clean and tidy everywhere, there were even flowers growing by the tents of the officers,’ Podpalov recalled. The Russians found their friends, and they were invited to their tents, where they drank rum with them. The French soldiers walked them back to the river, embraced them many times, and invited them to come again. A week later Podpalov returned to the French camp on his own, but he could not find his friends. They had left for Paris, he was told.59
12
Paris and the New Order
The Peace Congress was scheduled to begin at the French Foreign Ministry on the Quai d’Orsay in the afternoon of 25 February. By midday a large and excited crowd of spectators had gathered along the Quai d’Orsay to watch the arrival of the delegates. Stretching from the Pont de la Concorde to the rue d’Iéna, the onlookers had to be kept back by infantrymen and the gendarmerie to allow the carriages of the foreign dignitaries to pass by and pull up outside the newly completed buildings of the Foreign Ministry. The delegates arrived from one o’clock, each one cheered with cries of ‘Vive la paix!’ and ‘Vive l’Empereur!’ as they stepped out and entered into the building. Dressed in morning coats, the delegates assembled in the magnificent Hall of Ambassadors, where a large round table covered with green velvet and twelve armchairs around it had been laid out for the conference. The hall was a showcase for the decorative arts of the Second Empire. Satin crimson drapes hung from the walls. The only pictures were life-size portraits of Napoleon III and the Empress Eugénie, whose dominating gaze was a constant reminder to the delegates of France’s new position as the arbiter of international affairs. On a console by the fireplace was a marble bust of Napoleon I – persona non grata in diplomatic circles for more than forty years. The Paris congress marked what Napoleon III wanted to believe was the return of Napoleonic France to the Concert of Europe.1
The choice of Paris as the venue for the congress was a sign of France’s new position as the pre-eminent power on the Continent. The only other city where it might have taken place was Vienna, where the 1815 treaty had been signed, but the idea was rejected by the British, who had been suspicious of the diplomatic efforts of the Austrians since the beginning of the war. With diplomatic power shifting briefly to Paris, Vienna now appeared a city of the past. ‘Who could deny that France comes out of all of this enlarged,’ wrote Count Walewski to Napoleon, after learning that he would become the host of the congress. ‘France alone will have profited in this struggle. Today she holds first place in Europe.’
The congress came only three months after the ending of the Exposition Universelle, a glittering international event rivalling London’s Great Exhibition of 1851. Five million visitors had made their way through the exhibition halls on the Champs-Elysées. The two events placed Paris at the centre of Europe. This was a major victory for Napoleon III, whose decision to enter the war had always been influenced by his need for prestige at home and abroad. From the start of the peace talks the previous autumn, he had emerged as the key player, on whom all the other powers depended for the satisfaction of their interests. ‘I am struck by the general deference to the Emperor Napoleon,’ wrote Princess Lieven to Baroness Meyendorff on 9 November. ‘The war has carried him pretty high, him and France: it has not enhanced England.’2
Peace talks had been going on throughout the winter, and by the time the delegates arrived in Paris, most of the controversial issues had already been resolved. The main sticking point was the tough stance of the British, who were in no hurry to end a war in which they had not had a major victory to satisfy their honour and justify their losses of the previous eighteen months. The capture of Sevastopol had, after all, been a French success. Urged on by a belligerent press and public, Palmerston reiterated the minimum conditions he had set out on 9 October, and threatened to keep on with the war, starting with a spring campaign in the Baltic, if the Russians failed to come to peace on British terms. He pressed Clarendon, his Foreign Secretary, to accept nothing less than complete Russian submission to his conditions at the Paris congress.
Despite his assertions, Palmerston’s demands were in a state of flux. By November he had given up on the idea of securing independence for Circassia: no representative from that confused territory could be found to sign a t
reaty on its behalf. Yet he continued to insist that Russia should be deprived of the Caucasus and Central Asia, and was adamant that British firmness could obtain this. Russia was negotiating from a weak position, he wrote to Clarendon on 25 February, and was showing ‘impudence’ by arguing against the latest version of the British terms: the complete removal of Russian ships and arsenals from the Black Sea and the evacuation ‘of every part of Turkish territory [including Kars] now occupied by Russian troops’. These conditions, Palmerston maintained, were ‘not dishonourable to Russia … but only calculated to be manifest and patent pledges of the sincerity of her disclaimer of aggressive intentions’. Warning Clarendon about Count Orlov, the leader of the Russian delegation to Paris, he revealed his Russophobic attitudes:
As to Orloff, I know him well – he is civil and courteous externally, but his inward mind is deeply impregnated with Russian insolence, arrogance and pride. He will do his best to bully without appearing to do so. He will stand out for every point which he thinks he has a chance of carrying, and he has all the cunning of a half civilized savage.3
The French and the Italians were disgusted by Palmerston’s behaviour (Victor Emmanuel, the Piedmontese king, described him as a ‘rabid animal’). Eager for peace, the French did not share the British inclination to punish Russia. They needed a rapprochement with the Russians to realize Napoleon’s plans in Italy. Sympathetic to the cause of Italian unification, the French Emperor calculated that he could regain Savoy and Nice – captured by the French in 1792 but returned to Piedmont by the Congress of Vienna in 1815 – by helping the Piedmontese to conquer Lombardy-Venetia from the Austrians and expel the Habsburgs from the rest of Italy. Requiring the support or armed neutrality of the Russians to defeat the Austrians, the French were unwilling to go along with Palmerston’s punitive initiatives against Russia. Their main point of difference with the British concerned the boundary of Bessarabia, a territory to be given back by Russia to Ottoman Moldavia. Palmerston, supported by Austria, took a tough line, arguing that Russia must not have any means of access to the Danube, the key Austrian anxiety. The Russians wanted to use Kars as a counterweight to Bessarabia, and the French supported them. But, under pressure from the British and the Austrians, Napoleon persuaded Orlov to accept a compromise at Paris. Overall, the Russians lost about a third of the Bessarabian land they had taken from the Turks in 1812, including the Danube delta, but they retained the Bulgarian communities of Bessarabia and the strategically important mountain ridge running south-east from Chotin. The British claimed a victory; Austria celebrated the liberation of the Danube; and the Russians felt the loss of (southern) Bessarabia as a national humiliation. It was the first territory the Russians had ceded to the Turks since the seventeenth century.4
The Crimean War Page 49
