by Tom Anderson
By 1760, the situation in India looked bleak for Britain. The great French victories of the 1740s had been built on in the 1750s, with the British East India Company failing to retake any of their former strongholds in the Carnatic, and finally losing Cuddalore. A betrayal by the Nawab of Bengal had resulted in much of the BEIC’s effort being focused on fighting the rebellious Bengalis and installing a more pliable series of six puppet princes in the Nawab’s place. This was eventually achieved, and Britain kept the rich trading post of Bombay on India’s western coast, but the south and much of the interior became closed to British influence.
In the successive Mysore-Haidarabad Wars of the 1770s and 80s, it was clear that the British had far less influence with Haidarabad, the side they backed, than the French did with Mysore. These wars did, however, result in the Nizam of Haidarabad withdrawing the Northern Circars region from French control due to overt French support of his Mysorean enemies. The BEIC moved in to defend the Circars from any FEIC attempt to retake them. A French siege of Masoolipatam, the chief town in the region, failed in 1786.
It is worth noting that the conflicts between the FEIC and BEIC often had little or nothing to do with the wider wars between Britain and France in Europe and the New World, and when Britain and France were supposedly at peace with each other, fighting continued in India.
The FEIC remained under the able leadership of Joseph François Dupleix until his death in 1770. The post of gouverneur général was taken up by Jean-Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, comte de Rochambeau, who lacked Dupleix’s unique mercurial genius but was nonetheless a competent commander and administrator, and dutifully became versed in Indian matters.[122] The BEIC struggled to find one equally capable who could lead them back to a position of power. They would not find him for some years.
William Pitt had been an able Prime Minister to King Frederick I for many years and had led Britain through the Third War of Supremacy, but he had never managed his finances very well and when he died, he left his family in debt. Furthermore, in order to retain his image as the Great Commoner, he had never taken a title, limiting the income of his eldest son John.[123] John decided that in order to restore the family finances, he would have to imitate his great-grandfather, Thomas “Diamond” Pitt, who had made his fortune (initially quite illegally) from the diamond trade in India. The elder Pitt had eventually become Governor-General of Madras, now lost to the French, and had once saved it by buying out the Nawab of the Carnatic...
John Pitt enlisted in the East India Company in 1773 and travelled to India. He became a cornet of cavalry, just as his father had started, but saw rather more frontline combat. He achieved a colonelcy by 1786 and fought at the Siege of Masoolipatam against the French, as well as in many earlier conflicts with native states. Pitt received a wound to the leg at the siege from a French musket ball, ending his career on the front line as it forced him to walk with a cane, but by this time, at the age of 30, he had already made his fortune and paid off his family’s debts. Nonetheless, Pitt had developed a love of India and chose to remain. He became Governor-General of the Presidency of Calcutta in 1790, and so was the pre-eminent British official in India at the time of its greatest, most unpredictable upheaval since the fall of the Mughal Empire...
Chapter #16: The Last Roundup
From:“In The Eleventh Hour: The 1780s” by Professor Andrew Colquhoun (1971)—
Bavarian Question (18th Century) [See also: Bavarian Question (19th Century)]
A diplomatic triumph for the then-Archduchy of Austria towards the end of the eighteenth century, which in other circumstances might have spiralled out of control into yet another general European war.
In 1783, the last Wittelsbach Elector of Bavaria, Maximilian III, died without issue.[124] The important Duchy of Bavaria defaulted to the Sulzbach line, specifically Charles Theodore (then known as ‘Charles IV Theodore’), Elector of the Rhine Palatinate. Charles Theodore was uninterested in ruling Bavaria and negotiated a deal with Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand IV, who by this time had also succeeded his mother Maria Theresa to become Archduke of Austria and ruler of the associated Hapsburg lands.[125] Adding Bavaria to the Hapsburg domains would firmly establish Austrian supremacy in the Empire and put an end to any ideas of Prussian revival after the downfall of Frederick II’s ambitions. While Prussia had not made further attempts to displace Austria as supreme power within the German states since the Third War of Supremacy, the Austrian defeat by the Prusso-Russian alliance in the War of the Polish Partition had been an embarrassment.
Ironically enough, it was this very victory that hamstrung any Prussian attempt to respond to the Bavarian crisis. Prussia was bogged down in suppressing a rebellion by disenfranchised Polish szlachta and King Frederick William II was unwilling to risk the Prussian army to try and dissuade the Austrians by force. Ultimately this rebellion would have another negative effect on Prussia’s fortunes, for Prince Henry was killed by Polish partisans on the way to command the army based in Warsaw, and so the inexperienced Frederick William II was left without his chief advisor. Prussian retribution for the partisan attack was savage, further poisoning relations with their supposedly equal co-kingdom, and further distracting the Prussians from any attempt at a coherent foreign policy within the Empire.
The late Maximilian III’s consort, Maria Anna Sophia of Saxony, having failed to receive Prussian backing, next attempted to use her influence in her native Saxony to bring that state into opposition with Austria’s plans. Predictably the Elector of Saxony, Frederick Augustus III, refused. Saxony had grown considerably in power thanks to reaping the spoils of the Third War of Supremacy, but as of yet was in no state to face Austria alone. Furthermore—just as the negotiators who had ended the Third War of Supremacy had foreseen—many of Saxony’s new territories existed purely at the sufferance of Austria, and the gains made in that war would rapidly be reversed if Saxony opposed Austria.
It is possible, of course, that France, Britain and Russia might also have seen fit to oppose the Austrian move, but all three were busy with their own conflicts—France and Britain with the Second Platinean War, Russia with preparations for the Baltic war with Sweden (which, in the event, never materialised). Therefore, Charles Theodore’s deal went through with no attempts from the other powers to prevent it. As the rightful heir to the Duchy of Bavaria, he ceded it to the Austrian crown in exchange for the Austrian Netherlands, which were incorporated as the new independent Duchy of Flanders.[126]
Flanders was in personal union with Charles Theodore’s original lands of the Rhine Palatinate, far separated from it by the territory of countless other German states, and Flanders herself was split in half by the prince-bishopric of Liége.[127] Thus, the state could only function within the bounds of the Holy Roman Empire and on the Emperor’s say-so, which suited Ferdinand IV down to the ground. Austria had had little real interest in the southern Netherlands since acquiring them from Spain in the War of the Spanish Succession, unable to fully exploit their economic potential as the Dutch jealously closed the Scheldt to Flemish trade whenever it looked as though they might be getting somewhere. Providing the southern Netherlands were denied to France, the Austrians were thus indifferent to their fate. The old Austro-Dutch treaties were renewed by the Duchy of Flanders, ensuring that the fortresses along the Flemish-French border would be manned by Dutch troops.
Charles Theodore’s new subjects had mixed feelings about him. Nearly all of them were happier to have a less distant ruler than Ferdinand IV, whose policies to centralise the Holy Roman Empire around Austria had left the southern Netherlands neglected and forgotten. Furthermore, Charles Theodore established a new academy of the sciences in the capital, Brussels, just as he had in the Palatinate years before. He was also a patron of the arts, promoting the works of Flemish artists, sculptors and composers in the fashionable circles of European nobility. However, some Flemings feared that, without the assured might of Austria directly behind them, the new state would be easy pickings
for the next time France decided to attempt a conquest, and who knew if the next Marshal Saxe would have a Louis XV as king to so meekly trade it back again?
As for Bavaria itself, the Bavarian people rapidly grew to dislike Ferdinand IV’s policies of centralisation and integration, with Bavaria increasingly being treated as just another Austrian province. Some voices at the Emperor’s court argued that the Bavarian army should be dismantled and incorporated directly into the Imperial forces, both to make matters more efficient and to make it more difficult for Bavaria to be detached again following a future Austrian defeat. In the event, though, these plans were not implemented, at least not in time to make any difference.
For a new power was arising in Europe. Unpredictably, inexorably, it would topple all the grand schemes and new orders of the continent’s nobility, leaving them to crash in flames and threatening to take their progenitors with it. Everything this new power touched turned to dust.
In France, the Revolution had begun...
Interlude #4: Nation Building
Dr Theodoros Pylos: But before we depart for the first great tragedy of this world’s history-
Dr Bruno Lombardi: -that term is debatable, but yes, we should cover one more area. Namely-
Pylos: -the constitutional makeup and the national symbols of the Empire of North America-
Lombardi: -lest these come as a surprise when we cover the entry of Imperial troops into the-
Captain Christopher Nuttall: Gentlemen? Brevity, if you please.
Pylos: Er—yes, sir.
Lombardi: The national symbols of the Empire of North America.
*
From: “The History of the Empire of North America: An Introduction” by Dr Paul Daycliffe (1964)—
The national symbols that we take for granted were not always with us, of course. It is probably true that the turkey would have come to symbolise North America even without its endorsement by Sir Benjamin Franklin, as it was thought of as a sign of the exotic and promising land of America in Europe long before that. Other symbols, however, could easily have been different if history had turned a different way.
There were many previous tunes associated with America long before an official national anthem was considered appropriate. “Hail, America” served as a unifying national song for many years, though now it is forgotten save by patriotic orchestras. Each Confederation, and even many individual provinces, also had their own songs, and regiments called from these Confederations brought their music all over the world in the wars of the nineteenth century. It would not be until the latter half of the nineteenth century that “The Cross and Stars Forever” would be recognised as the official national anthem—as should be obvious from the fact that the events depicted by the song did not occur until the midpoint of that century.
Furthermore, the old Jack and George itself was not always been universally beloved by the people over whom it waved, even before the Flag Debates of the nineteenth century. Many in the northern Confederations objected to the clear Virginian influence behind the design, at least until the events of the 1840s and 50s altered the balance of power within the Empire. After that unfortunate period, the Jack and George was, on the contrary, clung to by some nostalgics as a memory of the national unity which now seemed to be slipping through Americans’ fingers. It is perhaps no surprise that the supposedly radical departure of a new flag following the Reform period ended up in reality quite closely resembling its predecessor. The older Jack and George forms are still, of course, very popular to signify both historical sites and as a political statement, and remain in current use by some military and civic organisations.
The maple tree remains a universally acknowledged symbol of North America, though this was and is sometimes objected to by those parts of some Confederations where that tree does not grow. However, the maple is now inextricably linked with America in the minds of Europeans, and any attempts by those objectors to add southern trees such as the dogwood or palmetto were always doomed to failure even before the tides of history made the question irrelevant. Ironically the one southern candidate that might have a large enough geographic range to catch on, the magnolia, had become irrevocably associated with a narrow political identity by the point in time that this debate emerged, and thus was never an option.
It is anachronistic, though, to claim that an American national identity existed before the end of the eighteenth century—just as it is anachronistic, in many ways, to claim a British one existed. It was in the crucible of a great war that the self-image of the two nations was fixed, a self-image that would persist long after the reality had drifted from the myth. The Jacobin Wars might have had a more immediately apparent effect on France and continental Europe, but they also had profound consequences for Britain and the Empire of North America...
*
Excerpts from the Constitutional Acts of 1788:
An Act Declaring the Rights and Liberties of the Subjects of the Empire of North America, and the Manner of Government thereof.
WHEREAS in pursuance of His Majesty’s most gracious recommendation to the two Houses of Parliament in Great Britain, to consider of such measures as might best tend to strengthen and consolidate the connection between H.M.’s domains, the two Houses of the Parliament of Great Britain and the assembled delegates of the Provisional United American Assembly have severally agreed and resolved that, in order to promote and secure the essential interests of Great Britain and America, and to promote the Protestant religion and the liberties of England throughout the corners of H.M.’s domains, it will be advisable to concur in such measures as may best tend to allow H.M.’s subject within the Empire of North America coëval rights and liberties to those of his cousin residing in Great Britain, and on such terms and conditions, as may be established by the Acts of the respective Parliaments of Great Britain and of the Empire of North America.
And whereas, in furtherance of the said Resolution, both Houses of Parliament and the Assembly have likewise agreed upon certain Articles for effectuating and establishing the said purposes, in the tenor following:
Article First. That the said Empire of North America shall, upon the 1st day of January which shall be in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred eighty-eight (N.S.), be recognised in law as a Dominion to which is granted the same Parliamentary rights and powers as of Great Britain, or of Ireland, pursuant to the following terms and conditions…
Here follows the opening paragraphs of the American Constitution of 1788, whose creation was commissioned by the above Act of the Westminster Parliament:
Constitution of the Empire of North America (1788)
We the appointed Representatives of the Subjects of His Imperial Majesty’s Empire of North America, in Order to form a more perfect Union, protect our Rights, defend our Religion, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do propose this Constitution for the Empire of North America.
Article First
That a Continental Parliament be called, under the Acknowledged Precepts of the Westminster Parliament as Established in the Constitution of 1688, Suitably Amended for the Differing Conditions of Colonial Existence;
Article Second
That this aforesaid Continental Parliament shall consist of two Houses, of Lords Spiritual and Temporal and of Commons, and that the Former shall be appointed by His Majesty the King-Emperor or his invested Lord Deputy, and that the Latter shall be Elected subject to the following Terms and Conditions;
Article Third
That the Commoners, styled Members of the Continental Parliament, shall be elected by the Free Vote of all Protestant Freeholders with residence in the Empire of North America, that One Member shall be elected by each Province, and further, that Additional Members be elected by those Towns and Cities granted the status of Borough by His Majesty the King-Emperor…
13 further Articles are included in the orig
inal Constitution, for a total of 20. Notably absent in this Constitution is much in the way of detail about the internal workings of the Confederations and their specified powers in relation to the imperial Continental Parliament. The former deficit would be interpreted as leaving this up to the Confederations themselves, leading to much in the way of diverse forms of government, while the latter would provoke much argument and amendment in the nineteenth century.
The original 20 Articles of the Constitution have since been largely obscured by successive amendments and replacements, but the original Bill of Rights (though itself much amended) is better known to the popular imagination and can be quoted by many American schoolchildren:
American Bill of Rights (1788)
The following Declarations of the Rights and Liberties of all Imperial subjects are made:
That the pretended power of suspending the laws, dispensing with laws, or the execution of laws by regal authority without consent of the Continental Parliament is illegal;
That levying money for or to the use of the Crown or by the Westminster Parliament by pretence of prerogative, without grant of the Continental Parliament, for longer time, or in other manner than the same is or shall be granted, is illegal;
