This is about Winston's distant relative who was arguably one of the greatest
military commanders of European history and is focused on the War of Spanish
Succession. It is a very long read and will try to just relate interesting
highlights as I remember them (or maybe misremember them).
England is coming out of the the Glorious Revolution and James II is king and
his wife delivers a baby who is a son and the delivery is witnessed by 70
people, but all are Catholic, and thus begins the "fake news" of the' warming
pan baby'. Since James is Catholic, and England is Anglican, it is believed
that the heritage of the baby is questionable because it was not witnessed by a
Protestant. The baby becomes the Prince of Wales, but he is banished to France
and one of the conditions of the treaty of the War is that he leave France.
Remember the massacre of the Huguenots in France as well as the legacy of the
30 years war on the continent. The "Great Pretender" eventually dies in Italy
in his late 50's . (At one time he invaded Ireland/ England, but it was
unsuccessful).
The situation was settled by the entry of William of Orange from Holland and
his wife Mary arriving in England and the Duke of Marlborough and many officers
leaving James for William and a Protestant dynasty taking charge. The Duke and
others are later put in the Tower of London for sedition and they go to trial.
A note is put in evidence of a conspiracy to kill William of Orange and it
comes out that all of the signatures were forgeries and "artist" admitted it.
All the people on the document were astounded that the signatures looked so
real. All were exonerated and the Duke came back into the King's good graces.
Queen Anne followed ( she had 17 miscarriages) and the War of Spanish
Succession lasted 9 years and the Duke of Marlborough wins many engagements and
is the commander of the English, German, United Provinces (Holland), and the
Holy Roman Empire against France and sort of Spain.
Results which are interesting: 1) England gets the Rock of Gibraltar, 2)
England removes France from Nova Scotia, but a planned attack on Quebec is
abandoned. The Massachusetts colonials find the British army haughty and
contemptible and the British army finds the colonials rustic and unreliable
(this is about 1708) 3) The Whigs are merchants making lots of money with the
Bank of England (started by William of Orange), so the Tories come up with the
idea of the South Sea Company (They are mostly land owners, falling behind).
The treaty with France wins a concession to import slaves to the New World from
Spain, France, Portugal and think that they will be successful like the East
India company. 4) the treaty ending the war is a cluster of disasters as
England makes peace with France and abandons the other allies. 5) The Duke of
Marlborough is fired by Queen Anne, and the allied armies feel loyalty to
Marlborough, who suffers under allegations of financial impropriety and
humiliation because his Queen broke promises with the allies. He spends severa
years in exile.
The South Sea bubble, England getting into the slave trade, the Bank of
England, the East India Company and Gibraltar all play important parts of our
history in important ways that are only seen in retrospect. Our Louisiana
Cajuns are a special gift of this war. Admiral DeGrace was able to escape an
English blockade when the English fleet went to relieve the blockade of
Gibraltar by the Spanish, allowing us to defeat Cornwallis at Yorktown (who
later was made Governor General of the East India Company making a fortune).
The times were very contentious back in the day, even more so than our current
situation. Many of our forefathers were Puritans, other dissenters, Quakers.
Cavaliers, and Scots-Irish. They didn't get along that well in England, so
maybe we shouldn't be surprised that we still don't get along that well. The
first slave was owned by a free Black in Virginia who paid his way as an
indentured servant for 7 years service, bought another black to help him on his
farm who ran away before he had served his 7 years and when caught the court
punished the indentured servant with slavery. This was about 1640. The owner's
name was Anthony Johnson.
All the confusion and politics of coalition warfare played out in the War of
Spanish Succession.
PS. After Anne dies, a German from Hanover, George, a Protestant becomes King
George of England, about 1715. More is to come, but the contentiousness will
persist.
WE can't help it, maybe its genetic??? Perhaps it has always been sort of like
this. Napoleon, when he sold the Lousiana purchase believed that our country
would break up into many parts like Europe and that France would regain some of
the land.
Doug Everett
