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Home Great Britain and Europe, 1815-78 A Period of Comparative Peace, 1815-54 A Period of Comparative Peace, 1815-54; Part 4 |
A Period of Comparative Peace, 1815-54; Part 4Lord Palmerston returned to the Foreign Office in 1846, and almost immediately the good understanding with France came to an end over the Spanish marriages question. Into the details of this complicated affair we cannot enter. It is sufficient to say that the Queen of Spain and her sister were both unmarried, and that the Courts of Europe busied themselves in discussing what husbands should be provided for them. Great Britain objected to the Queen of Spain marrying a son of Louis Philippe, and France to her marrying a relation of Queen Victoria's. Eventually Louis Philippe threw over an informal agreement he had made with the British Court, and arranged that the queen should marry one of her cousins, who was a contemptible person and in weak health, whilst her sister married Louis Philippe's son; and the marriages took place on the same day (1846). Great Britain was furious, as it was thought that the queen would have no heirs, and that consequently Louis Philippe would secure the throne of Spain for his own descendants. As a matter of fact the queen did have children, and the British fears proved groundless; but the British distrust of Louis Philippe remained incurable.Louis Philippe, however, was not to reign much longer. The great year of Revolutions came in 1848. France started the movement by deposing Louis Philippe and inaugurating a republic; after ten months of turmoil, Louis Napoleon the nephew of the great Napoleon, was elected as president for four years. Revolutions, headed by political reformers or ardent nationalists, followed in nearly every country in Europe, but especially in Hungary and Italy, where the people strove to rid themselves of the hated Austrian yoke, and in the different states of Germany. The Emperor of Austria abdicated, and his minister, Metternich, was overthrown; whilst the emperor who succeeded, Francis Joseph, then a youth of eighteen, was driven from Vienna. The Prince of Prussia had to fly to England, and there was some severe fighting in Italy and Hungary. Lord Palmerston sympathized with these various movements, gave advice in all directions, and actually allowed arms to be sent indirectly from Woolwich Arsenal to the insurgents who rose in Sicily. Before long, however, the forces of reaction were triumphant. Austria was enabled to preserve her rule in Northern Italy, and, with the aid of the Russians, to crush the Hungarians, whilst the movement in Germany fizzled out. Meanwhile Lord Palmerson's policy had provoked Queen Victoria's keen dissatisfaction. Moreover, he was inclined to carry on negotiations with other countries without consulting either the queen or the prime minister. The queen quite rightly protested, and when Lord Palmerston, contrary to the wishes of the queen and the prime minister, expressed his approval of a coup d'etat by which Louis Napoleon had made himself master of France, he has, dismissed (1851). |
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