| Copyright | ||
|
Home Great Britain and Europe, 1815-78 British Diplomacy and the Period of Warfare, 1857-71 British Diplomacy and the Period of Warfare, 1857-71; Part 2 |
British Diplomacy and the Period of Warfare, 1857-71; Part 2The British Government, however, maintained a strict neutrality, though two incidents nearly produced a war with the Northern States. A Northern man-of-war violated British neutrality by taking on the high seas from a British mail steamer - the Trent two agents of the Southern States who were coming to Europe with the object of obtaining European assistance. The British nation was furiously indignant, and its Government sent the Guards to Canada, and penned a dispatch demanding the surrender of the agents and an immediate apology. The Queen, at the suggestion of the Prince Consort - it was his last official act before his death persuaded the Government to make the wording of the dispatch less peremptory in tone, and to give the Northern States an opportunity of giving way without humiliation, an opportunity of which they fortunately took advantage (1861).In the other incident the British Government was at fault. A vessel was being built at Birkenhead for use as a cruiser on the side of the South. The British Government was given information about it, I mi neglected to take steps in time, and consequently the steamer, called the Alabama, was able to leave Birkenhead in 1862, and for the next two years played havoc with the merchant ship of the Northern States. The States demanded compensation, and eventually, after long and critical negotiations, the matter was finally ended in 1872 by Great Britain paying over three million pounds. Whilst the American Civil War, still raging, a new personality in European affairs had arisen in Bismarck. Since 1815 the policy of Prussia had lacked initiative and courage, and Lord Palmerston once spoke of her as a quantite negligeable. But Palmerston was to be rudely undeceived when Bismarck became the chief minister of the King of Prussia in 1862. His policy was one of "blood and iron " - he knew exactly what he wanted, and was determined to spare no force in order to secure it. Lord Palmerston, now nearing eighty years of age, with a pacific court, a lukewarm and occasionally hostile cabinet, and an army which was small, and not, since the Crimean War, considered to be of great efficiency, was no match for such a resolute diplomatist. Thus, in 1863, British sympathy was aroused in behalf of the Poles, who, owing to Russian misgovernment, had risen in insurrection. The British Government dispatched three protests against the cruelty of the Russians in dealing with the rising, whilst Bismarck, afraid lest a successful rising in Russian Poland might be followed by a similar movement in Prussian Poland, concentrated three army corps on the western frontier of Prussia, ready to help Russia if occasion arose. It is needless to say, therefore, that British protests were unavailing, and the insurrection in Poland was stamped out with merciless ferocity. British intervention had merely irritated Russia without mitigating the lot of the Poles. |
Chronology |
| copyright by www.uuo-ununoctium.info |