Revolutionary Europe, 1789-1815

by H. Morse Stephens

French Invasion of Portugal. 1807.

The two most faithful allies of England were the small kingdoms of Portugal and Sweden. The Russians were left to deal with the latter; Napoleon resolved to attack the former himself. The French Emperor, like the Directory before him, insisted on regarding Portugal as an outlying province of England, and, indeed, there was some ground for this view, as owing to the Methuen Treaty the relations between the two countries were very close. Yet the Prince Regent of Portugal in 1806 had declined to declare himself the open ally of England, and insisted on the maintenance of his position of neutrality. Nevertheless, Napoleon resolved to ruin Portugal because the Prince Regent declined to become a party to the Continental Blockade. He at first resolved to act with Spain as he had done in 1801, and on the 29th of October 1807 the Treaty of Fontainebleau was signed, by which it was agreed that the combined armies of France and Spain should conquer Portugal. The little kingdom was then to be divided into three parts; the northern provinces were to be given to the King of Etruria in exchange for his dominions in Italy which Napoleon desired to annex; the southern districts were to be formed into an independent kingdom for Godoy, the Prince of the Peace, the lover of the Queen of Spain, and the most powerful man in that kingdom; and the central portion was to be temporarily held by France. In pursuance of this secret treaty a French army under General Junot marched rapidly across the Peninsula, and on the news that it was close to Lisbon, the Prince Regent, with his mother, the mad queen, Maria I., and his two sons sailed for Brazil with an English squadron. Hardly had the Regent left the Tagus when Junot entered Lisbon on the 20th of November 1807. The French were favourably received in Portugal. The Portuguese resented the departure of the Prince Regent; democratic principles had made considerable progress; and no idea was entertained that there was a secret design to dismember the kingdom. Junot had little difficulty in occupying almost the whole of Portugal; he sent the picked troops of the Portuguese army under the name of the Portuguese Legion to join the Grand Army in Germany; and he promised a Constitution to the country. On the 1st of February 1808 he issued a proclamation that the House of Braganza had ceased to reign, and after the fortresses had been surrendered he proceeded to administer Portugal as a conquered country.

Sweden.

Gustavus IV. of Sweden, who had taken the power into his own hands from his uncle the Regent Duke of Sudermania and had married the sister-in-law of the Emperor Alexander of Russia, in 1797, had inherited the hatred for France, which had been, after 1789, one of the guiding principles of his father, Gustavus III. He had been the ready ally of England in all the coalitions against both the French Directory and Napoleon, and after the rupture of the Peace of Amiens in 1803, he became the key-stone of the Anglo-Russian alliance. In 1805 he promised to place himself at the head of an English, Russian, and Swedish army which was to invade Hanover, and occupy Holland; but he failed to set sail on the appointed day, and caused the expedition to lead to no result. Nevertheless, he remained faithful to England, and at the time of the Treaty of Tilsit refused to abandon the English alliance. As has been already said, Swedish Pomerania was occupied by a division of the Grand Army, under Marshal Brune, and Sweden never recovered the ancient conquest of Gustavus Adolphus. In 1808, on the obstinate refusal of the Swedish King to accede to the Continental Blockade, the Emperor Alexander, as had been agreed at Tilsit, invaded Finland. England was ready to assist Sweden, and a powerful army, under Sir John Moore, was sent to Stockholm. At this crisis the King showed signs of insanity. The English expedition retired, and at the beginning of 1809 Gustavus IV. was dethroned.

The Rearrangement of Europe.

Holland.

After he had made himself Emperor, and still more after his victories over Austria and Prussia and his alliance with Russia, Napoleon began to assure his power on the Continent by establishing vassal kings in the neighbourhood of France. Just as the French Directory had surrounded the French Republic with smaller republics governed after its own model, so Napoleon surrounded his frontiers with subject kingdoms. The Batavian, the Cisalpine, and the Parthenopean Republics were succeeded by the kingdoms of Holland and of Naples and the vice-royalty of Italy. The form of the Batavian Republic had altered with every change in the Constitution of France. From a democratic Republic in the time of the Convention it had become a Directory and a Consulate, and in 1805, after the French Empire had been established, it received a new Constitution. By this arrangement Count Schimmelpenninck, a distinguished Dutch statesman, was appointed Grand Pensionary for life, but in June 1806 he was induced to resign, and Louis Bonaparte, the favourite brother of the French Emperor, was made King of Holland. The Dutch people had no objection to these changes. The introduction of the French system of administration consolidated the country from a group of federal states into a united nation. Its trade prospered, though it lost its fleet at Camperdown in 1797, and in the Texel in 1799, and it became more wealthy than ever, in spite of the conquest of all its colonies by England, by the close communication established with Paris and the abolition of the vexatious transit-duties in Belgium. Louis Bonaparte, the first King of Holland, showed himself a sagacious monarch. He caused the Civil Code to be introduced into his dominions in the place of the old cumbrous system of Dutch law. He encouraged literature and art, and he moved the capital from the Hague to Amsterdam. But the introduction of the Continental Blockade caused profound discontent. The Dutch merchants were ruined by its rigorous application; riots took place in many districts; and since Napoleon found the Continental Blockade was being evaded he caused French troops to enter Holland and occupy the mouths of the rivers. Louis Bonaparte protested against this conduct, and in 1810 he resigned the crown which his brother had given him.

Italy.

Rome.

Naples.