A History of the Reformation (Vol. 2 of 2)

by Thomas M. Lindsay

Margaret, Duchess of Parma, the nominal Regent of the Netherlands, had found her position intolerable since the arrival of the Duke of Alva, and was permitted by Philip to resign (Oct. 6th, 1567). Alva henceforth was untrammelled by even nominal restraint. A process was begun against the Counts Egmont and Hoorn, and William of Orange was proclaimed an outlaw (Jan. 24th, 1568) unless he submitted himself for trial before the Council of Tumults. Some days afterwards, his eldest son, a boy of fifteen and a student in the University of Louvain, was kidnapped and carried off to Spain.[262]

William replied in his famous Justification of the Prince of Orange against his Calumniators, in which he declared that he, a citizen of Brabant, a Knight of the Golden Fleece, a Prince of the Holy Roman Empire, one of the sovereign Princes of Europe (in virtue of the principality of Orange), could not be summoned before an incompetent tribunal. He reviewed the events in the Netherlands since the accession of Philip II., and spoke plainly against the misgovernment caused, he said diplomatically, by the evil counsels of the King’s advisers. The Justification was published in several languages, and was not merely an act of defiance to Philip, but a plea made on behalf of his country to the whole of civilised Europe.

The earlier months of 1568 had been spent by the Prince of Orange in military preparations for the relief of his countrymen, and in the spring his army was ready. The campaign was a failure. Hoogstraten was defeated. Louis of Nassau had a temporary success at Heiliger-Lee (May 23rd, 1568), only to be routed at Jemmingen (July 21st, 1568). After William had issued a pathetic but unavailing manifesto to Protestant Europe, a second expedition was sent forth only to meet defeat. The cause of the Netherlands seemed hopeless.

But Alva was beginning to find himself in difficulties. On the news of the repulse of his troops at Heiliger-Lee he had hastily beheaded the Counts Egmont and Hoorn. Instead of striking terror into the hearts of the Netherlanders, the execution roused them to an undying hatred of the Spaniard. He was now troubled by lack of money to pay his troops. He had promised Philip to make gold flow from the Low Countries to Spain; but his rule had destroyed the commerce and manufactures of the country, the source of its wealth. He was almost dependent on subsidies from Spain. Elizabeth of England had been assisting her fellow Protestants in the way she liked best, by seizing Spanish treasure ships; and Alva was reduced to find the money he needed within the Netherlands.

It was then that he proposed to the States General, summoned to meet him (March 20th, 1569), his notorious scheme of taxation, which finally ruined him—a tax of one per cent. (the “hundredth penny”) to be levied once for all on all property; a tax of five per cent. (the “twentieth penny”) to be levied at every sale or transfer of landed property: and a tax of ten per cent. (the “tenth penny”) on all articles of commerce each time they were sold. This scheme of taxation would have completely ruined a commercial and manufacturing country. It met with universal resistance. Provinces, towns, magistrates, guilds, the bishops and the clergy—everyone protested against the taxation. Even Philip’s Council at Madrid saw the impossibility of exacting such taxes from a country. Alva swore that he would have his own way. The town and district of Utrecht had been the first to protest. Alva quartered the regiment of Lombardy upon them; but not even the licence and brutality of the soldiers could force the wretched people to pay. Alva proclaimed the whole of the inhabitants to be guilty of high treason; he took from them all their charters and privileges; he declared their whole property confiscated to the King. But these were the acts of a furious madman, and were unavailing. He then postponed the collection of the hundredth and of the tenth pennies; but the need of money forced him on, and he gave definite orders for the collection of the “tenth” and the “twentieth pennies.” The trade and manufactures of the country came to a sudden standstill, and Alva at last knew that he was beaten. He had to be satisfied with a payment of two millions of florins for two years.

The real fighting force among the Reformed Netherlanders was to be found, not among the landsmen, but in the sailors and fishermen. It is said that Admiral Coligny was the first to point this out to the Prince of Orange. He acted upon the advice, and in 1569 he had given letters of marque to some eighteen small vessels to cruise in the narrow seas and attack the Spaniards. At first they were little better than pirates,—men of various nationalities united by a fierce hatred of Spaniards and Papists, feared by friends and foes alike. William attempted, at first somewhat unsuccessfully, to reduce them to discipline and order, by issuing with his letters of marque orders limiting their indiscriminate pillage, insisting upon the maintenance of religious services on board, and declaring that one-third of the booty was to be given to himself for the common good of the country. In their earlier days they were allowed to refit and sell their plunder in English ports, but these were closed to them on strong remonstrances from the Court of Spain. It was almost by accident that they seized and held (April 1st, 1572) Brill or Brielle, a strongly fortified town on Voorn, which was then an island at the mouth of the Maas, some twenty miles west or seaward from Rotterdam. The inhabitants were forced to take an oath of allegiance to William as Stadtholder under the King, and the flag of what was afterwards to become the United Provinces was hoisted on land for the first time. It was not William, but his brother Louis of Nassau, who was the first to see the future possibilities in this act. He urged the seizure of Flushing or Vlissingen, the chief stronghold in Zeeland, situated on an island at the mouth of the Honte or western Scheldt, and commanding the entrance to Antwerp. The citizens rose in revolt against the Spanish garrison; the Sea-Beggars, as they were called, hurried to assist them; the town was taken, and the Spanish commander, Pachecho, was captured and hanged. This gave the seamen possession of the whole island of Walcheren save the fortified town of Middleburg. Delfshaven and Schiedam were seized. The news swept through Holland, Zeeland, Guelderland, Utrecht, and Friesland, and town after town declared for William of Orange the Stadtholder. The leaders were marvellously encouraged to renewed exertions.[263] Proclamations in the name of the new ruler were scattered broadcast through the country, and the people were fired by a song said to be written by Sainte Aldegonde, Wilhelmus van Nassouwe, which is still the national hymn of Holland. The Prince of Orange thought he might venture on another invasion, and was already near Brussels when the news of the Massacre of Saint Bartholomew reached him. His plans had been based on assistance from France, urged by Coligny and promised by Charles IX. “What a sledge-hammer blow (coup de massue) that has been,” he wrote to his brother; “my only hope was from France.”[264] Mons, which Louis had seized in the south with his French troops, had to be abandoned; and William, after some vain efforts, had to disband his troops.

Then Alva came out from Brussels to wreak a fearful vengeance on Mons, Mechlin, Tergoes, Naarden, Haarlem, and Zutphen. The terms of the capitulation of Mons were violated. Mechlin was plundered and set on fire by the Spanish troops. The Spanish commander sent against Zutphen had orders to burn every house, and to slay men, women, and children. Haarlem was invested, resisted desperately, and then capitulated on promise of lenient treatment. When the Spaniards entered they butchered in cold blood all the Dutch soldiers and some hundreds of the citizens; and, tying the bodies two and two together, they cast them into the Haarlem lake. It seemed as if the Papists had determined to exterminate the Protestants when they found that they could not convert them.

Some towns, however, held out. Don Frederick, the son of Alva and the butcher of Haarlem, was beaten back from the little town of Alkmaar. The Sea-Beggars met the Spanish fleet sent to crush them, sank or scattered the ships, and took the Admiral prisoner. The nation of fishermen and shopkeepers, once the scorn of Spain and of Europe for their patient endurance of indignities, were seen at last to be a race of heroes, determined never again to endure the yoke of the Spaniard. Alva had soon to face a soldiery mutinous for want of pay, and to see all his sea approaches in the hands of Dutch sailors, whom the strongest fleets of Spain could not subdue. The iron pitiless man at last acknowledged that he was beaten, and demanded his recall. He left Brussels on Dec. 18th, 1573, and did not again see the land he had deluged with blood during a space of six years. Like all tyrants, he had great faith in his system, even when it had broken in his hand. Had he been a little more severe, added a few more drops to the sea of blood he had spilled, all would have gone well. The only advice he could give to his successor was, to burn down every town he could not garrison with Spanish troops.

The new Spanish Regent was Don Louis Requesens-y-Zuniga, a member of the higher nobility of Spain, and a Grand Commander of the Knights of Malta. He was high-minded, and of a generous disposition. Had he been sent to the Netherlands ten years sooner, and allowed to act with a free hand, the history of the Netherlands might have been different. His earlier efforts at government were marked by attempts to negotiate, and he was at pains to give Philip his reasons for his conduct.