Civil War Breaks Out in Northern Spain

The Spanish Absolutists seized the town of Seo d’Urgel, and there set up a provisional government.

Continuing Spanish Demand Constitution,
our selection from History of Modern Europe by Charles A. Fyffe published in 1890. The selection is presented in six easy 5 minute installments. For works benefiting from the latest research see the “More information” section at the bottom of these pages.

Previously in Spanish Demand Constitution.

Time: 1812-1820

The Serviles, supported by French money, broke into open rebellion in the North. When the session of the Cortes ended, the King attempted to overthrow his enemies by military force. Three battalions of the Royal Guard, which had been withdrawn from Madrid, received secret orders to march upon the capital (July 6, 1822), where Ferdinand was expected to place himself at their head. They were, however, met and defeated in the streets by other regiments, and Ferdinand, vainly attempting to dissociate himself from the action of his partisans, found his crown, if not his life, in peril. He wrote to Louis XVIII that he was a prisoner. Though the French King gave nothing more than good counsel, the Ultraroyalists in the French Cabinet and in the army now strained every nerve to accelerate a war between the two countries. The Spanish Absolutists seized the town of Seo d’Urgel, and there set up a provisional government. Civil war spread over the northern provinces.

The Ministry, which was now formed of Riego’s friends, demanded and obtained from the Cortes dictatorial powers like those which the French Committee of Public Safety had wielded in 1793, but with far other result. Spain found no Danton, no Carnot, at this crisis, when the very highest powers of intellect and will would have been necessary to arouse and to arm a people far less disposed to fight for liberty than the French were in 1793. One man alone, General Mina, checked and overthrew the rebel leaders of the North with an activity superior to their own. The Government, boastful and violent in its measures, effected scarcely anything in the organization of a national force or in preparing the means of resistance against those foreign armies with whose attack the country was now plainly threatened.

The ambassadors of the three Eastern courts presented their notes at Madrid demanding a change in the constitution and, after receiving a high-spirited answer from the Ministers, they quitted the country. Canning, while using every diplomatic effort to prevent an unjust war, had made it clear to the Spaniards that England could not render them armed assistance. The reasons against such an intervention were indeed over whelming. Russia, Austria, and Prussia would have taken the field rather than have permitted the Spanish Constitution to tri umph; and although, if leagued with Spain in a really national defense like that of 1808, Great Britain might perhaps have protected the Peninsula against all the powers of Europe combined, it was far otherwise when the cause at stake was one to which a majority of the Spanish nation had shown itself to be indifferent, and against which the northern provinces had actually taken up arms. The Government and the Cortes were therefore left to defend themselves as best they could against their enemies. They displayed their weakness by enacting laws of extreme se verity against deserters, and by retiring, along with the recalcitrant King, from Madrid to Seville.

On April 7th the French troops, led by the Duke of Angouleme, crossed the frontier. The clergy and a great part of the peasantry welcomed them as deliverers; the forces opposed to them fell back without striking a blow. As the invader advanced toward the capital, gangs of Royalists spread such terror and devastation over the northern provinces that the presence of foreign troops became the only safeguard for the peaceable inhabitants. Madrid itself was threatened by the corps of a freebooter named Bessieres. The commandant sent his sur render to the French while they were still at some distance, begging them to advance as quickly as possible in order to save the city from pillage. The message had scarcely been sent when Bessieres and his bandits appeared in the suburbs. The Governor drove them back, and kept the Royalist mob within the city at bay for four days more. On May 23rd the advance guard of the French army entered the capital.

It had been the desire of King Louis XVIII and Angoul6me to save Spain from the violence of Royalist misrule and fanaticism. On reaching Madrid, Angouleme intended to appoint a provisional government himself; he was, however, compelled by orders from Paris to leave the election in the hands of the Council of Castile, and a Regency came into power whose first acts showed in what spirit the victory of the French was to be used. Edicts were issued declaring all the acts of the Cortes affecting the monastic orders to be null and void, dismissing all officials appointed since March 7, 1820 and subjecting to ex amination those who, then being in office, had not resigned their posts.* The arrival of the ambassadors of the three Eastern powers encouraged the Regency in their antagonism to the French commander. It was believed that the Cabinet of Paris was unwilling to restore King Ferdinand as an absolute mon arch, and intended to obtain from him the grant of institutions resembling those of the French “charta.”

[* ‘This process, which was afterward extended even to common soldiers, was called ” Purification.” Committees were appointed to whom all persons coming under the law had to send in detailed evidence of correct conduct in and since 1820, signed by well-known Royalists. But the committees also accepted any letters of denunciation that might be sent to them, and were bound by law to keep them secret, so that in practice the purification became a vast system of anonymous persecution.]

Any such limitation of absolute power was, however, an object of horror to the three despotic courts. Their ambassadors formed themselves into a council with the express object of resisting the supposed policy of Angouleme. The Regency grew bolder, and gave the signal for general retribution upon the Liberals by publishing an order depriving all persons who had served in the voluntary militia since March, 1820, of their offices, pensions, and titles. The work inaugurated in the capital was carried much further in the provinces.

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