The Political History of England – Vol XI

The first detachment of the British army reached Lisbon on Christmas day. It was not destined, however, to play an active part in the Portuguese struggle. The insurgent army was as greatly discouraged as the loyal troops were elated by its arrival, and the government was moreover enabled to employ a larger force on the scene of hostilities. The insurgents were in consequence driven out of the province of Beira and the greater part of Traz-os-Montes. A new invasion from Spanish territory, supported by some Spanish soldiers and Spanish artillery, took place during January, 1827. The greater part of the province of the Minho fell into the hands of the rebels, and on February 2 they captured the important town of Braga. But the forces of the regency proved too strong for them, and early in March the insurgents evacuated Portugal altogether. The Spanish government, now that little could be effected by further assistance to the Portuguese refugees, determined at length to perform the duties of a neutral power, and disarmed them.

The British troops remained in Portugal till March, 1828. By that time the disturbances had assumed a purely domestic character, and it was ultimately decided to recall them. But a firmer policy than that actually followed would have been necessary in order to extricate Great Britain from the strife of Portuguese factions, in which her recent action had given a decided advantage to the constitutional party. That party had been driven into opposition before the British troops were recalled. On July 3, 1827, King Peter had issued a decree appointing Dom Miguel his lieutenant, and investing him with all the powers which belonged to him as king under the charter. Miguel, after visiting London, arrived at Lisbon on February 22, 1828, and was sworn in as regent four days later. As he was twenty-five years old, and therefore of full age according to Portuguese law, he could not with any show of equity have been kept out of the regency longer. Miguel's installation as regent was followed by a series of riots as well on the part of the absolutists, who desired to make him king, as on the part of the constitutionalists who feared that he would make himself king. It was not long before he definitely identified himself with the absolutist party.

MIGUEL'S USURPATION.

On March 14 the cortes were dissolved. On May 3 Miguel summoned the ancient cortes in his own name, and on June 26 they acknowledged him as king. The immediate result of this act was that all the ambassadors, except those of Spain and the Holy See, quitted Lisbon, and the lapse of time did not induce them to change their attitude towards Miguel. A further complication was introduced by Peter's definite abdication in favour of his daughter on March 3, executed before he had any suspicion of Miguel's designs, which placed Miguel in the position of regent for his infant niece instead of for his brother. After this formal abdication Peter despatched his daughter to Europe, intending that she should proceed to Vienna. When, however, she arrived at Gibraltar on September 2, her conductors, hearing of Miguel's usurpation, determined to take her to England, and she landed at Falmouth on the 24th. Peter, on hearing of Miguel's usurpation, naturally considered the regency terminated, and claimed to act as the guardian of the infant queen; the Brazilian ministers in Europe acted as his agents, while his partisans assembled in England and attempted to use this country as a basis for warlike operations in Portuguese territories.

The situation of 1826 was thus reversed. Instead of an ultra-royalist party resting on Spain, a constitutionalist party resting on Brazil and attempting to rest on England was now threatening the established government at Lisbon. Wellington was anxious to maintain a strict neutrality, but he failed to prevent a ship of war and supplies of arms and ammunition going from Plymouth to Terceira in the Azores, where Donna Maria was acknowledged as queen. He succeeded, however, in preventing a larger armament, which had been raised under the name of the Emperor of Brazil, with Rio Janeiro as its nominal destination, from landing at Terceira. This action, though the logical consequence of the British opposition to the conduct of Spain in 1826, was severely criticised in England as equivalent to an intervention on behalf of Miguel.

Meanwhile Canning's attempt to prevent the separate action of Russia in the Eastern question had been doomed to disappointment. The destruction of the Turkish navy at Navarino was naturally regarded at Constantinople as an outrage, and the Porte demanded satisfaction from the ambassadors of the allied powers. This they refused to grant on the ground that the Turks had been the aggressors, and they in their turn demanded an armistice between the Turkish troops and the Greek insurgents. As the Porte remained obdurate, the ambassadors of France, Great Britain, and Russia, acting in accordance with their instructions, left Constantinople on December 8, 1827. But though war seemed imminent, the tsar still disowned all idea of conquest, and professed to desire nothing further than the execution of the treaty of London. A protocol was accordingly signed on the 12th by which the three powers confirmed a clause in the treaty, providing that, in the event of war, none of them should derive any exclusive benefit, either commercial or territorial.

The British government imagined that the powers might still effect their object by diplomacy, and that it would not be necessary to abandon the Turkish alliance. But any such idea must have been rudely shaken by the hati-sherif of December 20. In that document the sultan enlarged on the cruelty and perfidy of the Christian powers and summoned the Muslim nations to arms: he denounced Russia in particular as the prime mover of the Greek rebellion, the instigator of the other powers, and the arch-enemy of Islam; and he declared the treaty of Akkerman, by which the outstanding disputes between Russia and the Porte had been settled in October, 1826, to have been extorted by force and only signed in order to save time. This defiance of Russia, if not of all Christendom, was followed by a levy of Turkish troops and the expulsion of most of the Christian residents from Constantinople. No course was now open to Russia but to make war. It remained to be seen whether any other power would join her. On January 6, 1828, a Russian despatch announced the tsar's intention of occupying the Danubian principalities, and suggested that France and Great Britain should force the Dardanelles and thus compel the Porte to comply with the provisions of the treaty of London.

WELLINGTON'S EASTERN POLICY.

It is possible that if the direction of British foreign policy had remained in the hands of Goderich and Dudley, our government might have lent its support to a settlement of the Eastern question which would in effect have been the work of Russia only. The more daring policy of Canning, by which Great Britain had attempted to take the lead as opportunity offered, either in active co-operation with Russia or in active opposition to her, could only be directed by a more versatile statesman than the nation now possessed. The accession to office of Wellington, though it left Dudley at the foreign office, was really marked by a return to the policy of Castlereagh, a policy which, if not brilliant, was at least honourable, consistent, and considerate, and which in the hands of Wellington was managed with a sufficient measure of firmness, though with less tact and insight than had been shown by Castlereagh. The first object of this policy was to keep the special grievances of Russia distinct from the complaints which Europe at large or, in the present situation, the three allied powers were able to bring against the Porte. By so doing the British government hoped to prevent Russia from dragging other powers into a war for her private benefit, and also to render it impossible for Russia to use her special grievances as a lever by which she might effect a separate settlement of the general question. For some years this policy was successful. Russia did indeed wage a separate war with the Turks, but the Greek question was settled by the three powers conjointly, and Great Britain rather than Russia took the lead in the settlement. It was only after Palmerston had succeeded to the direction of our foreign policy in 1830, that it was discovered how far the victory of Russia in war had placed her in a position to dictate the general policy of the Ottoman court.

Wellington experienced no difficulty in striking out a line of policy along which he could carry France with him. On February 21 De la Ferronays, who had been recalled from the French embassy at St. Petersburg to occupy the post of foreign minister in the new liberal administration, which had been formed in France in December, 1827, despatched a note urging the immediate employment of energetic measures against the Porte. He saw that the hati-sherif gave special occasion of war to Russia, and he was naturally anxious to anticipate her isolated action by combined measures of coercion. He had, however, nothing better to suggest than the execution of the Russian proposals of January 6. Wellington, in his reply, dated the 26th, rightly minimised the seriousness of the hati-sherif, and characterised the proposed measures of coercion as destined to be ineffectual. He also expressed the fear that if the three powers combined to make war on the Turks there would be a general insurrection of the subject races in the Turkish dominions which might last indefinitely. He therefore proposed first to settle the Greek question by local pressure, after which he anticipated no serious trouble about events at Constantinople. On the same day he drafted a memorandum to the cabinet in which he proposed that the allied squadrons should proceed to the Archipelago, blockade the Morea and Alexandria, destroy the Greek pirates, stop the warfare in Chios and Crete, and call upon the Greek government to withdraw the forces which were operating in western and eastern Greece respectively under the command of two foreign volunteers, General Church and Colonel Fabvier. In other words, he proposed to coerce not the Porte but the actual combatants, Greece and Egypt, and to check each party where it was the aggressor. If the prime object of the government in the eastern question was the maintenance of order, these proposals were excellent. The one capital defect of the whole scheme was that it ignored the Russian desire for war, which rendered it impossible for the tsar to postpone the settlement of his own grievances until an arrangement should be come to on the Greek question; on the other hand, by isolating the Greek question, it left it possible for the western powers to proceed with its solution in spite of the outbreak of hostilities between Russia and the Turks.95

WAR BETWEEN RUSSIA AND TURKEY.

Russia's determination to act singly was, however, already made. On the same day, February 26, on which Wellington sketched his policy, Nesselrode issued a despatch declaring that war was inevitable, including among his reasons the repudiation of recent treaties by the Porte and the proclamation by it of a holy war. At the same time he endeavoured to disarm any possible opposition on the part of the powers by an invitation to them to make use of the coming war to carry out the treaty of London. In any case Russia would execute the treaty, but if she were left to herself, the manner of execution would be determined by her own convenience and interest.96 So far Russia had done nothing directly inconsistent with the maintenance of her concert with France and Great Britain, whose representatives had been sitting in conference with hers at London since January, 1827. But the reference in this last note to the possibility of a settlement of the Greek question according to the convenience and interest of Russia appeared like a threat of breaking up the alliance in case France and Great Britain refused to send their fleets to the Mediterranean. At least Wellington so understood it, and, rather than be a party to the war, he dissolved the conference of London in the middle of March. But he soon found that by so doing he lost the co-operation of France, and he was therefore compelled to accept the assurances of Russia that she intended to keep within the limits of the treaty of London, and to regard the Mediterranean as a neutral area. The conference was in consequence reopened at the beginning of July. Meanwhile hostilities had actually begun between Russia and the Turks. Russia declared war on April 26. On May 7 her troops crossed the Pruth. They rapidly overran the Danubian provinces, and on June 7 crossed the Danube into Bulgaria. They were destined, however, to spend more than a year between the Danube and the Balkans before they could force their way into Rumelia.

During the interval considerable progress was made with the settlement of the Greek question. The treaty of London in providing for the autonomy of Greece had specified no boundaries, and the first problem demanding the attention of the powers that had assumed the task of the settlement of Greece was to determine the limits within which that settlement was to be effected. It might be urged that all the Greeks who had accepted the armistice imposed by the powers in consequence of the treaty of London had a right to share in the settlement at which that treaty aimed. But the armistice had been broken by Greek attacks on Chios and Crete, and Wellington held that the powers were, in consequence, free from any obligation imposed by the nominal acceptance of the armistice. He, accordingly, desired to adopt the simple principle of granting the proposed autonomy to those parts of Greece in which the insurrection had proved successful, namely, the Morea and the Ægean Islands, and refusing it in Northern and Central Greece, where the Turkish forces still held their own. But the British cabinet was far from being unanimous; many, among whom Palmerston was specially prominent, urged the concession of a greatly increased territory. The changes which took place in the British ministry towards the end of May, 1828, deprived Palmerston of his share in its deliberations, and by substituting Aberdeen for Dudley at the foreign office, placed our foreign relations under the direction of a man of talent and experience, who had already exercised an important influence on British policy and who was more in sympathy with the policy of the prime minister than Dudley had been, but who was not content, like Dudley, to be a mere cipher in the department over which he was called to preside. Aberdeen, though opposed to the narrow boundaries which Wellington wished to assign to liberated Greece, was no less antagonistic than his chief to any attempt to make the new Greek state politically important; and he was even of opinion that the Russian declaration of war had released Great Britain from any further obligation under the treaty of London.

Such were the composition and policy of the British government when the conference of London reassembled in July. The differences between the powers had prevented any active intervention in Greece, since the battle of Navarino. The ports in the Morea, still occupied by Ibrahim, had indeed been blockaded, but it had been found impossible to induce Austrian vessels to acknowledge a blockade of such questionable legality, and the allied fleets had even permitted the embarkation of Ibrahim's sick and wounded together with 5,500 Greek prisoners, who were sold into slavery on their arrival at Alexandria. The renewal of the concert of the three powers was followed by a rapid change in the situation. On the 19th it was decided that France should send an expedition to expel the Turco-Egyptian troops from the Morea, while Great Britain should render her any naval assistance that might be necessary. This step was valued by the British government as definitely committing France to a share in the settlement of the Greek question, and therefore interesting that power in opposition to any attempt at a separate settlement by Russia. It also furnished a safe outlet for French military ardour, disappointed by the results of the Spanish expedition. In fact, the evacuation of Spain, which was in progress at the date when this agreement was concluded, materially reduced the strain which the new undertaking imposed upon the French government. France immediately prepared to send out a force amounting to nearly 22,000 men. But before they could arrive, the greater part of their task had been performed by other hands.

TURKS EXPELLED FROM THE MOREA.

Codrington's conduct in permitting the embarkation of the Turkish sick and wounded with their prisoners had given great dissatisfaction at home, and the cabinet had resolved on his recall before the ministerial crisis of the latter part of May. That crisis occasioned a fortnight's delay, and, in consequence, Codrington was able, before his successor arrived, to make a naval demonstration before Alexandria and on August 6 to obtain the consent of Mehemet Ali to the following proposals: an exchange of prisoners was to take place, involving the liberation of the recently enslaved Greeks, and the Egyptian army was to be withdrawn from the Morea, but Ibrahim was to be allowed to leave behind 1,200 Egyptian troops to help to garrison five fortresses which were held by the Turks. Before either the new London protocol or the Alexandria convention could be carried into effect, further differences had arisen. Russia had proclaimed a blockade of the Dardanelles and ordered her admiral to carry it out. This proceeding was regarded by the British government as a breach of faith and a menace to British commerce. It was, however, impossible to abandon co-operation with Russia for fear that the Greek question might become involved in the issues at stake between her and the Porte. Wellington, in consequence, contented himself with obtaining certain exemptions from the operation of the blockade on behalf of British subjects trading with Turkey, and with the exclusion of the Russian fleet from the operations conducted in the Mediterranean in accordance with the orders of the London conference. The French force for expelling the Egyptians from the Morea arrived almost simultaneously with the Egyptian transports for removing them. On October 5 Ibrahim set sail for Egypt, with 21,000 men, leaving 1,200 behind in the five fortresses in accordance with the terms settled at Alexandria. The French began their attack on the remaining fortresses two days later, and by the end of November had expelled all the Turks from the Morea. By the terms of their engagements, they ought now to have departed. But it was hardly to be expected that France would so readily abandon the advantage that the presence of her troops gave her in the settlement of the eastern question.

Meanwhile the negotiations made slow progress. On November 16 a protocol was issued placing the Morea with the neighbouring islands under the guarantee of the powers. Wellington had opposed any extension of the guarantee to Central Greece on the ground that the allies had to provide both the necessary military force and the cost of maintaining the Greek government, so that any undertaking beyond the Morea would involve heavy expense without rendering lighter the task of maintaining order. But the real decision of the question lay not with the diplomatists at London, but with the diplomatists on the spot. Representatives of the three powers had been sent to Poros to make detailed arrangements in accordance with the terms of the treaty of London. Stratford Canning, who represented Great Britain, was one of the supporters of an extended frontier, and in the end the ambassadors at Poros drew up a protocol in favour of erecting Greece south of a line connecting the Gulfs of Arta and Volo into a hereditary principality, which was also to include nearly all the islands. Even Samos and Crete were recommended to the benevolent consideration of the courts. All Mohammedans were to be expelled from this territory. The tribute payable to Turkey was to be fixed at 1,500,000 piastres, but this was to be paid not to the Turkish government, but to those who might suffer pecuniary loss by the confiscation of lands hitherto owned by Mohammedans.

PEACE OF ADRIANOPLE.

The spring of 1829 was marked by events which went far to cancel the arguments on which Wellington had based his case for a restricted frontier. Not only the north coast of the Gulf of Corinth but Acarnania and Ætolia were liberated by the Greek forces under Sir Richard Church the castle of Vonitza falling on March 17, Karavasara shortly afterwards, Lepanto on April 30, and Mesolongi on May 17.97 Meanwhile the terms agreed upon at Poros had been adopted and further defined by the conference at London on March 22. It was now provided that the future hereditary prince was to be chosen by the three powers and the sultan conjointly, and that the terms were to be offered to the Porte by the British and French ambassadors in the name of the three powers; any Turkish objections were to be weighed.98 It was not till June that Robert Gordon and Guilleminot, representing Great Britain and France respectively, were able to lay these proposals before the Porte, and it was only after a Russian army under Diebitsch had crossed the Balkans that the Porte on August 15 accepted them, and even then only with extensive modifications. These limited the new state to the Morea and the adjacent islands, and left the tribute assigned to the same purposes as before the revolt; a limit was to be set to the military and naval forces of Greece, and Greeks were not to be allowed to migrate from Turkish dominions to the new state.

Wellington was of opinion that these concessions were adequate. He attached great importance to the consent of the Porte, to dispense with which seemed to him a sure method of encouraging a general revolt in the Turkish dominions; and he also advocated a limited frontier in the interests of the Ionian Islands. He doubted whether it would be found possible to remove Capodistrias, who had been elected president of Greece for a period of seven years on April 14, 1827, from his office to make room for a hereditary prince, and he felt sure that if Capodistrias were once granted Central Greece he would not hesitate to attempt the conquest of the Ionian Islands. Capodistrias had in fact refused to accept any of the arrangements proposed by the London conference, and was still engaged in the vigorous prosecution of the war. Wellington did not, however, succeed in inducing France and Russia to remain content with the Turkish concessions. Diebitsch's successful march through Rumelia encouraged Russia to demand more, and filled the minds of the French ministers with the wildest schemes of aggression. They actually proposed to Russia that the northern part of the Balkan peninsula should be divided between Austria and Russia while the whole peninsula south of the Balkans, with Bulgaria to the north, was to be formed into a new state under the sovereignty of the King of the Netherlands, whose hereditary dominions were in their turn to be divided between France, Great Britain, and Prussia.

Such chimerical projects were based on the assumption that Constantinople lay at the mercy of the army of Diebitsch; and this was believed to be the case not only by the court of Paris, but by that of London, and even by that of Constantinople. But no one knew better than Diebitsch how precarious his situation was, and, if Russia wished to obtain advantageous terms, it was necessary for her to make the most of the illusion while it lasted. On September 14 the peace of Adrianople was signed, which established the virtual independence of the principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia and secured for all powers at peace with Turkey a free passage for merchant ships through the Bosphorus and Dardanelles; Russia received a small addition to her Asiatic territories, and Turkey accepted both the treaty of London of July 6, 1827, and the protocol of London of March 22, 1829. The difficulties raised by Turkey's opposition to the full terms of the protocol were thus swept aside, and it was now clear that, if that protocol was to be further modified, it would be modified out of regard for the interests of Europe not by way of concession to Turkey. France and Great Britain were naturally averse from a settlement of the question by Russia alone, even when that settlement was on lines to which they had given their consent, and they might have been expected to propose some alteration in the scheme. But the conciliatory action of Russia rendered such proposals needless. On September 29, only fifteen days after the treaty, Aberdeen received a formal proposal from Russia that Turkey should be offered a restriction of the Greek boundary in return for a recognition of the total independence of Greece.99 This proposal removed Wellington's fear that the new principality might be used as a basis for an attack on the Ionian Islands; while the maintenance of Turkish suzerainty seemed less important after the apparent prostration of Turkish military power in the recent war.