# The rise and fall of the Emperor Maximilian/Chapter I

CHAPTER I.
Alleged Cause of the French Intervention—The Convention of La Soledad—Real Position of Juarez—Commencement of Hostilities—Previous Negotiations with Maximilian—Secret Aim of the French Intervention—Cause of England's Withdrawal—Disappointment and Opposition of General Prim—Napoleon's first 'Idea'—He throws off the Mask—Feeble Character of the French Policy.
WHAT was the idea which was dominant at first when the French flag was sent under the walls of Vera Cruz? And, later, what was the real cause of the declaration of war hurled against the President Juarez?
If we are to depend upon the official declarations, we see that the government of the emperor, in virtue of a convention signed November 20, 1861, in conjunction with England and Spain, had determined, by a joint intervention, 'to compel Mexico to fulfil the obligations already solemnly contracted and to give us a guarantee of a more efficient protection for the persons and property of our respective countrymen.' These are the instructions which were intrusted to Rear-Admiral Jurien de la Gravière, who was invested with the chief command of our military forces sent to Mexico, together with a naval squadron. M. Thouvenel, the minister of foreign affairs, made the following addition to the admiral's instructions:—
'The allied powers decline any intervention in the domestic affairs of the country, and especially any exercise of pressure on the will of the population with regard to their choice of a government.' ​In the early part of January, the three plenipotentiaries addressed a collective note to the Mexican government, demanding reparation for all the grievances and wrongs which had been suffered. On February 9, 1862, the allied commissioners informed Doblado, Juarez's minister, that the allied troops would march about the middle of the month to occupy more wholesome quarters in the interior, and invited him to come to an understanding with the Count de Reuss (General Prim).
The army, on landing, had been placed under the orders of the Spanish general Prim. Spain had 7,000 men there, and France about 3,000. England had only landed some marines. On February 13, 1862, the Mexican government and the plenipotentiaries of Spain, England, and France, signed respectively the preliminary convention of La Soledad; the 1st article of this confirmed the authority of Juarez, and the 6th stipulated that the Mexican flag, which had been lowered on the approach of the allied squadrons menacing Vera Cruz, should be again hoisted.
Nearly two months necessarily elapsed before the draft of the treaty found its way back from Europe to the camp of the negotiating parties, who had been obliged to consult their respective governments. Through a very proper exercise of foresight, article 3 of the convention of La Soledad had stipulated that, during the progress of negotiations, the expeditionary corps should occupy the towns of Cordova, Orizaba, and Tehuacan—quarters that were favourable to the health of the soldiers. Doblado, the minister, had made this concession, and Juarez had ratified it. Although it seemed right, from our point of view, looking at the fatal effect of the (terres chaudes) especially during the winter season, to imperiously exact this liberty of ​moving the troops, still the pride of the Mexicans was deeply wounded by the president's concession; they also felt humiliated because the evacuation of their invaded territory had not preceded the preliminaries of reconciliation. But Juarez, more inclined to subtlety than courage, was animated by a real desire to grant the reparations claimed by the allies, and clearly comprehended that he would never obtain the withdrawal of the hostile forces before serious pledges of conciliation had been exchanged. Confiding, however, in our word, the Mexican government had added a condition to the liberty of movement which had been dictated by humane feelings only, and had stipulated that, 'if the negotiations were broken off' (article 4), the allied forces should retire from the positions they had taken up, and should fall back along the road to Vera Cruz, as far as Paso Ancho, before any acts of hostility were committed, and, in this case, that the allied hospitals should remain under the safeguard of the Mexican nation.
The courier, whose return from Europe had been anxiously expected, was at last signaled in the roadstead. It was ascertained that England, rejecting all idea of an expedition into the interior of Mexico, had ratified the signature of Sir C. Wyke, its plenipotentiary. Spain, though expressing a certain reluctance, did not disavow that of General Prim. But France, through the medium of the Moniteur, declared boldly that she could not accept the convention of La Soledad, as being 'counter to the national dignity.' This public disavowal, inflicted as it was on an officer who was justly reputed to be jealous of the honour of his flag, excited a painful feeling of astonishment, and had but an untoward effect.
The admiral commenced his retrograde movement ​on April 1. The French troops had been occupying Tehuacan; they halted at Cordova, three stages from Paso Ancho, by the side of the Spanish force. But a rupture between the three allied bodies was now imminent, their respective views and interests being so plainly at variance. On April 9, 1862, the rupture was consummated; the cause especially alleged was the presence under our flag of Almonte, and some emigrants, who had arrived in the early part of March, who on account of their monarchical opinions were objects of suspicion both to Juarez and also to the English government. Sir C. Wyke, the British minister, wrote to Earl Russell—'By giving our intervention the appearance of a friendly protectorate, we shall be best able to consolidate a government which represents the intelligent and respectable portion of the nation.'
We will now state that, in 1857, a constitution voted by the general congress had conferred the presidency on General Comonfort, who was illegally deposed from his chair; that Juarez, in virtue of his commission as vice-president, had defended this constitution for six years. The Indian advocate seemed the only one who had not perjured himself! He held the position of chief magistrate in a republic which was convulsed and ruined by civil war. Standing at the head of affairs in a country thoroughly demoralised by the evil passions which sought to overflow it, he might perhaps have been able to do better, but he might also have done much worse. On him has fallen with all its weight the unhappy result of half a century of fanaticism and anarchy, and he has had the courage to bear his burden without giving way. For him at least the word 'country' has not been without signification, and he who would judge him, if he means to judge justly, ​must turn his back upon Europe and its ideas, and look only at the troubled horizon of Mexico.
The die was cast! The English and Spanish squadrons put to sea again, and the French expeditionary forces (about 6,000 strong) were left alone. They prepared for the offensive by pursuing their backward movement towards the Chiquihuite—an embanked torrent situate almost half-way between the Gulf and Orizaba—the wooded escarpments of which commanding the pass had been armed for the defensive by the Mexicans. Whilst the French commander, faithful to the engagement he had entered into, was making this counter-march, a report was spread that the lives of our sick soldiers who had been left behind in the hospital at Orizaba, under the protection of the enemy, were threatened by the Juarist army. The French commander, yielding to the dread that his defenceless men would be put to death, immediately faced about, and violating, though with reluctance, the promise he had given, began the offensive by making his way by forced marches to Orizaba, without having repassed the strong position of the Chiquihuite.
Such is a brief recapitulation of the events in the first phase of the Mexican expedition. If we consider nothing but the facts which the imperial government laid before the country, it looks as if Napoleon III. had but one aim in view—that of protecting the interests of our countrymen, interests which would have been wronged by the convention of La Soledad, if the latter had been ratified. Surely, France was only generous in protecting with its safeguard those Mexican refugees who wished to tread once more the soil of their country. If we were to believe the official language, the war took its rise from the refusal or illusory concessions opposed by the Mexican president ​to the legitimate demand for reparation put forward by our minister. Juarez then must remain alone responsible to posterity for the ruin of his people, and for all the blood shed upon Mexican soil, shed, too, in such profusion, but yet powerless to fertilise it!
We will, however, endeavour to seek out the truth which in this matter is so difficult to get at; and now that we have placed the principal actors on the stage, let us enquire what was passing behind the scenes. To the ambiguity of official phraseology, we shall reply by hard facts and incontestable documents.
On January 18, 1861, exactly ten months before the convention was signed by the three powers, whilst Juarez was presiding in his capital, and little thinking of the storm that was gathering in Europe in order to break over his head, France was conspiring for his fall. In the little town of Tlalpam, about four leagues from Mexico, General Leonardo Marquez was riveting the first links in the chain of intrigue which already united the cabinet of the Tuileries with the palace of Miramar. On this very night, an Indian courier, bearing a confidential note, entered Mexico. General Marquez wrote to the Licenciado Aquilar, Santa Anna's former minister, to say that the time was come 'for organising a reaction—political, social, and military.' He offered him the presidentship of a directory, and the right of choosing as its members those whom he thought most capable of serving the good cause. The motto Dios e Orden was proclaimed; it was the signal of revolt against ' Libertad e Independencia', which was the republican formula.
At the same time, a body of Mexican refugees, at whose head stood MM. Gutierrez de Estrada, Hidalgo, Almonte, Mgr. La Bastida, and the ex-president Miramon, was agitating in Paris; they profited by the ​favour in which they stood at the Tuileries, and by their admission to the court, to awaken an august sympathy in behalf of their cause. Moreover, Mgr. La Bastida, Archbishop of Mexico, speaking in the name of his clergy—deprived of their mortmain property by a law issued in 1859 (property amounting to 900 millions of francs)—contended warmly for the same interests at the court of Rome, which was not backward in showing favour to a project the intention of which was to place a prince of the Catholic race of Hapsburg on the throne on which Iturbide once sat.
Some persons maintain that the Mexican empire was one of the results of the peace of Villafranca. Without attaching any great importance to this assertion, it is beyond all doubt that, at the very time when Marquez was organising a revolt, the Mexican refugee party, secretly supported by the French government (in the bosom of which Spanish sympathies prevailed), offered the imperial crown of Mexico to the Archduke Maximilian, who had just renounced all official position in his own country, and held himself ready for any eventuality.
The negotiations between Paris and Miramar lasted about eight months ere the reluctance of the archduke could be overcome. At last, the prince addressed to M. Gutierrez de Estrada, the authorised confidant, a letter written in Spanish, on both sides of a large page. Maximilian declared that he would accept the throne that was offered to him, but only 'on the condition that France and England would support him with their moral and material guarantee, both on land and sea.' M. Gutierrez, who was at Paris, at once forwarded this precious document (which we have read) to the Licenciado Aquilar, in order that he might make it known to the members of the plot which was hatching in ​Mexico. But the secret was not so well kept but that, in 1862, this late minister of Santa Anna was placed in confinement. Some time after, in default of any sufficient proof of guilt, Doblado signed his warrant of release.
The archduke's acceptance therefore was binding on France as early as the end of 1861, at the very moment when the maritime expedition, concerted by the three powers against the republic, was about to be carried out. In this combination, developed under the veil of secrecy, we shall discover the mysterious aim of the intervention of the French government, which had hoped to have induced the English cabinet to share its views, and to promise its active co-operation in the establishment of the Emperor Maximilian on the throne which had been promised him. The rebel party, recruited mostly among the clerical faction, only waited for the appearance of the tri-coloured flag in Mexican waters before commencing to open the campaign.
The defence of our countrymen, the wish to avenge the outrages they had suffered—outrages which it would be more just to lay to the charge of all Mexico than to Juarez personally—all this was nothing but a pretext, which was intended from the first to be subordinate to the second scheme of the enterprise. But this pretext was appealed to, so as to get the troops landed on the republican territory, and to get foothold there, in expectation of the day when the French government might be freely able to inaugurate its policy in the New World—a policy pregnant with danger, and causing France to contradict completely its professed principle of non-intervention. If any doubts were entertained as to this, they would be soon put an end to by two subsequent events which ​exercised a great influence on the disastrous issue of the enterprise. We allude to the rupture of the convention of La Soledad, and to the Emperor Napoleon's letter to General Forey.
Why was the convention of La Soledad torn up by France only?
From the very day that England was indirectly initiated into the projects secretly nourished by the French government, she was eager, by signing the convention, to get clear of the Mexican question. It was not till October 1861, after Maximilian had made his demand for the English guarantee, that M. Thouvenel gave directions that the British cabinet should be sounded on this subject, without anything distinct being implied in the overtures which were made. It turned out that these overtures were badly received on the other side of the Channel. Without delay, our minister of foreign affairs, having been several times questioned by the English ambassador, and fearing that he had gone on rather too far, replied very categorically that 'no government would be forced on the Mexican people' (despatch of Lord Cowley to Earl Russell, May 2, 1862). On another occasion, M. Thouvenel, being questioned by Lord Cowley on the subject of the candidature of the Archduke Maximilian, and being asked whether negotiations on the point were pending between France and Austria, replied in the negative. Our minister's statement was as follows:—'Negotiations have been entered on by the Mexicans themselves alone, who have proceeded to Vienna for this purpose.'
In spite of these denials, England thought it prudent to assert the authority of Juarez, and to retire from the business. She cared but little to compromise her responsibility by giving the future emperor a ​guarantee which she has subsequently proved she is not very prodigal in granting. She was well aware that the guarantee which was demanded of her was almost without limit, and might precipitate her fleet into a conflict with the United States. Even if the British cabinet had been imprudent enough to grant it, the parliament would most certainly have disavowed their act. Thus, Sir C. Wyke, her plenipotentiary, had but one aim, and that was, as is commonly said, to get out of the scrape as well as he could, and, profiting by the joint pressure, to obtain advantageous indemnities which would heal all the wounds of the English claimants. In fact, England has been the one to profit most by the sacrifices we have made, thanks to the deductions made in her favour from the Mexican receipts during the whole time of the expedition.
As to the court of Madrid, General Prim had enticed it into the Mexican expedition, animated as he was by a purely personal ambition. Being allied through his wife to the family of Etcheverria, a member of which was actually in Juarez's council, and keeping up, as he did, an active connection with Mexico, which he knew was always ready for military 'pronunciamientos' the Count de Reuss, whose brilliant reputation had already preceded him, pictured for himself, if not a royal diadem, at least a viceroy's coronet, which would once more attach the former Spanish colony to its mother-country. As soon as he was conscious of the state of things which France desired to introduce, and when he heard of the arrival of the reinforcements brought by General de Lorencez, and intended for an expedition into the interior, which he had flattered himself that he should attempt alone, Prim felt that his illusions were at an end and at once persuaded his government to abandon the project, discountenancing at the same time ​the French enterprise. His journey to Vichy had given rise in his mind to certain magic hopes; the vanishing away of all these excited, therefore, considerable ill-will, and dictated his famous oration to the Spanish senate, numerous copies of which he took good care to forward to the United States. Prim must surely have forgotten that he had had the honour of commanding the combined expeditionary force! For, in May 1863, whilst the French were being killed under the walls of Puebla, he sent to his uncle, the Juarist minister, under the cover of the British legation, and through the hostile port of Tuxpan, a large number of copies of this very speech, so inimical to the arms of his late allies.
Finally, why was it that the French government alone put an end to the compact of La Soledad? Admiral Jurien, our plenipotentiary, who has left behind him in Mexico a beloved name and a high reputation for honour and rectitude, received the affront of a public disavowal when the emperor 'adopted the resolution of withdrawing his full powers from the admiral.' Now, it is certain that the admiral, surrounded as he was by the public esteem, might have gone to Mexico all alone without any fear for his safety, and could have personally arranged with President Juarez all the differences which divided the two governments. Prudence itself dictated this course of action. Was it more desirable to upset the power then existing in virtue of the constitution, under a pretext that it did not enjoy all the power and all the authority that might be expedient? On the other hand, it is beyond doubt that the French plenipotentiary had perfectly reconciled the dignity of his country with the interests of his countrymen.
'The Mexican government,' Doblado had written ​in Juarez's name, to the allied commissioners, 'is resolved to make every kind of sacrifice in order to prove to friendly nations that the faithful fulfilment of the engagements it enters into will be, for the future, one of the invariable principles of the liberal administration.'
This declaration, if made in good faith by a stable government, should have been satisfactory. It is true that a reference to the past permitted doubts being entertained as to the execution of these promises. It would, therefore, have been better, at the very outset, when the admiral first left Paris, to have frankly declared war. Negotiations seemed idle, if a refusal to give the time that was requisite for carrying them into effect had been previously determined on, and if they were in anticipation to be declared illusory in consideration of the weakness and presumed bad faith of Juarez.
The admiral acted properly, and the best proof of this is the fact that a few months after this disavowal (against which, however, public opinion had pronounced), the chief of the state himself called to his side Admiral Jurien, who, besides this flattering distinction, was sent a second time to Mexico, hoisting his flag in the iron-clad frigate 'La Normandie.' It is impossible not to be struck with this strange contradiction. But we shall find an explanation of it in the letter written in 1862 to General Forey, at the time when the latter received the command of the corps d'armée intended to avenge the check experienced by General de Lorencez, a check of which we shall speak in due course.
The emperor wrote:—
Fontainebleau, July 3, 1862
and maintains the integrity of its territory; if, with the assistance of France, a firm government is kept up there, we, on the other side of the ocean, shall have restored to the Latin race its power and its prestige.
Napoleon.
Henceforth, then, the expedition has for its aim the triumph of the Latin race on American soil, in order to oppose the encroachments of the Anglo-Saxon. In this imperial document, the real idea of the emperor is for the first time revealed. It stands in formal contradiction to the instructions given by the French government to its plenipotentiary, and also to the language of its ministers—MM. Billault and Rouher—which, up to that time, asserted from the tribune that the creation of an empire for Maximilian had never been a matter in question, and that the defence of our national interests had been the sole cause of the hostilities against Juarez.
In fact, the redress of the wrongs of our countrymen had been nothing but a mask which it was at last time to take off. The archduke was about to appear upon the scene. The admiral had been disavowed, because, acting as he did in good faith, he very nearly ruined a hidden project of which he had been kept in ignorance. The convention was repudiated by France because the latter would not treat, being in fact unable to do so, bound as it was to Maximilian. Our financial claims were for the time no longer in question. The downfall of Juarez was the only business in hand, and in order to upset the president's chair, it was necessary that the French army should enter Mexico arms in hand.
Thus, from the outset, the intervention of France in Mexico was the result of an ambiguous policy, which proved a constant incubus on the enterprise; and when Juarez consented to engage in this war à outrance, ​signalised and terminated as it was by such terrible reprisals, it was because he recognised from the very first that the tri-coloured flag was but a mask for the imperial banner which followed in the track of the foreigner, and that the existence of the republic was menaced in the very first instance. We may well believe that this unavowed aim was the principal cause of the disguised support which was furnished by the United States to the republican cause from the beginning —a support which sufficed to hold in check, and finally to ruin, the French influence in America. Certain documents, which were found in General Comonfort's baggage, abandoned in the foundry at San Lorenzo, have come under our observation. They leave no doubt whatever as to the co-operation of the United States, and that the latter comprehended that France desired to profit by the war which was internally devastating them, so as to effect a counterbalance to the Anglo-Saxon influence. President Lincoln, whose honesty was so praised in France, wrote to Juarez:—'We are not at open war with France, but reckon on money, cannon, and voluntary enlistments, all of which we shall countenance.' He kept his word.
Here, too, one cannot help being painfully impressed by the vacillations of the imperial government, which seemed as if it dared not adopt a decided character in its trans-oceanic policy, and from the commencement to the conclusion of the expedition resorted to little else but half-measures. The idea of placing the Latin race as a bulwark against the encroachments of the Anglo-Saxon, who probably half a century hence will embrace the entire globe by joining hands with the Russians, was certainly an imposing one, and well worthy to tempt a bold heart and a great nation; but only on the condition that the means of its success ​were a previously assured certainty. It was easy to foresee that in any case of rebuff, the ruin of this idea would accelerate and irretrievably precipitate the downfall of Latin influence in America, and would for ever destroy its prestige, which the Spaniards had done so much to compromise. But if this idea was to triumph, it needed the co-operation of the United States themselves. It is very certain that there was a favourable opportunity in 1862, looking at the secession of the Southern States from those of the North. Then was the time for France to have acted vigorously, and to have obtained allies even in the enemy's camp. Two courses were open, and both were practicable; but here we shall not pretend to decide between them. Either it was necessary at the first onset to decide in good earnest for the cause of the Union, and to restrain the South by a threatening demonstration on the frontier of the Rio Bravo; or, if the belligerent character of the secession party was recognised, it was essential to go the whole length without hesitation, and to consummate the work of separation by declaring openly for the planters of the Southern States, who, fired with the recollections of French glory, waited but the succour of our promise to triumphantly offer a helping hand to our expeditionary force which was marching on Mexico. Through an inconsistency which one can now, on looking back, hardly conceive possible, the imperial policy wandered away from every logical tradition. The belligerent character which had been accorded to the Southern States served only to prolong to no purpose a sanguinary contest; and our government repulsed the reiterated overtures of the Southern proprietors, whom they encouraged, as it were, only yesterday, and finally abandoned to their fate. From ​that time the Latin cause was lost. The victorious Yankees crossed the Texan frontier en masse, and, allured by the hopes of plunder, assumed the form of Juarist guerillas, and overran the Mexican provinces of Nuevo Leon, La Sonora, and Tamaulipas.