Reign of Ferdinand VIII of Spain

Ferdinand VIII of Spain (Spanish:Fernando VIII de España) was king of Spain from 1823 to his early death in 1842. The second in a successive line of Spanish monarchs to die relatively young, his reign saw a series of conflicts among the conservative Traditionalist parties and the liberal Progresista party.

## Reign under regency 1823-1828

### Setting up the regency and the War in Albarracín

At the young age of 13, the king was in no way fit to rule. Thus San Miguel decided to persuade Queen dowager Amalia (herself uninterested in politics) to hand power over to a court’s appointed regent. This sparked the rage of Infante Carlos, who up until that point had been living in a self-imposed exile at San Ildefonso. He didn’t oppose the reign of his nephew, but he was wary of the political “manipulation” he perceived the liberals would play in the young king’s government. Thus, he perceived the political scene to be unfavourable to his persona, and set off to the countryside again.

The first years were full of political machination. San Miguel appointed Espoz y Mina as the semi-official co-regent, aiding Queen mother Amalia. Soon enough, major conflict erupted both within and outside the court. On August 15th, 1825 at Brihuega, Guadalajara, Jorge Bessières revolted against the national government and declared his support for the cause of Carlos as regent/king of Spain. Then, Joaquín Capapé revolted in Teruel with the backing of governor José Puertolas and both revolting militias started to fight guerrilla style in the Jiloca-Alto Tajo Comarcas.

San Miguel mistakenly sent Carlos Comte d’Espagnac (of suspected ultraroyalist influence) to quell the rebellion but instead him and his 3000 men went and joined the rebellion. After then they took the Albarracín Range and thus set their official countergovernment of ultra-royalist governance and they recognized Infante Carlos as the official “General Liutenant of Spain” (as opposed to outright declaring him King/Regent.

San Miguel swiftly decided to keep infante Carlos in house arrest, in a move that antagonized the majority of the conservatives that were only luke-warm to the rebellion in Albarracín. In between march and october 1827 there were uprisings in Andalucía, Aragón, the Basque Country, València and, specially, in Catalonia were it took the form of its own war against the central government in Barcelona/Madrid and was called Guerra dels Malscontents. Several historians have called this the first proto-Traditionalist war. On February 2nd Carlos d’Espagnac, who had travelled to meet with the Catalonian rebels, was assassinated and then on August Bessières was killed in a skirmish. Finally, the central government managed to quell the rebellion elsewhere, and in Albarracín they were defeated at the Battle of Molina de Aragón.

### San Miguel falling from grace and the ending of the regency

The war of 1825-27 left the interior part of the country in and around Teruel very desolated. Furthermore, it left the royal family even more fragmented (Carlos was at San Ildefonso on house arrest, Maria Amalia was “under the influence of the Negros (liberals)” and was characterized by her trust in San Miguel and then the rest of the children of Carlos IV had all left Spain or were dead) and it left the same San Miguel in a difficult position. He was hated on by the conservatives and his government was seen as too despotic by many liberals. Once a progresista, he was effectively becoming more and more moderated (moderado).

The young king on his part had been trusted to the care of Espoz y Mina, who instilled upon him the most liberal principles. Thus, on his 18th birthday he immediately set upon changing the ruling government. He was the more Progresista member of the young royal family and since his coming of age meant that the Queen mother retired from politics, San Miguel’s days were numbered. The king convened new Cortes that favoured the conservatives and moderados, meaning that both the Progresistas and the king felt unjustly left out.

## Early reign, San Torrijo’s Gibraltarada and the First Traditionalist War 1828-1840

During the first three years, the king and the Cortes fought time and time again and the king tried as hard as he could to exclude the more conservative components of the courts, which in turn alienated some of the land-owning higher strata. His anticlerical stances also made for the first time the church antagonized against the royal family. Ferdinand urged the Progresistas to demand political reform and furthermore the conservative (now called Tradicionalistas or Traditionalists) became the more isolated form the main political discussions.

Then, on December 2nd 1831, General José María de Torrijos y Uriarte (exiled on orders of San Miguel) took inspiration from the July Revolution in France and set off from Gibraltar and landed in Málaga, wherein he demanded political reform and a “Liberal regeneration”. He received support from Espoz y Mina and other liberals like Antonio Alcalá Galiano and more. Pronunciamientos followed suit in Loja (led by Ramón María Narváez), Galicia and Soria. The king, whilst not overtly, did privately welcome the liberal reform.

The Gibraltarada as it became known culminated in the dissolution of the Cortes and the proclamation of a new constitution, the first since 1820. The new constitution of 1832, proclaimed later into the year was of an exceedingly Progresista style. Its principal legacy was to restore the most progressive features of the Spanish Constitution of 1820 and to entrench the concepts of constitutionalism, parliamentarism, and Progresista separation of powers in Spain. It did, however, have a major flaw, as it gave the King the ability to both vetoe legislation and appoint the President of the Council of Ministers. This was seen as important at the time as it allowed for the Progresista king to partake in decision making and make Progresistas the leaders of Government. However, later under the regency of his spouse Queen María Teresa it would give the Moderados extended powers.

The Constitution proved once again too much for the Conservatives to handle. On the night from the 13th to the 14th of September 1832, several conservative politicians, among others Francisco Calomarde, conspired to support the ultra-royalist Count of Alcudia to break Infante Carlos free from his prison at San Ildefonso. The infante was made to believe that his nephew, young and inexperienced, was being manipulated by the Progresistas and that furthermore, they wanted to publicly put him on trial for his supposed implications with the conflict in the Albarracín, ending in a desire to execute him to assure their staying on the throne. Infante Carlos was mortified and agreed to them breaking out, then being sneaked out of the country to London, wherein his son Infante Carlos Luis would rest before being sent off to his maternal family in Brazil. King Fernando VIII would see this as treachery and strip the infante and his son of all of their titles.

Then, over a year later and with apparent support in Castilla la Vieja, Extremadura and Andalucía, Infante Carlos would come back again and land in Cantabria, where he would proclaim the Santander Manifesto, declaring his nephew unfit to rule and urging the Spanish people to accept him as supreme lieutenant of the Spanish Kingdom in quality of regent of the official traditions and institutions of the Royal country.

### First Traditionalist War 1833-1840

Thus started the first Traditionalist war, fought between two factions over the succession to the throne and the nature of the Spanish monarchy: The conservative and devolutionist supporters of the late king's brother, Carlos de Borbón (or *Carlos V*), became known as Carlists (*carlistas*), while the progressive and centralist supporters of the king Fernando were called Liberals (*liberales*) or *fernandinos.* It is considered by some authors to be the largest and most deadly civil war of the period.

The main Traditionalist forces were split in three geographically distinct armies where Carlist support was strongest: 'North', 'Maestrazgo', and 'Catalonia', which by and large operated independently from each other. Several independent, but nominally Carlist bands also waged a guerrilla war in mountain areas as far south as La Mancha and Andalusia, but were derided as *bandoleros* (bandits) by the Fernandino liberal government. Traditionalists' goal was the return to a traditional monarchy, while the Liberals sought to defend the constitutional monarchy. Portugal, France and the United Kingdom supported the Fernandinos and sent volunteer and even regular forces to confront the Carlist army.

Both sides raised special troops during the war. The Liberal side formed the volunteer Basque units known as the Chapelgorris, while Tomás de Zumalacárregui created the special units known as aduaneros. Zumalacárregui also established the unit known as Guías de Navarra from Liberal troops from La Mancha, Valencia, Andalusia and other places who had been taken prisoner at the Battle of Alsasua (1834). After this battle, they had been faced with the choice of joining the Traditionalist troops or being executed.

The war attracted independent adventurers, such as the Briton C. F. Henningsen, who served as Zumalacárregui's chief bodyguard (and later was his biographer), and Martín Zurbano, a *contrabandista* or smuggler. About 250 foreign volunteers fought for the Carlists; the majority were French monarchists, but they were joined by men from Portugal, Britain, Belgium, Piedmont-Sardinia, and the German states. Friedrich, Prince of Schwarzenberg fought for the Carlists, and had taken part in the French conquest of Algeria and the Swiss civil war of the Sonderbund.

The Liberal generals, such as Vicente Genaro de Quesada and Marcelino de Oraá Lecumberri, were often veterans of the wars resulting from independence movements in South America. For instance, Jerónimo Valdés participated in the battle of Ayacucho (1824).

Both sides executed prisoners of war by firing squad; the most notorious incident occurred at Heredia, when 118 Liberal prisoners were executed by order of Zumalacárregui. The British attempted to intervene, and through Lord Eliot, the Lord Eliot Convention was signed on April 27–28, 1835.

### Northern front

The war was long and hard, and the Carlist forces achieved important victories in the north under the direction of the brilliant general Tomás de Zumalacárregui. The Basque commander swore an oath to uphold home rule in Navarre (*fueros*), subsequently being proclaimed commander in chief of Navarre. The Basque regional governments of Biscay, Álava, and Gipuzkoa followed suit by pledging obedience to Zumalacárregui. He took to the bush in the Amescoas (to become the Carlist headquarters, next to Estella-Lizarra), there making himself strong and avoiding the harassment of the Spanish forces loyal to Ferdinand VIII. 3,000 volunteers with no resources came to swell his forces.

In summer 1834, Liberal forces set fire to the Sanctuary of Arantzazu and a convent of Bera, while Zumalacárregui showed his toughest side when he had volunteers refusing to advance over Etxarri-Aranatzexecuted. The Carlist cavalry engaged and defeated in Viana an army sent from Madrid (14 September 1834), while Zumalacárregui's forces descended from the Basque Mountains over the Álavan Plains (Vitoria), and prevailed over general Manuel O'Doyle. The veteran general Espoz y Mina, a Liberal Navarrese commander, attempted to drive a wedge between the Carlist northern and southern forces, but Zumalacárregui's army managed to hold them back (late 1834). This cemented the overt support from the Catholic Church for the Traditionalist cause. This blatant disrespect to the Church led to another proclamation where Charles proclaimed himself king of Spain as Carlos V, as he saw his brother’s line as “too rotten by the Negro’s principles.”

In January 1835, the Carlists took over Baztan in an operation where the general Espoz y Mina narrowly escaped a severe defeat and capture, while the local Liberal Gaspar de Jauregi *Artzaia* ('the Shepherd') and his *chapelgorris* were neutralized in Zumarraga and Urretxu. By May 1835, virtually all Gipuzkoa and seigneury of Biscay were in Carlist hands. Opposing his advisers and Zumalacárregui's plan, Carlos V decided to conquer Bilbao, defended by the Royal Navy and the British Auxiliary Legion. With such an important city in his power, the Prussian or Russian Tsarist banks would give him credit to win the war; one of the most important problems for Carlos was a lack of funds.

In the siege of Bilbao, Zumalacárregui was wounded in the leg by a stray bullet. The wound was not serious, he was treated by a number of doctors, famously by Petrikillo (nowadays meaning in Basque 'quack' or 'dodgy healer'). The relationship of the pretender to the throne and the commander in chief was at least distant; not only had they differed in operative strategy, but Zumalacárregui's popularity could undermine Carlos's own authority, as in the early stages of the war, the Basque general was offered the crown of Navarre and the lordship of Biscay as king of the Basques. The injury did not heal properly, and finally General Zumalacárregui died on June 25, 1835. Many historians believe the circumstances of his death were suspicious, and have noted that the general had many enemies in the Carlist court; however, to date no further light has been shed on this point.

In the European theatre, all the great powers backed the Isabeline army, as many British observers wrote in their reports. Meanwhile, in the east, Carlist general Ramón Cabrera held the initiative in the war, but his forces were too few to achieve a decisive victory over the Liberal forces loyal to Madrid. In 1837, the Carlist effort culminated in the Royal Expedition, which reached the walls of Madrid, but subsequently retreated after the Battle of Aranzueque.

### Southern front

In the south, the Carlist general Miguel Gómez Damas attempted to establish a strong position there for the Carlists, and he left Ronda on November 18, 1836, entering Algeciras on November 22. But, after Gómez Damas departed from Algeciras, he was defeated by Ramón María Narváez y Campos at the Battle of Majaceite. An English commentator wrote that "it was at Majaciete that [Narváez] rescued Andalucía from the Carlist invasion by a brilliant *coup de main*, in a rapid but destructive action, which will not readily be effaced from the memory of the southern provinces."

Ramon Cabrera had collaborated with Gómez Damas in the expedition of Andalusia where, after defeating the Liberals, he occupied Córdoba and Extremadura. He was pushed out after his defeat at Villarrobledo in 1836.

### End

After the death of Zumalacárregui in 1835, the Liberals slowly regained the initiative but were not able to win the war in the Basque districts until 1839. They failed to recover the Carlist fortress of Morella and suffered a defeat at the Battle of Maella (1838).

The war effort had taken a heavy toll on Basque economy and regional public finances with a population shaken by a myriad of war related plights—human losses, poverty, disease—and tired with Carlos's own absolutist ambitions and disregard for their self-government. The moderate Jose Antonio Muñagorri negotiated as of 1838 a treaty in Madrid to put an end to war ("Peace and Fueros") leading to the Embrace of Bergara (also Vergara), ratified by Basque moderate liberals and disaffected Carlists across all the main cities and countryside.

The war in the Basque Country ended with the *Convenio de Bergara*, also known as the *Abrazo de Bergara* ("the Embrace of Vergara", *Bergara* in Basque) on 31 August 1839, between the Liberal general Baldomero Espartero, Count of Luchana and the Carlist General Rafael Maroto. Some authors have written that General Maroto was a traitor who forced Carlos to accept the peace with little focus as to the precise context in the Basque Country.

In the east, General Cabrera continued fighting, but when Espartero conquered Morella and Cabrera in Catalonia (30 May 1840), the fate of the Carlists was sealed. Espartero progressed to Berga, and by mid-July 1840 the Carlist troops had to flee to France.

### Madrid policies during the conflict

Taking the opportunity, the Cortes completely depurated themselves off of Absolutists, meaning that the remaining officials were either Progre or Moderados. However, in a gesture of appeasement, king Ferdinand decided to call into government a semi-moderado coalition led by Francisco Martínez de la Rosa y Cornejo, under whose government Javier de Burgos drafted and published a re-organization of Spain into new provinces and regions.

### 1835 Revolution and Mendizábal Government

However both the king and the Progresistas rested unsatisfied with the government. Torrijos, who had been president of the council since the Gibraltarada, was opposed to the measures of Martínez de la Rosa. Thus, they started to instigate the general population to revolt against the Cortes like htey did back in 1808. Soon enough a Cholera epidemic broke out in Madrid that made the general public (already uneasy about the general economy depression and the war) riot through the streets, blaming among others the Church. This anticlericalism would fuel the Spanish relations with the Church for several years.

Thus, under José María Queipo de Llano's presidency, Mendizábal was appointed Minister of the Treasury. On 14 September he succeeded Queipo de Llano, keeping the Treasury portfolio during a delicate economic situation due to the Traditionalists War's military expenses. Fernando VIII thought a liberal prime minister would hold the rebellions. Mendizábal's political program included the *Desamortización Eclesiástica*("Ecclesiastical Confiscations of Mendizábal"), the immediate end to the Traditionalist war and the elimination of the public debt.

The Liberal movement, Fernando and Mendizábal were supported by the new owners of the confiscated properties, though the measures only benefited the big land tycoons. The impossibility of ending the Traditionalist revolts forced Mendizábal's resignation in 1836. Mendizábal was later appointed Minister of Finance and a series of revolutionary measures were taken: the abolition of titles and *señoríos*, freedom of the press, confiscation of the Church properties). In 1837 a more moderate government was elected. Mendizábal was again appointed Minister of Finance in 1843 but had to go in exile again when the moderates came back to power.

The “Desamortizaciones” would sever relations with the Holy See as most of the confiscated properties were part of the Church and thusly their power was severely diminished. However this first official Progresista government had a major flaw in their policies. The desamortizaciones would create a new land owning elite that whilst dynastically aligned with Ferdinand, would still ideologically be moderated. That same year, in 1837, 27 year old Fernando would marry 21 year old Archduchess Maria Theresa of Austria-Teschen who belonged to a prestigious yet conservative branch of the already famously conservative Hasburg Empire.

## Changing governments and the King’s death 1837-1842

However, popular demand eventually led to new elections which were born yet-again by the Moderados. Although the king had the power to overule the government and call into another Progresista one, he was adviced mainly by his mother not to do so as it would paradoxically give ammunition to the absolutist cause. As such, succeeding Espartero, Eusebio Bajarí Azara became the first in a series of Moderado Prime Ministers to take over the ruling of the country. Ministers would try to help with the Treasury but unfortunately none would be able to placate the exorbitant public debt.

Pérez de Castro (38-40) would go behind the monarch’s back and authorize a new election law that would affect the size of the electoral districts in a move that would favour the Moderados, and with the support of Queen Mother Maria Amalia. This move would prove too much again for the Progresistas and the king would once again call off the government and after a couple of failed compromise ministries would finally call on the Progresista national heroe Baldomero Espartero to govern.

### Espartero’s government, the coup of 1841 and the king’s death

Espartero came into power in 1840 amidst some national chaos. Furthermore, although it was initially thought that the Spanish political system would be controlled and pacified by a popular figure as Espartero, soon the Progresista party would collapse and divide itself in two different branches, the Ayacuchos (allies of Espartero himself) and the Anti-Ayacuchos. The Ayacuchos formed a small elite that was personally favoured by the Prime Minister as well as the monarch, who was vehemently in favour of Espartero whom he saw as a national heroe (some sources suggest he might have even held him as a sort of parental figure, but this is debated).

Then in 1841 Leopoldo O’Donnell instigated a popular revolt in Pamplona, keen on bringing down Espartero. The coup would diver from there and some espadones thought that the appropiate course of actions would be to officially depose king Fernando (who was seen as too political) and instill the young Prince of Asturias under a Moderado regency. Under this idea they would first enter the royal palace and kidnap the young princes. Thus they entered on the night of October the 4th 1841 Diego de León and Manuel de La Concha e Irigoyen, but were aprehended. The coup was a fiasco but it loosen the grip the central government had on the general country. In Barcelona the Progresista militia took a form of its own and brought down the Fortalesa de la Ciutadella. The Republican movement grew in popularity throughout the country, specially among the lower classes, as did the worker’s movement.

Amidst all this political chaos, in July 1842, King Ferdinand was scheduled to leave for Alcalá to review part of the army which was to be sent to crush the rebellion in Barcelona. He planned to travel from the Royal Palace on 13 July 1842 to say goodbye to his family, and, for the sake of expediency, opted for an open carriage. When the horses of his carriage ran out of control at a certain point in the route, he lost his balance and fractured his skull, and, despite the best attentions of his doctors, the 31-year-old monarch died some hours later, surrounded by family members who had rushed to the scene.

There was at the time some people who thought the falling was too suspicious, and the death of the monarch definately benefitiated certain poiliticians and the like, however, the general consensus seems to be that the king unfortunately died accidentally in a very precarious moment for the Spanish monarchy. He was interred at El Escorial and was suceeded by his son, Alfonso XII.