Feb 1717 Gloire du Roi has shown up and for non players of G7 here are the highlights.
1) As is traditional with G7 reports – no Russian Naval losses to report. This month winner of the Czar’s “I sink ships” award goes to Spain mostly due to losses in African and West Indies waters. French Corsairs more likely to blame than Sea Monsters, Storms, Insurance fraud by the captains and other perils of the sea.
2) In news also vaguely linked to French Corsairs. In Dublin Lord Balmerino has summoned the Irish Parliament to meet in the Catholic Cathedral rather than the Parliament building saying that the Parliament building was destroyed in a Spanish attack in 1706. Which is odd since the Spanish attack was purely on French Corsair ships in the port of Dublin and the Parliament building has been standing undamaged for at least ten years after the engagement which sunk Rene Trunin and his pirate fleet. Delayed reaction to an over-shot perhaps?
3) In London King James awarded titles to the English Naval Commanders who managed to finally get out of being stuck in the ice and sail into Danzig with grain and a small Army to show his support for the current King of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.
4) King James and his government are also trying to set up a peace conference in London to settle the final division of the Polish Lithuanian Commonwealth.
- Poland will be represented by Ambassador Polanski who I assume wants to keep the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth as intact as possible.
- Prussia which claims West or Royal Prussia including the Port of Danzig will be represented by Baron Otto von Manteuffel. This claim is believed to have taken a few dents due to Prussian defeats in Royal Poland.
- The Kulmar Union which wants the Protestants of the Courland to join the Proteantant Union of the North and be freed from the Catholic-Orthodox Commonwealth is actually being represented by the Russian envoy Yuri Ushakov.
- Yuri Ushakov has also been tasked by the Czar to end what the Czar views as the domination of Orthodox Lithuania and the mostly Orthodox Western Ukraine by the Catholic Kingdom of Poland and unite these areas back into Holy Mother Russia under the benign rule of its loveable, pious and friendly Czar. As this means the end of the Commonwealth and the loss to the Crown of Poland of half of its territory this is not popular with the Poles and with Catholic and Unitarian Nobles in Lithuania and the Ukraine or with Muslims. Probably even vaguely Orthodox Cossacks on the West Bank prefer distant and light rule from Warsaw to rule by the Czars hard men in Kiev.
- As for Austria it seems to be being represented by a Goat !? Its not 100% sure what the Goat is tasked to do since Austrian troops entered southern Poland to protect the Catholic Kingdom of Poland and its population from Cossack raiders and also help restore the Elector of Saxony to his Catholic Kingdom. News then arrived that Augustus of Saxony the former Catholic King of Poland had converted back to being a Protestant…..this guy changes religion as often as Goldolphin turns his coat…..and was no longer a suitable King of Poland in the eyes of Vienna and Rome. Then came news that the French had invaded the Holy Roman Empire and held captive Princes of the Holy Roman Empire including the one engaged to the Emperor eldest daughter (and heiress of Austria). At which point Vienna lost interest in the Commonwealth and Austrian troops in Krakow seem to have done nothing but drink coffee and train a local defence force. So I assume the Goat is left chewing the cud unless Augustus of Saxony or his son decides he wants to become a Catholic again and also wants his old Throne back.
5) In rather better news for Hapsburg diplomatic and wedding policy its has been announced that the Infante (Crown Prince) of Portugal is to marry the Princess Maria Amalia Von Hapsburg who is the second daughter of the Holy Roman Emperor and as important for Portugal’s trade and security the niece of Charles Von Hapsburg King of Spain etc.
Since King John V of Portugal is due to take as a 3rd or perhaps 4th wife (sorry lost count) a Scots Duchess it seems that Portugal is trying to keep both Spain and France happy by marriage links to both sides closest allies.
The Hapsburg House of Austria now just need to free bridegroom of the heiress of Austria from French captivity and then find x4 other suitable matches over the next decade and all will be well with the world according to Vienna and Madrid.
6) Lot of letters and “calls to the faithful” are in circulation attacking King James for trying to turn England, Ireland, Wales, Scotland and the American colonies Catholic and calling him lots of nasty names and demanding the overthrow of the “usurper” and the placement of the Good Queen Anne on the throne.
7) Kulmar Union diplomats seem active in the UDP while after some confusion the Kulmar Union security service seem to have finally decided that the Danish Royal Court has been the target of an attempt to infiltrate and murder the Princess Anne Stuart (Protestant heir to the thrones of England, Scotland and Ireland – known to some as “Good Queen Anne). Seems that the Jacobites are getting the blame but the truth or otherwise of these charges is unknown.
But probably reasonable to believe that a lot of propaganda and other dark arts going on between the Jacobites and the Baltic Powers and probably Persia. So unlike the open honourable struggle being waged between France and the Hapsburgs.
Not a lot to report from the Franco-Hapsburg battlefronts as both sides basically in winter quarters and waiting for the ground to dry but can report that a) Moldavian Cavalry in Spanish service have raided into Artois to show the flag in French occupied Hapsburg lands, burn barges and generally attack Villiars supply lines b) Spanish siege Mortars have continued to pound the former Spanish now French Fortress City of Perpignan and c) Austrian river warships classed as corvettes are patrolling the Rhine to enforce the Imperial Trade Ban on the French and have been joined by Flanders ketches reported in the paper as being French. Which went down really well in Brussels !! Almost as bad as Nottingham based papers calling the French occupied Flanders territory of Artois – Aquitaine.
9) In the Anglo-French Naval war against the Shah of Persia also not a lot to report. The Pope has given a sword to the English Admiral to carry against the Shia Muslim Ghazi – just how happy is the Royal Navy and Protestant English in general to find out that they are now on a Catholic Crusade to help the free French sailors from Persian captivity? This following King James taking Spanish Gold to fund Catholic Schools not only for the Catholic Irish but everyone else as well.
Meanwhile the Persians are mounting a blockade of the English Naval base on Socotra Island. This Island is very dry with limited water and limited food supplies especially if its fishing boats can not get too sea. Indeed lack of water and supplies was why Portugal abandoned the Island as a base in the historic past. So question now seems to be can Persians hold blockade in place for long enough so the enlarged garrison runs out of food and water and is forced to surrender. Or will the English be able to mount a relief effort and bring in food and fresh water?
10) Meanwhile on the battlefields of the Polish Commonwealth:-
- Austrians taking coffee and cake with Archbishop Brinsky and the Chief Rabbi of Krakow.
- Swedes resting in Courland and relieved to find that an outbreak of disease in their 3rd Army has now ended. It is assumed that once its a bit warmer they will advance to join up with their Prussian allies in East Prussia.
- Defeated Prussian armies are limping back towards Berlin and East Prussia from Warsaw and Danzig. Ambassador Harley of England urged his Polish allies to pursue and finish off the Prussian forces but both General Pletov in Warsaw and the Polish and English commanders in Danzig declined to launch a pursuit allowing the Prussians to get away. While King Stanislaw Leszczynski troops were happy to celebrate their part victory over the Prussians by mocking and insulting the envoy of the Russian Czar.
Hate to say it but Harley was 100% correct and the Polish Generals are idiots for letting the Prussians escape. Or perhaps they have been bribed since after initial action against Russian trade caravans the 200 Squadrons of the Polish Cossacks who would have been the perfect troops to ride the Prussian retreat into a red ruin have gone missing from the battlefield.
- The true extent of the Polish error and why Harley was right about not allowing a defeated foe to get off the ropes along with why its unwise to insult the envoys of the Czar came clear shortly afterwards when news arrived from Minsk. Were after five months of fighting which killed his Field Hetman – Gand Hetman Janus Radziwill and the whole Army of Lithuania (50 F 30 H 100 FC) burnt their regimental flags and made an unconditional surrender to the generals of the Czar.
Its not clear if the Lithuanians had eat all their horses and supplies and were starved into surrender. Or as King Stanislaw just feasted and rested in Warsaw they just gave up on any hope of relief.
11) To celebrate his victory the Czar from his field HQ in Polock to the north of Minsk celebrated his victory by arranging for the refurbishment of the Orthodox Cathedral of the Holy Spirit in Minsk and the Bernadine Monastery in Minsk.
He also questioned if the English are now going to declare war on every Nation which has a slave trade including the Ottomans and themselves and declared that the Russian trade in Tobacco is to be limited to Russian registered merchants only. So it would seem that while Russia is open to all types of tobacco including Spanish and Ottoman tobacco the actual distribution and supply in Russia itself is limited to Russian registered merchants.
12) Other stuff reported included various Persians getting rewarded for their efforts in the Holy War against the French and Russian colonial types doing Russian colonial type things like drinking tea, drinking coffee, holding banquets with speeches and trying to meet the Governor of Fort Prudhomme only to find he is still back in France.