The Dominion's Dilemma: The United States of British America (2 page)

    As Governor-General, Jeff Davis had almost single-handedly talked Her Majesty’s Government into that second Mexican adventure. Basically by assuring London that the Royal Army, still reeling from the Indian Mutiny and already caught up in the Second Opium War in China, wouldn’t be needed to throw the French and their puppet emperor, Maximilan of Austria, out of Mexico.

   The hardcore anti-war Whigs had accused Davis of being “disingenuous, hypocritical and cynical” by arguing that the Dominion had experience fighting wars without the RA’s help.
Considering
that Davis fought on the losing side in that bloody, futile gamble by old Calhoun, Polk, Taylor and some others to make the
South an independent Dominion
…
or maybe an independent country,
thought
Colonel Wilder,
I could see some validity in the Whig argument
.
Since the whole point
of the damn
rebellion had been to hold on to the South's “peculiar institution." Slavery, to be more precise.

     Of course, Davis hadn’t been alone: Lee and Johnston had also served the so-called “Confederate States of America.” And they might have gotten away with it, if not for "Old Fuss and Feathers”: Winfield Scott, the greatest general in Dominion history.

    
Of course,
time heals all wounds…that and prosperity
.  The dawning of the mechanized age had made the South, or at least the white South, prosperous again by 1845.  The former slaves, however, were a different story: their condition continued to be the Dominion’s gravest problem…as well as its biggest embarrassment…

    The Southerners had gradually worked their way back to positions of authority, due, chiefly, to the First Mexican War.  And to General Scott. Wilder's old boss had argued successfuly for the inclusion of former Rebel officers in the USBA forces organizing to battle Santa Anna. Their successes, including Lee's as chief engineer of Scott's own campaign to capture Mexico City, had led to their regaining influence in Dominion military and political affairs. Colonel Lee, for instance, went from Mexico City to The Point as superintendent, before going west to fight Comachees. Eventually, in 1862, he had been promoted to lead the USBA Army's second conquest of Mexico. 

    Now former Rebs were spread out throught the Army and the government. Davis' victory in the '60 election had seemed, to many, the symbolic, formal reuniting of the Dominion. 

    The “honorary” pallbearers formed up now and followed the Lees across campus to the chapel. Mary Lee---
after all these years she still hasn’t forgiven me;  blames me personally for the loss of Arlington House back then
---riding behind in a carriage. Open, despite the cold, nasty late October western Virginia weather, with her daughters, Mary, Mildred and Agnes. The procession quickly picked up other mourners along the way, so that the line snaked back virtually to the Lee home by the time the coffin finally reached the chapel.

    There was a pause before entering and the Lee boys gratefully lowered the casket. Which, to Tom's relief at least, was covered solely by the Stars and Stripes of the United States of British America.
Not that the old Rebel Stars and Bars aren’t visible damn near everyplace else…

    Word came down that the cause of the delay was Sam Grant---Ulysses Simpson Grant himself---17
^th
Governor-General of the USBA. The G-G's train had finally arrived at Lexington Station. He would be appearing any minute.  That Grant, who 10 years prior was clerking in his father’s Galena, Ill. dry goods store, was G-G was something most people still found difficult to believe.

     But Sam had been asked to organize and command a regiment of Illinois volunteers to fight the French-backed Royalists in Mexico, based on his service in the First Mexican War.
And
off he went, like one of those rockets whose red glare Francis Scott Key described so poetically in the Dominion anthem. The ones that illuminated Fort McHenry when a Frog fleet bombarded it back during the Napoleonic wars.

     Grant moved quickly up the chain of command in the northern theatre along the Rio Grande. And there won everlasting fame for defeating a significantly larger Franco-Royalist army at Ciudad Aquna, across from the dusty Texas town of Del Rio. This, while Lee was simultaneously replicating Scott’s march to Mexico City.

     The Whigs, who had restored their party’s original name, “Republican,” in the patriotic hoopla that followed the new war's outbreak, nominated William Seward of New York to run against Davis in ’64, while the war still raged.  The mendacious Davis' insistence on personally overseeing all aspects of government, including the war, had left him the most reviled man in Georgetown---and the Dominion---by election day. Looking to balance the ticket with a Westerner, who also happened to be a war hero, the Republicans plucked Grant from the Army to run for Vice G-G.

   
No one, of course, thought Seward would have the bad manners to die late in his term, leaving Sam in charge…

   Official mouners and the public alike began shivering as the wind grew stronger, the clouds darkened and the wait lengthened. Grumbling at the delay, Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman, Grant’s No. 2 in Mexico and now commander of the USBA Army, marched over to Wilder.

    “Colonel Wilder, sir!”
I haven’t put on a uniform since shortly after the end of the Rebellion.
But people insist on using my
military title.
Hell, if it makes them happy…

     “Quite a turnout, right Colonel? Looks like the whole South is here.” Sherman looked at Tom shrewdly. “But you, Sam and I seem to make up the majority of the Northern contingent. Once Sam gets here, of course…” The laugh came from deep down Sherman’s throat and the red head shook with the effort.

    “Good to see you, Cump.” Wilder had known Sherman forever, or at least since the General's step-father, former G-G Ewing, brought Cump and his brother John to Georgetown in the late ‘30s. Before Cump, too, disappeared into The Long Gray Line…

     “How’s things on the Plains?” Cump’s major duty was protecting the settlers, miners, ranchers, trappers and various persons of lesser repute from the increasingly angry Indians.
Who have the audacity to think a treaty with the USBA is worth more than the scrap of paper they had made their mark on...

      “Damn tough, Colonel.” Sherman took off his uniform hat and wiped his brow, which, despite the chilly weather, looked remarkably moist.  “The Plains Indians are the best light cavalry in the world. We have our hands full. And these damn miners and wagon masters! They sneak on or across Indian land. Some make it, some don’t. But it’s the Army’s fault if we don’t protect them all!” The high cheek-boned face was now almost as red as the hair.
Or those fearsome Sioux the newspapers keep screaming about
.

     “Well General, we’ve had problems with the Indians, particularly the Sioux, ever since my day. In fact, the Rebellion might have been over a lot sooner if General Scott hadn’t been forced to detail so many troops out west…”

     “Didn’t know you’d been out that way, Colonel…”

      “Wasn’t, really. Did spend time in Arkansas Territory. But then I came back East as General Scott’s so-called ‘intelligence aide.’ Saw the whole damn Rebellion unfold.”

     Tom looked up at the dreary sky. Rain, or maybe sleet, was beginning to fall.

     “Right from the day the General found out that the Royal Navy had turned the Atlantic Squadron's most powerful fighting ship into a mail packet…”

___________

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

June 17, 1776:

    “I don’t care what agreements Franklin has worked out with Burke, Pitt or any of the King’s other puppets.”  John Adams was roaring, his words rattling off the ceiling of Carpenter’s Hall and bouncing back into the open galley housing the daily session of the Continental Congress. “We’ve come too far to back down one inch. To do so now would convince London that we’re not united, not serious about self-government and not capable of implementing our words with deeds.
    “To accept this compromise would place ourselves forever at the mercy of the King, the Prime Minister and Parliament. We’ve gone beyond that. They’re 3000 miles away. It is time for these united colonies to become united states!”
    Edward Rutledge of South Carolina looked around at his fellow delegates from 13 diverse colonies: from Samuel Chase of Virginia to John Jay of New York to Pennsylvania’s John Dickinson. Some were Southerners to whom maintaining their own ‘peculiar institution’ was as important as possible independence. Some were radicals like the Adams cousins. Others were moderates like Maryland’s Charles Carroll. Still others were as conservative as Dickinson.
    As he finished counting heads, Rutledge shook his own.  “You don’t have the votes, my Massachusetts friends. This Congress wants self-government, free trade and a say in the imposition of taxation. A few skirmishes don’t make a war. Who’s to say Washington can defeat entire British armies…to say nothing of their overwhelming naval support? No, this compromise proposal Franklin has received from London is a Godsend. Let’s approve this ‘Colonial Compact’ and end this turmoil and divisiveness before more blood is needlessly shed!”
    There was a general murmur of agreement in the well of the Congress.  Hearing and accepting it, John Adams knew that his final plea for a declaration of independence from the British Empire had failed.  “Though I am firm in my belief that the King and his government think of us as little more than ignorant colonials...The Almighty’s---and this Congress’---wills be done.

    “I pray future correspondence and communication with London will bring the peace, stability and justice this correspondence promises. Though I doubt such a thing is…”
   Rutledge smiled. “Now John, don’t take it all back.”
     But for 56 years, much to the amazement of Adams, his contemporaries and later Americans, the Colonial Compact had provided precisely the peace and stability British America craved.

  Then...   

___________

London, England

January 4, 1833:

   The icy rain which had been pelting central London when Harry Bratton’s carriage left the Colonial Office had changed to snow by the time he arrived at the remote dock chosen by the Admiralty to receive
HMS Irresistible
at the conclusion of its record-setting 19-plus day run from Baltimore.
  
You’d
think the bloody Royal Navy would
schedule these things for a more civilized
hour
, Bratton thought as he stepped from the carriage.
Two o’clock in the morning is no
time
to be waiting
for a damn ship to
show up from British America, no matter how
important the
dispatches it is carrying.
And why did His Lordship insist that I come down
here
in the
middle of
this miserable January night to take possession? Surely the Colonial
Office could wait until 8 a.m. to see if Andrew Jackson has won the plebiscite for a second term as British America’s Governor-General! Or if this chap Clay has
unseated him in the non-binding popular vote.
(Not that any plebiscite winner had ever been denied appointment by the King under the system hammered out by Edmund Burke and Franklin fifty years before.)
  
No,
thought Bratton as he pulled his cloak tightly around his neck,
Earl Goderich not
only wants the results immediately, but has convened some sort of meeting for 5 a.m.--five o’clock in the bloody morning!--to review them
. Bratton shook his head, as much in wonderment as to dislodge the snow that was now blowing horizontally and sticking to his face below the protection available from his hat’s brim. As he peered down the dock towards the River, he began to make out a lamp and the vague outline of a figure holding it.  Captain James Akkridge of the Admiralty, no doubt.
I wonder how long he’s been
standing out there in this atrocious weather? Well, that’s the Royal Navy for you. Chaps don’t know when to come in out of the rain…or in this case, snow.
    Apparently hearing the approaching footsteps, Captain Akkridge turned suddenly toward him. “Ah, Harry, good of you to come. Can’t make out the
Irresistible
yet, but she’s bound to be close. Shouldn’t be much longer.”
     “Careful how quickly you move about there, James, or they’ll be fishing your frozen corpse out of the Thames at first light. This dock is getting somewhat slippery.” As Bratton got closer, he could see that Akkridge was holding a large lantern in his gloved right hand. “Is that to guide the
Irresistible
in, James? I’d think they’d have some better navigational aids on the Thames than that.”
      “Heavens no, old chap. Simply to provide us some light. So what is this all about, eh, Harry? My orders were simply to meet you here, see you were handed over a dispatch from the colonies and then conduct
HMS Irresistible’s
captain immediately to the Admiralty. Strange bit of work, don’t you think?”
       Bratton smiled into his cloak as he fought off a shiver. “Don’t know myself what’s in the dispatch box, Captain Akkridge,” he blandly lied. “I’m only the postman, you see. And I’d be careful how you refer to the semi-autonomous, self-governing dominion formally named the United States of British America, if I were you. Quincy Adams and the rest of the British American delegates to Parliament will have you assigned to a very different sort of colony---Australia, perhaps---if they hear you refer to their native shore like that!”
      Akkridge snorted as the outline of the frigate, one of the first of the new screw-designs, began to emerge through the snow and fog. “Yes and isn’t that the damnedest thing? Half of Britain had no real representation in Parliament until last year and here these damn colonials have, what, 23 or 24 delegates now? No wonder the resentment and calls for Parliamentary reform kept growing. Harry, without reform there would have been blood in the streets within months!”
    
James Akkridge has to be the most liberal Royal Naval officer I’ve ever met,
Bratton thought. He could now see the bulk of the
Irresistible
as it closed the dock. “I’ll leave reform to the politicians…and public safety to the Home Office. I’ve got enough to handle at the Colonial Office as it is.”
      “There, you’ve proven my point,” Akkridge said with a laugh. “If British America isn’t a colony, why is its administration overseen from the War & Colonial Office? Come, old chap, tell me how I’m wrong.”