Update 12: 1555 – 1559
1555 A Year of Change
Pietro, Mathilda and Wilhelm Verner were in Munich contemplating Europe. The narrow concerns of kings and princes divided up this vast continental unity into unnatural blocks of individual interests, while the Verners tried to see it all as a single vast canvas of their trading empire. Their goal was to move goods and money from where there was excess to where there was demand. They had to stay one step ahead of the events that shaped the political landscape. Mathilda rattled off the highlights from recent dispatches:
*Treaty of Santa Domingo, or was it San Jose, between Spain and the Mexica settled their differences.
*Christian I, the new King of France, had issued the Edict of Paris: legalized Protestantism in France; taxed, but permitted the practice of Judaism, banned Islam and supported it all with royal patronage of the arts.
*The Treaty of Lisboa brought peace to the Iberian Peninsula and attempted to divide up the New World between Genoa and Portugal.
*A rising tide of Catholic reactionary forces took hold in Western Europe and linked up with the powerful and heavy-handed Polish Inquisition. Even the papacy was lending its considerable support to the effort to make war upon the Protestant heresy.
*There was talk of a League of Protestant nations to balance the might of aggressive Catholic states. But talk was all it appeared to be.
*The Dutch war of independence continued unabated.
*Greece continued to be a festering sore in the Ottoman Empire and support for it was growing among Christian kings and the Princes of Muscovy. A *Bavarian and Greek alliance was even purported to be underway.
*The Dorias of Genoa were taking the setback to their overseas plans in stride and forging new alliances at home and abroad.
Wilhelm foresaw continued trouble in America as the rising powers of the New World competed with Europeans for land. All three Verners feared a reopening of hostilities in Germany and had alerted their captains to be ready when the hiring frenzy started. Their recent investment in the manufacture of gunpowder weapons was paying off handsomely. After lunch, the talk turned to the upcoming wedding of young Wilhelm to Viola, a great granddaughter of Andrea Doria. Viola was not well connected to Doria power centers, but did have many close associations with the traders and explorers of the large and influential family.
And war came just as they had anticipated.
North Sea coast of Germany 1555
Mikolaj Jazlowieki surveyed the wreckage that had been Bremen as it lay beneath his perch in the cathedral spire. His 10 divisions had been unexpected cargo in the holds of Portuguese merchant ships and the city quite unprepared. His troops had spent the last 10 days pacifying the heretical Protestants who dominated the city and all of western Germany for that matter. The stupid bastards hadn’t rolled over and converted or died like he had thought. They had fought back and he had no choice, but to kill them all and burn their hiding places. It’s a pity, he thought, but such was the will of God. The summer would be a long one. He would now move south to connect up with his Spanish allies moving up the Rhine from Brussels and the Knights of St. Stephen moving down the Rhine from their headquarters inside the League of Strasburg.
For Sir Hugo Berlin, Knight of the Order of St. Stephen, the ride up the Rhine had been exhilarating. The thousand knights in his two battalions raced against the other thousand knights who advanced up the eastern bank. The prize: Cologne. His troop had won by three days. The swathe of dead heretics and burned villages they left behind was wide and long. Petty nobles cowered in their castles or fled the avenging swords of the holy knights. Hesse and Nassau mustered a few divisions, but those were routed and then put to the sword when Spanish troops from Belgium closed in on their rear.
The lack of gunpowder troops was clearly a disadvantage for the Order and there was little prospect of remedying that problem any time soon. The Professional armies were all mixed Catholic and Protestant and once they were ordered to put Protestant towns to the torch, and the heretics to death, they balked. Such armies were moved to mutiny and rather than face that, their commanders abandoned the field. Without the Spanish and the Polish harquebusiers, the Knights of St. Stephen were no match for trained troops. Musket balls had sent many of their number to the arms of their Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. There were too few commoners that held the mother church as closely as the knights to raise more than a handful of infantry. Once Spain had brought the upstart Dutch to heel there would be more than enough to put the fear of God into every last Protestant heretic in all of Germany.
Outcomes:
-400 Knights of St. Stephen
-3 divs Spain
The Channel, that spring morning in 1555, was surprisingly calm and a relief to the 20 divisions huddled in the holds of numerous Spanish transports and on the decks of 17 squadrons of warships. They were enroute from Spain to the North Sea coast of the Spanish Netherlands. Captain Francisco Esperanza’s transport was at the rear of the flotilla and to his bow was a forest of masts. The chalk cliffs of Dover were barely visible to the north and east. It would be a good day for sailing.
Shortly after the troops had been fed their allotted salted fish and biscuit, thunder rumbled its way south and all work stopped as eyes turned to the north. More cannon fire rolled south and smoke was now evident. Unsure of what to do, Esperanza maintained his course with a little less sail. He hoped that by the time he reached the site of conflict, it would be over. With 17 squadrons they outnumbered the tiny rebel fleet. He was confident a strong westerly wind propelled him up the Channel. Peter “Sharpeye” had a different take on the situation. He was perched high atop the mainmast of the Mary Rose, the flagship of the English fleet that was tacking south on the same winds straight into the flank of the Spanish line. The trap was sprung as the front half of the Spanish warships passed the narrowest part of the Channel. 10 Dutch and 10 more English squadrons blocked the way east even as the westerly winds put them at a disadvantage. Their advantage quickly noted, the leading Spanish ships pushed hard to close the gap. Slightly late, but at the right spot, were the flagship and 15 more English squadrons: amidships to the Spanish line and with the weather edge. They hoped for a romp through the transports, as well as, destroying the Spanish warships.
From his vantage point Peter watched the confusion grow until it filled the horizon: bow to stern and port to starboard. Who was doing what to whom was hard to tell with all the smoke and noise, but two small Spanish ships crumbled and sank as the Mary Rose moved through the roiling turbulence and not far away a galleon blew up in a fiery display. By an hour after noon, fatigue and lack of powder and shot let the slacking winds clear the smoke and reveal the morning’s work. Clearly they had won. English flags snapped in the breeze everywhere he looked. The fleeing Spanish were making for Belgium if they could or had turned south tacking against the wind. The tally of the lost could begin. Peter shouted the names of ships he knew and could see to the deck below.
An hour after the first of the cannon fire Captain Esperanza knew things were going badly and hove to like many of the transports around him. The fighting was coming his way. Belgium was too far off and France was closed. If he had to run, it would be south and back to Spain. Within two hours Spanish ships were fleeing past and he knew it was time. They would be weeks at sea and all for naught. Poor sick soldiers.
Outcomes:
-12 sqds Spain
-10 divs Spain
-6 sqds Great Britain
-3 sqds The Netherlands
Cologne
Sir Hugo Berlin and General Mikolaj Jazlowieki met for the first time in a tavern in Cologne late in 1555. They were veterans telling war stories around a table, draped in whores who spilled out of loose dresses, drinking beer and wine as they laughed at the stupidity of Protestants now dead and rotted across western Germany. The fires of hell would burn brightly with the souls of those who had perished beneath the holy banner of the Pope and the true Church.
The collapse of the Spanish invasion renewed the hope of the Dutch nation and with great élan they marshaled new armies against the few divisions holding the southern portion of their land. Outnumbered significantly, it was retreat or accept defeat. The Spaniards fled to Belgium and its forts. As word of the horrors of the advance of the Knights of St. Stephen flooded into Belgium, the Protestants there rose up against their Spanish lords and threw them out. The Dutch, with all their differences, were at least, not Catholic reactionaries. Fort after fort, city after city fell to the surging Protestants until half the country was under Protestant and Dutch control.
“The dark, the dark, kissing in the dark…”
The butchery in Greece continued in 1555. Prince and heir Suleiman II led the Ottoman army through northern Greece. As he did so, Andreas the Greek king’s eldest nephew, was in Bavaria; Greek insurgents began guerilla warfare in Thrace and Ionia, and Prince Konstantinos led a force to isolate Athens from its local supply base. In response Suleiman swept, at the head of his army, into the Peloponnesus in pursuit of King Basil. Weeks of cat and mouse warfare followed as the Greeks struck hard to disrupt the Turkish offense and the Turks scoured the hills to catch the small harassing bands. Their fondest hope was to decapitate the movement and parade through the streets of Athens and then Istanbul with Basil’s head on a pike.
Petros and his friend Demetrius were camped on some god-forsaken and barren hillside not too far from ancient Olympus. They were on night watch above the King’s camp in the narrow ravine below. Years of war had taken it toll and they were both tired. Both had lost family, homes and work as smiths in a small town outside of Thebes. Hopes for success and then peace had risen and crashed too many times for them to be enthusiastic about the latest set of promises from Basil. Turkish gold was real and it was heavy in both their pockets. Suleiman’s sudden and persistent pressure on the King’s ragtag band had made them all a bit skittish and ready to run. The plan was simple and, Petros thought, had a real chance of success. Commotion down the ravine in an hour or so would include gunfire, albeit, by drunk soldiers shooting at pumpkins with turbans, would stir the King to ride up the ravine to escape. Where the route narrowed Petros, Demetrius and six others would be waiting. In a single blast they would bring down the king and end this fruitless war. With the gold they would live on Crete like nobles. Or so they planned.
On schedule noise and shouting turned to gunfire. The king’s tent brightened and saddled horses appeared. The gunfire continued and a person screamed “Bloody Turks!” The king mounted and with two body guards he headed up the ravine. At the last checkpoint they were challenged and the King thrust his ring into the lantern light. Musket fire, screaming men and horses filled the chilling night. Petros, Demitrius and their accomplices dropped their weapons and disappeared into the dark.
By early summer1556 the fragile Greek state had recovered. Konstantinos was now king. The assassination of his father had been a crushing blow and the nation had almost disappeared under the heavy and destructive boot of the Turk, but the king and his Doria wife rallied the nation and kept hope alive from Naples where they fled when Basil died. Then they struck back. Andreas with his Bavarian allies and help from Muscovy invaded a lightly defended and very surprised Trebizond. In an effort to be coordinated, about the same time, 10 Russian divisions broke out of their lightly guarded enclave in Bulgaria and struck west to Sofia. Like screaming Nazghul racing towards Mt. Doom, Suleiman II and his army fled Greece for Istanbul. The Russians were checked in a battle at the edge of Sofia and lack of troops on both side ended the affair. Suleiman I raise d new troops to contain the Trebizond incursion and successfully did so.
King Konstantinos used the diversion to re-establish his control over a much reduced population in the Peloponnesus. Bavarian crusaders for St. Michael raided the northwest corner of the Ottoman Empire for plunder and created substantial unrest. Many of the crusaders continued on to join the Greek effort. In a further effort to aid the Greek cause, Genoa relinquished one of her Vespuccica trading posts to the young nation.
Outcomes
-6 divisions Ottomans
-5 divisions Muscovy
Ayutthaya City
In the Archives of Khmer a wizened scribe was hunched over fresh paper as the morning sunlight added a warm glow to the room. Dispatches, notes, scrolls and bits of paper with writing were scattered across the oversized table. He grumbles under his breadth as he goes through the various piles.
Nobody ever sorts these things before giving them to me. They just show up in a heap. He picks up a complicated looking document and gives it a read:
“Grant the Spanish and Genoese most favored Europeans trading status with the right to permanently live in the Khmer Empire and better access to the Empire’s many colonies and trade posts. They are also granted the permission to conduct their own private religious services with Catholicism recognized by the Emperor as one of the protected religions along with Buddhism (all sects), Taoism, Confucianism, Islam (all sects) and other tribal religions.” Religion or diplomacy? After a few minutes of additional reading he decided Religion and moved on to the next.
“The Portuguese, noting the Emperor’s father, King Naityu’s decrees against them and to respect filial piety, will not be granted any of the rights granted to the Spanish and Genoese and will be severely restricted and penalized in their movement.” Hmmm…diplomacy seems to best for this one. Onto the shelf behind him it went.
“Map exchange with Spain…Khmer acquires West coast of Africa, East coast of Vespuccica and West Coast of Vespuccica and gives up Indonesia & Philippines, China & Japan and Australia & New Zealand”. Clearly, he thought that would be cartography. And guessed the purchase of the Bengali trading post in Sumatra would be that also. Or maybe colonies would be better. He glanced up at a high shelf and pondered, then decided for colonies.
The next document told the Japanese to stay out of Khmerian waters and possessions in ANZ. Even after maps of that same region was given to Spain? Huh? What’s the logic in that? He would never understand the diplomats and this was surely diplomacy. Onto the shelf.
And now even more colony stuff: settlers to Cebu and Suan. Ho Hum, more of the same week after week. When would he get something new an interesting to read? After a few more minutes of sorting, Prince Ramesuan dispatches from Pegu turned out to be just the ticket. The thick sheaf of papers took him over an hour to read and detailed all the glorious campaigns of the Khmer army as it conquered the Irrawaddy valley from Pegu City to Mandalay and Manipur. He had soldiered in his younger days and fondly remembered the battles around Malacca. The new gunpowder warfare seemed so exciting and different than his day. He hoped that a grand parade would be held and the Prince would march at the head of his victorious army. Reminiscing filled much of his afternoon. He was stirred from these meditations by a young boy who bounded into the archives with more enthusiasm than anyone should have. He practically shouted the news that Captain Adnan was on his way from the coast and a royal summons was in the works. Now that was news! The ancient scribe mustered a smile as he slowly straightened and rose from his chair.
“Pats back in order to look for a knife stuck in it” --The Strategos
Soco listened quietly to the reports. Most were uninteresting and typical of what he heard most days. A few needed his attention. New Valencia was building strength and discussions with the Aztecs had led to some expectation of joint naval maneuvers and training to help offset the advantages clearly shown by Spain. Both were good signs and runners were soon leaving the small unobtrusive palace.
Two weeks later…
Five divisions of veterans under Alejandro Ninfor, and in Spanish hire, advanced into the dense oak and hickory forests that marked the border of New Valencia and Calusa. The road was little more than a wide path that crossed the cleared European looking fields of New Valencia and disappeared into the thick virgin forests that dominated the landscape this far from the coast. There was no real anticipation of surprise since there was only one road through the forest and the locals used it every day as they brought such goods as they had into the Spanish lands to barter. The Spanish target was a medium sized town about 20 miles in. It had an 8 foot palisade of oak logs and was surrounded by corn fields flat enough for maneuvers and good gun emplacement. This would be the forward base for future operations in the attack. While the city would clearly be alerted to their coming, the Spanish did not expect that two days would give them sufficient time to mount any real defense. The first days march brought them into striking distance of their goal and sentries were thick about the camp perimeter.
The attack came as the troops were eating breakfast over smoking fires and it came from the west. There was no forming up or neat lines of battle just musket fire from the way they had come. And then as skilled sergeants hastily organized to respond to the muskets, a flood of hatchet wielding mad men poured from the underbrush and overwhelmed the northern flank with screaming fury. The core of the camp, under Alejandro’s direct supervision, brought order to the chaos and much sought refuge for those fleeing the outer camp. Desperation grew though, as gunfire and melee attacks erupted along Alejandro’s only exit paths. To remain was certainly to be overrun, if not by the enemy, by his own increasingly panicky troops. Blinded by the forest and without any intelligence on the size of the Calusan army, he ordered his now surrounded army to move west in hopes of breaking through and then making a run for new Valencia. Had he know that he was outnumbered four to one he might have taken a less valiant path. Resistance was a bad choice. There was no end to the fury and waves of attackers. Gunfire and trees created gaps in the Spanish lines and those were quickly filled with determined soldiers who gave no quarter. After two hours the urgency of escape became full fledged panic and what was left of Alejandro’s five divisions dissolved into a bloody morass of dead and dying.
Outcomes
-5 divs Spain
-6 divs Calusa
The joint Aztec Calusan naval exercises didn’t turn out as either party expected. Soco wasn’t about to let the Aztecs burn his navy while at sea and the Aztecs never let their ships accidentally get cornered without ample sea room for maneuver or escape. Otherwise the joint naval activities went well even if little was actually accomplished. About the time that Captain Alejandro Ninfor marched into the forests of western Calusa, the two navies parted ways avoiding what could have been a cause for war had that been on either nation’s mind.
The Calusa were a paranoid people and ever since the Spanish had tried to force them into submission, they had vowed to be ever vigilant in the matters of protecting their homeland. It was always guarded with multiple layers of defensive strategies. The first being the mangrove swamps and saw grass of the everglades. What the Calusa took for granted and knew like the streets of home was a vast wetland maze filled with stinging insects, alligators and hidden dangers to those that ventured there without guides.
The invasion that was to strike at the Calusa capital from the south was well planned. The dry season minimized the soggy terrain and risks of having to resort to melee rather than gunpowder warfare as they approached the city. The landings were well organized and took place at the best sites to allow the army to get inland and out of the mangroves quickly. But all the planning in the world could not offset the paranoid diligence of the Calusa.
Thirty Aztec divisions landed without opposition two days march south of the suburbs of the Calusan capital, but as soon as they began to move inland, trouble began. The battle to move off the beaches and out of the mangroves were hand to hand and stretched for five miles down the coast as each side kept trying to gain leverage on the other. All of the fine training with guns and in European formations was useless amid the unkempt and wild lands of the south Florida coast. Both side reverted to the old ways, but with steel rather than stone edges.
The second prong of the Aztec invasion sailed into the harbor of Soco’s home and refuge within a few days of the landings. 10 divisions and a dozen squadrons was more than just a show of Aztec strength. Twenty defending squadrons scrambled to meet the challenge, but took a beating as they did so. The Calusan boats were of their own design and built for maneuvering in the shallow waters of the Florida coast. Once at sea they effectively put the Aztecs at a disadvantage. Two battles developed in those early morning hours. At sea the Aztecs lost the battle to contain the more numerous Calusan fleet and keep it from putting to sea. On land the assault on the harbor’s fort went well and by the time that the warships had settled into pounding each other at close range, the fort fell.
By noon the Aztecs knew that fate of 40 divisions hung on the battle between warships and they were outnumbered, even if not out gunned. Calusan loses had reduced the odds to two to one against the Mexica, but the fast Calusan ships could easily get behind the less maneuverable galleon of the Aztecs to cause terrible damage. It was not to the commander’s liking. If he lost at sea, the fort would fall and then the troops struggling to the south would be isolated and destroyed. He would cut his losses. Two divisions would be sacrificed to hold the fort and use its guns to bombard the city. The rest would be withdrawn, and with the fleet, head south to pick up the invasion army and sail to Cuba. Had he known that Calusan runners were already on their way to the north and west to bring another 15 divisions back to the capital, he would have been more pleased with his decision.
Outcomes:
-6 sqds Aztecs
-12 divs Aztecs
-10 sqds Calusa
-10 divs Calusa
The Mandate of Heaven slips a bit
Suon Sok had been creating great concern off the south coast of China for some weeks. His war junk had become the terror of the seas as it took prize after prize without any apparent effort. Sok wasn’t greedy and once his hold was full he planned on moving south sell his goods in some out of the way Khmerian port or perhaps make the run to India and even higher prices. The cargo would keep him lavishly for many months, but the news gleaned from a Captain Wong of the Chinese navy might be far more useful. Rebellion was afoot across the Ming Empire; the far northeast was in full uprising as local lords pushed the inattentive Han overlords out on their ears. In 1557 household maids attempted to assassinate the Emperor Zhu Houzong. He was saved by his wife, but it was sufficient for the ambitious to declare the he had lost the mandate of Heaven. Along the southeast coast two generals had declared themselves free of the imperial harness and rallied around a vaguely-connected-to-the-Emperor’s-line youth who declared himself the new emperor. Armies were on the move.
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum…”
Captain Morgan sat at a wobbly table on the glistening coral sands, under clear skies and looked out over the clear turquoise waters. His fellow captains (Kilpatrick, Chambrun, and Akkerman0 were with him. The years had been good for them and their small fleet. Good winds and luck had netted them 5,000 gold doubloons (about 1 EP) that would not see the coffers of the Portuguese King. The captains rarely all came together, but it was time to decide how to recruit from the many would be pirates who made it clear they would join if allowed. As many as 7 new ships could be outfitted.
They all preferred the warm waters of the Carib Sea to the colder climes of Croatan, but did remember fondly when a Kalmar expedition stumbled upon them in the quiet sounds of eastern America. The Nordics were more surprised and failed to respond quickly enough. Their intrepid explorers were reduced to corpses floating amid the charred wreckage of their ships. But that was then. The booty of the Main was there for the taking. It was a glorious morning.
Meroe, Among the Pyramids of Nubia
Paul Hanson looked like any one of the other hundred Europeans hanging out on the edges of the coronation. Menas of Ethiopia was being crowned King of Kings for the Nubian chiefdoms. The ceremony was extravagant for such a dusty outpost, but it impressed the locals who paid sincere homage to their new king. When the week-long display of Ethiopian power and glory ended Paul retired to a hired boat and prepared for the trip down river to Egypt. His months in cool mountain air of Addis Abba had been most pleasant and he did not look forward the heat of Egypt, but it was from there that he could send his dispatches to Mathilda Verner in Venice.
He was preparing two copies that would each travel a different route. What Menas had achieved in a few short years was impressive and a bit frightening. Trade was increasing and things like coffee growing in importance to folks like him. But what moved from Europe to Ethiopia was even more interesting: know-how, weapons, and engineering. Internal security seemed to be tightening especially towards Egyptians coming up the Nile. Rumors of a new and quite skilled “secret police” were everywhere and made him very nervous. He was glad to be leaving. Two days later and three days before he set off down the Nile, a Venetian trader stopped him on the street. Had he heard? An Embassy was being arranged. The most impressive personages of the Emperors court would be going to Europe to establish relations with the crowned heads of Christendom. They would depart from Massawa and sail to Suez, cross the isthmus and then sail on to Venice and points beyond. Now this was news and worth carrying in person. Once he had gathered the details he would make haste to leave for Europe ahead of the delegation and be first to bring the news to Venice. There was much to be done.
Previously on Survivor…
Suon Sok was on the deck of the Jayavarman with Captain Adnan of the Royal Khmer Navy. The seas were calm and they were enjoying tea and fruit in the afternoon sun. They were 500 leagues north of Koa Nafa. Three weather beaten and broken ships lay off the starboard bow. Ships that were now crawling with Suon’s crew as they made repairs and tried to bring them back to seaworthiness. The two captains talked and Adnan told of his adventures far across the eastern ocean. The scores of balmy islands and endless tracks rolling swells made actual mapping difficult, but the winds and currents were charted as best they could. Weeks of sailing had not brought them to land of any size larger than a small island before they had had to turn back because of dwindling supplies. In most regards the journey had gone well, at least until, a typhoon caught them. There was nowhere to run and after three days of terrible battering much of the fleet had simply vanished. Even the giant junks of the Elephant Throne were not immune to boiling seas and raging winds. Within two days the Captain Adnan’s small flotilla was sufficiently seaworthy to make the trip to Cebu or the Spice Islands and thence to Malacca. After three days of sailing together, Sok and the Jayavarman parted company with Adnan and turned north. If the rumors of trouble in China were true, it would mean easy pickings. As the green sails of the Khmer ships disappeared over the horizon, Suon Sok mused over the idea of a long voyage to the east.
Outcomes:
VoD SP (South Pacific) Khmer
