1636: The Saxon Uprising — Snippet 59
“At least a week, would be my estimate. He’ll want to assemble a large fleet of barges before he comes down the river toward Regensburg.” Heinrich smiled, in that thin and humorless way he had. “No easy task, squeezing barges out of Danube rivermen. They’ll hide them in places you’d never think of — burn them, sometimes, rather than give them up.”
“That should give you –”
“I’ll have the division in Regensburg long before then. We’ll hold the city, Mr. President, never fear. How long it will take to recover Ingolstadt, on the other hand…” He shrugged again. “I would say that mainly depends on how the political situation here in the USE resolves itself.”
“Yes, you’re right. If all goes well –”
“The emperor recovers, Oxenstierna hangs, Wettin hangs — ask me if I care the swine got himself arrested — every other stinking traitor in Berlin hangs, we catch the traitors who sold out Ingolstadt — disembowel those bastards, hanging’s too good for them — proper order is restored, the Prince of Germany is back in power where he belongs, and Maximilian is food for stray mongrels in the streets of Munich.”
Ed stared at him. Heinrich could be…harsh.
“That seems perhaps a bit –”
“Yes, you’re right. Munich’s street curs are innocent parties to the business. Unfair to poison them with such foul meat. We’ll feed the duke to his pigs instead.”
***
After the general left, Ed dilly-dallied for a few minutes before finally accepting the need to take care of the business he most desperately did not want to take care of.
He’d have to write messages to be radioed to John Chandler Simpson in Luebeck and Mike Stearns in Bohemia. Telling the admiral that his son had vanished into the chaos of war and telling the general that his sister had done the same. Rita Simpson, née Stearns, had been living in Ingolstadt with her husband Tom. God only knew what had happened to her when the Bavarians came pouring in.
Worst of all, he’d have to tell Mary Simpson, Tom’s mother. And this would be no brief, antiseptic radio message. As luck would have it, she was in Bamberg at the moment, raising money for one of her many charities or cultural projects.
The Dame of Magdeburg, they called her. But before the day’s end, she’d just be one of many anguished mothers.
There was something to be said for Heinrich Schmidt’s simple remedies, all things considered. A Swedish chancellor throttled, a Bavarian duke munched on by hogs.
Ed could live with that. It’d still be nice to complete more than every fourth sentence, though.
Luebeck
Princess Kristina was reading the newspaper in Ulrik’s hands by leaning over his shoulder. Most likely, because she found it comforting to rest her hands on his shoulders. It certainly wasn’t because they could only afford one copy of the Hamburg Morgenpost. The money sent by King Christian had arrived the day before. Here as elsewhere, Ulrik’s father had been profligate. If he wanted to — and he was tempted sometimes — the prince could now afford to launch his own newspaper.
The temptation wasn’t as great at the moment, though, as it would have been at most times. Luebeck’s own newspaper was wretched, but the city got quite regular delivery of Hamburg’s largest newspaper. Allowing for its Fourth of July Party bias, the Morgenpost was quite good; one of the three or four best in central Europe, in Ulrik’s opinion. It came out regularly and reliably twice a week, on Wednesdays and Saturdays, and in time of rapid developments of great public interest — such as right now — they strove to come out daily.
“Should we go right now, Ulrik?” the princess asked anxiously. “They’ve even arrested the prime minister!”
Yes, and what madness possessed Oxenstierna to do that? Ulrik had pondered that question from every angle, and from none of them did the deed look any more intelligent. He’d finally concluded that Baldur’s initial assessment had been correct.
“Wettin found out something — something really damaging — and Oxenstierna had to shut him up.”
At the time, Ulrik had dismissed the notion as being too…Baldurian. Norddahlish? The Norwegian adventurer was fond of imagining dark and fiendish conspiracies in every corner.
In Ulrik’s experience, that gave far too much credit to human ingenuity. Conspiracies existed, to be sure; many of them, and many were dark indeed. But fiendish? Fiendishness required brains. Nine times out of ten, conspirators behaved like buffoons and wound up exposing themselves out of sheer, bumbling incompetence.
He shook his head. “Not yet, Kristina. The more important thing isn’t the news coming out of Berlin, it’s the news coming out of Magdeburg.”
She frowned. “But there isn’t much news coming out of Magdeburg.”
“Yes, precisely. That means someone is keeping things quiet and orderly in that city — much against my expectations, I can tell you that. By now, I’d expected accounts of rioting mobs. Well, mobs, anyway.”
Baldur was sitting at a table in the corner of the salon. “At least a hanging or two!” he exclaimed, looking quite aggrieved. “Surely some nobleman was too stupid or too drunk to get out of the city before Oxenstierna blew everything up. But…nothing. The place seems as boring as a chur — ah…ah…”
Ulrik tried not to laugh, as the Norwegian groped for something — anything — that he found as boring as a church. And could come up with nothing. From the little smile on her face, Kristina was equally amused. Baldur Norddahl was to pastors what oil was to water, except that oil was not sarcastic.
Kristina’s expression became very intent. “Oh! I see what you mean. It’s like the detective says in one of those stories you lent me. The clever up-time English ones.”
Ulrik made the connection almost immediately. “Yes, you’re right. The curious incident of the dog in the night who did nothing — and that was what was curious.”
He set down the paper. “No, I think our initial plan is still the right one. Wait for a while, and let things develop further.” Another up-time expression came to him. “Give Oxenstierna some more rope with which to hang himself.”
Never underestimate the power of a woman capable of herding noble ‘cats’ to give money. If Mary Simpson discovers that Oxenstierna’s treachery forced her son and his wife to basically disappear…
@1
Right! Ox is pig food, in that case.
Sorry to finish the sentence for you, Jeff.
And Ulrik is NO dummy, maybe even a little smarter than Kristina, but more likely just older and wiser. And she is smart enough to listen to him! A marriage made in heaven if there ever was one.
@1 Jeff: You are SO right. Ox is going to wish Mary Simpson had never been born!
Not only will she find the funds for Ox’s demise, she will also fund the eradication of his name from memory. If Tom and Rita are even hurt.
Let’s not forget what will happen to the Adel (can’t remember his name, and couldn’t quickly find him in the prior snippets) who actually betrayed Ingoldstadt to Max.
Does the USE Constitution allow for forfeiture of title and lands for nobility caught committing treason?
Not To mention Mary already has a reason to strongly dislike Ox’s reforms.
Moving the capital??? after all the work she did to get Magdeburg the most cultured city in Europe?
And to BERLIN, of all places????
That alone would be enough to get her to oppose the conter-revolution, despite her dislike of the CoCs (which may just have become a little less over time…)
Maybe Axel is trying to divert Mike (to his assumption 3rd USE is near the Bohemia-Austria-Oberpfalz border) as well as SoTF forces to Oberpfalz.
In one action he’s managed to tee off Admiral Simpson (with the USE Navy and Marine Corps at his disposal), Mike Stearns (with 3rd USE Division), Becky Stearns (with both the CoC (she is near as much to the fore as Gretchen, Sparticus, Ed Piazza, etc.) and an extended family which includes both Nasi and a nascent merchant empire), and Mary Simpson (with a network among the moderate Adel, Burghers, Guildmaster’s, etc. that includes the Abbess of Quedlinburg and Hesse-Kassel’s widow). And I thought arresting WW was a bad move!!
@6 frederic: most whole-heartedly agree. Even Kristina considers Berlin a hole. And as mentioned in the snippets or in ‘Eastern Front’, most of the attractions of Berlin have yet to be (IMO Soviet East Berlin would be a step up).
I thought the idea was to keep Hesse-Kassel neutral and its army at home. So let’s do the math the USE Army and Marine Corps, the armies of SoTF, Hesse-Kassel, Bernhard Wettin, and possibily Bohemia, CoC militias against forces consisting largely of mercenaries. I wonder do the Lapps owe feudal loyality to the House of Vasa or personal loyalty to GA2?
I wonder if Mary Simpson will be as good at raising funds for an army as she is for culturals?
@5 Robert H. Woodman
From stories in the Gazettes and pieces here and there in the books it seems that the death penalty is not really unusual, certainly not for something as serious as treason. So I’d think that loss of land and title would be the least of their worries. ;)
How things turn out for their relatives is another matter, though I sincerely doubt that they would be disapproriated (that’s right right word for it, right?). While still on the subject of nobility and inheritance, has there been any suggestion for changing the laws to English-style primogeniture? It would be a way to slowly limit the size of the noble class.
@8 Randy
The Lapps are a complicated issue. As a cultural group they live in both Norway, Sweden and Russia, AFAIK largely autonomous in this era. They pay their taxes to the King, but it wasn’t until the 18th/19th century or so that they were made to accept Swedish laws and rule. The Northlands (upper half of modern day Sweden) were sparsely populated even by Swedish standards and the cities that today are the major ones in the area were just beginning to be settled under G2A’s rule. These cities are all along the coastline.
So to sum up, they are Swedish subjects, but with a large degree of autonomy. Doesn’t stop them from serving in the Royal Army though. :)
Again we see a down-timer using up-time proverbs – probably because the author didn’t know the proverbs that the down-timers would have used. It’s acknowledged, and I’d probably be worse in this regard if I tried to write, but it’s still starting to get on my nerves.
#10 Johan: I think introducing primogeniture would cause every noble family in the USE to rise up in revolt. Noble status is too important to them to allow the change. On the other hand, introducing bills of Attainder sounds like a good idea to me. A bill of attainder is a legislative act saying that the target is guilty. Very neat. No defense possible, and you don’t need to prove a law broken. He’s guilty because we say so. Wentworth was hit with a bill of attainder, when they realized that he couldn’t be convicted in a court of law; It was a process frequently abused. But it might be just the thing here..
@8 Randy, @10 johan: Many are the next thing to mercenaries (similar to Croats in Imperial service), though some through clan ties may be sworn to G2A. In the war between G2A’s father and Sigismund for Sweden’s crown, Charles was forced to virtually reconquer northern Finland (mostly south of Sami territory). And his overeach declaring himself King of the Northlands embroiled Sweden in a war with Denmark (ended by G2A with a very lucrative treaty for Denmark). And G2A faced Russia winning Swedish Karelia and Swedish Ingria along with a quit-claim on Vyborg and Swedish Livonia; establishing the borders between Russian and Swedish territories. With all that backround history, G2A made sure to bind (fuedally or with clan-ties) as many Lapps/Sami/Northern Finns to himself as possible. (Remember that Finnish calvary were Captain Gars escort of choice and some were part of his bodyguard regiment.)
@#11, Terranova: I think downtimers using uptime proverbs is realistic. It’s a status thing; it’s new and exciting and “with it” and a way for them to be connected to uptimers. I enjoy seeing uptime slang and expressions in the dialog. They are often witty and usually are appropriate to the conversation in progress.
@12 dave o
Just might. But as you say it was frequently abused and you don’t want to set a bad precedent if you want to establish a modern judicial system and the rule of law.
It seems the abolition of the nobility will become a long and drawn out process probably stretching across a century, if not more. Alternating between encouraging them to abdicate and infringing upon their privilegies. Stick and carrot indeed. Which seems for the best as the noble class is quite large.
One ting I wonder though, since the Americans are intent on introducing equal inheritance law and equal rights for women in general, will it include the inheritance of noble titles? Here in Sweden women still cannot pass on a claim to nobility (I think a bill was introduced in the House of Knights some years ago but was defeated. At least I think so). Since Americans have never had a formal, privilegied aristocracy they’ve never had to deal with such a problem.
@12 – dave o
The very reason that the U.S. Constitution prohibits Bills of Attainder is that they are so easily abused, and in the experience of the American colonies, they were abused by the Crown repeatedly. I agree with Johan (@15) that permitting a Bill of Attainder is a terrible precedent for a modern society. The Constitution also prohibits “corruption of blood” for treason in the same clause that defines treason (Article III, section 3). I’m wondering how much of the U.S. Constitution was imported into the USE Constitution.
@15 johan: Salic descent, morgantic restrictions, as well as primogeniture seem to vary widely. Most Americans (myself included) would have no earthly clue how to codify such a thing. If they can get women allowed property inheritance (not as a widow’s gift or direct assign) and equality before the law they will be doing good.
@17 ET1swaw
From various GG’s it seems that at the very least in West Virginia County, SOTF, modern American inheritance law is in effect. Don’t know it that extends to the rest of the SOTF. I’m sure it’s not the case in the rest of the USE, though from the Wietze short stories it seems that the SOTF atleast allows women the right to own and run businesses and have control of their own household economies.
@11 The “…enough rope…” quotation is not really modern. Also it has got counterparts in many other languages, but if those were used/translated literally here then some readers would not get the point. I am quite sure that Kristina and Ulrik are NOT speaking English or German. With a Swede, a Dane and a Norwegian sitting around and talking (and reading a German newspaper), they could be speaking three different but mutually understandable languages–probably all in the same sentence. The three languages today are like dialects of the same root language. And they were probably even closer back then.
So Eric just “translates” for us. Thank you Eric.
#16 My knowledge of colonial history is far from complete, but I don’t recall any example of a bill of attainder used against an american. If you can point to any, I would be grateful. As I remember it, bills of attainder were used in England by Parliament against king’s ministers. Certainly during the English Civil War, this was the case.
@17 The problem isn’t a noble class as such, but the fact that the noble titles carry rights of governance (i.e. downtime noble titles still include judicial, executive and legislative power).
The way to solve it is to do what actually was done. The noble titles become private inheritances with maybe a special inhertiance law (no morganatic or salic descent) but without special political rights. This will be a gradual process, probably on a state by state basis (SoTF first, Hesse-kassel close to last). The various states can keep the title (Duke, Landgravine, etc.) and make the office elective, or even keep a so-called ‘House of Lords’ as a deliberative body (like the English).
@11, 14, 18
Actually almost all of these proverbs have downtime origins. They are called proverbs because they have been in use for a long while — many are biblical, or found in Shakespeare, or in some other old legends or literature.
What’s aggravating about seeing them in print isn’t that the downtime characters use them, but that they are *invariably* presented as “American” sayings, even when the specific saying are biblical or otherwise would have been known in 1600’s Germany.
I mean is one thing to do that with fecal matter striking the rotary air circulation device (you need a *engine* before you can have a fan rotating fast enough to make this funny), but ‘enough rope to hang themselves with’ has 17th century citations you can find with less than one minute of search, and in three more mimutes I found the German equivalent (sich selber henken) attested in 1494.
AArrggh!
#16 Robert: I took some time out to check my facts. Bills of Attainder were used by the Kings as well as Parliament. The last in British history was Edmund Fitzgerald, in 1798, for his part in the Irish Rebellion (or fight for freedom, if you prefer) of 1798. And they were used in the Colonies, although I still don’t have an example.
As for the horrible example, well I thought of the idea as more of an expedient to punish people who are obviously guilty, but have somehow managed to skirt existing law. Remember how new the USE is. Grantville follows the American version of common law. The german states probably follow roman law, but the practice is likely to differ widely among the states. To the extent customary law is followed, that certainly varies widely. I think it almost impossible to believe that there is an agreed upon code even of criminal law That would have been the work of the Parliament, after they settled the religious and citizenship issues. So expedients are called for. After that’s settled, Mike can call them a horrible example and forbid there future use.
@22 dave o: Mike is now a general, not prime minister. Although he is still a political figure he is now at least one step removed from the political arena. I don’t think that he could forbid the future use of a bill of attainder once it had been used the first time, or even if he could (and did) it would stick once he was gone from the ATL. For the USE to use a bill of attainder and then forbid the future use of them strikes me as: 1) locking the barn after the horse is gone 2) trying to shove the genie back into the bottle once you have removed the cork 3) (and I’m sure there exist many more ways of saying the same thing, take your pick.)
# 15, # 16, #22, A bill of attainder stripped you of all civil rights. Right to trial, right to own property, right to your noble title, right to bestow inheritance. Property and titles usually escheat to the state.
Execution was not inherent in writs of attainder. But the government was free to kill you.
The scientific and industrial revolutions began changing the lives of ordinary people around eighteen hundred. More industrial factories, bigger towns and cities, fewer people working mechanized farms, more highways, railroads, the steam printing press, magazines and many newspapers, increased literacy and numeracy, growing middle class, all that stuff.
As Dave O points out, the last use of attainder happened 1798. Just as the industrial revolution was flexing its muscles. I find the coincidence significant. The writ of attainder was a medieval punishment. It worked well enough in Early Modern days. It was ill fitted to the brave new, Crystal Palace Victorian world.
Yes, the punishment should fit the crime. The punishment should also fit the times. A Bill of Alienable Rights will not fit the new style of government in the new modern culture. Uptime or downtime.
@19, @22 – dave o
I searched and could not find specifically named individuals in the American colonies prior to the Revolutionary War that were named in Bills of Attainder. One reference I found (Campbell Law Review, 2010, article by Duane Ostler) stated that prior to the war Bills of Attainder were almost unheard of in the colonies, but the colonists were familiar with them from English history.
During and immediately after the war, however, several sources I found stated that Parliament tried to attaint Samuel Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and other leaders, but the bill was quashed. Moreover, Jefferson drafted one of the most notorious bills of attainder in American history against a Tory laborer named Josiah Phillips. The case of Parker Wickham was notorious, as he was attainted in New York by the state assembly, essentially for carrying out his duties to the Crown conscientiously, and forced into exile in Connecticut, where he died. Pennsylvania issued 500 bills of attainder against Tories during the war.
Most, but not all, sources I found clearly stated that Americans became repulsed by bills of attainder because of actions by the Crown, and indeed, that’s what I remember from my high school and undergraduate college classes on American history. It seems more likely to me, though, having gone over the sources available to me online, that Americans probably had sorrows and regrets over the bills of attainder they themselves passed and a fear that if they didn’t stop such bills in the future, they could suffer bills of attainder in the future. Thus, the prohibition ended up in the Constitution.
So, I had my history a bit wrong. I apologize. I hope this clears things up.
If you are interested, the link to the article by Duane Ostler is:
http://law.campbell.edu/lawreview/articles/32-2-227.pdf
The interesting bit about Jefferson’s bill of attainder against Josiah Parker is:
http://www.history.org/foundation/journal/spring02/attainder.cfm
Wikipedia has a good, short article on Parker Wickham. See:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parker_Wickham
Sorry to go on so long about this, but the question of a bill of attainder and its history could be quite germane to the present story or to future storylines. And, it’s a darned interesting question anyway. :-)
Oops. I mistyped the last sentence in the second paragraph @24.
I should have said “Pennsylvania issued bills of attainder against 500 Tories during the War.” I don’t know how many actual attainder bills they wrote, but the source I used was specific in the number of Tories attainted.
@22 & @23 dave o & Vince
It doesn’t really matter if they use it “just this once” and later condemn it. The Precedent will have been made. As Vince says, Mike Stearns will one day die as will all the other up-timers. They are all working against a timetable, basically. That is, to transform a feudal Europe into a modern (or as close to modern as they can humanly get) democratic place. And only the adult up-timers can do that. Those up-timers who are young children now will not have any real experience of our world and thus cannot be expected to continue this struggle. The adult Americans must get the ball rolling fast and hard enough for the desired changes to take place. When they are dead it’s too late. So Bills of Attainder seems an obvious no-no to me.
Johan is right (@28). Bills of attainder are just plain wrong and unfair to the victim(s) thereof, and two (or more) wrongs don’t make a right. Period.
It doesn’t require a bill of attainder to arrest and hold someone (e.g. Ox) for trial, nor to give those accused fair trials once they are duly indicted, nor to administer the prescribed punishments for those convicted. A bill of attainder is just a lazy substitute for competent police work and/or the work of prosecuting attorneys. It has no place in legitimate law enforcement.
A bill of attainder strikes me as being anathema to a democratic society. It would be backsliding, to say the least, and not necessary either. “Guilty because we say” is horribly easy to abuse…imagine if a bill of attainder was passed against Mike Stearns, for example?
IMHO we dont have to discuss a Bill of Attainder, because the law of the Holy Roman Empire allows the imposition of an Imperial Ban (in german ‘Reichsacht’). This ban could also be extended on nobles and the banned person lost all rights and possessions. In legal terms they were counted as deceased and the person could be robbed, beaten and killed without repercussions. I’m sure this possibility would be available to USE law, because it was one of the few instruments that worked for the Emperor against the quite indeoendent noblemen. So GA would have used that legal instrument too, except their is a swedish counterpart that covers this problem also.
@12 and others, you must retain the moral high ground for the long term. If you set a precedent of stripping citizens of their rights without a fair trial then others can do that to you. An OTL example is when insurgents were rendered (ie: sent to Egypt to be tortured) it them meant that the west couldn’t be outraged when their own combatants were also kidnapped and tortured. Civilisation is a package, not something that has optional clauses depending on who is doing what to whom.
@12 and others, you must retain the moral high ground for the long term. If you set a precedent of stripping citizens of their rights without a fair trial then others can do that to you. An OTL example is when insurgents were rendered (ie: sent to Egypt to be tortured) it them meant that the west couldn’t be outraged when their own combatants were also kidnapped and tortured. Civilisation is a package, not something that has optional clauses depending on who is doing what to whom.
#32 et al. See comment 31, Bluemax. The Reichsacht accomplishes exactly the same things a bill of attainder does. Only the form is different.
#24 Vince. It’s obvious to me that Mike will be Prime Minister again, after the Civil War. It’s also obvious to me that he’s working toward a written constitution. Reichsacht and/or Bills of Attainder can be forbidden by amendment, which eliminates the possibility of their future use. It’s not an exact parallel to what happened during and after the US revolution, described in #26, but close enough for government.
As far as downtimer use to uptimer aphorisms, sayings, etc. goes when you look at a culture in which another culture becomes cool/high status (for example American culture in Korea, where I live) you get a huge amount of single words adopted, but these words are often used differently in a new context and some two word phrases but very very very very very few of the long phrases that you see constantly in 163*. For example stuff like “the curious incident of the dog in the night who did nothing — and that was what was curious” is waaaaay too long to come through but stuff like calling a pocket knife a McGyver instead of a pocketknife comes through just fine. I can see why the stories have a lot of these long uptimer phrases from a literary standpoint so I don’t mind them much, but they’re always really jarring from a realism standpoint, especially since we don’t see much of downtimers using uptimer words and short phrases in ways that uptimers would find strange because of the different context (like using “cider” for any lemon-flavored soda here in Korea).
To me, having downtimers use uptime words and phrases is a way for Eric to insert a little comic relief into a pretty grim story.
One thing to consider, most of the people using the longer phrases are ones with a lot of education who have read the uptime books. Thus, their quotations make more sense than if a steet thug had done something like this. Also, the Holmes reference is noted as one from a book she recently read. Rememer how popular the Terminator quote “I’ll be Back” became?
It just struck me…if Ox’s head rolls – who’ll be the next chancellor of Sweden – Col. Erik Hand, Mike Stearns, Wilhelm Wettin, Kristina, Prince Ulrik…?
@13 I was thinking of the Lapps in the bodyguard. Just where is the bodyguard regiment, how large is it, and who is loyal to? Is it anything like the praetorian guard (sometimes confused with Caesar’s Legio X Equestris, which was its role model), the household cavalry/guard regiments of Victoria, or Alexander’s companions? Is this GA2 version of the hangman regiment? As a historical aside, Hitler’s Leibstandarte regiment became the 1ST SS (Panzer)Division, not to be confused with FührerBegleitbataillon commanded by Erwin Rommel which became Großdeutschland (Panzergenadier)Division. Possibly the most elite units of the Waffen SS and Wehrmacht respectively.
Very nasty people and I wonder to what extent Axel has control over them.
@38 – Terranovan
I think that Mike Stearns, Wilhelm Wettin, Princess Kristina, and Prince Ulrik all can be eliminated from consideration. Stearns is USE/American. Wettin is a traitor, or at best a morally dubious choice, and a German to boot. Kristina is a minor and heir to the throne. Ulrik is Danish, heir to the Union of Kalmar, and Kristina’s betrothed. Colonel Erik Hand is an interesting choice and possibly a good one as well, but he must be legitimized first.
Really, I suspect that we have not met the next Swedish chancellor.
@40 Robert—The next Swedish Chancellor will probably be Ox himself, exiled back to Sweden, where he can not do any real harm, and with Gustav’s curses ringing in his ears as he sails away. I do not think that Gustav will kill him (I assume a full recovery, as Becky seems to, as well) because he is too capable.
@39 Randy: OTL Axel’s cousin was Governor-General of Finland until replaced (sometime between 1634-35 when he became Lord High Treasurer for Sweden and 1637 when Per Brahe’s reforms took effect) by Per Brahe (older brother of Nils (NTL General in Main and Upper Rhine) who OTL died from wounds soon after G2A). Another cousin OTL became Governor-General of Livonia and Ingria in 1635. My take is the Finns would be personally loyal to G2A vice his government. But Axel does have alternate ties available (remember ATT many Sami/Lapps/Northern Finns are mostly clan-based peoples with a near-feudal system still).
@40 Robert H. Woodman: We have met Per Brahe (in passing) in ‘1632’. General Tott (relationship similar to Hand’s; who we have met), Jacob de La Gardie (1st cousin to PLC King and 2nd cousin to G2A; who we have not), and Carl Carlsson Gyllenhielm (illegitimate half-brother of G2A; who we have met) are all relaated to G2A as well (for that matter the rulers of Ostfriesland (before they joined the United Provinces (soon to be KLC)) vice the USE were 2nd or third cousins (descended from G2A’s grandfather)) though most by bastardry or Salic link or both. Johan Skytte (G2A’s tutor and Governor-General of Ingria, Livonia, and Karelia until replaced by an Oxenstierna (chancellor of Uppsala and Tartu Universities as well); who we have not met) might also be considered. G2A’s Generals (Tott, Tortensson, Nils Brahe, and Hand, etc.)are needed where they are; as are Gyllenhielm and de La Gardie (Sweden’s Lord High Admiral and LH Constable (in administrative charge of all Swedish land forces) respectively. For that matter, Baner’s older brother (married to Nils’ and Per’s sister) is available. Don’t forget Julie, Sharon Nichols, Eddie, and the Count of Narnia (and I think Caroline as well) are all Swedish/Imperial peers (4 of the 16 IIRC, which include Axel, his brother and cousins, and the Brahe brothers (Nils and Per).
FYI there is nothing in canon yet as to who succeeded Magnus Brahe (uncle to Per and Nils and father to Ebba Brahe (G2A’s first love (and reputed(disputed by historians)mistress)and wife of Jacob de La Guardie)) as Sweden’s LH Justicar when he died (OTL in 1633). Axel’s brother got it OTL with Per Brahe as his successor. OTL Axel managed to get LH Justicar (brother; replacing deceased Magnus Brahe), LH Treasurer (cousin (previously G-G of Finland); replacing G2A’s brother-in-law (father of Charles X Gustav – Kristina’s successor)), LH Chancellor (himself; succeeded by his son), and G-G of Ingria, Livonia, and Karelia (cousin replacing Johan Skytte) for his family (he was G-G of Swedish Prussia (Truce of Altmark lands) until it was lost in 1635 Treaty of Stuhmsdorf and his cousin (LHT)was G-G of Finland before Per Brahe as well). OTL Pappenheim and Nils Brahe had also died from Lutzen.
@39 Randy: All I can think of is those with him at the Croat Raid and at the Lake in ‘Eastern Front’ (where his replacement personal bodyguard came from). Probably not a Regiment per se (Tott’s Yellow Regiment (stationed between Saxony and Grantville) and the Thuringian Rifles come to mind).
@41 – robert
While you may be correct that G2A will let Ox live but send him back to Sweden where he can do no harm, I think that would be a strategic and political mistake in that it would erase much of the goodwill between G2A and his German subjects. A better and stronger message from G2A would be to hang Ox and replace him with someone else.
@42 – ET1swaw
I stand corrected. We may have met the next Swedish chancellor. I doubt seriously, however, that any of the Americans who became Swedish peers will accept the job of Chancellor from G2A without serious arm-twisting and major concessions from G2A. The same is equally true, if not more so, for the Count of Narnia. Also, would not G2A be required to legitimize Gyllenhielm before he could promote him, if that’s what he decided to do? (Ditto, Erik Hand.)
@45 Robert H. Woodman: Hand, Gyllenhielm, de La Gardie, and Tott are all descended from the wrong side of the blanket. G2A’s legitimate nieces and nephews (including a morgantic neice born post-death from his younger brother) and de La Guardies children (OTL Magnus was later LH Chancellor and married to one of G2A’s nieces (Charles X Gustav’s sister)) are all tweens at best.
I agree, Ox is toast if he loses or G2A recovers. If nothing else, his dealings with Mad Max and encouragement of Baner will fry him. If Tom Simpson or his wife is hurt or killed, he is beyond toast!!
At the risk of going even more off-topic, ET1swaw, how come you have such an intimate knowledge of this era of Swedish history? Personal relations?
Are there any canals connecting the Rhine river system (say, a tributary) with the Danube system? If so, it might be interesting for Admiral Simpson to send an ironclad to Ingolstadt…
VernonNemitz: wikipedia seems to say no http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhine%E2%80%93Main%E2%80%93Danube_Canal
@48 Just checking the map, there are none available today. I suspect a topographical map would show the mountains in south Germany that would make any such connection impossible. Otherwise, that would have been done earlier.
Coming at it from the other side would require going through lands controlled by the Turks. We might see Ottoman Ironclads coming up river before there are Austrian ones to oppose them.
1637, The Ottoman Invasion?
Note that SOMEONE there is copying upptime tech by using blimps/balloons against the Persians. What other things might come out of them? Did they get hold of a copy of the Sharps clone the French have? These are not the same incompetents Churchill laughed at during WW1 and if they are trying to keep up with the west, they could be FAR better equiped than the Austrians.