205-739: The Staatsbewind (translated into English as "state council" or "state authority") was a governing council of the Batavian Republic between 1801 and 1805. The presidents of the Staatsbewind were acting heads of state of the Batavian Republic. The Staatsbewind came into power after a coup d'état against the Uitvoerend Bewind on 17 October 1801. The reign of the Staatsbewind ended on 29 April 1805, when emperor Napoleon of France appointed Rutger Jan Schimmelpenninck as grand pensionary of
410-743: A constituent assembly that formally abolished the States and founded a new body, the Provisional Representatives of the People of Holland , that took over the functions of the States of Holland as long as the States General continued to exist ). Though the political make-up of the States General changed appreciably because of this change in personnel, it retained a number of defenders of the old particularist interests. The first order of business of
615-560: A bicameral Legislative Corps , to be elected in indirect elections, and a Directory -like Executive of five members. The end result looked much like the French Constitution of 1795 . This was approved by the Assembly on 10 May 1797. The draft-Constitution was to be subjected to a referendum on 8 August 1797, after a very lively campaign in which the French ambassador Noël weighed in with
820-543: A camp, and to garrison it with a formidable military force (15,000 men). But these rumors had on 29 June elicited a threatening diplomatic note from the British government that had given France pause. For the moment the French pretended that the alleged military build-up was just intended to "train the troops" and the preparations actually had halted. But around the end of July the French Cabinet appears to have seriously discussed
1025-428: A century of being confronted by foreign protectionism ) also was dependent on exports. All these sectors had suffered enormously from the war: the British blockade and French and British privateering had almost brought marine trade to a standstill, whereas a commercial treaty with France (which would have ended French discrimination of Dutch trade in industrial goods) proved an ever-receding fata morgana . True, much of
1230-457: A consequence of this electoral change. The "democrats" were mostly replaced by Patriot regents, who had no patience with democracy, and by the old Orangist regents, who did not even have to disguise their allegiance as in early 1801 a convenient amnesty was proclaimed. One surprising example is Egbert Sjuck Gerrold Juckema van Burmania Rengers , the Orangist burgomaster of Leeuwarden before 1795,
1435-576: A consequence, the British approaches to Prussia were becoming more specific. The government sent general Fawcett to the Landgrave of Hesse-Kassel to negotiate the hiring of mercenary troops, to be used to support a possible Prussian military intervention. Though the treaty with the Landgrave for 12,000 troops was eventually only signed on 28 September, the gesture was sufficient for the Prussians to be assured of
1640-402: A continuation of the old federal arrangements. As this was totally unacceptable to the unitarists, this draft was subsequently amended into its opposite, by a compromise that finally formed a basis for a new Constitution. The Assembly now began discussing other important matters, such as the separation between church and state, and the emancipation of minorities. The organs of the state were to be
1845-616: A country needed a head of state, and the Stadtholder was it. Instead he was an officeholder, appointed by the provincial States, who also was captain-general and admiral-general of the Union (there was originally no stadtholder on the confederal level). In the Orangist revolution of 1747 this office had been revamped to "Stadhouder-generaal" and made hereditary, and after the Prussian intervention of 1787
2050-578: A crescent from Halfweg , West of Amsterdam, via Amstelveen to the South, to Muiden , East of Amsterdam. But the commanders of the troops in Amsterdam realized that they could not expect to survive a Prussian assault. They desperately tried to temporize by asking for a ceasefire and negotiations. An Amsterdam delegation consisting of Abbema, Gales, Goll and Luden arrived in Leimuiden on 26 September to offer terms, but
2255-502: A degree of independence and to serve Dutch interests even where they clashed with the interests of the French. This clash of interests led to the eventual demise of the Republic when the short-lived experiment with the regime of " Grand Pensionary " Rutger Jan Schimmelpenninck proved unsatisfactory to Napoleon. The subsequent king Louis Bonaparte also refused to follow French dictates, which ultimately led in turn to his downfall in 1810 when
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#17328476399532460-544: A few weeks earlier the two States Army regiments that had been garrisoned in the city had been bribed by one of Harris' agents to defect wholesale, taking their cannon with them. The only defenders left were Free Corps. He therefore capitulated after a token bombardment by the Prussians, and he and his troops were made prisoners of war and transported to Wesel , where he was treated so badly, that he died in December 1787. The road to Dordrecht and Rotterdam lay now completely open for
2665-536: A first government-approved attempt at unification of the Dutch spelling was made; an embryonic Department of Agriculture and Department of Hydraulics were formed, to foreshadow the later government departments; even a Pharmacopeia Batavia started the regulation of drugs; and the School Law of 1806 organized a national system of public elementary education. Most importantly perhaps, the local-government law of July 1805 founded
2870-511: A force of 20,000 soldiers near Wesel on the Prussian-Dutch border, and to offer the command over this force to the Duke of Brunswick . But even on 8 August he indicated behind the scenes that this did not imply a fixed intent to initiate military steps. This would depend on a more satisfying attitude by the States of Holland. However, this was a political impossibility for the States of Holland: for
3075-447: A formidable obstacle. They consisted of fortifications, completed in 1663, according to the bastion fort -model perfected in the 17th century. They consisted of 26 bastions that completely encircled the city behind a deep moat (now the Singel canal). There was plenty of artillery available, though trained gunners were in short supply (despite the addition of 200 French gunners, seconded by
3280-572: A matter of fact, since the Spring of 1804 informal talks, mediated by Talleyrand, had been under way with the Batavian envoy in Paris, Rutger Jan Schimmelpenninck , who had a good personal rapport with Napoleon (by now emperor ). Schimmelpenninck was a power in the Batavian Republic by himself. He had played an important role as the leader of the federalist opposition in the "revolutionary" States-General of 1795, and
3485-488: A matter of fact, the position of Vérac, who had actively supported the "democrats", had been much weakened after the death of Vergennes and the fall of Calonne in early 1787, and his recall would follow just before the diplomatic situation exploded in September 1787, at exactly the wrong moment. The "solution" that a French mediation would supply would therefore satisfy the "aristocratic" Patriots, but would severely disappoint
3690-405: A more democratic government in 1848 (the constitutional revision by Johan Rudolph Thorbecke , limiting the power of the king). A type of ministerial government was introduced for the first time in Dutch history and many of the current government departments date their history back to this period. Though the Batavian Republic was a client state of France, its successive governments tried to maintain
3895-496: A nephew of Duke Louis Ernest of Brunswick-Lüneburg , the old mentor of William V. His army consisted of about 20,000 Prussian soldiers, in three divisions, commanded by the generals Lottum , Gaudi and Knobelsdorff , Romberg and Kalckreuth . After the ultimatum had expired (the States of Holland had not replied to it, at the counsel of pensionary Adriaan van Zeebergh ) they marched on 13 September 1787 from their starting line at Zyfflich to Nijmegen , where they were joined by
4100-635: A new constitution, that he constructed in the Summer of 1804 in consultation with the Staatsbewind . As a matter of fact, a delegation of the Staatsbewind , consisting of Schimmelpenninck, and members of the Regency Van der Goes (the former agent) and Van Haersolte (a former director), presented the case for this draft to Napoleon in November 1804. When the clash about the French customs men therefore took place later in
4305-424: A notorious reactionary. The coup represented a counter-revolution. This became clear in the way the iconography of the 1795 revolution disappeared: the epigraph Vrijheid, Gelijkheid, Broederschap (Liberty, Equality, Fraternity) which had adorned all official publications, was henceforth removed, and the last Liberty Trees were removed from the town squares. Soon the old ways were restored. For example, though
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#17328476399534510-439: A permanent basis urgently. Besides, as the Dutch tax system was heavily skewed toward highly regressive indirect taxes, which inordinately burdened the impoverished population, he wanted to change this to a system that depended more on direct (income and wealth) taxes. Finally, he wanted to do away with the provincial differentiation in the taxation, and construct a nationally standardized system. When he put these reform proposals to
4715-532: A position to offer resistance, after the Woerden Defense Council had ordered all other troops to retreat to Amsterdam on 15 September) was ordered to surrender by Knobelsdorff on 17 September. The town was commanded by Alexander van der Capellen, a brother of the Patriot leader Robert Jasper van der Capellen . He recognized that his position was hopeless due to the lack of preparations for a siege. Furthermore,
4920-405: A provincial rota and according to national quotas of representatives of each province (much like the old States-General). Except for Holland, the old provinces were reconstituted. The local and provincial administrative organs continued to be elected – no longer by universal manhood suffrage, but by a system of census suffrage . Most important was the change in personnel of these organs, mostly as
5125-401: A rapprochement with conservative and Orangist circles. These were to become his power base. Though Schimmelpenninck was a convinced federalist, he was a pliable character also. When Napoleon indicated that he preferred a centralized organization of the Dutch state (as the re-federalized model of the Staatsbewind had clearly not worked out), he did not hesitate to implement this in his project of
5330-532: A second National Assembly returned one in which the balance of power had shifted to the unitarists in the Fall of 1797. Nevertheless, the federalists managed to retain control of the new constitutional commission by a bare majority. This led to more dawdling and the unitarists in the Assembly now came with their own proposal in the form of the Declaration of 43 on 12 December 1797, containing a nine-point manifesto concerning
5535-419: A separate electoral base. Though the coup of 22 January 1798 did not bode well for a genuinely democratic approval process for the new constitution (and the French would have preferred going the "safe" way of approval by the rump assembly) the plebiscite that started on 17 March (in the usual form of elections in "primary" assemblies of about 100–500 voters) had a reasonably democratic quality. On 23 April 1798,
5740-439: A shift in the stance of the Prussian government, promoted by Hertzberg, who was assisted by a "leak" of the British government to the Prussians of its correspondence with the French government about its demand to be allowed to join the mediation. This made clear that the French already had acceded to this demand, without informing the Prussians. It also became clear that the British were far more enthusiastic about putting pressure on
5945-464: A sleight of hand that unfortunately would also become familiar in the Dutch constitutional politics of the successor states: they counted the 350,000 abstentions as "tacit affirmations". Unlike the coup of June 1798, the Augereau coup did present a sharp break with the recent past. The new constitution reduced the role of the legislative branch (which now did not have the right of initiative), and expanded
6150-403: A small retinue (a chamberlain, a lady in waiting, and two officers, colonel Rudolph Bentinck, an adjutant of the stadtholder, and Frederick Stamford, the military tutor of her sons), but no armed escort (Harris had advised it was safe enough to only take a bag of gold along to bribe Patriot Free Corps with ) she was indeed intercepted near Goejanverwellesluis by a Free Corps patrol from Gouda . She
6355-505: A supportive appeal. This probably contributed to the resounding defeat of the proposal (108,761 votes to 27,995). The Assembly was back at square one. At this moment foreign events in the form of the 18 Fructidor coup of General Pierre Augereau intervened. This brought the more radical faction to power in France, which proved to be ultimately less patient with the vagaries of the Dutch political process, and more prone to intervene. Elections for
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6560-401: A system of national taxation. There was to be a five-man Uitvoerend Bewind as a collective Executive , with eight national Agenten (government ministers) doing the actual Administration , directing Foreign Affairs, Police and Interior, Justice, Finance, War, Navy, National Education, and National Economy. Most importantly, as historian Simon Schama states: "[i]ts central aim was to change
6765-483: A total of about 150 million guilders. The other provinces owed 155 million guilders. The grand total in 1795, at the beginning of the Batavian Republic, came to 760 million guilders; this imposed a debt service of 25 million guilders annually. The indemnity of the Treaty of The Hague immediately added 100 million guilders to this total, and the maintenance of the French army of occupation added about 12 million annually (while
6970-403: A unifier). The conservative federalists were more adept at parliamentary manoeuvering. Rutger Jan Schimmelpenninck proved himself especially adept at this. The frustration this engendered among the democrats led them to appeal to popular opinion and to extra-parliamentary action. Meanwhile, the Assembly installed a constitutional commission that in November 1796 presented a report that amounted to
7175-574: A year after the peace, war resumed. Napoleon was now intent on the destruction of Great Britain by culminating in an ambitious planned invasion . The French expected the Batavian Republic to play a major supporting role in this. As the Franco-Batavian alliance's embodiment, the Staatsbewind was forced to assent to a Convention bringing the total of French and Batavian forces in the Netherlands to 35,000. In addition, 9,000 Batavian troops were slated for
7380-473: A year later), restoring the old confederal order. A similar "solution" seemed appropriate for the Batavian Republic. The Batavian government, and its constitution, were particularly disliked by the Consul (no friend of democracy in any case), because of the snub that Amsterdam bankers gave in 1800 to his request for a big loan at the usual generous rate of interest the French expected as a matter of right. He blamed
7585-659: The Balance of Power on the Continent). This fully complied with the Orangist position in the conflict with the Patriots. In other words, the British standpoint was incompatible with the French one as a basis for a compromise to be imposed in the mediation. But it was attractive to Prussia, because the British fully supported the king's demand for "satisfaction", and they encouraged him to take military steps. The French started to become nervous because of these developments, and Montmorin warned
7790-500: The Cape of Good Hope , without the Dutch even being consulted. The Dutch ambassador in France, Rutger Jan Schimmelpenninck , who acted as the Dutch plenipotentiary , vainly protested that the Treaty of The Hague had guaranteed the Dutch colonies, and that France had promised not to make a separate peace. After this separate peace had been concluded, the British were left to negotiate with the minor French allies separately. This did not mean that
7995-522: The Civil list of king George with his grudging approval. It was clear that other expenses of the campaign of subversion also would be financed from this slush fund. Once he returned to the Republic Harris' agents swarmed out to bribe officers of several States Army regiments, paid by the States of Holland, to defect. The States were forced by their success to cashier a large number of officers whose loyalty
8200-496: The Eems department . The aim was to organize the country into units with equal numbers of primary assemblies (hence the small Amstel department with its large population). The first elections for the administrative organs of these new entities were held in March 1799. But, of course, such a reorganization did not suddenly change the old allegiances of the people living in these areas. In any case,
8405-600: The Fourth Anglo-Dutch War this policy succeeded in bringing down the level of debt, but this war brought a large uptick in the public debt: between 1780 and 1794 the province of Holland alone issued 120 million guilders of new bonds. In 1795, its total debt stood at 455 million guilders. To this should be added the debts of the United East India Company and its sister, the WIC , and the five Dutch Admiralties for
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8610-535: The French Revolutionary Army . The Batavian Republic became a client state , the first of the " sister-republics ", and later part of the French Empire of Napoleon . Its politics were deeply influenced by the French, who supported no fewer than three coups d'état to bring the different political factions to power that France favored at different moments in its own political development. Nevertheless,
8815-570: The Germanic tribe of the Batavi , representing both the Dutch ancestry and their ancient quest for liberty in their nationalistic lore. In early 1795, intervention by the French Republic led to the downfall of the old Dutch Republic. The new republic enjoyed widespread support from the Dutch populace and was the product of a genuine popular revolution. However, it was founded with the armed support of
9020-506: The Haarlemmermeer to Sloten . This landing circumvented the earthwork at Halfweg, that otherwise might have been a major obstacle, because it dominated the narrow isthmus between the Haarlemmermeer and the IJ river. The defenders were surprised, and the road to Amsterdam from Haarlem lay open. The Prussian troops then turned South toward Amstelveen where they arrived just in time to support
9225-682: The Orangist Grand Pensionary Laurens Pieter van de Spiegel . This de facto status of Anglo-Prussian protectorate was internationally formalized in 1788 by the Act of Guarantee (for which Great Britain and Prussia acted as guarantors) and the Triple Alliance between the Dutch Republic, Prussia, and Great Britain. The Netherlands was little more than a pawn for the major powers. The French Revolution embraced many of
9430-515: The Peace of Pressburg and was busy dividing up Europe in client-kingdoms apportioned to his relatives. He saw a good candidate for such a position in the Netherlands in his brother Louis Bonaparte . Ver Huell started scheming with his French patrons behind the back of Schimmelpenninck and feeding negative information about the Pensionary that found its way into the French press. Schimmelpenninck's position
9635-535: The Peace of Utrecht in 1713, had become a millstone around its neck. By 1713 the public debt of the County of Holland had reached 310 million guilders; the debt of the Generality was 68 million; and the debts of the smaller provinces, and of the cities came on top of this. The debt service of Holland alone in that year required 14 million guilders, which exceeded its regular tax revenue. Most of this humongous public debt
9840-464: The Staatsregeling voor het Bataafsche Volk was approved with 153,913 votes against 11,587 (i.e., just 641 more people voted for approval in 1798 than had voted for rejection of the previous draft in 1797; about 50% of the electorate had voted.) The new regime therefore seemed well-grounded in the new doctrine of popular sovereignty . The new constitution addressed many of the reformist concerns of
10045-507: The States of Holland had fired him as Captain General of their troops in 1786. This had not been done on a whim: the decision to travel to The Hague had only been taken after Gijsbert Karel van Hogendorp had undertaken a secret mission to the Orangist leaders in that city to discuss its advisability, because her husband was, as usual, hesitating about what course of action to follow. The leader of
10250-489: The Uitvoerend Bewind (Gerrit Pijman in particular) therefore amended the project in a sense that gave re-federalization even more emphasis. They unilaterally convened the primary assemblies by a proclamation on 14 September 1801, have a referendum on this new draft constitution . The Assembly defiantly ruled this proclamation illegal on 18 September. Then General Augereau (he of the Fructidor-coup), now commander-in-chief of
10455-489: The Uitvoerend Bewind for this, and many other foibles, like undermining the boycott of British goods. To remedy these ills, a new Batavian constitution on the political principles of the Consulate (union, authority, political office for men of ability and social station) was needed. The new French ambassador Charles Louis Huguet, marquis de Sémonville he sent to The Hague in 1799 was just the man for this job. Meanwhile, even
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#173284763995310660-466: The Uitvoerend Bewind . All these disaffections came together with the coup on 12 June 1798, of that recidivist , General Daendels, in which he disturbed a dinner party of Delacroix and three members of the Uitvoerend Bewind , violating the diplomatic immunity of the ambassador by putting pistols to his chest. The members of the Representative Assembly were arrested in session. The fall of
10865-456: The civil list was fixed at the "modest sum" of 1.5 million guilders. The constitution of the Pensionary was actually to be maintained with a few minor alterations (the title of raadpensionaris changed to that of King; and the size of the Staatsraad and the legislative corps nearly doubled). Prussian invasion of Holland The Prussian invasion of Holland was a military campaign under
11070-441: The "democratic" Patriots. But despite this hidden French agenda, Vérac (and his colleague Jean-François de Bourgoing , who had joined him as a special envoy in the Spring of 1787) kept indicating a willingness to support the Patriots (of both varieties) militarily. At the request of Vérac, the new French Foreign Minister Montmorin authorized on 7 July the surreptitious sending of two detachments of 50 engineers and one of 50 gunners to
11275-523: The 28th to urge her to accept the overtures of the Amsterdam delegation, because he had little desire to attack Amsterdam, whose defenses he considered too formidable. However, he was met at the stadtholder's residence not only by the Princess and her husband, but by a cabal of Orangists, including the British ambassador Sir James Harris ; the Grand Pensionary of Zeeland, Laurens Pieter van de Spiegel ;
11480-698: The Batavian Republic. Batavian Republic The Batavian Republic ( Dutch : Bataafse Republiek ; French : République Batave ) was the successor state to the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands . It was proclaimed on 19 January 1795 and ended on 5 June 1806, with the accession of Louis Bonaparte to the Dutch throne . From October 1801 onward, it was known as the Batavian Commonwealth ( Dutch : Bataafs Gemenebest ). Both names refer to
11685-519: The British bona fides. Together with the outbreak of the Russo-Turkish War on 19 August this decided the Prussian king in favor of an invasion of Holland. Brunswick advised him that if he wanted to go through with it, it had to be before October, as the weather would otherwise make a campaign impossible. On 3 September the British envoy in Berlin, Joseph Ewart , presented a note in which an agreement
11890-460: The British. Java , however, remained Dutch until 1811. Another potentially important consequence of the peace might have been that a number of provisions of the Treaty of The Hague, that had been conditional on a peace, like the reduction of the French army of occupation, would now have become operational. However, the First Consul proved reluctant to reduce the numbers of French troops, or return
12095-536: The Duke granted on 2 October. The same day a deputation of the city government left for The Hague to start negotiating with the Orangist States of Holland. At first it tried to bluff its way out of giving in to demands for total adherence to the resolutions of 19 September. It insisted on keeping the current city government in power and maintaining the right of the people to elect its representatives. But on 3 October it became clear that all hope of French intervention
12300-410: The Duke replied to their request with the remark that they could best adhere to the resolution that the rump-States of Holland were about to adopt in which they meekly asked the Princess what she required to satisfy her honor. The deputation returned to the Amsterdam vroedschap with this answer and a new deputation was sent to The Hague on the 29th to do this. The Duke visited the Princess incognito on
12505-725: The Duke, took the Southern route along the river Waal to the fortress city of Gorinchem . Gaudi's division split in two detachments after Arnhem , and marched on both banks of the river Rhine towards Utrecht. Finally, Lottum's division, mainly cavalry, moved North-West from Arnhem to the Veluwe and ultimately the coast of the Zuiderzee toward the Eastern border of Holland, and the Hollandse Waterlinie . In theory they could expect resistance from
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#173284763995312710-574: The Dutch Republic at the end of 1784 he had immersed himself in its politics, and become the de facto leader of the Orangists. He had surrounded himself with agents of influence , like the Zeeland pensionaries Van de Spiegel and Van Citters , and other secret agents, like baron van Kinckel and count Charles Bentinck, who not only gathered intelligence, but actively took part in secret operations. At first his financial outlays had been relatively modest, on
12915-416: The Dutch politicians and his own government about what either had actually said, so as to calm tempers on both sides. When the Princess became aware of this double play, she started to work for Thulemeyer's recall. Thulemeyer also tried to cool the Prussian ardor by exaggerating the rumors about French preparations for war in case of a Prussian intervention in the form of establishing an armed camp in Givet on
13120-427: The Dutch population looked favorably upon the French incursion, and often considered it a liberation, the French were quickly able to break the resistance of the forces of the Stadtholder and his Austrian and British allies. However, in many cities revolution broke out even before the French arrived and Revolutionary Committees took over the city governments, and (provisionally) the national government as well. William
13325-513: The Dutch republic from a client state of Great Britain and Prussia into a French one; henceforth it would conduct a foreign and military policy dictated by France, where its predecessor had followed British dictates since 1787 (an offensive and defensive alliance of the two republics was part of the treaty). With the treaty, economic policies would in effect also be made subservient to the interests of France, but this did not mean that it lost its independence in all respects. The program of reform that
13530-415: The Dutch revolutionaries attempted to put in place, constrained by the political realities of the French revolution, was mostly driven by Dutch needs and aspirations. The political events in the Netherlands were mainly derived from Dutch initiative, with some notable exceptions. The French were responsible for at least one of the coups d'état, and the French ambassador often acted as a proconsul . At first,
13735-405: The Dutch to maintain a French army of occupation of 25,000 men. To fulfill its responsibilities, Dutch financier Pieter Stadnitski joined a committee at the end of July 1795. To beat hyperinflation it was announced that from 3 August French soldiers in the Batavian Republic would be paid in sound Dutch currency and going forward no one could be obliged to accept French assignats . This changed
13940-426: The Dutch were completely left to their own devices: whenever French interests seemed to be in danger, France decisively intervened on its own behalf, as in the attempt to deduct the value of the Dutch fleet , surrendered in 1799, that the British had purchased from the Stadtholder, from the indemnification of the Prince of Orange. That indemnification was an important sideshow in the negotiations. The consequence of
14145-435: The East. The main Prussian force of Gaudi and Knobelsdorff under personal command of the Duke had reached Leimuiden on the 23rd. The next day he had Amstelveen reconnoitered, where there was a strong defensive line of the Patriot forces in Amsterdam. The entire region had been inundated , so that the city could only be approached along a number of narrow dikes and dams that could easily be defended. The defensive line formed
14350-468: The Emperor. The latter, however, refused to speak with the Commission, and only communicated to them through the intermediary of Ver Huell. Talleyrand had meanwhile drafted a "Treaty" which contained the conditions under which the crown of "Holland" was to be offered to Louis: no union of the crowns; no conscription ; a possible commercial treaty with France; and the basic freedoms of the Netherlands (linguistic, religious, judicial) were to be maintained; while
14555-437: The Fall of 1786. Obviously, his idea of a "solution" was biased more in the direction of the situation as it had been before 1780, but he was open to a compromise, that would take away the main grievances of the "aristocratic" Patriots, which implied a weakening of the position of the stadtholder. Von Görtz had achieved little, however. After the request by the States of Holland for French mediation, that France accepted on 18 July,
14760-407: The French economic sanctions against Britain. Since the members of the Staatsbewind , and their friends, often profited from this clandestine trade directly, the patience of the French was wearing thin. Matters came to a head when the French commander in the Republic, Auguste de Marmont , ordered in November 1804 that French naval patrols and customs officials were to take over the responsibility for
14965-521: The French forces in the Netherlands, routinely closed the doors of the Assembly (by previous arrangement with Pijman) on 19 September, and arrested the dissident Directors. Despite this military putsch the campaign for the plebiscite took place in an atmosphere of political freedom unthinkable in France. Nevertheless, this did not result in great enthusiasm for the new constitution. When the votes were counted on 1 October, out of 416,619 voters only 16,771 voted in favor and 52,219 against. The Directors then used
15170-420: The French government). The Prussian army lacked a proper siege train , though it of course had its field artillery, that it now could bring within close enough range to bombard the inner city, if necessary. But the Prussian supply of artillery shot had grown rather sparse: only 200 were remaining for the moment. The Duke therefore was rather pessimistic about the prospect of a lengthy siege. He decided not to press
15375-462: The Generality coffers according to a repartition schedule last changed in 1616. Attempts to reform this structure during the 18th century were mainly fruitless. To ameliorate the situation the old Republic maintained a policy of severe austerity during the century, especially economizing on its defense outlays (which in large part explains why its military and political role declined so much). Up to
15580-508: The Holendrecht from Abcoude . The murderous shrapnel fire of the Patriot guns repelled several attacks by both columns, causing relatively heavy Prussian casualties. The village remained in Patriot hands until the troops were withdrawn the next day, because the fall of the Amstelveen outpost had opened the way to the inner defenses of Amsterdam for the Prussians anyway The final attack-prong
15785-572: The Holland repartitie who had previously been positioned there, on 23 September. The schutters manned several batteries of 3-pdr. and 6-pdr. field guns on the banks of the Amstel and the Holendrecht (a creek that flows into the Amstel just upstream of where the bridge was located). This enabled them to oppose two Prussian columns that approached the village along the West bank of the Amstel from Uithoorn , and along
15990-541: The Military Commission in Woerden. They arrived in small groups, in civilian clothing, but Harris soon discovered the covert operation. Though the States of Holland preferred French mediation, there were obviously other candidates. Prussia had offered its "good offices" long before the incident at Goejanverwellesluis, and sent Johann Eustach von Görtz to mediate between the stadtholder and the "aristocratic" Patriots in
16195-591: The Orangist party in The Hague, the British envoy James Harris saw possibilities to put pressure on the States of Holland if the Princess suddenly arrived, and he told van Hogendorp to give the green light to the Princess, who was with her husband in the armed camp of the Dutch States Army in Amersfoort . The stadtholder then grudgingly gave his consent. The Princess then returned to Nijmegen, while preparations for
16400-523: The Patriot members of the vroedschap stayed at home, and the members they had replaced in May occupied their seats again. On 9 October burgemeesters Dedel and Beels assumed their posts again, while Hooft stayed home. The situation before 21 April had been restored. On 10 October the restored city government signed the capitulation of the city, and 150 Prussians occupied the Leiden Gate. The new city government
16605-574: The Patriot troops in the city of Utrecht and in fortifications along the Rhine near Jutphaas and Vreeswijk (mostly members of Free Corps and the "Legion of Salm" ) and the States Army garrisons of a number of fortress cities ( Woerden , Gorinchem, Naarden , Weesp ), and the capital in those days, The Hague, who had been withdrawn in October 1786 from the command of the stadtholder by the States of Holland. But
16810-484: The Patriots on 18 August that they had to accommodate the Prussians, as France was not ready to be dragged into a war on their behalf. But the Patriots ignored him. Vérac's position became untenable due to his apparent lack of influence on the Patriots, who appeared to have taken the bit between their teeth, and he was recalled on 20 August; he was temporarily succeeded by Antoine-Bernard Caillard as Chargé d'affaires on 10 September. On 23 August 60 French gunners arrived in
17015-411: The Patriots since 1785, including no hereditary offices; no sinecures ; and accountability of officials. It also came down on the side of economic liberalism , as opposed to mercantilism , in the economic debate then raging in republican circles, and therefore promised to do away with guilds and internal impediments to trade. The old provincial-repartition system of public finance was to be replaced by
17220-527: The Patriots than the French. Harris always had sonorously given as his motive his respect for "the Ancient Dutch Constitution" (by which he meant the arrangement that had been instituted in 1747 and was therefore at the time only forty years old) that had to be Restored (also because it implicitly guaranteed British "rights" to a preponderant position in the Low Countries in the name of maintaining
17425-424: The Princess, as the total submission of the Patriots, in Amsterdam and elsewhere. It was agreed that the Duke would end the ceasefire with Amsterdam at 8 PM on 30 September, and attack the city's defenses on 1 October. Up to this moment the Prussian campaign had been a militärischer Spaziergang (military promenade), but things were not going to be so easy from now on. First of all, the terrain between Leimuiden and
17630-410: The Prussian ambassador Thulemeyer to the States of Holland mentioned only one casus belli : It asked ...that their Noble and Great Mightinesses agree to punish, at the request of the Princess, those who would be considered culpable of offenses against Her August Person. In other words, the Prussian war aims were quite limited, and intentionally so, firstly to avoid being seen as unreasonable by
17835-412: The Prussians. The divisions of Gaudi and Knobelsdorff now marched together to Schoonhoven where the defense line proved to be evacuated, so that the Prussian troops and their States-Army companions could march unhindered to The Hague. In that city a revolution had meanwhile taken place. On 15 September the "triumvirate" of the pensionaries Zeebergh , de Gijselaar , and van Berckel had proposed to
18040-546: The Representative Assembly on 30 September 1799, they met with massive resistance. This led to so much delay in its acceptance that by the time it was to be implemented (in 1801) the re-federalisation of the state by the new Staatsbewind regime was already underway. Eventually, Gogel's reforms were only implemented under the successor state of the Kingdom of Holland. These are (important) examples of instances in which
18245-404: The Republic by France. Diplomatic mediation , far from being a form of conflict resolution by a neutral third party, could more cynically be defined as the imposition of a political arrangement on often unwilling parties by one or more foreign powers, with their own agenda that determined the contents of the arrangement. France had certainly its own ideas about what the arrangement should be:
18450-529: The Schimmelpenninck regime actually accomplished more in its short existence than the previous regimes had accomplished in the ten years since 1795. This was, of course, mainly due to the diligent preparatory work that Agents like the ubiquitous Gogel; Johannes Goldberg , for National Economy; and Johannes van der Palm , for National Education; had done. Gogel's General Taxation Plan was finally enacted in June 1805;
18655-405: The States General. However, a grass-roots democratic movement began to form in the Summer of 1795, consisting of popular societies (clubs) and wijkvergaderingen (precinct meetings), demanding popular influence on the government. A kind of parallel government in the form of "general assemblies" sprang up next to the city governments and the provincial States that repeatedly came into conflict with
18860-449: The States did as asked: the people on her list were proscribed on 11 October. The Princess now was ready to do as she had promised, but the Prussian king had incurred great expenses that he wanted to be recompensed for. The Duke and the Princess negotiated him down from his initial demand of several million guilders, but he insisted on a "douceur" for the troops of exactly 402,018 guilders and 10 stuivers , to be paid by Amsterdam alone. But
19065-565: The States of Holland generously rounded this up to half-a-million guilders, to be paid by the entire province, and the king acquiesced. As invasions go, this was a bargain: the victorious revolutionary French forces in 1795 demanded an indemnity of 100 million guilders for their "liberation" of the Netherlands from the stadtholder's dictatorship. The Prussian invasion resulted in the Orange Restoration, bringing William V back into power , and causing many Patriots to flee to France. In 1795,
19270-468: The States of Holland that they also should move to Amsterdam, as The Hague was no longer safe. However, a few Holland cities that still were in Orangist hands, and the Holland ridderschap (College of Nobles) opposed the move, so that only the delegations of the Patriot cities actually moved to Amsterdam the next day. The rump-States of Holland that remained in The Hague then assumed power and started on 19 September to repeal all Patriot-tinged legislation of
19475-460: The States of Holland that they would give her satisfaction, though this protest did not yet take the form of an ultimatum. The Princess saw the possibilities immediately: she wrote a letter to her brother on 13 July in which she proposed that he would use the situation to bring about the restoration of her husband to his office of Captain-General and to liberate the Republic from the Patriots. But she overplayed her hand, because at this time Frederick
19680-550: The United Kingdom , and her brother king Frederick William II of Prussia . Her husband was little help: he wrote to his daughter, Princess Louise : "The misfortune which I foresaw has happened ... I was always against this journey and in my misfortune it is a great consolation that I did what was in my power to stop it and to dissuade your Mother from such a risky venture." Though the Princess did not expect much from her brother at first, her message fell onto fertile ground. Since
19885-575: The Utrecht defense force, that had so hastily retreated on 16 September, there were also Frisian Patriots, who had lost the Frisian civil war between the rival Leeuwarden and Franeker " States of Friesland " earlier in the month, with Johan Valckenaer and Court Lambertus van Beyma (at this time still on speaking terms) in the van. Both groups had little military value, especially as they were very demoralized. Rhinegrave Salm withdrew from Utrecht by night. He
20090-593: The Vreede-Fijnje Bewind opened the way for the actual implementation of the new constitution. The "Interim Directory" that now came to power (consisting of a few of the dissenting Agenten ) made haste with organizing elections for the Representative Assembly that convened on 31 July. By the middle of August a new Uitvoerend Bewind had been appointed and the Agenten who had been behind the coup, resumed their original positions. This new regime now started to implement
20295-565: The Year VIII in important respects: a bicameral legislature would be appointed by a "National College" (akin to the French Sénat conservateur ) from a list of names produced by a convoluted system of national elections. This met with little enthusiasm by two of the other Directors François Ermerins and Jean Henri van Swinden , and by the Representative Assembly, that rejected the project on 11 June 1801, by fifty votes to twelve. The majority in
20500-510: The abolition of the guilds formally remained, in practice regulation of crafts and trades was reimposed by local ordinances. Against this background the negotiations for the Treaty of Amiens started in October 1801. The minor participants in the negotiations between Great Britain and France (the Batavian Republic and Spain) were immediately presented with faits accomplis: the preliminary agreement ceded Ceylon , and guaranteed free British shipping to
20705-403: The ambassador's recall. At the same time, Daendels became disaffected with the regime he had helped put into power because of the depredations of the purging commissions. His French colleague General Barthélemy Catherine Joubert was displeased with the radicals because of conflicts about the co-dominion of Flushing . Finally, the newly appointed Agenten were disturbed about the inefficiency of
20910-425: The area and seen no troops there. The British Cabinet also sent William Grenville to the Netherlands for a fact-finding mission, and he sent in a report that fully supported Harris' policy. Both pieces of information hardened the position of the British government. King George had in June declared that it was impossible for the country to go to war, but in early August he indicated his approval for Harris' policies. As
21115-405: The attack immediately, also because he wanted to avoid desperate measures by the defenders like the so-called "large inundation": a breach of the sea dikes at Sloterdijk and Zeeburg , which would devastate the countryside, but certainly would force the Prussians to withdraw. But he need not have worried. The Amsterdam city government decided to ask for a ceasefire in the evening of 1 October, which
21320-494: The author of the declaratoir (proclamation) of the stadtholder of May 1787, and tutor of the stadtholder's sons, Herman Tollius ; the Zeeland Orangist Willem Aarnoud van Citters ; and another protégé of Harris, A.J. Royer, the secretary of the States of Holland; who all advised that it would be tactically better to put more pressure on the Amsterdam delegation, so as to elicit not so much the required apology to
21525-568: The border between France and the neutral Prince-Bishopric of Liège , that provided a theoretical route for a French army to the Netherlands, that circumvented the Austrian Netherlands . The camp in Givet was not entirely a figment of people's imaginations, as the first response of the French government to the threatening language of the Prussian king (and the movements to the Dutch border at Wesel of Prussian troops) had indeed been to erect such
21730-406: The city of Utrecht. Around this time there also was a government crisis in France, as Brienne was appointed "premier ministre" by king Louis, and de Ségur resigned in protest. As a consequence France was without a minister for War during the crucial month of September 1787. Meanwhile, the French bluff about the armed camp at Givet had been discovered by the British who had sent out several spies to
21935-621: The colonies that had been captured by the British since 1795, except Ceylon , but including the Cape Colony . This now made the attempts in the Asiatic Council, which had replaced the Directorate of the VOC in 1799, to reform the management of the colonies, more urgent. Dirk van Hogendorp was commissioned to write a proposal, that met with considerable enthusiasm from the more progressive elements on
22140-470: The colonies was promulgated, Hogendorp's proposals had been whittled down to insignificance. The vestigial democrats on the Council were now purged in favor of Orangist reactionaries like Hendrik Mollerus , and Hendrik Van Stralen . In any case, the Republic did not enjoy the possession of its colonies for long. After the resumption of hostilities in 1803 the returned colonies in most cases were soon recaptured by
22345-474: The constitution contained an age-requirement for the members of the Uitvoerend Bewind , which favored the election of staid Patriot regents, and discriminated against the more talented appointed Agents , like Jacobus Spoors , Gerrit Jan Pijman and Alexander Gogel . The tenor of the Bewind became more conservative in the ensuing years. The agents went to work energetically, however, and started with an onslaught on
22550-403: The council, like Samuel Iperusz. Wiselius and J.H.Neethling . He proposed to abolish all perquisites and sinecures ; to permit private trade; to permit native subjects to own private property; to substitute the "land levies" by a regulated land tax; and the abolition of all seigneurial rights in the colonies. This met with overwhelming resistance from vested interests. When a new Charter for
22755-743: The days before the Battle of Bergen . The Agent for Foreign Affairs, Van der Goes who had been in favor of distancing the Republic from the French, chose this inopportune moment to secretly approach the King of Prussia as a mediator, with a scheme in which the Hereditary Prince was to become a kind of constitutional monarch in a constitution on the model of the American Constitution. The Republic would revert to its traditional neutrality, while Britain would occupy North Holland, and France Zeeland . The overture
22960-516: The death of his predecessor Frederick the Great the previous year, the new king had given new hope to the pro-British court party around minister Hertzberg , and lessened the influence of the pro-French party of Hertzberg's rival, minister Finckenstein . Hertzberg was opposed to the alliance between France and Austria which at the time held the upper hand on the European Continent, and the détente
23165-601: The defense line around Amsterdam was very difficult. On the left-hand side there was the Haarlemmermeer , a large lake that shielded Amsterdam on the South-West flank. The terrain to the East of the lake was mainly peat bog , suitable only for animal husbandry and crisscrossed with creeks and ditches. In addition large sections were intentionally flooded closer to Amsterdam, and could only be traversed across dikes and dams that were protected with sconces and other earthworks. The area
23370-471: The demands of the democrats; the suppression of the virulent Patriot press; and some kind of "satisfaction" to be offered by the States of Holland to the Princess, in the form of an invitation to visit The Hague. This may sound reasonable, but unfortunately for Montmorin these proposals were unacceptable for the Patriots. Their view was that the incident with the Princess was a non-event; that she had been treated politely enough, and that her temporary detention
23575-478: The democrats the admission of the Princess to The Hague had acquired great symbolic significance. If the "triumvirate" of "aristocratic" Patriot pensionaries ( Zeebergh , de Gijselaar , and van Berckel ) and the Grand Pensionary Pieter van Bleiswijk would accede to the Prussian demand, that would cause a popular insurrection against them. The lack of a positive reaction of the Holland government caused
23780-491: The dissident members of the Assembly expelled; an "interim Executive Directory" empowered; and the constitutional commission reduced to seven radical members. Though the resulting constitution has sometimes been depicted as a French project, it was actually a result of the constitutional commission's discussions between October 1797 and January 1798. Except for the purge of the electoral rolls of "crypto-Orangists" and other reactionaries, it might therefore have been acceptable for
23985-457: The diverse Patriot factions of all stripes, got in the way of the effort to create an efficient national unitary state, as envisioned by Gogel. The unitary state was not an end in itself, but a means to higher ends. The republic had been in dire financial straits even before the revolution of 1795. The system of public finance that had been the envy of the world in its Golden Age , enabling it to throw far beyond its weight in world politics up to
24190-456: The end of June In sum, Harris' efforts severely undermined the military power of the Patriot States of Holland, which might have shifted the balance of military power to the stadtholder, if it had come to a full-blown civil war. For that reason the States of Holland on 23 June (so before the incident at Goejanverwellesluis) passed a resolution asking for mediation between the warring parties in
24395-409: The enemy on 5 July 1803. Later it banned cheese exports and butter. These measures were of little practical effect, since in 1804 the volume of general exports to Britain was nearly equal to that in the last year of peace in 1802. British goods reached Dutch destinations via neutral German ports or disguised as "American cargo". The republic was therefore an important "keyhole into Europe" that undermined
24600-545: The established order. In the Fall of 1795 the States General started to work on a procedure to peacefully replace itself, "by constitutional means", with a National Assembly that would possess full executive, legislative and constituent powers. This project at first met with sharp resistance from the conservatives. In some cases even force was used (as in Friesland and Groningen ) to overcome this opposition. The new National Assembly convened in The Hague on 1 March 1796. Like
24805-539: The final formalities of the Orange Restoration were taken care of. On 8 October the Princess indicated that her honor would be satisfied if "the authors" of her humiliation in Goejanverwellesluis would forever be barred from holding public office (she supplied a list); the Free Corps in the entire country would be disarmed; and all regenten that had replaced Orangists in the preceding months would be removed again. At
25010-480: The finances of the Republic and on its economy. Another real burden was the economic warfare that Napoleon launched against the British, which was answered by a British counter-boycott. This foreshadowed the Continental System which was written into law in 1806. However already in 1803 it started to choke off Dutch trade. Ostensibly, the Staatsbewind did its part by prohibiting the import of all goods from
25215-535: The first Assembly. Though an opponent of the radicals, he had politically survived the coups of 1798, and served as ambassador to France, and as plenipotentiary to the Amiens negotiations. Now Napoleon saw him as the person to clean the Augean stables of the Dutch client state. Schimmelpenninck saw himself in the same light. He had long had a woolly vision of a "national conciliation" in the Netherlands, that made him amenable to
25420-426: The first Dutch system of public administration. The French reaction to this flurry of reforms was mixed, however. The very zeal of the program might betoken a renascent nationalism that could work against French interests. The planned invasion of England was cancelled due to a lack of naval superiority, which was only reinforced by the debacle of the Battle of Trafalgar . The Dutch now began to clamor for economies in
25625-505: The form of the return of the Boulogne flotilla, which annoyed Napoleon, because he still had a use for it. The man who had led that flotilla to Boulogne, after repelling a superior British fleet , Carel Hendrik Ver Huell , was now Secretary for the Navy. He had also become a confidant of the emperor, and now engaged in a secret correspondence with Talleyrand and Napoleon. The latter had just concluded
25830-410: The good intentions of the Uitvoerend Bewind and its Agenten met with the political and economic realities of the times. Other necessary reforms (the abolition of the guilds, the reform of the system of poor relief to mention but a few examples) equally came to nothing. These defeats progressively led to disenchantment of the population with the regime, that already was in an awkward position because it
26035-470: The journey to The Hague were made by ordering fresh horses for her carriages along the route in two places. This caused suspicion among the Patriot Free Corps in the area, who in this way were alerted to her supposedly secret travel plans. The military authorities posted Free Corps patrols in the affected area with orders to intercept her. When on 28 June 1787 she departed from Nijmegen to The Hague with
26240-770: The leadership of Charles William Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick , against the rise of the democratic Patriot movement in the Dutch Republic in September–October 1787 with the aim of disempowering the patriots and disarming the Free Corps, as well as reinstating the William V of Orange as hereditary stadtholder in the Dutch Republic . On 7 June Von Salm-Grumbach was appointed by the Defence Committee in Woerden as commander-in-chief and Quint Ondaatje as liaison officer of
26445-407: The legitimacy of the regime, as moderate Patriots were also disenfranchised. The final blow was that the new regime reneged on its promise to elect an entirely new Representative Assembly. Meanwhile, the 22 Floréal coup in France undermined Delacroix, because it inspired more sympathy by French foreign minister Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord for the Dutch opposition members who demanded
26650-524: The loyalty of these mercenary troops was very doubtful, in view of the wholesale desertions during the preceding months. Besides the Nijmegen garrison of the States Army, the Prussian troops could count on the support of the States Army garrisons of Amersfoort and Zeist , who were more or less besieging Utrecht from a distance. The Gaudi division was supposed to attack Utrecht and the fortifications South of that city, but this proved unnecessary. The Rhinegrave
26855-404: The main frontal attack by a force of 4,000 Prussians earlier in the day. Amstelveen had until it was attacked in the rear by the Prussians from Sloten, valiantly held on under the command of Colonel count Guillaume de Portes, but the defenders had to retreat in the direction of Ouderkerk aan de Amstel , thereby opening the way to Amsterdam from the South. The village of Ouderkerk itself had been
27060-406: The matter became more urgent for the Prussians, however, even without the complication of the incident at Goejanverwellesluis. Montmorin gave them an opening when on 13 July he asked if the Prussians would be interested in joint mediation, and proposed a package that would consist of a number of de-escalating military steps in the Republic; the renunciation by the States of Holland of their support for
27265-570: The members of the Second Coalition was mostly against the French Revolution, its ideas and its consequences. By this time Napoleon himself was convinced of their perfidy. Talleyrand and Napoleon therefore saw a possibility of a compromise, in which France would retain its chain of docile client states, but with the "revolutionary" sting removed, to appease the Allies. That unrevolutionary docility
27470-469: The minds of reformers like Gogel had become receptive to the need for change. The frustrations of the stalemate between unitarist reformers and democratically elected federalist obstructionists had caused a certain disillusionment with democratic politics in the former (the latter were already convinced). An alliance was therefore forming between the would-be reformers, who would like to finally push their reforms through, by "Bonapartist" means, if necessary, and
27675-549: The minimum conditions to which the new constitution should conform. Now the course of events started to speed up. The new French ambassador Charles-François Delacroix took the side of the radicals. His behavior sufficiently intimidated the opponents of the radical proposals to actually fall in line. The coup that was to follow was therefore in reality superfluous. Nevertheless, the radicals, led by Wybo Fijnje and Willem Ockerse , in collaboration with Pierre Auguste Brahain Ducange ,
27880-497: The moderates, obviating the need for the January coup. In any case, the "suggestions" of Delacroix were rejected and the constitutional commission insisted on the following three essential points: universal manhood suffrage , without fiscal qualifications. the right of revision of the constitution at quinquennial intervals by the voters; and finally the rejection of the principle of a bicameral legislature , in which each House would have
28085-410: The month, Napoleon came to a speedy decision and soon thereafter the Batavian Republic had a new constitution and government. On 10 May 1805, Schimmelpenninck was therefore inaugurated as Raadpensionaris (Grand Pensionary) of the Batavian Republic. This venerable title (clearly chosen for sentimental reasons) had little connection with the former office of the States of Holland ; as a matter of fact,
28290-404: The nature of the Dutch state and to bind its new institutions into the framework of an electoral democracy." As such it had an importance that outlasted the Batavian Republic and set up an ideal to emulate for its successor states. Giddy with their success, the radicals now pushed further. Their legitimacy was already tenuous, because of the way they had seized power. Now they also lost support in
28495-463: The new local and departmental administrations, though elected, were supposed to execute the policies as centrally laid down by the national government. As the elections often put people in power who represented the old order (like Joan Arend de Vos van Steenwijk in Ouden Yssel) this was exceedingly unlikely. To put it differently, the political effort to attain "national unity" through reconciliation of
28700-463: The new office more resembled that of Stadtholder, though even William V, after 1787, had not possessed the powers Schimmelpenninck was to wield. His was a one-man Executive that would in no way be encumbered by the 19 man Legislative Corps, that had no powers apart from the Pensionary. The Pensionary conducted his business assisted by a Staatsraad , that resembled the French Conseil d'État more than
28905-488: The next day, and to retreat to Amsterdam where he proposed to make a stand. The only hope of the Patriots appeared to be to hold out until they could be relieved by a French army that was rumored to stand ready in Givet on the border of France and the neutral Prince-Bishopric of Liège to march to the Netherlands, so if the Patriots could defend Amsterdam long enough for the French to arrive, they might still be saved. The permission
29110-476: The old Raad van State , and by Secretaries of State, who resembled the Agenten of the Uitvoerend Bewind . Of course, such an important change in the constitution had to receive the imprimatur of the popular will. A plebiscite was duly organized which elicited 14,903 Yes-votes (against 136 Noes) from an electorate of 353,322. The abstentions were counted as "tacit affirmatives" in the now well-established tradition. Despite such unpromisingly reactionary trappings
29315-409: The old Dutch Republic was permanently replaced by a unitary state. For the first time in Dutch history, the constitution that was adopted in 1798 had a genuinely democratic character. For a time, the Republic was governed democratically, although a coup d'état in 1801 put an authoritarian regime in power after another change to the constitution. The influence of this period helped smooth the transition to
29520-440: The old Prussian king had maintained with France, and which had previously held Prussia back from all too aggressive interventions in the Dutch Republic that might offend France. The incident with the Princess played into his hands. Fredrick William's first impulse was rage; he instructed the Prussian envoy in The Hague, Thulemeyer to protest to the States General of the Netherlands about the insult to his sister, and to demand from
29725-451: The old administrative organization of the country, in a deliberate attempt to liquidate the very identity of the old federal structure. The once mighty province of Holland was carved into three pieces: Amstel (Amsterdam and immediate vicinity), Texel (the northern peninsula) and Delf (the southern part); and the other provinces were often merged in larger entities, like Overijssel and Drente into Ouden Yssel , and Frisia and Groningen into
29930-461: The old revolutionary States-General, the new National Assembly contained radically opposed parties: the unitary democrats, led by Pieter Vreede , Johan Valckenaer and Pieter Paulus , and the federalists, such as Jacob Abraham de Mist and Gerard Willem van Marle . But there was a broad continuum of opinion between these poles. In this force-field the federalists held the upper hand after the sudden demise of Paulus (who might otherwise have acted as
30135-504: The other European Great Powers , and secondly, because the Prussian king had at this stage no intention of overturning the Holland government, possibly obligating him to engage in a lengthy and costly occupation. The matter was supposed to be resolved in a fortnight, and therefore the troops were only provisioned for a campaign of short duration. The command of the invading troops was entrusted to Generalfeldmarschall Charles William Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel , coincidentally
30340-516: The other funding requirements of the republic added another 20 million annually). To fulfill its engagements to the French Republic, Pieter Stadnitski joined a committee at the end of July 1795. On August 3 it was announced that from that date French soldiers would be paid in sound Dutch currency and no one could be obliged to accept French assignats anymore. In 1814 the public debt stood at 1.7 billion guilders. The average ordinary revenue of
30545-414: The peace treaty specifically exempted the Dutch from paying anything. Instead, an arrangement between the French, British and Prussians (the former stadtholder's champions ) in the matter was reached that in return for dropping any and all claims William was to be compensated with the abbatial domains of Fulda and Corvey Abbey (see also Principality of Nassau-Orange-Fulda ). The Treaty restored most of
30750-479: The peace treaty was that the Batavian Republic now received international recognition, even by the British, and that the old Dutch Republic was now irreversibly dead. This put an end to all pretensions of the Stadtholder and his heirs, such as they were. It may be important to note that these pretensions were dubious to begin with. The Stadtholder was never the sovereign power in the Netherlands, despite understandable misconceptions by foreigners, who may have thought that
30955-513: The people who wished to restore the old federal order, in the hands of the old regent class. Director Besier in particular was amenable to a project that would extend executive power (and curtail that of the Assembly), and revert the constitution to federal devolution. With the help of Sémonville he now started to push a project of constitutional reform that followed the French Constitution of
31160-538: The plan to mount such a force. The minister of Foreign Affairs, Montmorin , and the minister for War, de Ségur , were in favor, but the Finance Minister Brienne vetoed the plan, for lack of money. From that time on the Camp of Givet was nothing more than a French bluff to keep the Prussians and British guessing, and the Patriots hoping. The reason why the British government was so alert to French military moves,
31365-410: The policies that their radical predecessors had written into the constitution. The coup of June therefore was not a reactionary revolution, but only brought about a change in personnel. Soon most of the people that were arrested at both the January and June coups were released in the spirit of reconciliation that the new regime advocated. The make-up of the Representative Assembly closely resembled that of
31570-564: The political ideas that the Patriots had espoused in their own revolt. The Patriots enthusiastically supported the Revolution, and when the French revolutionary armies started to spread the revolution, the Patriots joined in, hoping to liberate their own country from its authoritarian yoke. The Stadtholder joined the ill-fated First Coalition of countries in their attempt to subdue the suddenly anti-Austrian French First Republic . The Patriots sought French revolutionary aid in their struggle against
31775-400: The port of Flushing, for the good of the Dutch as he pointed out, as they needed many of their own troops in their restored colonies, so the "protection" of the French troops was considered necessary. On the other hand, the departure of the French troops was an indispensable point for the British as they could not allow the Netherlands to be dominated by a hostile power, and the Batavian Republic
31980-470: The powers of the Executive, which now became known as the Staatsbewind (Regency of State). The elective principle was reduced to a formality: the Staatsbewind , originally consisting of the three directors taking part in the coup, expanded its membership by co-optation to twelve. This executive then appointed the first 35 members of the legislature. As vacancies arose, these were filled, as far as possible, on
32185-423: The powers of the Stadtholder had become dictatorial. But formally the States General had been sovereign since 1588, and the Stadtholder was merely their "first servant". The British may have entertained certain fantasies about his formal status, but never seriously considered it. An example of this would the British acceptance of the surrender of the Batavian fleet in the name of the Stadtholder in 1799, as though he
32390-449: The previous years, starting with the reinstatement of the stadtholder in his offices of Captain-General of the States Army and Admiral-General of the Navy. William V returned to The Hague on 20 September at the head of his States-Army troops, and the Hague garrison, that up to that moment had nominally opposed him, fell immediately in line. The Hague Orangist mob started looting Patriot homes, and
32595-413: The process of creating a written Dutch constitution was mainly driven by internal political factors and not by French influence until Napoleon forced the Dutch government to accept his brother, Louis Bonaparte , as monarch. The political, economic, and social reforms that were brought about during the relatively short duration of the Batavian Republic have had a lasting impact. The confederal structure of
32800-412: The proposed overseas expedition. Even more importantly, the Dutch were to supply five ships-of-the-line, five frigates, 100 gunboats, and 250 flat-bottomed transport craft, capable of holding 60–80 men by December 1803. In total the Dutch were meant to provide transport for 25,000 men and 2,500 horses, the major part of Napoleon's invasion armada, and all at Dutch expense. Napoleon's imposed real burdens on
33005-437: The republic at this time amounted to between 28 and 35 million guilders. However, since the outbreak of the war in 1793 the expenditure had been running at between 40 and 55 millions. For the year 1800 the republic had to find 78 million guilders for its expenditures. In other words, the new Agent of Finance, Gogel, was faced with a financial emergency. He needed to generate about 50 million guilders annually in ordinary revenue on
33210-410: The return to either the Dutch constitution during the two "stadtholderless periods" of 1650-1672 and 1702-1747 , or at least to the era in which the formal powers of the stadtholder were far less than after 1747 (for instance like under the stadtholderate of Frederick Henry ). On the other hand, the French king had been adamant that he did not want any "democratic" experiments in the Dutch Republic. As
33415-478: The revolutionaries therefore was to strive for the reform of the confederal state, with its discrimination of the Generality Lands , and of particular minorities (Catholics, Jews), in the direction of a unitary state , in which the minorities would be emancipated , and the old entrenched interests superseded by a more democratic political order. As a first step the representatives of Brabant were admitted to
33620-419: The revolutionaries used the constitutional machinery of the old confederal republic. They resumed where they had left off after the purge in 1787 of Patriot regents , taking over the offices of the Orangist regents that were now purged in their turn. (For instance, the States of Holland and West Friesland were replaced by having the 18 cities that formally were represented in those States send representatives to
33825-493: The rump-Assembly because of their partisanship. Not wishing to repeat the mistakes of the French Jacobins they moved against the popular political clubs that formed their political base, thereby alienating their most enthusiastic supporters. On the other hand, at the behest of Delacroix they also moved against "counter-revolutionaries" by having purging commissions removing these men from the electoral rolls, further undermining
34030-507: The same scale as those of his French colleague Vérac, but in May he had conceived a plan on a far larger scale. The immediate cause was that the Orangist States of Gelderland, who were financing the States Army troops that the States of Holland had tried to recall to the Holland borders in 1786, were now in severe financial difficulties, because of this unusual extra expense. Harris estimated that he needed £70,000 to support Gelderland. The Cabinet granted these funds, money to be laundered through
34235-424: The second National Assembly of 1797. The new regime was soon to discover that changes do not easily come about by legislative fiat. The part of the constitution that worked adequately was the experiment with indirect democracy. During the period in which the constitution was in force, the system of primary assemblies that elected delegates who voted for the respective organs of government worked efficiently, and kept
34440-434: The secretary of the French ambassador, now started to plot the coup d'état of 21–22 January 1798, which, with the assistance of General Herman Willem Daendels , put the radicals in power. A rump assembly of about fifty radicals declared itself a Constituante , which in one fell swoop enacted the entire radical program, while the other members of the Assembly were forcibly detained. All provincial sovereignties were repealed;
34645-651: The soldiers heartily joined in. One of the consequences of the reconstitution of the States of Holland in The Hague was that this body could order the States-Army garrisons of a number of the fortress towns behind the Hollandse Waterlinie to offer no resistance to the advancing Prussians. Naarden, under the command of the Patriot leader Adam Gerard Mappa , surrendered for that reason on 27 September, as did nearby Weesp. This enabled Lottum, who had up to that moment made little progress, to approach Amsterdam closely from
34850-405: The stadholder into exile. The French Revolutionary War proceeded disastrously for the forces of the Stadtholder. In the severe winter of 1794/95 a French army under General Charles Pichegru , with a Dutch contingent under General Herman Willem Daendels , crossed the great frozen rivers that traditionally protected the Netherlands from invasion. Aided by the fact that a substantial proportion of
35055-444: The stadholder, but did not want to be considered territory conquered by France, but rather a "sister republic". There was open warfare, with the Patriots' cause dependent on its success on the battlefield. With the defeat of allies of the stadholder at Battle of Fleurus , Austria abandoned its interest in the southern Netherlands. French revolutionary forces were able to take advantage of the freezing of rivers in December 1794 and forced
35260-429: The suggestion of British Ambassador Harris she added that the criminal prosecution of the dismissed persons should remain a possibility. Harris wrote in his diary: "‘It is necessary to hold a rod of terror over the heads of these factious leaders, though it may, perhaps, not be to make use of it." If the States of Holland acceded to these wishes, she would ask her brother the Prussian king to remove his troops. Of course,
35465-403: The surveillance of cargoes in Dutch ports, with powers of confiscation without reference to Dutch authorities. The Staatsbewind forbade any Batavian official to take orders from the French on 23 November 1804. This act of defiance sealed the fate of yet another of the Batavian regimes. Napoleon had long been dissatisfied with what he viewed as the foot-dragging and inefficiency of the Dutch. As
35670-433: The suspicion on the part of the French and the Patriots that he had all the time conspired to bring the event about, and that it was no more than a provocation. And this was more or less the consensus in diplomatic circles in The Hague, though hypotheses about who actually conspired with whom varied. In any case, the Princess, back in Nijmegen, on 29 June wrote letters of complaint to her husband's nephew, king George III of
35875-428: The target of two other attack prongs that morning. It was an important strategic object, because the village had the only bridge across the Amstel river outside Amsterdam, which was essential for the communications between the Prussian troops on either side of the river. The village was occupied by Amsterdam schutters under the command of colonel George Hendrik de Wilde after it had been evacuated by States Army troops on
36080-628: The territory was annexed into the French Empire. Due to the disastrous Fourth Anglo-Dutch War , the Patriot party revolted against the authoritarian regime of Stadtholder William V but were quickly struck down through the intervention of William's brother-in-law Frederick William II of Prussia in September 1787. Most Patriots went into exile in France , while The Netherlands' own " ancien régime " strengthened its grip on Dutch government chiefly through
36285-455: The trade had shifted to flags of convenience (especially that of the US and European neutrals like Prussia), but the peace made the resurgence of the Dutch carrying trade fully practicable. Nevertheless, some changes proved irreversible, like the shift of trade patterns to German ports, and the decline of the fisheries. The peace turned out to be of short duration. On 18 May 1803, slightly more than
36490-615: The troops in Holland. Salm was not recognized by all officers, and his new powers were legally controversial. On the 28 June, he marched to Woerden to capture princess Wilhelmina of Prussia , the wife of the Prince of Orange. At the end of July Salm ordered conquering Palace Soestdijk and besieging Amersfoort. First came the arrest at Bonrepas of Stadtholder's wife, Wilhelmina of Prussia , on her way from Nijmegen , where William V had taken refuge, to The Hague . There she intended to request her husband to be allowed to return to, after
36695-427: The troops of the garrison of the Dutch States Army in that city under command of the stadtholder . The Prussian government had asked permission from the States of Gelderland , Utrecht and Overijssel for the march through those lands, as their conflict was with Holland only. After entering the Netherlands, the Prussian army split in its three components, which marched in three columns: Knobelsdorff, together with
36900-400: The voters engaged. However, exactly because the Republic was a genuine democracy, other goals of the regime were less easy to attain. The elections often put people into office that were very much opposed to the unitary state that was now enshrined in the constitution, and to other innovations that it entailed, or in any case were of a conservative inclination. This already applied at the top:
37105-505: Was a sovereign prince. But this was all make-believe, and it ended with the peace of 1802 (though it was revived in 1813). The Prince had reason to feel aggrieved by this. He did have large patrimonial estates in the Netherlands that now were forfeit. Besides, the loss of his hereditary offices entailed a loss of income. According to his own calculations the arrears in all these incomes since 1795 amounted to 4 million guilders. The Staatsbewind refused to pay this, or any sum, point blank, and
37310-443: Was also brushed with the tar of the depredations of the French "sister republic" that mainly viewed the Batavian Republic as a milk cow , both collectively (in its demands for loans at very low interest rates ) and individually (in the demands of French officials for bribes and other extortions). The sagging popularity of the Republic did not escape the attention of the British intelligence services. However, because this intelligence
37515-637: Was an assault, again launched from Abcoude, along the Gein and Gaasp rivers to Duivendrecht , on the Eastern approaches to Amsterdam. Here the Prussians were also repelled by a battery of Amsterdam schutters . In the next days the Prussian soldiers ransacked the summer residence of the Amsterdam Patriot burgemeester Hendrik Daniëlsz Hooft . In any case the road to the Muiden Gate in the Amsterdam inner defenses remained closed. Those inner defenses remained
37720-400: Was bisected by the meandering Amstel river, that was only spanned by a few bridges, so that troops marching from the South were forced to divide in two columns that could not easily support one another. The defenders of Amsterdam were mainly elements of Free Corps from all over the Netherlands, who had been forced to retreat to the Amsterdam redoubt as a last resort. Besides the remnants of
37925-458: Was filtered through the eyes of Orangist agents in the Republic and émigrés in England, it was erroneously interpreted as possible support for an Orangist restoration. This caused the miscalculation that led to the ill-fated Anglo-Russian invasion of Holland in the peninsula of North Holland in 1799. Though the expedition ended in failure the members of the Uitvoerend Bewind became very nervous in
38130-406: Was forced to flee to England on a fishing boat on 18 January 1795. The French presented themselves as liberators. But there were acrimonious negotiations between the representatives of the new Batavian Republic and those of the French Republic , and a harsh Treaty of The Hague was concluded on 16 May 1795. In addition to imposing territorial concessions and a huge indemnity, the treaty obligated
38335-484: Was given and the evacuation started the next day and soon degenerated into total chaos. The Free Corps became totally demoralized and threw away their arms. Only the Legion of Salm maintained its composure and reached the outskirts of Amsterdam on the 16th. But the Prussians were able to occupy Utrecht unopposed the same day, and move on to The Hague. The fortress city of Gorinchem (the only garrison south of Amsterdam still in
38540-404: Was held by Dutch private citizens, so in a sense it merely engendered an internal money circuit in the Dutch economy. However, it was mostly concentrated in the hands of the rentier class, while the debt was serviced by mainly regressive taxes that weighed on the working population. Most importantly, these were taxes levied by the individual provinces, who serviced their own debt, and paid into
38745-435: Was her own fault; that the States of Holland were fully within their rights to prevent her from coming to The Hague to preserve public order; that therefore there had been no insult, and there was no need for an apology, let alone "satisfaction." And this on 14 July had been the reply to Frederick William's diplomatic protest of early July. The Prussian king, not pleased that he was not taken seriously, now decided to concentrate
38950-413: Was immediately released, and allowed to return to Nijmegen. Meanwhile, Harris in The Hague was worried about the lack of news about the Princess. He was playing cards with the French envoy Vérac that evening, and was so off his game that he lost a lot of money. As soon as he received news about the interception, he regained his composure, and started to take advantage of the situation, thereby supporting
39155-537: Was in doubt. This caused a tug of war with the other provinces in the States-General in June with parliamentary chicanes around the status of the delegations of the rival States of Utrecht determining temporary 4-3 majorities for either the Patriot or the Orangist side in the States General. Eventually there was a complete breach between the States of Holland and the majority of the States General (the provinces of Zeeland, Gelderland, Friesland and Utrecht (Amersfoort)) at
39360-451: Was incapable of defending its own neutrality. This was to be an insoluble dilemma in the coming years. Real advantages of the peace came in the economic field. As an open economy , the Republic needed unhindered trade. It was heavily dependent on exports of agricultural products to the British markets, and on its services sector (especially its large merchant fleet, and the banking sector), whereas its industry (whatever remained of it after
39565-499: Was lost. The city government therefore acceded to all Orangist political demands, but attempted to get favorable terms for the surrender from the Duke. Indeed he agreed not to occupy the city, but to limit himself to a symbolic occupation of the Leiden city gate. The French soldiers, and the remnants of the Legion of Salm and the "flying brigade" of Mappa were given safe conduct to the Generality Lands , and left on 7 October. The same day
39770-478: Was not mistreated, as has been asserted by Orangist propagandists, but only temporarily detained in a nearby farm, to await the arrival of members of the Military Commission in Woerden. The only untoward thing that happened was that the leader of the patrol drew his saber, but he put it back in its scabbard when requested. When the Military Commission arrived she was told she would not be allowed to proceed to The Hague, for fear of instigating public unrest there, but she
39975-436: Was not safe until the Free Corps and the schutterij had been disarmed. This happened in the following weeks, while 2,000 States Army troops garrisoned the city to help keep order. The Patriot press was suppressed, and the expression of Orangist sentiments again encouraged (by repealing the prohibition against wearing orange colors in public; now the wearing of the black Patriot cockades was prohibited). Meanwhile, in The Hague,
40180-427: Was only interested in an apology, and did not conflate this with something that might frustrate the attempts at mediation France and Prussia had previously made. Stamford, who had conveyed the Princess's letter by hand, heard the king exclaim: "The b... wants to draw me into a war, but I'll show her that she doesn't lead me." Envoy Thulemeyer also played a moderating role, be it with questionable means, as he lied both to
40385-746: Was proposed for Anglo-Prussian cooperation in operations against the Dutch. The common objective was to be the restoration of the stadtholder to his former position. The Prussian army was to remain encamped in Gelderland for the duration of the Winter, whatever the outcome of the conflict, and Britain would subsidize the expenses. Britain would hire German troops to support the Prussians. Britain would warn France that if it tried to intervene, Britain would mobilize its sea and land forces. Prussia and Britain would act in concert in further measures. After that events developed rapidly. The ultimatum issued on 9 September 1787 by
40590-614: Was rejected, and it caused a lot of embarrassment in the relations with the French Directory. At this time Napoleon Bonaparte performed his coup of 18 Brumaire , establishing the French Consulate . The Franco-Batavian relations now entered a whole new era. Though Napoleon had a warlike reputation, his policies in his first years as First Consul were aimed at restoring peace in Europe, albeit at terms favorable to France. The animus of
40795-443: Was replaced by the French veteran of the American Revolutionary War , Jean Baptiste Ternant , who had been seconded by the French government, together with a few hundred gunners. He had tried in vain to organize the Patriot defenses in Overijssel, but that province went over to the Orangists without a fight. The most credible part of the defenders consisted of the Amsterdam schutterij and the Free Corps. Colonel Isaac van Goudoever
41000-400: Was still in charge of the "white" regiment of the schutterij , but just around this time he had been forced to take to bed, because of a leg injury. Salm left Utrecht on Saturday evening, 16 September, and hurried to Uithoorn and Ouderkerk aan de Amstel , without giving battle. On Thursday, September 20, 1787, the Stadtholder and his wife arrived in The Hague. In Amsterdam Salm's escape
41205-430: Was that the British Cabinet of Prime Minister William Pitt and Foreign Secretary Carmarthen had just in May fully endorsed the policy of active support of the "British" party (i.e. the Orangists) in the Republic, together with a campaign of subversion , espoused by Harris. Harris was of necessity (as Carmarthen offered little guidance) an envoy who not so much executed foreign policy, as made it. Ever since he arrived in
41410-421: Was to be assured by constitutions designed to eliminate not only domestic conflict (as was the new French political order), but also any flashes of impertinent nationalism. France therefore embarked on a program of constitutional reform in the dependent republics, first in the Helvetic Republic , where Napoleon as Mediator imposed the Constitution of Malmaison in 1801 (followed by the Second Helvetic Constitution
41615-446: Was very aware of the strategic danger that the two-pronged attack (north and south of the city) posed. It was likely that the Prussians simply would pass him by and encircle the city, in which case his main force would become entrapped, and the Hague would become endangered. For that reason he asked the Defense Council in Woerden, that was in nominal command of the Holland troops in Utrecht, on 14 September for permission to evacuate Utrecht
41820-431: Was very resented, and if he had arrived there he would certainly have been harmed. This city, to which the Defense Commission had hastily retreated at Salm's request, closed the gates to Salm's troops. The Prussian operational plan for the attack on 1 October consisted of a five-pronged approach. The most audacious part was an amphibious landing by 2,000 troops, transported from Aalsmeer on flat-bottomed boats across
42025-409: Was weakened by the fact that he was slowly going blind. The Dutch Secretaries of State and the Staatsraad did not have much choice: their only options were a complete extinguishing of the national identity in the form of annexation to the Empire, or the lesser evil of a new kingdom under one of Napoleon's relatives. A Groot Besogne (Grand Commission) was formed to conduct the unequal negotiations with
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