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The establishment of Maximilian's empire in Mexico
The establishment of Maximilian's empire in Mexico Author:John Musser Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: su V sn CHAPTER IV The Allies In Mexico After the signing of the Convention of London, it was agreed by the allied powers that the expeditionary forces sh... more »ould consist of six thousand Spaniards and three thousand French. England was to contribute a strong naval divison, two line-of-battle ships, four frigates, several smaller vessels, and a landing force of seven hundred marines.1 The plenipotentiaries were, on the part of England, Sir Charles Lennox Wyke, and Commodore Dunlop, the latter taking the place of Sir Alexander Milne, who owing to the trouble with the United States over the Trent Affair, had been put in command of all the British naval forces in the western Atlantic;2 and on the part of France, Dubois de Saligny and Rear Admiral Jurien de la Graviere. Spain sent only General Juan Prim, Conde de Reus and Marques de los Castillejos, as both commander of her contingent and commissioner.3 On December 14, 1861, the Spanish fleet under Admiral Joaquin Gutierrez de Rubalcoaba sailed into the harbor of Vera Cruz and demanded the surrender of the city within twenty-four hours.4 Upon the indignant protest of the governor,6 the next day the Spaniards took possession of the dismantled fortress of San Juan d'Ulloa, and on the 17th, without opposition, disembarked and entered the city.6 The commandant of the forces landed, General Emmanuel Gasset y Merca- der, issued on December seventeenth, two proclamations to the people of Vera Cruz, the one to reassure them of their personal safety, and declaring that the Spanish troops "have no mission of conquest, no interested views. They are led solely by the duty of demanding satisfaction for the non-fulfillment of treaties, and for the acts of violence 1 Niox, Expedition De Mexique, 39-40, for detailed account of the French f...« less