Olive trees can be badly damaged by a killer frost - a sad thing indeed, especially when the cold actually destroys the tree. And frost does kill - literally and metaphorically. It is also sad when olive branches, traditionally proffered in an attempt to effect peace, are rejected - are called Poohsticks even. But these branches can also, it must be admitted, be used as a kind of arboreal weapon - bashing with an olive branch does occasionally happen after all. This strikes me as a sort of perverse/reverse theology - plow-shares getting turned into swords. Such distressing things we have witnessed here in our little Res His world, but what about in the real world? How many times in history have olive branches been proffered and rejected? How has mankind been thus injured by pride and by pig-headedness? Humans can be such destructive fools at times - in both the real and the virtual world.

I've always felt a bit sorry for Neville Chamberlain: he strikes me as a sad, failed hero of the olive branch type, a man who has gone down in history as a complete and utter plonker - as one who negotiated not wisely, but who nevertheless meant well. His olive branch certainly turned into a huge poohstick. What other examples of the olive branch/poohstick - and the wielders of such -  come to mind?


"...there was once a time when appeasement was a legitimate instrument of diplomacy to settle international disputes. The point was to acknowledge grievances, negotiate and compromise and thus avoid armed conflict. Ever since British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain surrendered Sudetenland to German Chancellor Adolf Hitler in the 1938 Munich agreement, however, appeasement has become synonymous with weakness and thus irreconcilable with practical idealism..."

The Arrow and the Olive Branch: Practical Idealism in US Foreign Policy (Jack Godwin)

Temperance wrote:

It is tragic when olive trees are bitten and destroyed by a killer frost, or when proffered olive branches are accepted only as Poohsticks: a sort of perverse/reverse theology - plow-shares getting turned into swords. Such sad things we have witnessed here in our little Res His microcosm of a world, but what about the real world? How many times in history have olive branches been proffered and rejected? How has mankind been thus injured by pride and by pig-headedness? Chamberlain was a sad, failed hero of the olive branch, a man who has gone down in history as a complete and utter plonker - as one who negotiated not wisely, but who nevertheless meant well. What other examples of the olive branch/poohstick - and the wielders of such -  come to mind?

Temperance,

"It is tragic when olive trees are bitten and destroyed by a killer frost, or when proffered olive branches are accepted only as Poohsticks: a sort of perverse/reverse theology - plow-shares getting turned into swords."

What a "dichterischer" sentence, Temperance...
Although for a continental...that about the olive branch I knew...but "proffered"? Found in my dictionary: "offered for acceptance" but then : "poohsticks": "pooh" in my dictionary: an exclamation of disdain,,scorn of disgust? But better look on the net...immediately I found:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poohsticks
And even, unbelievable:
http://pooh-sticks.com/
I hope our British/Continental exchanges overhere, will be a mutual cross-fertilisation ...

 "plow-shares turned into swords"
Yes, and bronze church bells turned into shells of "cannonballs"?..."projectiles"? "we call it an "obus", but it seems not to exist in Dutch...
My grandmother told me about WWI: the Germans taking the bells from the spires of the churches to make shells from it...she said...
She was from 1889 and still talking about Napoleon and the Prussians...she said it to  the invading Germans of 1914 too...But the Napoleon she was mistaken, without knowing it she was talking about Napoleon III...

But yes Temperance I got the message now and will do my best to find examples...
About Chamberlain I discussed it in the time nearly to death...and it is a very complex history...the British Empire...underestimating the danger...Realpolitik...and so on...
But he accelerated the building of the planes that we so badly needed in 1940...

PS. I don't know where to look first to contribute, Res Historica is so busy nowadays...

PPS. And "my" thread about "dictators and democracy" is still not covered yet and has to wait...I read a parallel discussion on Historum, with an example from there for my thread, but overthere that particular thread is already history...I have to seek it all back...sigh...

Kind regards from your "dedicated" Paul.

An 'Olive Branch Petition' was sent by the American Continental Congress to King George III in July 1775. It reached Westminster on 14th August and was rejected out of hand with the king apparently not even reading it. In reply, however, King George issued his own 'Proclamation of Rebellion' on 23rd of August which effectively outlawed the Congressmen.

The petition had been a final attempt at achieving a peaceful settlement to the ongoing constitutional crisis in North America by appealing over the head of Parliament directly to the Crown. Although the petition arrived in Britain at the end of August it was not officially 'received' until the 1st of September and this led later commentators to suggest that the Petition and the Proclamation had tragically passed each other mid-Atlantic like proverbial ships in the night.

This, however, was not the case. Many of those who drafted the Petition did so in the full knowledge that it would more than likely fall on deaf ears. This, they hoped, would finally convince any doves or waverers in Congress of the futility of hoping for conciliation with the British government which obviously had no respect for, nor any intention of engaging in dialogue with them.

Paul, I've changed my OP a fair bit - it was poorly written - still is, but it will have to do...

This is wandering a little bit from my question about historical olive branches, but I wanted to add that I was surprised to learn that the olive tree has long been a symbol of peace - it's not just in the Biblical story of the dove and the olive branch (after the Flood).

The Greeks (and the Romans) have always seen the olive tree as important. You all probably knew this, but I didn't:


The olive tree figures large in the Greek myths and in essence is at the very foundations of western civilization. According to legend, Athens got its name after the goddess Athena and the god Poseidon competed to deliver the most useful gift to mankind. Poseidon donated a splendid war horse. Athens bestowed an olive tree on the city, whose fruit was nourishment and whose oil could be used as food, medicine, unguent and fuel. Athena won, and so Athens took her name.  On a deeper level, the legend is really the manifestation of a turning point in human history, where aggression is supplanted for a life closely bound to the ardent cultivation of the land, for a peaceful existence rooted in domesticity and intellectual wisdom.

 So revered was the olive tree in Classical Greece, that Solon, one of the city’s wise men and lawmaker, enacted the first legislation to protect it. Anyone caught cutting or uprooting an olive tree was liable  to death. While all olive trees were considered sacred, some were considered more so. These were called Moria. They were protected by short fences and harming them in any way was considered a capital offense. To this day, the Greek word for punishment, timoria, comes from the name of these religiously significant trees.

The sanctity of the olive tree was so deeply embedded in the ancient Greek psyche that to this day olive oil plays a seminal role  in the sacraments of he Greek Orthodox Church. Its reverence is rooted as much in the spiritual as in the practical. In antiquity, the olive tree was valued because of its resistance to the droughts that kill off cereal crops and because of its ability to flourish on barren mountain slopes where little else could thrive. It provided nourishment. It was used to preserve foods. It was used to light lamps, to cleanse the body, and to flatter the appearance, as olive oil was often mixed with  other ingredients to make cosmetics and perfumes.

Temperance wrote:

 On a deeper level, the legend is really the manifestation of a turning point in human history, where aggression is supplanted for a life closely bound to the ardent cultivation of the land, for a peaceful existence rooted in domesticity and intellectual wisdom.

Let's wander a bit further..........

It's very possible to dispute the above quote and say that agriculture and sedentism is where all the trouble started.

Yes, when folk settled down to cultivate the land and raise beasts the population exploded but that population comprised smaller, less healthy individuals who picked up a whole range of nasty diseases from their livestock, diseases which are still around and one day will most likely replicated the post WWI flu epidemic and kill off a huge number of people. They became slaves to the land and the grinding labour and constant uncertainty of relying on a very small range of foodstuffs.

Then there was the concept of ownership of land and resources which required defending and so leading to social differentiation and hierarchies and the development of organised, large scale religions which had a lot to do with trying to influence the weather and the conditions that threatened those vulnerable crops as well as being manipulated by those hierarchies.

So suggesting domesticity in that sense brought an end to aggression and introduced a life of peaceful, bucolic bliss is at best arguable.

To return to your op, isn't there an argument that Chamberlain's appeasement was of necessity, or at least fortunate, in that it allowed the British forces to prepare for a war which in 1938 they were not in a fit state to prosecute?

ferval wrote:

Yes, when folk settled down to cultivate the land and raise beasts the population exploded but that population comprised smaller, less healthy individuals who picked up a whole range of nasty diseases from their livestock, diseases which are still around and one day will most likely replicated the post WWI flu epidemic and kill off a huge number of people. They became slaves to the land and the grinding labour and constant uncertainty of relying on a very small range of foodstuffs.

Or as Bruce Chatwin wondered in "Songlines": was the original Pandora's Box a neolithic pottery urn? ... that is to say the symbolicc marker of mankind settling down to live permanently in one place, alongside his domestic animals, other families ... and all their combined refuse and ordue?

Also I seem to recall that several studies have clearly shown that hunter-gatherer societies - whether in the frozen north of Canada, in the Amazon rainforest, or the Australian outback - generally all have much more "free time" ie time not directly associated with getting food or shelter, than do fixed farming societies. So more time to talk, to sing, to dance, to paint caves, to carve totems, to make intricate costumes, or whatever.

But we digress, sorry Temp.

ferval wrote:

Temperance wrote:

 On a deeper level, the legend is really the manifestation of a turning point in human history, where aggression is supplanted for a life closely bound to the ardent cultivation of the land, for a peaceful existence rooted in domesticity and intellectual wisdom.

Let's wander a bit further..........

It's very possible to dispute the above quote and say that agriculture and sedentism is where all the trouble started.

Yes, when folk settled down to cultivate the land and raise beasts the population exploded but that population comprised smaller, less healthy individuals who picked up a whole range of nasty diseases from their livestock, diseases which are still around and one day will most likely replicated the post WWI flu epidemic and kill off a huge number of people. They became slaves to the land and the grinding labour and constant uncertainty of relying on a very small range of foodstuffs.

Then there was the concept of ownership of land and resources which required defending and so leading to social differentiation and hierarchies and the development of organised, large scale religions which had a lot to do with trying to influence the weather and the conditions that threatened those vulnerable crops as well as being manipulated by those hierarchies.

So suggesting domesticity in that sense brought an end to aggression and introduced a life of peaceful, bucolic bliss is at best arguable.

To return to your op, isn't there an argument that Chamberlain's appeasement was of necessity, or at least fortunate, in that it allowed the British forces to prepare for a war which in 1938 they were not in a fit state to prosecute?

Ah - so accepting Athena's gift was not such a wise decision after all? Seems we should fear not just the Greeks bearing presents, but their deities' offerings to us as well...

I know nothing about Chamberlain and what happened at Munich and why: I just have in my mind that famous and rather pathetic image of him joyfully waving his bit of paper about when he returned from talking to Hitler; maybe the British were just playing for time, not offering olive branches at all?

Perhaps olive branches are always suspect with "What's in it for us?" as the ulterior motive in all peace talks. Edward IV, one of the most successful warriors England ever produced, decided (much to his brother Richard's disgust) to offer such an olive branch to Louis XI: on a hot day at the end of August 1475 he and the French king met on a bridge at Picquigny. Edward offered the French peace and a grateful Louis accepted. Edward probably had no doubt that he could win a victory if it came to a fight, but peace was simply the more profitable option:

The negotiations led to an agreement signed on 29 August 1475. The two kings agreed to a seven-year truce and free-trade between the two countries. Louis XI was to pay Edward IV 75,000 crowns upfront, essentially a bribe to return to England and not take up arms to pursue his claim to the French throne. He would then receive a yearly pension thereafter of 50,000 crowns. Also the King of France was to ransom the deposed Queen Margaret of Anjou, who was in Edward's custody, with 50,000 crowns. It also included pensions to many of Edward's lords...

Sort of Brexit, Plantagenet style.

Well, reverse Brexit maybe................

Didn't Elizabeth I of England offer Mary Q of S the chance to renounce her claim and go back north as queen dowager (or was it France? My historical knowledge/memory is atrocious) but Mary rebuffed the proposal out of hand?

I'm not sure that Chamberlain's policy of Appeasement is really a case of "offering an olive branch" but rather trying to manage a difficult developing situation whilst appeasing the electorate at home. As Ferval says it served to buy time, but also even as late as the 1938 Munich Crisis there really was little appetite in Britain for another war with Germany. So though he announced "Peace in our time", I rather feel that was mostly for home consumption and that any "peace" agreement with Germany was in reality just desparately trying to contain developments without getting too involved.

By contrast, although no less driven by pragmatic reactions to changing geo-politics ... the moves toward the Entente Cordiale in 1904 between Britain and France and so to formally end centuries of mutual rivalry and animosity is perhaps a better example of offering an olive branch, no?

Ferval,

"To return to your op, isn't there an argument that Chamberlain's appeasement was of necessity, or at least fortunate, in that it allowed the British forces to prepare for a war which in 1938 they were not in a fit state to prosecute?"

Yes that was also an argument that emerged in my discussions on the old BBC board. Britain was not ready in 1938 and Chamberlain bought time to rearm for the future confrontation: planes and tanks and so on...
With a quick research (one minute ) I found this:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/higher/history/roadwar/munich/revision/2/
"The British public celebrated their relief that war had been, for the present, avoided. However, there was growing concern that Hitler was not, as Chamberlain believed, just another politician who was open to negotiation. Instead, increasing numbers of people believed that he would continue to behave aggressively and that war would come, sooner or later. Even Chamberlain began to build up British forces against that possibility."
"Opinions on Munich
Pro-appeasers
Supporters of the appeasement policy believed that it had bought Britain valuable time to rearm for war. Previously, we had been too weak militarily to help Austria and Czechoslovakia.
Anti-appeasers
Churchill thought we had shamefully betrayed Czechoslovakia and lost a potential ally in the fight against Nazi Germany. Tellingly, in 1940 every third tank used in the invasion of France was built at the Skoda ironworks in Czechoslovakia."
I "did" on the old BBC board a thread, which received many contributions. I had my first in depth information about Munich from "The collapse of the third republic (the French one) from the American William Shirer...

PS: Ferval I forgot to mention your name on Triceratops' thread about the Battle of France. I sought again all the threads about that event on the old BBC messageboards and there you can read still all us contributions, as yours, Vizzer's and (also some of mine )...

Kind regards from your friend Paul.

ferval wrote:

Didn't Elizabeth I of England offer Mary Q of S the chance to renounce her claim and go back north as queen dowager (or was it France? My historical knowledge/memory is atrocious) but Mary rebuffed the proposal out of hand?

John Guy says that Elizabeth was "still acutely sympathetic to Mary" when she arrived in England in 1568, but I'm not so sure "sympathetic" is the correct word: it is, however, also a word used by Jane Dunn, "Yet Elizabeth, right to Mary's death, had sympathy with her plight." But did Elizabeth really feel such "sympathy" for her "good sister" that she was anxious to offer any kind of "olive branch" to this Scottish rival? The offering of olive branches after all surely suggests genuine good will, an altruism and a desire for the well-being of others. Do olive branches - or altruism -  ever really play a part in realpolitik? I doubt it, and Elizabeth was the mistress of realpolitik: she was concerned always with her own survival and with England's security. I believe Elizabeth's instinct certainly was to return her cousin with all haste to Scotland, but not because she wanted to "put things right with Mary" or to be kind to her unhappy cousin. She definitely toyed with the idea of returning Mary to Scotland - but as pensioner and puppet of England (the role Mary's son later readily accepted). Elizabeth was outraged at the insolence and presumption of the (male) Scottish nobility in their treatment of their anointed Queen, and she knew very well that these rabidly Protestant, proto-republican men were as much a danger to a female sovereign of England as any of the Catholic princes of Europe. But she had to be careful. She confided her thoughts of a compromise plan to the Spanish ambassador of all people (mmm - an odd choice of confidant): "I am thinking of returning her to her kingdom with the title of Queen, but without any power to govern; and I think that her acquittal should be so arranged that it should be left in doubt; for if her complete innocence were to be declared it woud be dangerous to this Kingdom, to my friends and to myself."

Friends? Moray was no friend, but she could not afford to alienate the new ruling elite in Scotland, the men who were essential to the English policy of keeping Scotland close and the French out. I wonder this "confidence" to the Spanish got back to Mary? Probably. No wonder she exploded with impotent rage up there in Carlisle.

But Cecil was having no offering of "olive branches", no pretence that Mary had any choice in what was to happen to her. In one of his unremitting memos, Cecil weighed up the possibilities: allow Mary back home, but only if she acknowledged Scotland's status as a satellite by ratifying the Treaty of Edinburgh in its original form; or allow her to go into European exile, but only if Moray were allowed to continue as regent in Scotland, acting for young James; or have Mary "live in some convenient place without possessing her kingdom, where she may not move any new troubles." Prison - the "convenient place" (what a chilling euphemism) - was the safest option.

Mary, after the raging and the tears were spent, realised she must appeal to Cecil and show that she would be willing to accept, if not an olive branch at least an olive twig. She wrote to the man himself (29th May 1568), throwing herself on his mercy and appealing "to Cecil's sense of honour and fair play". Guy tells us (although how he knows about the laughter is uncertain): "When Cecil read this letter, all he could do was laugh." Cecil had already decided what was to be done with Mary - probably had decided long before the events of 1568 - possibly around the time the assassination of Darnley was being planned...

Frost-bitten - or hard-bitten - that Cecil certainly was - more so than his famous mistress.

Thanks for that detailed reply Temp, it's a relief to see that the old memory hasn't gone entirely.

I really ought to read up on all of this again, after all I live only a couple of minutes stroll from the site of the battle of Langside and all the local streets are named after people and places with connections to Mary, the only obvious omission is Bothwell something, there are several Darnley's. The land originally belonged to the the Maxwell's of Pollok who were supporters of M q S. The one street name that I can't tie in is Mariscat Rd, any suggestions?

Sorry, I have done it again, wandered off topic.

The Frankfurt Proposals of November 1813.
After the Battle of Leipzig, the Allied powers, chiefly influenced by the Austrian minister Metternich, offered Napoleon peace on the basis that he would remain Emperor of France and that France would retain its' "natural frontiers" ie the Pyrenees, the Alps and the Rhine. Napoleon delayed too long in replying and the war went on.

France in 1801. The Allied offer would have left France looking like this:

Triceratops wrote:

The Frankfurt Proposals of November 1813.
After the Battle of Leipzig, the Allied powers, chiefly influenced by the Austrian minister Metternich, offered Napoleon peace on the basis that he would remain Emperor of France and that France would retain its' "natural frontiers" ie the Pyrenees, the Alps and the Rhine. Napoleon delayed too long in replying and the war went on.

France in 1801. The Allied offer would have left France looking like this:

 
Triceratops,

yes, as far as Koblenz and Cologne incorporated and the whole of nowadays Belgium...
But Napoleon was not a man of peace...he wanted conquest...
Armand de Caulaincourt searched, as French ambassador in Sankt Petersburg, desperately for peace before the Russian Campaign because the so-called commerce with Britain abandoning the Continental "stelsel" (in Dutch: stelsel, don't know in English)...
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Armand-Augustin-Louis-marquis-de-Caulaincourt-duc-de-Vicence
From the link:
From November 1807 to February 1811, Caulaincourt was ambassador to Russia, working incessantly for peace against Napoleon’s arbitrary policy. Napoleon created him duc de Vicence (Vicenza) in 1808. Recalled in 1811, Caulaincourt was subjected to Napoleon’s angry taunts that he was “Russian.” After the invasion of Russia began (1812), Caulaincourt asked to be sent to Spain, as far away from the Emperor as possible. Yet he was part of the small entourage accompanying Napoleon on his return from Russia to Paris.
Caulaincourt negotiated the armistice in Silesia (June 1813) and went to the abortive congress at Prague. After the Battle of Leipzig, he became foreign minister as the “man of peace,” but Napoleon was not peaceful, and by mid-March 1814 the congress of Châtillon had failed. Caulaincourt finally reached Alexander I and, on April 10, 1814, signed the treaty that sent Napoleon to Elba; he was with him in the last grim week at Fontainebleau.

" After the Battle of Leipzig, he became foreign minister as the “man of peace,” but Napoleon was not peaceful, and by mid-March 1814 the congress of Châtillon had failed."
That I called Napoleon a man of conquest and nothing else was on a French Historyforum a statement causing ressentment...

Kind regards, Paul.

There is a pub near Virginia Water, Surrey, called the Rose and Olive Branch, a name which, according the pub's website, recalls an incident during the Civil War. Nice story - but is there any basis for it in fact?


Once an old beer and cider House, this Inn is between 200-250 years old and stands on what used to be crossroads at the foot of a hill in Windsor Great Park. This hill was known then as Gallow Hill on top of which stood a gibbet, which was seldom uninhabited in those days, but over the years the name has been corrupted to Callow Hill...


...It is said that, during the Civil War in the seventeenth century, the Royalist and Cromwellian forces met here to sign a treaty, upon completion of which the leader of the Roundheads presented the leader of the Cavaliers with an olive branch as a symbol of peace, and received in return a red rose. It was from this event that this inn  derived its name, and it is believed to be the only one of this name in England.

In our sign can be seen the Roundhead presenting the Cavalier with the Olive Branch and receiving in return the Rose, whilst in the background the rival forces are signing the treaty outside this Inn at the Crossroads. In the distance stands the Hill and the Gallows Tree, bearing its customary fruit.








Was any kind of peace treaty signed in Windsor Great Park?

Temperance,

" Nice story - but is there any basis for it in fact?"
It's seems true about the tree in which Charles II climbed, when he fled to France pursued by his ennemies.

Temperance when I have time I will seek for some peacemakers, but for the moment here and on Historum: the Leopold III question and an Italian woman asking for details about the Low Countries or in English or in French, very busy. And wanted to contribute to Caro's thread too about snuff and smoking.

Kind regards from your friend Paul.

Temperence, I've recently been doing a lot of research into the history of Windsor Castle during the Civil Wars (as a result of which I've had an article on the subject published!) and there wasn't much fighting in the area.  The Castle was abandoned by the King at the start of the conflict and occupied by the Parliamentarians.  Prince Rupert attempted to recapture it shortly after Edgehill, but was sent packing with his tail between his legs.  It seems to have been a pretty staunchly Roundhead locale, and to the best of my knowledge the Cavaliers made no other notable foray into the area.  So I'm not sure the story is true, nice though it is.

On a broader subject of the Civil Wars, the Heads of the Proposals was quite a substantial olive branch offered by the New Model Army to Charles I (albeit after he'd already been defeated once in 1647) - it would have resulted in very few limitations on his authority.  The fact that he rejected it outright backfired spectacularly on the King, however.  Obviously it led to the Second Civil War, the abolition of the monarchy and his own execution; however, it infuriates me that Charles is a martyr of the C of E for supposedly defending it - if he had accepted the 'Heads' he could have saved the Anglican Church (which would have been allowed to continue, with the abolition of compulsory attendance being the only significant change) , but his own stubbornness resulted in its destruction.

How interesting, Anglo-Norman - but sad that no olive branches were offered (or accepted) at Windsor during those unhappy days of Civil War.

What stubborn fools the Stuarts were - they never seemed to understand that compromise - the gracious acceptance of the  olive branch - was not necessarily weakness, but was rather a display of strength and political acumen. I'm reminded of a line from "Wolf Hall" - Cromwell to Norfolk: "It would allow the King an honourable way back..."  But then people often don't want an "honourable way back", do they: they prefer conflict and defeat...

The Tudors, I think, were not so daft - or were they?

I think it is that the Stuarts were determined that they ruled by divine right and were reluctant to water that idea/mission down. I don't think the word 'mission' is quite what I wanted here, but I can't think of the word I do want.

Caro wrote:

I think it is that the Stuarts were determined that they ruled by divine right and were reluctant to water that idea/mission down. I don't think the word 'mission' is quite what I wanted here, but I can't think of the word I do want.

Caro,

I made already a thread overhere about the kings ruling by divine right. Not from that thread, but I am thinking now for you at the word "mandate". A mandate from heaven as the Chinese emperors. But overhere in Europe they hadn't the trick to remove the emperor if he had lost the mandate of heaven. A Philip II for instance was convinced that he had to defend the kingdom of God in the heaven here on earth. Dangerous people I would say. But the Protestants were not that better, religion mingled in earthly matters, for instance the 30 years war:
Cuius regio eius religio...about one third of the citizens in nowadays Germany and the countries around it were dead after that period, mostly by starvation and diseases caused by that starvation and the lack of civil organisation following from the continuous war acts (don't find anything in my dictionary even not the word "oorlogshandelingen") Have to agree on the superiority of the web nowadays, in two seconds I found on the web: "oorlogshandelingen" (acts of war, hostilities)

Kind regards from Paul.

PaulRyckier wrote:

Armand de Caulaincourt searched, as French ambassador in Sankt Petersburg, desperately for peace before the Russian Campaign because the so-called commerce with Britain abandoning the Continental "stelsel" (in Dutch: stelsel, don't know in English).

Is 'stelsel' the Netherlandish word for 'blockade' perhaps, as in 'the Continental Blockade'?

The inability of Napoleon to comprehensively enforce the blockade (even in the countries directly controlled by France), let alone interdict British trade in the myriad loopholes of the Baltic and the Mediterranean etc. meant that 'the Continental Blockade' was essentially ineffective. The British had gained experience in adapting to blockades and boycotts a generation earlier during the War of American Independence. In August 1774 the First Continental Congress organised a boycott of British goods as a response to the placing of Massachusetts under martial law following the Boston Tea Party the previous December. The effect of this was to prompt the 'Petition of London Merchants for Reconciliation with America' in January 1775. This amounted to significant and very important support for the colonists at the heart of the British economic establishment.

Prominent supporters of the American cause in Britain such as John Wilkes and Edmund Burke were encouraged by the Merchants' Petition so much so that in November Burke introduced to the House of Commons a 'Bill for Composing the Present Troubles and for Quieting the Minds of His Majesty's Subjects in America'. This would have meant a repeal of the coercive acts of 1774 (i.e an end to martial law in Massachusetts), a pardon for the rebels, a repeal of the tea tax and a renunciation of Westminster's right to tax America. The bill, however, was defeated.

One needs to consider what had changed in the intervening 10 months between the issuing of the Merchants' Petition and the failure of Burke's Bill. What had happened was that those self-same merchants had been busy from the moment the boycott began finding new markets for their exports in Eastern Europe and elsewhere. So successful were they in this, that these new markets more than offset the losses incurred as a result of the American boycott. In fact the total value of British exports in 1775 was actually greater than it had been in 1773.

So when King George and Parliament rejected the Olive Branch Petition that year they did so at precisely the time when British popular support for the colonists was diminishing. Put simply, most British people were generally unaffected by events in America either politically or economically. A little appreciated aspect of the era of American independence is that 'Amexit' from the 'BE' (British Empire) actually had minimal impact on the economy of Great Britain.

Vizzer,

"Is 'stelsel' the Netherlandish (in fact the word is "Dutch" (in the bilingual Belgium Dutch is in in Dutch: "Nederlands" and in French: "du néerlandais") word for 'blockade' perhaps, as in 'the Continental Blockade'?


I was in a hurry and for fear to loose my message when going to google and returning to preview...I have now looked for it, and when putting "continentaal stelsel English" I hand't not that much respons...but then I found this with the whole term between quotation marks...
[url=http://www.mijnwoordenboek.nl/vertaal/NL/EN/Continentaal Stelsel]http://www.mijnwoordenboek.nl/vertaal/NL/EN/Continentaal%20Stelsel[/url]
I see now that the link don't work, but in the original that I copied it worked. (continentaal stelsel-continental system)

yes "stelsel" I found it in my dictionary too: "stelsel"(system)
And yes in English it is also: Continental System, Continental Blockade. French: Blocus continental (blockade in Dutch: blokkade)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continental_System

"The British had gained experience in adapting to blockades and boycotts a generation earlier during the War of American Independence. In August 1774 the First Continental Congress organised a boycott of British goods ..."

That's an interesting piece of history that I didn't know yet...Thank you for that.

"So when King George and Parliament rejected the Olive Branch Petition that year they did so at precisely the time when British popular support for the colonists was diminishing. Put simply, most British people were generally unaffected by events in America either politically or economically. A little appreciated aspect of the era of American independence is that 'Amexit' from the 'BE' (British Empire) actually had minimal impact on the economy of Great Britain."

Yes reality sometimes topples good intentions...and politics are so unpredictable as the events that influence politics...

"A little appreciated aspect of the era of American independence is that 'Amexit' from the 'BE' (British Empire) actually had minimal impact on the economy of Great Britain."

Are you hinting that... . No, no both parties will loose...Unity makes strength...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unity_makes_strength
Even Brooklyn...
"The motto of Brooklyn, a borough of New York City founded by Dutch settlers, is "Eendraght maeckt maght". It appears on Brooklyn's seal and flag. Additionally, it is the motto of The Collegiate School, the oldest primary and secondary school in the United States. The motto Eendragt maakt magt also appears on the badge of the police force of Holland, Michigan, combined with God zij met ons (God be with us)."

I just some couple of hours ago I suppose on a message to Meles meles, read about a Mongol leader Djengis Khan? who learned to his sons about unity makes strength by letting them try to break a bunch of lances instead of one single one...but I don't find it again...

But I can understand the border policy of the UK of not letting in every one...I think even for that aspect Europe will again break up in national borders, a kind of "containerisation", dividing in smaller entities and with control at each entity better control the flow. And a better protection of the European borders...Now Macron is proposing "hot spots" in Lybia and Italy wants to help...

Kind regards from Paul.

PS: I found again my favourite word for "containerisation"...compartimentation...I thought that it was an English word, but now it seems to be French and female...the English word is: "compartmentalization"...what a word...it is nearly as long as some (hmm: many ) German words...and yes the Dutch are also good in that...for instance "kinderdagverblijftoilet" toilets in a child care day institute

Kind regards, Paul.

Vizzer and I forgot to mention that I had an exhange with Nielsen in the thread "on this day"? about the bombardement of Copenhagen...I wanted  to include it and then forgot it...growing older
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Copenhagen_(1807)


Kind regards, Paul.

Vizzer,

""Is 'stelsel' the Netherlandish (in fact the word is "Dutch" (in the bilingual Belgium Dutch is in in Dutch: "Nederlands" and in French: "du néerlandais") word for 'blockade' perhaps, as in 'the Continental Blockade'?" I now just saw that you meant it in German. In German it is: "Niederländisch"

Kind regards from Paul.