Chapter Summaries

Potemkin ordered a scheme to discredit Stanisław II and accelerated preparations for war against Poland, while Poland’s intelligence service dismantled the Targowica Confederation. The chapter ended with Stanisław Potocki thanking the British ambassador after two Potocki family members were abducted en route to trial.

• Potemkin wrote Zubov instructions to entrap Stanisław II and ordered General Mikhail Kakhovsky to prepare an attack on Poland before year’s end.
• Francisco Branicki and other Conservative nobles agreed to gather troops and ask Russia to intervene against Poland’s Constitution, forming the Targowica Confederation.
• Branicki began preparations for rebellion, but Polish agents arrested six members of his family and prosecutors charged them with organizing riots.
• Polish authorities purged many Confederation members, while Bar Confederation followers killed the Rzewuski family after its members sought Russian support.
• Armed thugs abducted two Potocki family members during their transfer from Warsaw Prison to Poland’s High Court.
• Stanisław Potocki thanked British Ambassador Daniel Jason, who condemned the proceedings against his family as political persecution.

Jason arranged for Prussian officers and British spies to free Potocki, who revealed that loyal Polish troops could be rallied and hoped Russia would help. In Paris, Joseph visited Notre-Dame to discuss Sugar Beet cultivation with Archbishop Beaumont, but waited while the church held its Valentine’s Day Love Voucher event, where Camellia offered 40,000 Francs.

• Jason had Prussian officers in the Polish army replace Potocki’s guards and help British spies stage his escape.
• Potocki blamed the Patriotic Party and Poniatowski for imprisoning nobles, and said two or three thousand loyal soldiers could be mobilized.
• Jason promised to arrange a secret meeting between Potocki and the Tsar.
• Joseph went to Notre-Dame to seek Archbishop Beaumont’s support for expanding Sugar Beet cultivation, but found the cathedral crowded for its Valentine’s Day event.
• Joseph waited while Archbishop Beaumont began auctioning the First Love Voucher, and Camellia offered 40,000 Francs.

Camellia won the First Love Voucher for 40,000 Francs, then was mocked by two noblewomen for pursuing the Crown Prince until Perna intervened. In a church prayer room, Camellia gave Perna the voucher and they spoke openly about loving Joseph, who had been sleeping nearby and overheard them.

• Camellia startled the crowd by bidding 40,000 Francs for the First Love Voucher, and Archbishop Beaumont awarded it to her after no one else bid.
• Miss Herio and another noblewoman insulted Camellia in the church corridor, but Perna stepped in and forced Miss Herio to apologize.
• Perna comforted the tearful Camellia in a prayer room and encouraged her to pursue her feelings for the Crown Prince.
• Camellia offered Perna the voucher, and Perna refused it while explaining that she accepted she could only be Joseph's mistress.
• Joseph woke on a bench, overheard Perna and Camellia discussing their feelings for him, and wondered which of them he should choose.

Joseph tried to persuade Archbishop Beaumont to devote church land to Sugar Beet cultivation, then proposed a Contracting Agreement that would place forty thousand qing under government management. When Beaumont resisted, Joseph demanded eight million Francs from the church to fund a new expedition to Saint-Domingue, prompting Beaumont to reopen negotiations.

• Joseph met Archbishop Beaumont at Notre-Dame de Paris and proposed that the church expand Sugar Beet cultivation on its Farmland.
• Beaumont agreed to plant only eight hundred qing of Sugar Beet, despite Joseph urging him to commit much more land.
• Joseph proposed a Contracting Agreement under which the church would hand forty thousand qing to the Minister of Agriculture in exchange for annual payments based on tenants' rent tax plus five percent.
• When Beaumont resisted the agreement, Joseph announced that the church had to provide eight million Francs for eight thousand additional Expeditionary Force troops bound for the Caribbean Sea.
• Beaumont stopped Joseph from leaving and agreed to discuss the Contracting Agreement again.

Joseph secured Beaumont’s agreement to contract church land for agricultural management while planning a gradual recovery of church holdings. In Munich, the opening of a French department store threatened Walter Berlant’s workshop, and Berlant joined preparations for an operation against the store.

• Beaumont agreed to contract 40,000 hectares of church land to the Minister of Agriculture at a fee 6% above tenant rents.
• Joseph hurried to Versailles Palace to finalize the land-contracting plan with Venio before spring planting began.
• Walter Berlant watched Munich’s first French department store open across from his struggling ironware workshop.
• A square-faced man summoned Berlant to Wisgen Street for an operation starting in an hour and told him to bring straw men and banners.
• Berlant called his two sons, collected their prepared supplies, and headed to Wisgen Street.

Lord Grenville used a protest against French goods in Munich to identify wider opposition to the Rhine-Seine River Treaty. He then urged Austria to join a coalition demanding that France renegotiate the treaty, promising support from other German states.

• Brandt joined a Munich protest against low tariffs and French goods, and Gabriel led the crowd toward a French department store.
• The protesters burned a straw effigy of Cajetan Dietrich, fought with shoppers, and were dispersed by Police and military forces, with several troublemakers arrested.
• After observing the protest, Grenville told Kevin that discontent over French imports could unite people across several states against France, and arranged meetings with Pappenheim, Dietrich, and Munich's Chamber of Commerce President.
• A week later, Grenville met Kobzl and the Earl of Rhinefels at Schönbrunn Palace and warned that Austria's trade imbalance and debt threatened its finances.
• Grenville urged Austria to renegotiate its tariff rates with France and promised British support, claiming Bavaria, Salzburg, Württemberg, Augsburg, and other signatories could jointly pressure France to reopen treaty negotiations.

Kobzl and Thugut planned to use British support to renegotiate the Rhine-Seine River Treaty, while Grenville agreed to draw more states into the agreement. In Paris, Charles asked Joseph to propose to Grand Duchess Alexandra so she would stay instead of returning to Saint Petersburg.

• Kobzl reported the British proposal to Leopold II, and Thugut advised using Britain to lead negotiations over the Rhine-Seine River Treaty.
• Leopold II approved Thugut's plan to invite Britain into the treaty and seek a suspension while the signatories renegotiated tariffs.
• The British agreed to join the treaty and offered to bring Saxony, Thuringia, and Prussia into it, while Grenville left Vienna for Württemberg.
• Grenville told Kevin Ronide that Britain would use the negotiations to strengthen its ties with Austria and the South German States.
• Joseph sent Eman to have Double Company prepare gifts for Russia, then listened as Charles asked him to propose to Grand Duchess Alexandra so she would remain in Paris.

Joseph comforted Charles over Alexandra’s departure and prepared gifts and diplomatic overtures for Potemkin’s funeral in Russia. Alexandra warned Charles about the dangers of sweets before leaving, but Queen Mary dismissed her warning and ate a macaron.

• Charles told Joseph that Alexandra had rejected his marriage proposal, and Joseph assured him that she would return to Paris for her lessons.
• Charles filled his pockets with macarons from the gifts sent to Joseph, while Joseph explained that the sweets had been delivered by Soleil on behalf of noblewomen.
• Joseph and Talleyrand discussed using Potemkin’s funeral to strengthen French influence in Russia, including gifts for Catherine II and a letter greeting Duke Zubov.
• Alexandra arrived to bid farewell before returning to Saint Petersburg, and Joseph ordered a gift set for her as well.
• Charles offered Alexandra macarons, but she refused and warned that sweets could ruin his teeth and ulcerate his feet, making him throw them down and cry.
• Queen Mary comforted Charles, called Alexandra’s warning a joke, and ate a macaron herself.

Joseph faced the threat of the United Kingdom joining the Rhine-Seine River Treaty and rejected both tariff concessions and war, choosing instead a deterrence strategy. He ordered an earlier vote in Karlsruhe and proposed financing opposition with French Paper Money, despite Brienne’s warning about currency stability.

• Bayei reported that most treaty signatories would support a vote on the United Kingdom joining, while Brienne and Mirabeau explained the South German States’ grievances over French competition.
• Brienne proposed negotiating tariff increases with Austria and Bavaria, but Joseph refused to sacrifice France’s industrial growth to satisfy them.
• When Brienne suggested using war to block the proposal, Joseph chose deterrence and ordered the vote moved from Munich in two months to Karlsruhe in twenty days.
• Joseph directed Bayei to offer loans to Baden, Württemberg, Augsburg, and Hesse in exchange for votes against British entry.
• Joseph ordered twenty-four million Francs in Paper Money printed for the loans, and Brienne warned that the influx could undermine confidence in the currency.

Joseph explained how France could profit from lending Franc Paper Money to small countries and warned against loans exceeding trade volumes. He then visited Baden to persuade Grand Duke Karl Friedrich with a proposal for a railway and export distribution hub.

• Joseph explained to Brienne and the ministers that loans in Franc Paper Money would expand the currency’s influence without seriously destabilizing France.
• Mirabeau proposed increasing the loans, but Joseph cautioned that they must remain close to trade volumes to prevent land purchases and financial speculation.
• Brienne warned that Britain might urge Württemberg and other South German States to reject the loans, and Joseph said France would use deterrence to secure their acceptance.
• A week later, Joseph arrived in Karlsruhe, where Grand Duke Karl Friedrich welcomed him with a grand ceremony.
• Joseph offered to build a Wooden Railway connecting Strasbourg and Stuttgart and establish warehouses in Baden, proposing to make it a distribution center for French exports.

Joseph secured Baden’s agreement to a Franco-Baden military exercise by tying it to a French loan for the Wooden Railway, while Bayei persuaded Upper Hesse’s adviser to consider French loans and Steam Engines. At the Rhine-Seine River Treaty vote in Karlsruhe, a display of French and Baden military strength drew Upper Hesse’s representative toward the exercise.

• Joseph offered Frederick a 900,000-Franc French loan for the Wooden Railway and won his agreement to a joint military exercise with written assurances that French troops would withdraw after it ended.
• Bayei answered Lützck’s concerns about Upper Hesse’s trade deficit by proposing industrial subsidies and discounted Steam Engines, and Lützck agreed to report the offer to the Grand Duke.
• On March 10, 1792, Wilberforce told the Austrian representative that British loans could win support for the United Kingdom’s entry into the Rhine-Seine River Treaty.
• Cannon fire interrupted Wilberforce and the Earl of Rhinefels, and a Baden official explained that France and Baden were conducting the Steadfast Will exercise with 50,000 troops.
• Lützck traveled north of Karlsruhe, watched a massive column of soldiers and supplies pass, and was directed to a hill overlooking the exercise.

Lützk and the other negotiators watched France’s Steadfast Will military exercise near Karlsruhe, where a staged battle displayed the French force’s discipline and firepower. They concluded that France could rapidly mobilize an army of fifty thousand, leaving them shaken as they returned to the palace and struggled to focus on the trade agreement.

• A Baden Major announced that Steadfast Will was a defensive exercise involving Baden Royal Guards and the French Royal Guard Legion.
• Lützk watched the Blue and White Sides clash with infantry, cavalry, and artillery, and was impressed by the French troops’ speed and discipline.
• Viscount Shaun complained that France was merely flaunting its strength, but Baron Heinemann argued that the exercise targeted the vote on bringing the United Kingdom into the Rhine-Seine River Treaty.
• Heinemann reasoned that France had assembled fifty thousand troops in only a few days, shocking the negotiators; in reality, Joseph had combined twenty-five thousand Royal Guard Legion soldiers with twenty-three thousand older troops from nearby garrisons.
• After the exercise entered a break, the negotiators returned to Karlsruhe Palace, still unnerved by the display and unable to concentrate on the trade agreement.

France used military exercises to pressure the Rhine-Seine River Treaty delegates into rejecting the United Kingdom’s bid for membership. Upper Hesse and Augsburg voted against the proposal, preserving France’s South German market, while a British expeditionary fleet arrived at Port Royal, Jamaica.

• French cannon fire and troop exercises disrupted the treaty negotiations, and Bayei announced France’s opposition to British membership.
• At the banquet, Wilberforce raised Britain’s offer to win support, while Kobzl worried about the coming vote.
• Lützk faked a severe illness to delay the vote, then followed his letter’s advice from the Duke of Darmstadt to oppose Britain’s bid.
• When voting resumed, Upper Hesse and Augsburg opposed membership, ensuring the United Kingdom could not secure enough votes.
• More than ten days later, Upper Hesse ordered 140 LJ15 Steam Engines and components from the French United Steam Engine Company.
• A British fleet carrying four thousand expeditionary soldiers and military supplies arrived at Port Royal, Jamaica.

General Brand’s British Expeditionary Force routed Auriol’s rebels in Jamaica, but Auriol escaped into the Blue Mountains and the British were drawn away to face an uprising in the Bahamas. The chapter revealed Joseph’s Caribbean-wide plan to use coordinated rebel attacks and Saint-Domingue’s smuggling network to keep British forces overstretched.

• General Brand landed in Jamaica with elite troops, gathered intelligence, and prepared an assault on Auriol’s rebel army.
• Brand’s forces attacked at dawn, broke the rebel front within half an hour, and forced Auriol to abandon Kingston and retreat toward the Blue Mountains.
• Auriol escaped with a little over eight hundred soldiers, gained shelter and supplies from Maroons settlements, and rallied his officers to continue resisting.
• After three weeks of pursuing and blockading Auriol’s force, Brand withdrew from the Blue Mountains and sailed for the Bahamas when Nassau came under siege.
• Joseph’s plan coordinated Caribbean rebel armies through the Special Trade Association’s ships, while Saint-Domingue supplied weapons and ammunition.

Brand’s campaign in the Caribbean faltered as rebels in Nassau and the Windward Islands gained support, and Louverture brought Saint-Domingue soldiers to help the Bahamian rebels. When Lieutenant Colonel Strauss pursued the rebels outside Nassau, cannons opened fire from the Cotton fields, leaving the English force under attack.

• Brand failed to catch the Bahamian rebels and later sailed to Barbados, leaving one thousand soldiers under Lieutenant Colonel Strauss in Nassau.
• Auge sent Major Toussaint Louverture and nearly eight hundred Saint-Domingue soldiers to Nassau to support Kenneth Liddington’s Bahamian Rebel Army.
• Louverture proposed attacking the English soldiers in Nassau before they could strike the rebels.
• The Bahamian rebels attacked Strauss’s positions, then broke and fled after English cannon fire and an Infantry Line assault.
• Strauss ordered most of his companies to pursue the fleeing rebels, but cannons in the Cotton fields fired into the English ranks.

Louverture and Liddington captured Nassau for the Bahamian Abolitionist Organization, while Brand sought French aid to suppress the Caribbean rebellions. The chapter ended with Booker watching a much larger American force near the Georgia–South Carolina border.

• Louverture’s Black soldiers routed English troops near the cotton fields, and Liddington rallied the Bahamian rebels to reinforce them.
• Louverture and Liddington pursued the English into Nassau, which the Bahamian Abolitionist Organization took by dawn; Governor Frederick Essex escaped by ship.
• Brand refused to leave Barbados and agreed to send an officer to seek French military aid against the rebels.
• Booker watched more than sixteen thousand American soldiers, including five thousand American Legion troops, from the border between Georgia and South Carolina.

Booker led a desperate assault to rescue enslaved Blacks, but American forces crushed his army and drove him across the Savannah River into Altamaha territory. While attending a feast with Chief Hopoithle, Booker discovered that the Indians also held Black people as slaves, as General Wayne prepared to cooperate with them against the rebellion.

• Booker rejected a retreat and ordered Ansen to rescue the enslaved people while he attacked the American camp.
• Wayne’s forces ambushed Booker and Ansen; Ansen and his soldiers died, while Booker escaped west with about five hundred survivors.
• Booker’s remnants crossed the Savannah River into Altamaha territory, where Chief Hopoithle’s envoy welcomed them and promised protection.
• Booker executed dozens of wounded soldiers who could no longer fight, then accepted Chief Hopoithle’s invitation to a feast.
• While riding toward the settlement, Booker spotted Black slaves working in Altamaha Cotton fields under Indian guards with Whips.
• Wayne agreed to cooperate with the Indians to suppress the rebellion and told a colonel he could do as he wished afterward.

Booker’s rebellion was crushed after the Altamaha Tribe betrayed the Black rebels and helped the Americans trap them, only to be betrayed and attacked in turn. Joseph learned that the United States had suppressed the uprising, while independence movements continued across the Caribbean.

• Booker killed the Altamaha Indians who had escorted him, then hurried back when he heard gunfire near his camp.
• Chief Hopoithle’s eldest son led the Altamaha warriors against Booker’s poorly commanded rebels as Wayne’s troops blocked their escape.
• After the Indians defeated the rebels, Wayne’s soldiers shot the Indians and surrendered Blacks while Arlette’s forces attacked the Altamaha settlement.
• Booker and his officers killed Indian overseers at the plantations and fled into the forests with more than one hundred thirty Black followers.
• Joseph received reports in France that the Americans had suppressed the rebellion, while Caribbean territories apart from Jamaica declared independence.

Joseph considered how France could profit politically from Caribbean independence and decided to accept England’s request for help in the Bahamas in exchange for funding. He then traveled to Brest Bay to witness the maiden voyage of the Mediterranean Light, the world’s first steam-powered warship.

• Joseph recalled that France’s Sugar Beet crop could offset the Caribbean’s expected Sugar Cane failure and considered ways to influence the region’s future independent nations.
• Joseph proposed publicizing the massacre of Booker’s Black rebel army to foster Caribbean hostility toward the United States while preventing conflict between Blacks and Indians.
• Fouche delivered Brisot’s report that General Brand needed French troops in the Bahamas, and Joseph ordered him to accept the request in exchange for compensation.
• Joseph went to Brest Bay, where Marquis Castelli showed him the completed Mediterranean Light ahead of its maiden voyage.
• Murdoch and Trevithick explained that improvements to the LJ52A Steam Engine had raised its average interval between failures to more than thirty hours.

Joseph witnessed the Mediterranean Light demonstrate its speed and tactical advantage over a Third-rate Battleship, establishing the promise of France’s Steam Frigates. He also discovered that Jouffroy had built an experimental Steam Paddle Wheel Ship and wondered about the designer’s earlier work.

• Joseph rewarded Murdoch and the other engineers, then promised noble titles if they completed the 200-horsepower Steam Engine.
• The Mediterranean Light easily outraced a galley, opening a gap of more than six hundred meters in less than fifteen minutes.
• The Mediterranean Light repeatedly used the T-Crossing Tactic against the Valiant, firing four times while the battleship failed to bring its broadside to bear.
• Joseph and the naval officers celebrated the demonstration and discussed how Steam Frigates could challenge the English Fleet in the Mediterranean Sea.
• Joseph spotted an experimental Steam Paddle Wheel Ship and learned from Borda that Jouffroy had designed it before joining Brest Shipyard.