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Editor says, what if the Spanish Conspirators had won out? Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s).
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In 1825, on this day Kentuckian Hero
General James Wilkinson died in Frankfort, the capital of the Independent Commonwealth that he had fought so hard to establish. He was sixty-eight years old.
General Wilkinson passes awayAnd yet the catalist of that nationhood was not the implausible Yankee myth of a shadowy Spanish Conspiracy, but rather the failure to achieve statehood under the old Articles of Confederation.
Wilkinson's contribution was to persuade Spanish Governor Esteban Rodríguez Miró to grant the exclusive rights to trade on the Mississippi River (previously, the Union had those rights but paid a hefty tariff) [1]. Free navigation opened the door to outright independence, as it allowed Wilkinson and his supporters to argue forcefully against admittance to the Union under the new constitution.
As a result, the dream of westward expansion was checked even before General Washington took office as Union President. Ironically, under different circumstances, Washington might even have appointed Wilkinson as Commanding General of the United States Army but fate had decided that they would be peers and perhaps rivals.
Entry posted by Todayinah Editor
© Alternate Historian, 2004-.Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Politicians Source: Wikipedia Labels: James Wilkinson, Spanish Conspiracy, Kentucky, Mississippi, America. Editor says, this article explores idea from the Price of Cide, AH: Prevent US Expansion West of the Mississippi and Wikipedia.
In OTL it was never signed and the Union agreed a separate treaty. Wilkinson served in the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War, but was twice compelled to resign. He was twice the Commanding General of the United States Army, appointed first Governor of the Louisiana Territory in 1805, and commanded two unsuccessful campaigns in the St. Lawrence theater during the War of 1812. After his death, he was discovered to have been a paid agent of the Spanish Crown.
~ The Kentucky purchase of Louisiana from the French sealed the doom of the young United States...
~ It'd be war VERY soon.
~ But, could the U.S. have turned that money into a purchase of a great chunk of French claimed lands elsewhere? Napoleon just wanted money.
~ I don't seriously believe Kentucky would have remained independent. Either it would have been absorbed by the U.S. (peaceably or not) or it would have become a dependency of Spain or some other European power.
As for a Kentucky purchase of Louisiana, what would it have used for money? the Purchase in our own history strained the limited finances of the young USA; Kentucky, standing alone, would have been in a worse position.
~ This could have put a whole new spin on the slavery question...
~ With Wilkinson around, things would have been interesting.
© Today in Alternate History, 2013-. All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
