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Speaker 1: Happy Saturday everyone. Recently on the show, we talked about

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Speaker 1: Princess Charlotte of Belgium, also known as Carlotta of Mexico.

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Speaker 1: Previous host Sarah and Bablina did an episode on her

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Speaker 1: husband Maximilian back on November four eleven. That older episode

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Speaker 1: doesn't really talk much about Charlotte, and our new episode

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Speaker 1: doesn't spend nearly as much time on why Maximilian was

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Speaker 1: sent to Mexico or what happened after he got there.

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Speaker 1: So for folks who would like those parts of the story,

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Speaker 1: we are sharing this classic episode today. Enjoy. Welcome to

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Speaker 1: Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production of I

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Speaker 1: Heart Radio. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Sarah

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Speaker 1: and we talk about royalty a lot on the podcast.

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Speaker 1: It's really one of my favorite subjects to cover, and consequently,

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Speaker 1: because we talked about it so often, some subgenres have developed.

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Speaker 1: One of them royal imposts. You know, we've talked about

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Speaker 1: guys like Lambert Simnels and Falsdamitri Yeah, another self proclaimed

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Speaker 1: monarchs like Emperor Norton and the King of Beaver Island

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Speaker 1: James Strang Yeah, or just sad royal childhoods like Queen

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Speaker 1: Victoria Queen Elizabeth. There seemed to be a lot of those,

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Speaker 1: and almost every other Royalty episode is a sad royal childhood.

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Speaker 1: But one of my favorite of these royal subgenres, though,

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Speaker 1: is the puppet ruler. You know, somebody who is important

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Speaker 1: or maybe really charismatic, or just well connected, maybe just

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Speaker 1: well born and kind of weak and easy to control,

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Speaker 1: who is ultimately propped up by a more powerful outside force,

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Speaker 1: who's really controlling things. And we're going to talk about

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Speaker 1: a famous puppet ruler today, Ferdinand Maximilian, Archduke of Austria

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Speaker 1: by birth, Emperor of Mexico by invitation, and he'll really

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Speaker 1: surprise you. He's naive but goodhearted. He truly believes the

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Speaker 1: people of Mexico want him, an Austrian prince to rule them,

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Speaker 1: though he's deliberately misled in that respect, and will look

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Speaker 1: at that a little bit more later. He takes this

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Speaker 1: opportunity to rule with fatal dedication. Yeah, I think he

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Speaker 1: really will surprise you guys as a as a not

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Speaker 1: so good example of a puppet ruler when it all

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Speaker 1: comes down to it. But we're also going to talk

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Speaker 1: about the antithesis of royalty today. Mexico's national hero Benito Juarez,

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Speaker 1: who was a self made man who rose to the presidency,

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Speaker 1: you know, got his own education, and successfully defended his

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Speaker 1: country from an allied European invasion. You know, pretty serious stuff.

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Speaker 1: But that these two men, a Halfsburg prince and the

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Speaker 1: orphaned son of Zapatec Indians should ever be in conflict

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Speaker 1: together in Mexico is just pretty bizarre when you think

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Speaker 1: about it. But that they had remarkably similar plans for

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Speaker 1: what they wanted to do with Mexico, plans for the

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Speaker 1: people of Mexico, is just downright strange. So we're going

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Speaker 1: to talk about both of them. We're going to talk

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Speaker 1: about many, many countries and many rulers in this episode.

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Speaker 1: It really has something for everyone, it does. So at first,

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Speaker 1: we're going to start out with Maximilian Ferdinand. Maximilian Joseph

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Speaker 1: was born in Vienna July six thirty two, and his

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Speaker 1: full title was Prince Imperial and Archduke of Austria, Prince

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Speaker 1: Royal of Hungary and Bohemia. That sounds pretty fancy, like

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Speaker 1: a lot of power, but those were really just his

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Speaker 1: younger son titles. Maximilian's older brother, you see, was the

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Speaker 1: future Emperor Franz Joseph of Austria Hungary. So the younger Maximilian,

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Speaker 1: who was intelligent, needed some sort of occupation in life,

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Speaker 1: and so those were the titles that he got. At

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Speaker 1: twenty two, he became Rear Admiral of the Austrian Navy

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Speaker 1: and worked to modernize it, And at twenty five he

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Speaker 1: took up the position of Governor General of the Lombardo

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Speaker 1: Venetian Kingdom, which was under Austrian control at the time,

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Speaker 1: and he also got married. He married the beautiful, full

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Speaker 1: and charming seventeen year old Princess Charlotte of Belgium, who

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Speaker 1: was the daughter of King Leopold. The first we mentioned

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Speaker 1: him in our Victorian Albert episode. He's kind of young

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Speaker 1: Victoria's male mentor her uncle Um. But Maximilian might have

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Speaker 1: been really too bent on modernization. When it came to

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Speaker 1: his job in Italy, his brother considered his policies they're

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Speaker 1: just too liberal and ended up removing him from power.

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Speaker 1: So when Maximilian lost the job, he decided to take

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Speaker 1: a little time off go on a trip, and he

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Speaker 1: journeyed all the way to Brazil, which really kicked off

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Speaker 1: a new world fascination kind of an obsession, even with

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Speaker 1: Maximilian so speaking of the New World. At the same

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Speaker 1: time Maximilian was governing in Italy and traveling to Brazil,

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Speaker 1: Mexico was in the middle of a civil war. La

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Speaker 1: Reforma a liberal movement with the goal of curbing the

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Speaker 1: power of the aristocracy and the Church. The movement's eventual

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Speaker 1: leader was a man named Benito Juarez, a Zapateech Indian

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Speaker 1: who had been born in eighteen o six. He didn't

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Speaker 1: seem like a likely candidate for the eventual president of Mexico.

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Speaker 1: He was orphaned at the age of three, and he

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Speaker 1: didn't even speak Spanish until he left his hometown and

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Speaker 1: studied in Wahaca. He was smart, though, and while at

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Speaker 1: first his intelligence made him a likely candidate for the priesthood,

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Speaker 1: he was soon studying law. His first public office was

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Speaker 1: on the municipal council, and he became a member of

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Speaker 1: both the state and national legislatures, judge, and eventually governor

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Speaker 1: of Wahaca, making him a notable public figure in the state.

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Speaker 1: But he got into trouble by being so notable, because

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Speaker 1: when the Conservative Party of Mexico returned to power in

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Speaker 1: the elections of eighteen fifty three, Whereas was exiled into

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Speaker 1: the United States and he lived in New Orleans in

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Speaker 1: really almost semi poverty. I've seen it described for two

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Speaker 1: years before his party took back control and he was

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Speaker 1: appointed Minister of Justice and Public Instruction for the new administration.

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Speaker 1: The new reform government started to make some really really

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Speaker 1: big changes in Mexico, and these changes were of course

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Speaker 1: supported by Uarez as A as a minister. And just

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Speaker 1: to give you a sense of what was going on, um,

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Speaker 1: the government abolished the special courts for the clergy and

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Speaker 1: the military. It broke up landed estates in this attempt

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Speaker 1: to sort of create a middle class from scratch in Mexico,

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Speaker 1: and it forced the church to sell its property, though

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Speaker 1: don't think of it quite like Henry the Eighth style,

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Speaker 1: because they didn't actually start confiscating property. And then it

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Speaker 1: also increased the educational opportunities available to the poor, something

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Speaker 1: that Whereas especially was really interested in and you can

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Speaker 1: understand why from his own background. And most importantly, the

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Speaker 1: government created a new constitution in eighteen fifty seven, so

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Speaker 1: basically they were in the process of transforming Mexico into

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Speaker 1: a modern nation. State. But in eighteen fifty eight the

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Speaker 1: conservatives revolted and Uarez was forced to withdraw from Vera Cruz,

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Speaker 1: where he created his own government in exile, and that

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Speaker 1: began a three year long War of the Reform, which

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Speaker 1: started before Ajuarez could finally return to power in eighteen

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Speaker 1: sixty one, where he was voted president. He inherits a

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Speaker 1: lot of problems though, after three years of war, Mexico

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Speaker 1: is deep in debt. So on July seventeenth, eighteen sixty one,

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Speaker 1: President Juarez supports a movement passed by the Mexican Congress

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Speaker 1: and suspends payment of all foreign debts for two years.

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Speaker 1: So this is not okay with the European countries who

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Speaker 1: are owed money from Mexico. But what are they going

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Speaker 1: to do about it? Well, some Mexican conservatives were living

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Speaker 1: in exile abroad, and one of them, Jose Manuel Hidalgo

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Speaker 1: e as now Rezar, suggests to Empress Eugenie, the Spanish

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Speaker 1: wife of the French Emperor Napoleon the Third, that perhaps

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Speaker 1: Juarez could be driven from power by a new European

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Speaker 1: backed monarchy. Sounds like a bold plan, doesn't it It is?

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Speaker 1: It's one also that would be a win win for

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Speaker 1: Mexican conservatives and France, since for one thing, Juarez would

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Speaker 1: be gone. Also France would get her money back and

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Speaker 1: both would get control of the new monarch. Yeah, so

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Speaker 1: they both have something they can get out of it.

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Speaker 1: And as a further incentive though, for Napoleon the Third,

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Speaker 1: installing his own ruler, his own puppet ruler in Mexico

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Speaker 1: would potentially prevent the country from falling under US control,

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Speaker 1: which was something that France was very uncomfortable with. So

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Speaker 1: on October thirty one, eight sixty one, France, Britain, and Spain,

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Speaker 1: three of the big countries that had money due to them,

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Speaker 1: agreed to stage a joint attack on Mexico to recoup

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Speaker 1: their debts. There's another player, though, that is really kind

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Speaker 1: of more notable for being out of the game than

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Speaker 1: in it. And I just think this is so interesting.

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Speaker 1: But since the eighteen twenties, the US had tried to

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Speaker 1: prevent European influence in the America's with the Monroe Doctrine

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Speaker 1: um just for folks who don't know, basically a policy

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Speaker 1: that viewed any European efforts to colonize the Americas as

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Speaker 1: a sign of aggression. To the United States itself. So

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Speaker 1: normally Napoleon the Third wouldn't have wanted to test the

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Speaker 1: Monroe Doctrine and by extension, test the United States. But

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Speaker 1: since the American Civil War had really just started, Napoleon

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Speaker 1: figured correctly that the US had bigger problems to deal

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Speaker 1: with than a French invasion of Mexico. Still, Napoleon the

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Speaker 1: Third knew better than to attempt to install someone related

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Speaker 1: to him. Instead, he offers the crown to the available

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Speaker 1: eligible Habsburg Prince Maximilian, So it gives Maximilian something to

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Speaker 1: think about here, something to consider. Then, on January eighth,

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Speaker 1: eighteen sixty two, more than ten thousand Allied troops arrived

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Speaker 1: in Vera Cruz. Though the British and Spanish soon pull

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Speaker 1: out of the scheme, Yeah, you can't imagine that they

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Speaker 1: would be very keen on the idea of a French

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Speaker 1: controlled ruler being installed in Mexico. Yeah, and Nouarez isn't

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Speaker 1: happy about it either. He makes his opposition to this

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Speaker 1: European scheme quite clear. He declares that any foreigner who

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Speaker 1: makes an armed invasion without the declaration of war will

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Speaker 1: be put to death, as will any Mexican who assists

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Speaker 1: a foreign invasion. That's an important law or proclamation to

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Speaker 1: remember actually for this episode, So just keep it in

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Speaker 1: the back here, keep it in mind. There are some

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Speaker 1: really difficult early battles for the French though, with this invasion.

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Speaker 1: On May five, eighteen sixty two, the French are trounced

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Speaker 1: at Puebla, which is a victory still marked today by

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Speaker 1: Sinca to Mayo. Next time you go out for Sinca

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Speaker 1: to Mayo, you can tell all your friends that you

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Speaker 1: know it is not Mexican Independence Day. You know the

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Speaker 1: story behind it. Yeah, that's what people mean when they're like,

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Speaker 1: that's not what Sanco to Miles about. It's not now

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Speaker 1: you know what you're drinking Margarita's for victory at Puebla.

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Speaker 1: So reports of that defeat though, get back to Paris

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Speaker 1: and really kick off mass disapproval of Napoleon the Thirds Project,

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Speaker 1: I mean that they were going to war over these

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Speaker 1: debts and trying to install a king. Another big defeat

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Speaker 1: happens April eighteen sixty three at the Battle of Cameron,

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Speaker 1: where only three of Captain Jean Danjeese's legionnaires survive and

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Speaker 1: Donjeue's own wooden hand. This is just like a weird,

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Speaker 1: kind of freaky side note. N Jeu's own wooden hand

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Speaker 1: is recovered from the scene of the battle and turned

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Speaker 1: into the symbol of the foreign legion. Because the French

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Speaker 1: soldiers had fought so bravely even though they were really overwhelmed,

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Speaker 1: it sounds like maybe things aren't going to work out

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Speaker 1: for the French. But by May thirty one, eighteen sixty three,

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Speaker 1: they do get the upper hand and Uarez and his

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Speaker 1: army have to flee to the city of Sound Luis Potosi,

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Speaker 1: which is in the north of Mexico, and basically just

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Speaker 1: continue a series of retreats all the way to El

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Speaker 1: Paso del Norte, which is later renamed the dad Arras.

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Speaker 1: He and his followers, called Republicans or Huaristas, continued to fight,

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Speaker 1: but then back at the capital, a new conservative government

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Speaker 1: is established and a formal invite goes out to Maximilian.

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Speaker 1: He accepts under two conditions. One is that the French

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Speaker 1: will protect him, and the other is that he has

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Speaker 1: the approval of the majority of the Mexican people. So

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Speaker 1: poor Maximilian, he's misled in both of these respects. Really,

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Speaker 1: only a small percentage of the Royalists want the Austrian

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Speaker 1: prince to rule, and Napoleon is already beginning to regret

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Speaker 1: his decision just a few months after offering the crown,

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Speaker 1: but before Maximilian actually moved, Napoleon writes to a friend, quote,

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Speaker 1: I realized that I have gotten myself into a tight corner.

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Speaker 1: But the affair has to be liquidated. So yeah, that's

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Speaker 1: disconcer arting for sure. But still Maximilian is really upbeat

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Speaker 1: about his new role. He in Charlotte, who changes her

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Speaker 1: name to Carlotta, arrive in Mexico May eighteen sixty four,

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Speaker 1: and he's they're fully believing that he does have the

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Speaker 1: support of the Mexican people, not just this little group

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Speaker 1: of royalists. But both of them take their new job

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Speaker 1: pretty seriously to Carlotta learned Spanish and began studying Mexican

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Speaker 1: while Maximilian, surprise surprise, started by upholding most of warez

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Speaker 1: Is reform, so he again doesn't seem like he's acting

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Speaker 1: a protector of Mexico's indigenous people. And unfortunately for Maximilian,

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Speaker 1: that line of thinking, his real sense of responsibility towards

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Speaker 1: his people didn't help him out much at all. He

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Speaker 1: made no friends with his policies. The Conservatives were disappointed

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Speaker 1: that they had basically imported for in Ouarez, and the

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Speaker 1: Church was angry that he refused to restore their lands

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Speaker 1: and instead upheld Wharez as reforms. And though Maximilian's policies

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Speaker 1: were markedly similar to those of Warez, the liberals hated

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Speaker 1: him for having toppled their legitimate government land. He's just

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Speaker 1: random Austrian dude, right. So to add to this, Maximilian

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Speaker 1: basically had to personally finance his own government. France took

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Speaker 1: all the customs revenue to pay back that pre war debt,

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Speaker 1: so everything came from Maximilian's own inheritance, which really makes

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Speaker 1: it seem that France wasn't going into this in good faith.

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Speaker 1: I mean, and now Napoleon had Napoleon the third had

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Speaker 1: multiple motives, But if his primary motive was to get

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Speaker 1: the money back at the expense of the government he

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Speaker 1: had set up, you have to wonder, but his intentions

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Speaker 1: really were all along. And meanwhile, it's not like the

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Speaker 1: fightings over either. Maximilian has to get further help from

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Speaker 1: his brother in Austria and his father in law in Belgium,

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Speaker 1: and the US, even though the Civil War is ongoing,

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Speaker 1: is still a factor. Lincoln didn't openly complain about the

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Speaker 1: violation of the Monroe doctrine because there was too much

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Speaker 1: French and the Confederates. And meanwhile, Maximilian refused the services

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Speaker 1: of Confederate troops who had moved into Mexico for fear

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Speaker 1: was already with Juarez. The two wrote to each other,

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Speaker 1: and the US provided him with some assistance even during

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Speaker 1: the Civil War. After the war ended, more than fifty

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Speaker 1: thousand U S soldiers approached the border and transferred arms

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Speaker 1: and weapons to the Wuarristas. By June twenty, eighteen sixty five,

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Speaker 1: even the idealistic Maximilian could see the writing on the wall.

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Speaker 1: He could see what was about to happen here, he wrote, quote,

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Speaker 1: it must be said openly that our military situation is

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Speaker 1: very bad. The American Civil War has ended and threat

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Speaker 1: of war with the United States looms, so Napoleon the

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Speaker 1: Third sees the riding on the wall too though. On

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Speaker 1: January eighteen sixty six, he informs Maximilian that he's going

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Speaker 1: to withdraw French troops from Mexico, and he doesn't even

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Speaker 1: wait for a reply before he publicly announces that intention.

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Speaker 1: So when Carlotta figures out what's going on and realizes

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Speaker 1: that Frances pulling out, she heads off to Europe to

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Speaker 1: try to rally support around her husband. She begs Napoleon

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Speaker 1: the Third to reconsider. She asks Pope Pious the ninth

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Speaker 1: to help, and when it becomes clear that no one

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Speaker 1: can really do anything for Maximilian, she has a mental

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Speaker 1: breakdown and she suffers from the effects of that for

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Speaker 1: the rest of her life. So Maximilian, meanwhile, he still

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Speaker 1: believes that he has the support of the Mexicans and

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Speaker 1: he won't abdicate since he feels like he'll be abandoning

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Speaker 1: them if he does so. So his backers make him

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Speaker 1: Supreme Commander of the Imperial Army, and on February five,

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Speaker 1: eighteen sixty seven, he leaves Mexico City for Krataro, where

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Speaker 1: he's met by his general's Miramon and Mahia. They await

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Speaker 1: waras as advancing army. There, Carrataro falls May eighteen sixty

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Speaker 1: seven and Maximilian is arrested. His living conditions are harsh,

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Speaker 1: there's no caught, and there are these ironic reading choices

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Speaker 1: like the history of King Charles the first of England,

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Speaker 1: which I'd have to say it would be depressing to

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Speaker 1: read about a king who had lost his throne and

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Speaker 1: his head while you were in prison, indeed. And then

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Speaker 1: on June Maximilian and his generals go to trial where

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Speaker 1: they're charged under the old ware As degree of eighteen

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Speaker 1: sixty two, that one that we mentioned to you guys

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Speaker 1: earlier and asked you to remember, that's coming into play now.

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Speaker 1: And so their court martialed and condemned to death, and

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Speaker 1: on June nineteenth they're executed by firing squad outside of Carrataro.

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Speaker 1: Miramon and Mahia are shot in the Backish traders and

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Speaker 1: Maximilian as shot head on, and Maximilian goes down pretty memorably.

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Speaker 1: His supposed last words are Viva Mexico, Viva Independencia so

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Speaker 1: whare is This decision to execute Maximilian is really pretty

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Speaker 1: unpopular abroad. Men like Victor Hugo and Giuseppe Garibaldi, who

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Speaker 1: is another former podcast subject, had even petitioned Ware's to

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Speaker 1: spare the Archduke's life. But because Waas wanted to set

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Speaker 1: an example for would be invaders coming into his country,

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Speaker 1: and because so many Mexicans had died in the war,

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Speaker 1: Wuarez decided not to spare Maximilian. Obviously, by July one,

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Speaker 1: the news of the death had gotten back to Paris,

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Speaker 1: right as Napoleon the Third was about to open the

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Speaker 1: prize giving ceremony of the Paris World's Fair, So really

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Speaker 1: bad timing for him, and as detailed accounts started coming out,

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Speaker 1: some Pool's anger at Napoleon the Third is really rekindled.

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Speaker 1: You know, why did he get into this in the

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Speaker 1: first place, and especially because Maximilian is a pretty sympathetic figure.

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Speaker 1: One of the people who is disturbed at France's involvement

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Speaker 1: in this whole thing is Eduard Manet, who decides to

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Speaker 1: go against his own dislike of painting what he hadn't seen.

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Speaker 1: You know, he believes artists should paint from life. He

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Speaker 1: decides to go against that principle and recreate the execution

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Speaker 1: of Maximilian because of course he had not been there himself.

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Speaker 1: But he doesn't go about it like the heroic historic

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Speaker 1: picture kind of style. He uses really detailed news reports

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Speaker 1: and they're all of these very strange You can you

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Speaker 1: can look them up actually on MoMA's website because they

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Speaker 1: had an exhibit of some of Manet's paintings of this,

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Speaker 1: you can check out these little cut and pace postcards.

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Speaker 1: People are really into making of the time taking pictures

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Speaker 1: of um just soul jurorsey in this case the wall

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Speaker 1: where Maximilian was executed, and then pasting on heads, like

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Speaker 1: pasting on Maximilian's real head or Mehia's real head. And

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Speaker 1: uh so Mane had all of this kind of stuff

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Speaker 1: to look at, and he did a series of paintings that,

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Speaker 1: due to their controversial subject matter, were never exhibited in

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Speaker 1: Paris during his lifetime. But we want to give you

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Speaker 1: sort of enclosure on our other subjects we've covered in

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Speaker 1: this podcast, to especially Warez, because his later history really

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Speaker 1: surprised me. I knew him as a Mexican national hero,

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Speaker 1: and I figured since he was an older man at

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Speaker 1: this time. He probably had sort of a heroic end

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Speaker 1: of life. But even though he was re elected President

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Speaker 1: of Mexico, political mistakes late in his career made him

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Speaker 1: really extremely unpopular at his death. Yeah, he died in

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Speaker 1: eighteen seventy two and didn't become the celebrated hero that

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Speaker 1: he is today until the twentieth century, when it became

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Speaker 1: clear that as reforms had helped to modernize the country.

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Speaker 1: Carlotta or Charlotte lived until and she never really recovered

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Speaker 1: from her paranoia and mental illness. She spent the rest

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Speaker 1: of her life in castles in Belgium and in Italy,

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Speaker 1: and Maximilian's older brother Franz Joseph framed as emperor until

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Speaker 1: nineteen sixteen. Thank you so much for joining us today

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Speaker 1: for this Saturday classic. If you have heard any kind

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Speaker 1: of email address or maybe a Facebook you are l

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Speaker 1: during the course of the episode, that might be obsolete.

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Speaker 1: It might be doubly obsolete because we have changed our

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Speaker 1: email address again. You can now reach us at History

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Speaker 1: Podcast at I heart radio dot com, and we're all

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Speaker 1: over social media at missed in History, and you can

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Speaker 1: subscribe to our show on Apple podcasts, Google podcast The

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Speaker 1: i heart Radio app, and wherever else you listen to podcasts.

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Speaker 1: Stuff you Missed in History Class is a production of

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Speaker 1: I heart Radio. For more podcast from i heart Radio,

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Speaker 1: visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you

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