War of The Spanish Succession - Prelude

Prelude

When the French court first learned of the will, despite the paper victory for the Bourbons, Louis XIV's advisors argued that it was safer to accept the terms of the Second Partition Treaty than to risk war by claiming the whole Spanish inheritance. However, Jean-Baptiste Colbert, the French foreign minister, successfully argued that whether France accepted all or a part of the Spanish Empire, it would still have to fight Austria, which did not accept the nature of the partition described by the Treaty of London.

Furthermore, the terms of Charles' will stipulated that Anjou was to be offered the choice of the whole Spanish Empire or nothing; if he refused, the entire inheritance was to go to Anjou's younger brother Charles, Duke of Berry or to Archduke Charles of Austria if the Duke of Berry refused. Knowing that the Maritime Powers (England and the United Provinces) would not side with France in a fight to impose the partition treaty on the unwilling Austrians and Spanish, Louis determined to accept his grandson's inheritance.

Charles II died on 1 November 1700, and on 24 November, Louis XIV proclaimed Anjou as Philip V, King of Spain. The new King was declared ruler of the entire Spanish empire, contrary to the provisions of the Second Partition Treaty. Despite the violation of the agreement with England, William III lacked the support of the ruling elites in England or the United Provinces to declare war against France, and reluctantly recognized Philip as king in April 1701.

Louis, however, took too aggressive a path in his attempt to secure French hegemony in Europe. He cut off England and the Netherlands from Spanish trade, thereby seriously threatening the commercial interests of those two countries. This enabled William III to secure the support of his subjects and to negotiate the Treaty of Den Haag (1701) with the United Provinces and Austria. The agreement, reached on 7 September 1701, recognized Philip V as King of Spain, but allotted Austria that which it desired most: the Spanish territories in Italy. As a condition, Austria also accepted the Spanish Netherlands, thus protecting that crucial region from French control. England and the United Provinces, meanwhile, were to retain their commercial rights in Spain.

A few days after the signing of the treaty, William III's predecessor as King of England, James II, who had been deposed by William in 1688, died in France. England and the United Provinces had already begun raising armies, and now, although Louis had treated William as King of England since the Treaty of Ryswick, he now recognized James II's son, the Catholic James Francis Edward Stuart (the "Old Pretender"), as the rightful monarch. Louis's action alienated the English public even further and gave William grounds for war.

Armed conflict began slowly, as Austrian forces under Prince Eugene of Savoy invaded the Duchy of Milan, one of the Spanish territories in Italy, prompting French intervention. England, the United Provinces, and most of the German states (notably Prussia and Hanover), sided with Austria. The Wittelsbach Electors of Bavaria and Cologne supported France and Spain. Portugal, while initially allied with the French, switched sides very early on with the Methuen Treaty. In Spain, the cortes of Aragon, Valencia, and Catalonia (regions of the Crown of Aragon) declared themselves in favor of the Austrian Archduke. Although King William III died in 1702, his successor in England, Queen Anne, continued the vigorous prosecution of the war, under the guidance of her ministers, Godolphin and Marlborough.