Ferdinand VII of Spain: Encyclopedia II - Ferdinand VII of Spain - Revolt

Ferdinand VII of Spain - Revolt

In 1820 his misrule provoked a revolt in favor of the Constitution of 1812 which began with a mutiny of the troops under Col. Rafael Riego and the king was quickly made prisoner. He grovelled to the insurgents as he had done to his parents. Ferdinand had restored the Jesuits upon his return; now the Society had become identified with repression and absolutism among the liberals, who attacked them: twenty-five Jesuits were slain in Madrid in 1822. For the rest of the 19th century, expulsions and re-establishment of the Jesuits would continue to be touchmarks of liberal or authoritarian political regimes.

When at the beginning of 1823 as a result of the Congress of Verona the French invaded Spain "invoking the God of St Louis, for the sake of preserving the throne of Spain to a descendant of Henry IV, and of reconciling that fine kingdom with Europe," and in May the revolutionary party carried Ferdinand to Cádiz, he continued to make promises of amendment till he was free.

When freed after the Battle of Trocadero and the fall of Cadiz he revenged himself with a ferocity which disgusted his far from liberal allies. In violation of his oath to grant an amnesty he revenged himself, for three years of coercion, by killing on a scale which revolted his "rescuers" and against which the Duke of Angoulême, powerless to interfere, protested by refusing the Spanish decorations offered him for his military services.

During his last years Ferdinand's energy was abated. He no longer changed ministers every few months as a sport, and he allowed some of them to conduct the current business of government. His habits of life were telling on him. He became torpid, bloated and horrible to look at. After his fourth marriage, with Maria Christina of Bourbon-Two Sicilies in 1829, he was persuaded by his wife to set aside the law of succession of Philip V, which gave a preference to all the males of the family in Spain over the females. His marriage had brought him only two daughters. The change in the order of succession established by his dynasty in Spain angered a large part of the nation and made civil war, the Carlist Wars, inevitable.

When well he consented to the change under the influence of his wife. When ill he was terrified by priestly advisers who were partisans of his brother Carlos. What his final decision was is perhaps doubtful. His wife was mistress by his death-bed and she could put the words she chose into the mouth of a dead man and could move the dead hand at her will. Ferdinand died on September 29, 1833.

It had been a frequent saying with the more zealous royalists of Spain that a King must be wiser than his ministers for he was placed on the throne and directed by God. Since the reign of Ferdinand VII no one has maintained this unqualified version of the great doctrine of divine right.

King Ferdinand VII kept a diary during the troubled years 1820-1823 which has been published by the Count de Casa Valencia.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Revolt", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki