Download App

Chapter 20: Chapter 80: Cause and Effect

After the victory of the bourgeois revolution, the situation in Europe did not improve, but worsened.

The capitalist who has just turned over to be the master has not yet established himself in the country, and he has exposed the essence of greed.

The newly established bourgeois government, instead of fulfilling its previous promises, has intensified the oppression of the people at the bottom.

Wherever there was oppression, there was resistance, and the worker-peasant movement began to see an increase.

In Lombardy, Marshal Radetzky collected a large amount of food before he left. After the Sardinian kingdom occupied the area, Milan city was short of food, and in order to raise food, they borrowed some food from the local people for emergency.

There was borrowing and repayment, and it is not difficult to borrow again.

It is a pity that the Kingdom of Sardinia seems to have forgotten they have already borrowed food from the people, which has aroused the dissatisfaction of the local people.

Because of this, when they came to request food supply from the locals, this time only few were willing to give them out. Next, in order was to raise funds for the war, the Kingdom of Sardinia began to collect another round of war taxes.

After the bureaucrats increased the amount of the war tax, the amount of the war tax has long exceeded the affordability of the lower class populace.

On April 21, 1848, the peasants of Brianza, who could not afford the high taxes, rebelled, and the uprising soon spread to Salerno, Calabria and other regions.

The insurgent army occupied the noble manor, seized the granary, distributed the grain to the common people, burned the IOUs and documents, and even distributed the land in some places.

The actions of the peasant rebel army frightened the capitalists and aristocrats. The Lombard government immediately sent troops to suppress it by force, and the uprising spontaneously organized by the peasant class was extinguished in less than a week.

The peasant uprising was just the beginning. After the Sardinian kingdom occupied the city of Milan, prices began to soar. Take bread, for example, from March to early May, prices skyrocketed by 74 percent.

The capitalists took advantage of this opportunity to make a lot of money in the country, and the people at the bottom were suffering from hunger and cold, making it difficult for them to continue, which hurt many people who supported the Kingdom of Sardinia.

On April 25, under the organization of the workers' mutual aid society, more than 5,000 workers in Milan took to the streets to petition the interim government appointed by the Kingdom of Sardinia, asking the government to lower prices and protect workers' rights.

There is no perfect worker protection law in this era, the best is the "Labor Protection Law" issued by the Vienna government, and its subsidiary bills.

There were not many workers in Milan who are literate, let alone considering political influence. The worker representatives directly copied a part of Austria's "Labor Protection Law" and added some clauses that they thought were reasonable, and then submitted the petition. .

In order to win over the local capitalists and nobles, the Sardinian Kingdom naturally had to have capitalists in the provisional government. They took advantage of this loophole for the first time, arrested worker representatives on charges of Austrian espionage, and sent troops to suppress the parade.

On April 28, a strike broke out in the city of Milan. Tens of thousands of workers took to the streets to fight for their rights and interests. The interim government ordered the National Guard to shoot at "the crowd that disturbed the social order", killing more than 300 people on the spot and arresting them more than five hundred people.

The white terror flooded the city of Milan, and the Milan labor movement temporary stopped under the suppression of the bourgeois liberal government.

...

The repression of the workers' and peasants' movement is far from just the Kingdom of Sardinia, the southern states of Italy, and the liberal bourgeois governments are also suppressing the workers' and peasants' movements one after another.

In Naples, the National Guard shot the striking printing house workers; in the Roman National Guard, in front of the bakery, massacred people demanding bread; in Palermo, the National Guard slashed the butcher's knife on his colleagues in the January Revolution

...

The perverse actions of the bourgeois government provided the most powerful support for the restoration of the feudal forces.

No matter how they boast, capitalism is more advanced than feudalism, but the people at the bottom find that the capitalist regime is more abhorrent than the feudal aristocracy.

The monarchy and aristocratic group also seized this opportunity and launched a counter-attack, the most representative of which was the Austrian counter-revolutionary group headed by Franz.

Most of the revolutions in Austria have been suppressed. In Italy, Pope Pius IX[1] of Rome was worried that the unification of Italy would lose his throne, and he was worried that the war with Austria would lose the support of Catholics.

With the efforts of the Austrian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, on April 29, 1848, Pius IX issued the "Declaration", which opened the clarion call for a counterattack.

On May 15, King Ferdinand II of Naples asked parliamentarians to swear allegiance to the constitution, which was opposed by the bourgeois parliamentarians.

That night, Ferdinand II transferred his troops into the city and raised his butcher's knife to the bourgeois parliament.

The Kingdom of Prussia, the Junker nobles who are not reconciled to defeat, is planning a counterattack, and King Frederick William III is still in vain with the bourgeois government.

France

As the source of the European revolution, it is naturally the most lively place.

On April 23, France held constitutional elections. The bourgeois republicans won an overwhelming victory, and the working class was excluded from the core of power.

The rise of right-wing forces in France has sparked dissatisfaction among the working class.

On April 26, French workers launched armed uprisings in Lyon, Limoges, and other cities and failed. The worker leader Blanqui[2] issued a statement condemning the government's betrayal of the revolution.

The class contradiction has risen to become the main contradiction in France, and the working class and the bourgeoisie have parted ways.

During the same period, the royalists were not idle either, and quietly stretched out their hands into the army.

If it weren't for the fact that the French royalists were divided into three parts and kept each other in check, there would be nothing to do with the bourgeoisie now.

...

Vienna

Looking at the information gathered in his hands, Franz breathed a sigh of relief. History has not changed much, and his butterfly effect has not completely changed the world.

An uprising broke out in the Lombardy region, which meant that the local popular base of the Kingdom of Sardinia was pulled to the same level as Austria, and there was no need to worry about falling into a civil war.

Venice

"Marshal, the enemy is out!" General Viktor said in the ear of Marshal Radetzky.

"Well, since the enemy has come, there is no need to hide and suppress ourselves anymore. Order the sixth division to teach the emerging Tuscan army first, and order the ninth division to destroy the Papal army crossing the river!" Marshal Radetzky coldly ordered.

Forcibly pushing the army of the Sardinian kingdom into Venice was already very difficult, and Radetzky did not expect to defeat the enemy by strategy.

"Your Excellency Marshal, I heard that King Charles-Albert is going to the front line. If he intervenes in command, our chance will come!" Edman suggested.

"No need, we can just set up the battle and fight the enemy decisively in the Mantua area, they won't have a choice but to face us.

For this war in Venice, the transportation cost of the Kingdom of Sardinia is twice as high as ours. You can calculate how much materials they have to transport every day to ensure the supply of the front line. " Marshal Radetzky said calmly.

[1] in the translation, the word pope wasn't included, I think it would be more fitting if the title is included, I will most likely do so, for many others.

[2] Louis Auguste Blanqui (he is an actual person) that is his full name.


Load failed, please RETRY

Batch unlock chapters

Table of Contents

Display Options

Background

Font

Size

Chapter comments

Write a review Reading Status: C20
Fail to post. Please try again
  • Writing Quality
  • Stability of Updates
  • Story Development
  • Character Design
  • World Background

The total score 0.0

Review posted successfully! Read more reviews
Report inappropriate content
error Tip

Report abuse

Paragraph comments

Login