User:EspanaViva/Sandbox Hispania

Spain
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Napoleonic rule and its consequences

Main article: Mid-nineteenth century Spain

The Second of May, 1808: The Charge of the Mamelukes, by Francisco de Goya (1814).

By the early 1790s, Spanish foreign influence had sufficiently faded that Spain was obligated to share with Great Britain access to 250-year old colonial claims to today's Alaska and Pacific Northwest. Domestically, the war with France in 1793 polarized the country in an apparent reaction against the Gallicised elites. Spain made peace with France in 1795, and in 1796, Spain, in support of France, declared war against Britain and Portugal. The disastrous Spanish economic situation (and other factors) forced the abdication of the Spanish king in favour of Napolean's brother, Joseph Bonaparte.

This new foreign monarch was regarded with scorn. On May 2, 1808, the people of Madrid took up a nationalist uprising against the French army, known to the Spanish as the War of Independence, and to the English as the Peninsular War. Napoleon was forced to intervene personally, defeating the Spanish army and Anglo-Portuguese forces. However, further military action by Spanish guerrillas and Wellington's Anglo-Portuguese army, combined with Napoleon's disastrous invasion of Russia, led to the ousting of the French from Spain in 1814, and the return of King Ferdinand VII.

The French invasion proved disastrous for Spain's economy, and left a deeply divided country that was prone to political instability for more than a century. The power struggles of the early part of the century led to the loss of all of Spain's colonies in Latin America, with the exception of Cuba and Puerto Rico.

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