Book Synopsis
While the United States was gripped in a desperate struggle for its very existence, France, Britain, Austria, and Spain had their eyes on Mexico. Benito Pablo Juárez García was a Mexican politician, military officer, and lawyer who served as the 26th president of Mexico from 1858 until his death in 1872. As a Zapotec Indian, he was the first Indigenous person to hold the office of President of Mexico. He also had the distinction of being the first democratically elected Indigenous president in postcolonial Latin America. Prior to his appointment to the Mexican presidency, he held a number of offices, including the governorship of Oaxaca and the presidency of the Mexican Supreme Court. The first French invasion was known as the Pastry War (1838–1839), which ended in failure. It also preceded the Mexican-American War, which was a tremendous victory for the United States, resulting in the US doubling its land mass to twice its size after accepting the surrender of Generalissimo Antonio de Padua María Severino López de Santa Anna y Pérez de Lebrón, also known as General Santa Anna, in 1848. The US agreed to pay $15 million (equivalent to $479 million in 2025) to General Santa Anna for the physical damage of the war, the land seeded to the United States, as well as forgiving the $3.25 million of debt already owed by the Mexican government to the United States. In the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, Mexico sold the territories of California, Texas, New Mexico, Utah, Nevada, and Arizona, and parts of Colorado, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Wyoming. This was a bargain since the United States had already occupied most of Mexico from Mexico City to the Canadian border.
The second French intervention in Mexico (1861–1867) placed the Juárez government in grave danger. After defaulting on loans made by the British, French, Spanish, and Austrian governments, a multinational military force was dispatched to Mexico for the purpose of collecting the debt. However, Great Britain, Spain, and Austria decided not to send troops. France was the only European nation that did. The second French intervention in Mexico, also known as the Second Franco-Mexican War, was the military invasion of the Republic of Mexico by the French Empire of Napoleon III. They did so to redeem the monies owed to them by the Mexican government. Pro-Spanish/European Mexican conservatives supported the invasion after suffering a defeat at the hands of the liberal government of Benito Juárez in a three-year civil war.
While this was going on, the Union government, led by President Abraham Lincoln, supported the Juárez Government's bid for independence from European encroachment. Lincoln and Benito Juárez became great friends, with Juárez agreeing to support the Union's efforts in closing off the Rio Bravo side of the Rio Grande River to Confederate trade and resupply. At the outset of hostilities, General Winfield Scott implemented the Anaconda Plan, which was the complete Naval blockade of the entire Confederate coastline from Virginia to Texas. The plan paid special attention to all Confederate ports and port cities. The blockade also sealed the Mississippi River off from all shipping, effectively cutting the Confederacy in half. Confederate President Jefferson Davis had great plans for the absorption of Mexico and the invasion of Cuba after the Confederate struggle for independence was secured. In 1863, after the Battle of Antietam, or Sharpsburg as it was known in the South, was concluded with no clear victor, several European powers began to seriously entertain the formal recognition of the Confederate States of America. This would have turned the Civil War into a world war. Britain had more than 11,000 troops along the New York-Canadian border, along with a Royal Naval fleet just outside US territorial waters near New York. They had orders that in the event of war, they'd be tasked with shutting down New York Harbor.
Although this story is purely fictitious, it is based on several events and concerns that were very real in 1863. With a ‘Pro-Confederate’ government in Mexico City, the Rebel cause would have been fortified with desperately needed supplies of war goods and medical stores. It would have also meant that the Davis government in Richmond would have had some very strong bargaining chips to use as leverage against the Lincoln administration. Although there is no documented evidence that President Davis had planned on killing President Juárez, it doesn’t mean that this idea wasn’t entertained in private conversation. This book takes us on a ‘What If?’ trip in history. Please enjoy