Liquid Courage

Great Britain vs. Spain
1739-1748

Many history drinkers need no excuse to repair to the porch on a summer evening with a gin and tonic.  But there is always military history to toast, and the gin and tonic is a perfect excuse to remember an obscure and bizarrely-named example of European colonial fisticuffs: The War of Jenkins’ Ear.

Gin and Tonic

• British gin
• tonic water
• lime
• ice

An 18th-Century war between the British and the Spanish highlights the elegance and historical resonance of the gin and tonic.  British colonies used gin to mask the bitter flavor of the quinine in tonic water, which was taken to prevent malaria.  The British Navy provided sailors with limes to prevent scurvy (thus the name ‘limey’).  Why limes and not oranges or lemons, which have more vitamin C?  Lemons and oranges came from Spain, which alternated as a British trading and warring partner.  Limes were obtained more reliably from the British West Indies, where the War of Jenkins’ Ear largely took place.

A drink that prevents malaria and scurvy, remembers The War of Jenkins’ Ear, and perfectly compliments a warm summer evening?  The gin and tonic deserves its canonical place in the ranks of history drinks.

Ratings:

• Strength: 3/5; the ratio of gin to tonic is a question of taste 
• Skill: 2/5; simple is as simple does
• Rank: 5/5; delicious

Background

The 1713 Treaty of Utrecht gave Britain a 30-year contract to supply the Spanish Caribbean colonies with slaves, goods, and sunburned mariners suffering vitamin C deficiencies.  As the old saying goes, when you give the British Empire a centimetre, they take a hectometre.  Suspecting the British of abusing the contract, the Spanish began inspecting British ships and seizing illicit cargo.

These search and seizures were testy moments, and Spanish ship captain Julio León “Mr. Blonde” Fandiño was a little overzealous in his punishment of offenders.  In 1731 Fandiño boarded the British brig Rebecca, accused the boat of piracy, and cut off the left ear of the Rebecca’s captain, Robert Jenkins.  Fandiño sang several lines of ‘Stuck In The Middle With You’ as he did this.

Hey, Captain Jenkins. Don't stick your thumbs in your ears and wiggle your fingers at the Spanish. That Mr. Blonde has an ill-favored look.

What Señor Blonde did not know was that Robert Jenkins was going to keep that ear for seven years and then present it to the British Commons during an inquiry into “Spanish Depredations upon the British Subjects.”  Jenkins’ moving testimony, when he asked the Commons, “How do I look?” and the Speaker replied, “I don’t know what to tell you, Robert,” pushed Parliament towards making war on Spain.  Aside from that moment, however, everyone agreed that Jenkins’ pickled ear was disturbing, and that his keeping it on the mantle for seven years was precisely the sort of thing his friends alluded to when declining his dinner party invitations.

In the summer of 1739, King George II ordered the British Navy to attack and seize Spanish ships and possessions in the West Indies.  War soon followed.  On November 22nd, 1739, six British ships of the line captured the poorly-defended town of Porto Bello on the coast of Panama.  The battle was a walkover, but Britain overreacted by christening Portobello Road in London, awarding the most medals of any 18th century battle, and playing “Rule Britannia” for the first, second, and millionth time.

The war lasted for three more years.  British Prime Minister Robert Walpole fell as a result of his lackluster enthusiasm for the war.  George Anson accidentally circumnavigated the globe, capturing a lot of Spanish gold and losing nine-tenths of his men along the way.  By mid-1742, the war was merged into a general European fracas (War of the Austrian Succession), as these things tended to go.  In the large view of European tiffs, The War of Jenkins’ Ear was a relatively lackluster affair, except to those people who had to hang out with Robert Jenkins from 1731 onwards.

The Boers in the Velt Gang, led by Butch Transvaal and the Orange Free State Kid, are all dead now…but once they ruled Southern Africa!

General Koos de lay Rey, President Kruger, and Christiaan de Wet, leaders of the Boer war effort

The Second Boer War took place in the Wild West of Southern Africa at the turn of the century.  What was it about?  The same thing dust-ups like these are always about, my friend.  Two independent Boer Republics came to loggerheads with the British over diamonds and gold discovered in the area.  British gold miners moved in from the southern Cape Colony, tensions increased, the British government tried to boss the Boers around, somebody cheated at cards, and war was declared.

The thing you got to understand, now, is that President Kruger of Transvaal saw the writing on the wall.  The British had fought the Boers in 1881, and now they were back, the smell of gold and colonialism in their upturned nostrils.  So Kruger allied Transvaal with the Orange Free State, equipped his militia with the best weapons available, and took the initiative.  He told the British they had 48 hours to withdraw, as “el dinero…es nuestro.”  The British laughed heartily at the moxie of the two tiny republics.  So the Boer Republics declared war on Britain on October 11th and shot the bejeesus out of them.

Can we not move? We're better when we don't move.

At first, the Boers whipped the British.  The Boers had no official army, you see, but rather an enthusiastic militia of farmers and hunters.  In hunting, it’s best to hit with your first shot, so your quarry doesn’t scatter.  This applied equally well to shooting the British.  And when community gatherings include 100-yard egg shooting contests (as the Boers enjoyed), you’re going to end up with good local marksmen.  The Boers had superior marksmen, excellent tactics, modern guns, knowledge of the terrain, and the ability to pronounce place names like Ysterspruit, Klerksdorp, Tweebosch, and Groenkloof.  The British, by contrast, kept trying to take the train from Elandslaagte to Magersfontein, only to get off in Bloemfontein, which was ridiculous.

The Boers embarrassed the British from October to December 1899, culminating with three spectacular victories over superior British numbers during “Black Week” (Dec. 10-15th).  After that, the British stopped messing around and changed tactics, over the protestations of a peppy railroad worker named Woodcock who thought the Boers were admirable gentlemen and if he was gonna get his colonialism powergrab repulsed, well there was nobody he’d rather repulse it than them.

Who ARE those guys?

The British brought in troops from Australia, New Zealand, Canada and British South Africa.  They initiated a scorched earth campaign to deprive the Boer militia of sustenance, and forced Boer civilians and sympathetic Africans into inhuman concentration camps (in which thousands died).  They built elaborate defensive fortifications, and began territory sweeps designed to root out Boer fighters.  The British also sent in Lord Kitchener to command the British offensive, and possibly an Indian tracker named Lord Baltimore and the toughest lawman in the West, Joe Lefors, whom you could always identify because he wore a white skimmer.

The Boers, led by chivalrous General Koos de lay Rey and mustachioed Christiaan de Wet, turned to guerrilla tactics to resist the British.  The guerrilla units operated in their home districts, living off the land and conducting quick, violent strikes against British troops and infrastructure.  The traditional British military units at first found they controlled only the sectors they physically occupied.  They had to deal with an enemy that blended into the sympathetic local population and avoided traditional military confrontations.  The British response, scorched earth and concentration camps, caused public discomfort back in England and political hearings were held.  Lord Kitchener was accused of pursuing military objectives with insufficient regard for civilian casualties.

So, in other words, not much here that could be applied to today’s modern insurgency problems.  Ancient history, folks.

By May 1902 the Boer resistance had been defeated, and the Treaty of Vereeniging (or as the British called it, “The Treaty of Ver….thingy”) signed on May 31, 1902 ended the conflict.  Transvaal and the Orange Free State were placed under the British Empire, and became part of the Union of South Africa in 1910.  The Union was the precursor to the Republic of South Africa, which y’all remember as a glitch-free enterprise, of course.

How to Make a “Boer Republic:”

[Ingredients]:

• 2 oz Grand “Free State Orange” Mariner
• 2 oz Godiva “We’re Dutch” Chocolate Liqueur
• kiwi

[Preparation]:

1. Mix alcohols over ice.  Garnish with kiwi slice.

How’s It Taste?

• 4 out of 5; mighty tasty.

Is It Hard To Make?

• 2 out of 5; no.

Does It Pack A Punch?

• 3 out of 5; don’t go overboard.

Hereeeeeeee's Hernán!

On March 4th, 1519, Hernán Cortés landed on the Yucatán Peninsula.  It was a bold move.  Cortés had been given command of a Spanish expedition to the Mexican interior by Diego Velázquez, the Spanish governor of Cuba.  Velázquez and Cortés were colonialism drinking buddies, but when it became clear to Velázquez that Mexican glory > Cuban glory, Velázquez tried to revoke Cortés’ command.  Cortés killed the messenger (literally), and when Velázquez arrived personally to stop him, Cortés waved adios to Velázquez from the helm of a ship.

Cortés sailed off to the mainland with 11 ships, 100 sailors and 530 soldiers.  On the Yucatán Peninsula he met the two people who would allow him to whisper silky words into the ears of the Aztecs: Geronimo de Aguilar, a shipwrecked sailor who had been living with the Maya, and La Malinche, a native woman given as a slave to the Spanish.  Aguilar spoke Spanish and Mayan, and La Malinche spoke Mayan and the Aztec language Nahuatl.  An effective game of New World Telephone ensued, and the rest, as they say, is lamentable.

Moctezuma II greeting Cortés

Cortés was a talented and persuasive military leader, and proved adept at manipulating alliances and social power structures he encountered in the native civilizations.  A massacre here, a hostage taking there, sprinkle with smallpox, and within two and a half years the Aztec Empire was in ruins.  On August 13, 1521, the city of Tenochtitlan surrendered to Cortés’ besieging forces, and that was that.

So pour out a splash of mezcal for the Aztec Empire.  Say what you will about their penchant for human sacrifice and oppression of surrounding peoples; the Aztecs were no match for the wildly successful combination of Spanish colonialism, New World Telephone, and smallpox.