Oxford, Bolingbroke, and the Peace of Utrecht

Abstract

The peace treaties concluded at Utrecht in March 1713, and the subsequent related treaties, were made memorable by the controversy which surrounded the British Ministry's part in forcing them through in defiance of the wishes of the Allies. Britain obtained considerable territorial and commercial concessions from France and Spain, together with general recognition of the Protestant succession in the House of Hanover. The Allies had less cause for satisfaction. The House of Habsburg, whose claim to the whole Spanish empire had been recognized by Britain since 1703, had to be content with the Southern Netherlands and a part of the former Spanish possessions in Italy. The United Provinces received a less favourable military barrier against France in the Nedierlands than they had been led to expect. From the point of view of the predominantly Tory Ministry, however, the most dangerous critic of the peace was the eleotor of Hanover, the future George I, who allied himself closely with the Whigs in their efforts to continue the War of the Spanish Succession until the throne of Spain was obtained for the Imperial House. The insistence of the Whigs that the Bourbon incumbent should give up the Spanish throne, compelled if necessary by Louis XIV, had caused the breakdown of negotiations in 1709–10, and, together with their injudicious impeachment of Henry Sacheverell, hastened their own dismissal by Queen Anne in June-September 1710 to make way for the more pacific Tories. The continued alliance of the House of Hanover with the Whigs after Anne's death in 1714 was to prolong the controversy concerning the peace; for one of the first actions of George I's Ministry, after their consolidation in parliament in the general election of 1715, was to impeach Oxford, Bolingbroke and others responsible for the Peace of Utrecht.