1834 Quadruple Alliance

With the beginning of the Carlist War, additional articles were signed in August of that year, by which the rest of the signatory parties undertook to help the legitimist government in Spain.

This put an end to Spain's membership of the Holy Alliance, already quite denaturalized, and it was a significant milestone that two countries traditionally at loggerheads, such as France and the United Kingdom, reached a mutual understanding.

The Quadruple Alliance guaranteed the support of France and the United Kingdom for the dynastic pretensions of the daughter of Ferdinand VII of Spain, Isabella II, against the pretender to the Crown, Carlos María Isidro de Borbón, a fact that was significant for the defeat of the latter's supporters in the First Carlist War and for the consolidation of the regime.

In the United Kingdom, the Whigs took over the government and imposed the Great Reform Act in 1832, which allowed for a certain political openness and a broadening of the basis of the parliamentary regime.

In any case, this collaboration had two important limitations: the traditional English principle of non-intervention and the different and conflicting economic interests of each country.

[6] López-Cordón emphasized this isolation, adding that it stemmed from the "disqualification of Spain as a European power, the result of the unfortunate foreign policy of Fernando VII".

[8] Javier de Burgos defined the treaty as "a kind of provocation directed at the Northern Powers" (Prussia, Austria and Russia).

[9] Moreover, the accession of France was at first viewed with reluctance by Palmerston, the British Foreign Secretary who signed the treaty, and was only achieved under pressure from Talleyrand, the French ambassador in London.

The final inclusion gives a secondary role to France, dependent on the rest of the parties; it was rather a moral effect to "dispel the rumors spread by the absolutist powers about Franco-British differences".

[18] Menchén does affirm that the "British collaboration was very valuable at some moments in spite of the economic compensations",[19] giving the example of its importance in resolving the blockade of Bilbao.

[21] French historiography explains the ambiguity of the aid by the European context: Louis Philippe I never lost the dialogue with Austria that would ask him to "restrain" the United Kingdom.

[19] Throughout the development of the war, French intervention was sought in compliance with the agreement and even a change of government was made, passing to the moderate Ofalia, so that there would be greater ideological harmony.

Firstly, in the attempt to reduce the excesses of both sides in the war, signing for this purpose two agreements, the Eliot and Segura Lécera, of "very relative effectiveness".

[16] Of greater importance is the second issue: intervention in the peace agreements that took the form of the Convention of Vergara, which in its final draft essentially included the terms of the British proposal, despite the fact that it was made without foreign mediation.

[21] Rodríguez Alonso shares this view, adding that the British diplomats "had played a fundamental role in the previous negotiations, but they took care that their work did not appear in the first place".

[26] The end of the Entente between the French and the British, and with it of the "spirit" of the Quadruple Alliance, was also due to the weakness it had since its formation because of the opposing economic interests that made political union impossible.

Spanish interventionism in Portugal worried the British, who feared the influence of France, and this led to an agreement to settle the Portuguese question again jointly, under the guise of the Quadruple Treaty.

[30] Regarding the consolidation of the Spanish liberal regime as the fruit of the "spirit" of the Quadruple Alliance, it is worth noting the British influence which, in any case, did not support the revolutionaries, but rather the more moderate among the progressives.

Caricature of Pedro IV and Miguel I of Portugal disputing the crown. The development of the Portuguese civil war would be one of the main reasons for signing the Treaty of the Quadruple. [ 1 ]
Talleyrand, the French ambassador in London, succeeded in getting France included in the treaty despite British reluctance. [ 13 ]
Exchange of prisoners for the Treaty of Lecera during the Carlist War. British diplomacy played a key role in the signing of this treaty, which sought to reduce the cruelty of the war. [ 16 ]
The Duke of Montpensier was one of the candidates that were considered to marry Isabella II. Although he was vetoed by the United Kingdom, he was able to marry the Infanta Luisa Fernanda , breaking the balance between the French and the English and ending the Entente between the two countries and, by extension, the Quadruple Alliance. [ 24 ]