What if the revolutions of 1848 had succeeded?
In 1848 revolutions swept Europe; by 1849 Russian troops and Radetzky had crushed Hungary and Italy. What if Kossuth had won?
What actually happened
In February 1848 revolution in Paris set off uprisings across Europe, the Springtime of Nations. In March Vienna rose and Metternich fled; Hungary won its own government under the April Laws; Milan drove out the Austrians in the Five Days, and Venice declared a republic. Charles Albert of Sardinia went to war with Austria.
The tide turned in the summer. Field Marshal Radetzky beat the Sardinians at Custoza in July 1848 and again at Novara in March 1849. The Roman Republic of Mazzini and Garibaldi fell to a French army in July 1849, and Venice surrendered in August. Vienna itself was retaken by imperial troops in October 1848.
Hungary fought on. Its Honvéd army under Lajos Kossuth's government won a series of victories in spring 1849, and in April Hungary declared independence. The young emperor Franz Joseph appealed to Tsar Nicholas I, and in June some 200,000 Russian troops invaded. On 13 August 1849 the Hungarian army surrendered at Világos. Thirteen Hungarian generals were executed at Arad.
The turning point
Hungary in spring 1849 was the revolutions' best chance. Its army had driven the Austrians out of most of the country. Historians such as István Deák have asked whether a march on Vienna, rather than the siege of Buda, could have forced a compromise before the Russians arrived.
The decisive factor, though, was the Russian intervention, which the Hungarians could not match. In Italy, the divisions among the revolutionaries and the strength of Radetzky's army mattered most. Charles Albert hesitated after the Five Days of Milan, Pope Pius IX withdrew his support for the national war in April 1848, and Naples recalled its troops; Radetzky, falling back on the fortresses of the Quadrilateral, had time to regroup. Mike Rapport's and Christopher Clark's accounts emphasise how the revolutions' internal splits, between liberals and radicals and among nationalities, made counter-revolution easier.
The world that might have been
In Crown & Plough the alternative reads: when Kossuth's Honvéd army threatened Vienna, the Emperor compromised; Hungary became an independent kingdom, and Lombardy passed to Sardinia.
Beyond the game, an independent Hungary in 1849 would have faced its own nationalities question, since Croats, Serbs, Romanians and Slovaks within it had fought against the Hungarian government. The Habsburg monarchy might have survived as a looser union much earlier than the Compromise of 1867, or broken apart.
An earlier Sardinian Lombardy would have given the Italian national movement a head start, perhaps making the later unification under Piedmont quicker or different in form.
Ripples through time
The 1848 turning point has no direct link to the other turning points of the era in the game, but it carries forward. In the Victorian era (1850), the Hungarian lands of the Austrian Empire form their own Kingdom of Hungary, and the scripted Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867 does not happen. Compare Garibaldi's Thousand for the next chapter of Italian unification.
- Carries into the next era Victorian Era
Play this turning point
The Age of Revolution era starts in 1789, so reaching 1848 means living through several generations or starting a family in the 1820s. Fighting against Austria, or holding land as a revolutionary, raises the odds. There is no dedicated Currents of History story or scenario for 1848.
The two sides are treated as evenly matched, and history is weighted moderately, so the outcome is more open than for the great battles.
Questions and answers
Why did the Hungarian revolution of 1848 fail?
Mainly because Russia intervened with some 200,000 troops in 1849 at Franz Joseph's request; Hungary also faced opposition from its own national minorities.
What were the revolutions of 1848?
A wave of liberal and national uprisings across Europe, beginning in Palermo and Paris and spreading to the German states, the Austrian Empire and Italy. Most were suppressed by 1849.
What happened at Világos?
The main Hungarian army under Artúr Görgei surrendered to the Russians there on 13 August 1849, ending the war of independence.
Did anything from 1848 survive?
Yes. The abolition of serfdom in the Austrian Empire in 1848 was never reversed, Piedmont-Sardinia kept the constitution Charles Albert granted that year, Denmark gained a constitution in 1849, and France kept universal male suffrage. The national questions raised in 1848 dominated the following decades.
Sources and further reading
Modern accounts: Mike Rapport, 1848: Year of Revolution; Christopher Clark, Revolutionary Spring; István Deák, The Lawful Revolution; Jonathan Sperber, The European Revolutions, 1848–1851.
← What if Napoleon had won at Waterloo?What if Russia had won the Crimean War? →