Big Bulgaria

In 1878, the emergence of a Bulgarian state threatened the Balance of Power in the Balkans. It was clear that Bulgaria could not simply be re-subsumed into the Ottoman Empire, the Russian Empire simply wouldn't stand for it. But at the same time, France and Britain couldn't tolerate a Russophile Greater Bulgaria poised not far from Constantinople, which Russian maps were already writing down as 'Tsargrad'. So a novel solution was sought. Rather than prolonging the Ottoman's agonies, the borders of 'Greater Bulgaria' would be recognised, but with a caveat. France and Britain would not recognise any Kingdom which had a Romanov or explicitly pro-Russian monarch. Instead, they called for a neutral arbiter, who could balance the Russian desire for a strong Slavic state in the Balkans, and the Anglo-French desire for buffer between Russia and the Mediterranean.

They found their neutral in a very strange place. The Commanding General of the Army of the United States, William Tecumseh Sherman, had proved his continued vigour with the quelling of mob violence against African-Americans in South Carolina. An invitation was extended and after much umming and ahing, Sherman accepted. He travelled to Sofia, and was crowned King of Bulgaria, and acknowledge the Ottoman Sultan as his suzerain, as per the Treaty of Berlin. Controversially, Sherman chose Tecumseh as his regnal name as 'it was a King's name once, it'll do for another'.

The newly crowned King Tecumseh found himself in a new and strange situation, a legally bound neutral in foreign affairs, but in domestic affairs he was a very powerful monarch. The vying and scheming of the National Assembly saw him forced to use arms to quell rebellion and bring order to the young kingdom, while attempted coups by Russian-backed groups saw the formation of a 'Liberal-Patriot' faction. Tecumseh behaved more like a President than a King, and while he crushed insurrection with force, allowed the loyal National Assembly to do its work. By the 1880s, Tecumseh was considered very popular, and if he didn't speak Bulgarian, in a Europe of foreign monarchs sitting on strange thrones, that was hardly considered an impediment.

With peace secured, Tecumseh's patronage saw a blooming in the arts in Bulgaria, something that is considered a blossoming of the Bulgarian Rennaisance that began in the early 19th century. He established parks to protect the Bulgarian wildernesses. As a lapsed Catholic, he established freedom of religion, in an overwhelmingly Orthodox state. For a time, this was unpopular, but it has earned him a glowing reputation in the years since. Over the late 1880s, many American Civil War veterans came to Bulgaria, and helped establish civil institutions and train a formidable Army that would help put paid to any Russian ambition to overthrow Tecumseh and impose a Russophile King.

King Tecumseh's death in 1891, saw his son take the throne. Thomas Sherman had come to Bulgaria with his father, and rather than become a priest had become enamoured with Bulgarian culture and history. Torn between his own Catholic faith, and the Orthodox beliefs of his adopted countrymen, he chose the path of a Prince. Crowned as King Toma, he was if anything a lighter hand in government than his father, delegating responsibility to his ministers and focussing on the arts and the cultural legacy left to him by his father.

It was not long into his reign that Toma had to deal with a major crisis. His father's death leant new strength to the Russophile groups that had buried themselves. His long-serving Prime Minister was shot while making a speech, and while he lived, he was forced to resign. A rebellion by Ultra-Orthodox groups saw Toma forced to take a more direct role than he had desired, and the rebellion had to be bloodily put down. The rebellion caused a great deal of stress and over the following years, Toma succumbed to depression.

Toma became exhausted by the role of King, even after appointing a new Liberal Prime Minister. He never married, likely due to his strongly held Catholic convictions, and abdicated in 1905, fourteen years after assuming the throne. He remained in Bulgaria, and after his abdication became a Catholic priest, working with the Orthodox Church to make the tolerant society that existed in law a reality.

Toma was succeeded by his younger brother, Philemon Tecumseh Sherman, who also chose Tecumseh as his regnal name. Tecumseh II never expected to be King and had been living in New York at the time of his coronation. As a trained lawyer, he focussed himself on further building stable and constitutional government. However, Tecumseh II's reign was besmirched by the rise of nationalist sentiment in the Balkans as Serbia and Greece objected to the remaining threat of the Ottomans. Tecumseh II was in particular forced to act by the rise of the Patriots to high office in Bulgaria and by violence against ethnic Bulgarians in Eastern Thrace. Forming an alliance with Serbia and Greece, Bulgaria drove the remaining Ottoman presence out of Europe, though the British and French intervened to keep Constantinople out of Bulgarian hands.

Not long afterwards, Serbia and Greece began to eye the extensive domain of Bulgaria. The two declared war on Bulgaria, but her American trained armies and highly sophisticated civil institutions, not to mention decades of inward investment gave her an advantage. She annexed Greek Macedonia, forced Serbia to recognise Slavic Macedonians as Bulgars and sponsored the Austrian severing of Bosnia from Serbia, as an independent Hapsburg Principality.

The neutrality of Bulgaria had been compromised, particularly by her support of Austria. This was affirmed by the marriage of Tecumseh II to a Hapsburg princess, and Bulgaria's entrance into the Central Powers, a powerful buffer to secure the Balkans for the alliance. Her wars against her neighbours had put her in Russia, Britain and France's bad books.

Tecumseh II himself however was not as disposed toward Germany and Austria, finding himself drawn more toward the Entente. And ultimately, when war threatened when his young son and Austrian wife were assassinated, and himself wounded by a Serbian terrorist, he elected not to go to war. If he had done so, he would have found himself at war with Russia, and he was under no illusions that that would mean doom for Bulgaria.

Tecumseh II's decision saw Bulgaria torn by violence as the Nationalists protested his actions, the Liberals tore themselves apart and the Socialists gained ground. Austria cut off their alliance, as did Germany, and Bulgaria found herself alone. With the country still marred in the eyes of the Entente, Bulgaria's neutrality was once again assured. The war eventually ended when Tecumseh II appointed a coalition of Liberal figures to run a National Unity administration. Tecumseh II found himself in a position of greater power than either his brother or his father.

After the Bloody 1910s, the 1920s followed in which Tecumseh II pursued greater democratisation. From the expansion of the vote to the mostly peasant population, the governing party emerged from the dregs as the National Union, an alliance of moderate Nationalists, pro-monarchy Liberals and agrarians. This centrist party would dominated Bulgaria's politics for the entire decade, delivering social and economic reforms which would settle the hardship born from internal division and war.

In the 1930s, Tecumseh II's rule returned to a lighter touch and the Nationalists, Liberals and Socialists began to resurge, undermining the Unionists. With the global economy suffering, the Socialist won a minority and the Unionists agreed to an informal arrangement. The rise of the Socialists saw a Nationalist reaction, and an attempted coup was put down. In 1933, the former King Toma died, and Tecumseh II oversaw a state funeral. The former King was interned in a Catholic Cathedral, emblematic of the success the House of Sherman had had in creating a tolerant society.

In 1936, the Nationalists and Liberals agreed to a pact and took the country by storm at the ballot box. Tecumseh II bit his tongue and recognised the government. The two party system was being born. The Nationalists were notably modelling themselves after the Slavophile party in Russia, which had gone from strength to strength under Sergei Witte. An industrialised Russia threatened the moderate Europe that had emerged under France, Germany and Britain. The collapse of Austria-Hungary saw the tinderbox lit. The Hungarians, backed by Russia rebelled and the Serbs, also backed by Russia invaded Bosnia. Germany declared war on Serbia, Russia declared war on Germany. France and Britain remained cautiously neutral.

With war breaking out all around, Serbia attempted to attack Bulgaria with Russian backing. The Nationalists schismed between those who favoured Russia and those who did not, and a National Unity government was hurriedly assembled, in which the Liberals absorbed the remaining Nationalists. The war ended in a hard-won German victory, helped along by rebellion in the Ukraine. Serbia was humiliated, and in the post-war, Bulgaria found herself presiding over a great Balkan sphere of influence.

King Tecumseh II died without issue in 1941, and was succeeded by his eldest sister's grandson, Coleman Morrison Fitch, who agreed to take the surname Sherman-Fitch and was crowned Kaloman I.