Factions of the Sutherlander Spring
Kingsmen (also "Frederyksmen", "Truefast")
Frederyksmen were the most anti-revolutionary of the factions at the turn of 1829.
King Frederyk III, who ascended the throne in 1821, was a conservative monarch opposed to the
Leiring, a period of liberalisation and moderation to the absolute monarchism that had been observed by the predecessors of Frederyk III.
The King's decision to abolish the Constitution in 1827 is seen to have aggravated the revolutionary spirit amongst moderates, however Kingsmen largely argued that this was a natural restoration of the King's order. Frederyksmen also largely were in favour of press censorship, intolerance towards Courantists and other citizens who were not practising Amendists, censorship of education that was "of risk" (attached to
Leiringly ideas, such as the liberal arts and modern philosophy), and formed a secret police to monitor and extinguish dissent amongst intellectuals. The electoral franchise was also reduced, as was the influence of the Almoot. They referred to themselves as "truefast", as a distinguishment from constitutionalists.
This class was primarily made up of the aristocracy, who largely opposed the Leiring philosophy of the preceding two kings, and who embraced Frederyk's rolling back of the tide, however included non-insignificant numbers from the middle classes.
In 1829, the country turned to revolution; Frederyksmen gained the epithet "Kingsmen", which was used in derision by other factions, becoming a pejorative that more moderate factions were referred to as an assertion that they fundamentally disagreed with the essence of revolution.
Constitutionalists (moderate-conservative royalists)
Constitutionalists, embodied by their factional leader Chancellor Graham Coulter, were the most moderate of the revolutionary factions in Sutherland. Unlike Hylanders, Constitutionalists supported the King's non-interventionist and anti-nationalistic tendencies, but opposed his rabidly anti-republican tendencies; Constitutionalists were more likely to believe that co-operation with the Western imperial powers would cement Sutherland's place and protect it from intervention, as well as enable it to corner the growing threat from Atinea. Constitutionalists strongly opposed war for political or ideological purposes, believing staunchly in the preservation of the political order, which Coulter believed was ensuring the steady "opening up" of Sutherlander society.
The faction developed in the early 1820s, as Coulter and his faction of conservative-liberals attempted to stem the tide of anger that bubbled over into revolution. Coulter himself was appointed Chancellor after the dissolution of the Almoot and removal of the more liberal Baldock Hyland before him, however failed to ever gain the full trust of the King. In spite of this, the King slowly granted begrudging respect to Coulter - recognising him as in favour of the preservation of the status quo in opposition to revolution - and Coulter began to resolutely advise caution and tolerance in the face of increasing dissent within even his own ranks, as moderate conservatives grew with unease over the authoritarian rule of the King.
In 1827, the King determined to repeal the Constitution. Coulter formed the Constitutional Society, believing that the King had overstepped his bounds in disrupting the status quo and peace of the realm, seeking to force the King's hand back towards moderation. Instead, the King removed Coulter as Chancellor, and appointed a succession of more conservative, "Truefast" Chancellors who proved ineffectual at assuaging the nation's mood.
The Constitutional Society, while initially influential as a means to opposition, was gradually eclipsed by the more radical factions, and faded from relevance until several years after the Spring.
Hylanders (liberal royalists)
Hylanders, embodied by their factional leader Baldock Hyland, were the historical liberal faction that was burgeoning at the time of the accession of King Frederyk III. Viewing the issue of a liberal constitutional monarchy as pivotal, they quickly became viewed as adversarial by the incoming King, who quickly dissolved the Almoot in an effort to remove Hyland from power.
Unlike Constitutionalists, Hylanders viewed the Compromise of 1811 which resulted in the Constitution as insufficiently conciliatory. Therefore, the decision by Frederyk III to repeal the Constitution was viewed as an inevitability by them. Hyland began to amass support as an opposition figure from within the political order and aristocracy at the time, although it was often viewed as insufficiently pro-Charterist by many of the working-classes. Hyland supported a stepping-up of the anti-slavery tilt of the Sutherlander state, basic working protections around the amount of hours that children could work as well as an inspectorate for work, however also supported the removal of the burgeoning welfare state for the poorest and out-of-work, deeming them as exploiting utilitarian rewards from doing what was easiest and most pleasant, not what contributed most to society.
In 1825, a Hylander (Carl-John Reddytch) received the title of Keeper of the Gavilgild (Sutherland's economic ministry), and used his role to liberalise grain prices; this rapidly increased them, making him and his government immensely unpopular. Hyland's opposition to Charterist revolt against the state in the mid-1820s rapidly discredited his liberal movement amongst the working-classes, who began to turn to extraparliamentary forms of resistance and pressure, creating the Charterist movement as it existed from after the March on Bridgwater.
The Hylander faction persisted in a less relevant form into the late 1820s, however was eclipsed relatively quickly by the Constitutionalists and the Howesmen in the face of revolution. Hylanders largely resisted the revolution, and supported market-reforms, opposed mass conscription, as well as preserving the role of the aristocracy and Church; this made them too fiscally liberal for Howesmen, too monarchist for the more revolutionary factions, and not sufficiently pro-status quo for the Constitutionalists.
Howesmen (agrarian moderates)
Gregory Howe emerged from the rapid change of the 1820s as a relative moderate, having initially been seen as a renegade radical. Widely viewed as a heterodox for refusing utilitarianism in the welfare system and opposing the grain laws, his writings in favour of Charterism's right to exist and proliferate in the face of increasingly "irrational" state action gained him a notable following in the "homesteads of Sutherland", especially in the industrial heartlands of Barrowland and Westmorland. Howe himself never argued for or against the monarchy, viewing it as "immaterial, when relative to the health of the state, weighting of power and wealth, or moots' reform". Howe also became the most known advocate against "misgovernment", in particular the corruption of the state by "Medway elites" (characterised, primarily, as stockbrokers), and is viewed as the first populist in Sutherland for this reason.
As revolution became more of a possibility in 1828, Howe was made aware that the Chancellor Alistair Bamford intended upon arresting him for sedition and treason to the King, and thus fled to the island of Rousay. From there, Howe published a piece opposing further emphasis being drawn to the anti-slavery push of the state, calling it a "tradeoff for the proliferation of working-class people", and a "needless expense". This lost his support from many liberal radicals, who had already begun to draw dividing lines based on advocacy for or against the monarchy as an institution, however his working-class grassroots support as a writer remained into his old age.
Howe was mostly irrelevant during the revolution itself. "Howesmen" were largely confined to representing rural, impoverished regions of the country, and mill towns, in the post-revolutionary order.
The Southern Free State's Guild (SFSG)
The SFSG was formed by a congress of anti-monarchists in 1827, following the breakdown of the constitutional order and arisal of the post-constitutional monarchy, viewing its repeal as the final straw. The Guild was itself largely split into three camps: Sumnerites (moderates), Maplers (centrists), and Mildenhall Group (radicals).
The Sumnerites were led by Venstre leader Thomas Sumner (pictured on the left), who advocated for a democratic republic with a robust constitution and liberal foundation built on the progress in the Leiring, rather than the more working-class tendencies in Charterism. Sumnerites were notable for being the most "defensive" bloc, both opposing revolutionary violence and supporting mass conscription, viewing the role of the Guild as a "shield, not a sword". Whilst initially Sumner held a majority of the Guildsfolk, this majority receded as the movement became more radicalised in 1828 and 1829, and Sumner was quietly sidelined.
Maplers, referred to for the maple leaves that their faction used on political cartoons and propaganda, were the centrist faction of the Guild. Maplers are, in hindsight, referred to as the "following" faction - they followed the Hylanders' liberalism until the tenure of Reddytch, and then followed Sumnerite tendencies until they too radicalised with the core of the Guild, and eventually supported the harsh reprisals of the Mildenhall Group, although unlike this Group, assimilated into the First Republic's political order as it slowly receded to moderate conservative aristocratic tendencies in the mid-19th century.
The Mildenhall Group was initially one group in favour of a more radically secular and "militant" state; they supported the total enfranchisement of the working-class men, virulently supported revolutionary violence, and viewed the Church as antithetical to the existence of the state. Unlike the Sumnerites, the Mildenhall Group advocated for the dissolution of the Church and wider reprisals against clerical figures. Following the dislodging of Thomas Sumner and the mainstream of the Venstre partisan force in 1831, the Mildenhall Group became the informal ruling class; leaders such as Yan-Derryk Aitken and Rudyard Hwitstane-Connyngsby are notable members. Hwitstane-Connyngsby came from the most radical faction, known as the Radicals, who increased the level of political censorship, mooted the disenfranchisement of the "burgher-landowner class", and reintroduced the death penalty for use against political moderates and "traitors". The group gained significant working class and grassroots followership during the Atineo-Sutherlander War, when Atinea attempted to seize on the unstable republican Sutherland to invade and recapture lost territories, however found that the invasion galvanised and mobilised Sutherlanders alongside the more radical factions. The execution of Sumner in 1834 turned the bulk of moderates in the Group, known as Aitkenites, against the rule of Hwitstane-Connyngsby, having already agitated to little success beforehand; the Merry Frelsedom in November 1834 saw the institution of a plural republican democracy, the end of political reprisals and moderation of anti-clericalism, political Commonwealth between Atinea and Sutherland, with moderate reforms to the franchise (but a lack of women's suffrage, as was advocates for by the Radicals), and land law such as a tax on land, as well as basic workers' protections and an end to the utilitarian poor laws (although this end was temporary, and was reversed until itself being ended by the Second Republican Spring in 1877.)
Redfellows (populist revolutionaries)
The Redfellows were the outsider group during the Spring, and are harder to pin down the exact factional allegiances of; while ostensibly backing the most radical of revolutionaries in their fervour for societal change and restructuring of the societal order away from aristocracy and industrialists, they also largely disagreed with the centralisation of power and cults of personality that developed in the Mildenhall Group during the mid-1830s. The group was also largely decentralised, meaning there was a plurality of opinion on each issue, however few were royalists or liberals.
Redfellows were known for their populist stances; they supported full, including women's, suffrage, labour reform, land reform, secularism, public works, sanitation, and temperance; some more radical Redfellows were beginning to enter what would become Loudainism-Dewarism, such as advocating to the end of private property, total taxation of income through rent, workers' ownership of industry, and allocation of labour by the state, however this was less representative of the entire cohort. While somewhat influenced by the utilitarian thinking of thinkers from the previous fifty years, they opposed the implementation of the poor laws and end of the welfare state, and believed that the endgoal was socio-economic equity. Redfellows are notable as being primarily extraparliamentary, operating largely in pubs and workplaces, and therefore they had largely an indirect effect on the other factions.
