109 years after its last shots had been fired, the historian David Paul Crook opened his account of the American Civil War with the following sentence.

Although more words have been written upon the American Civil War than most historical

subjects, that upheaval has never been accorded its just place in the international history

of our times. Crook attempted to rectify this in 1974 by presenting a study which

accorded the Civil War its proper international context.

His book, The North, the South and the Powers was the end result.

Crook concluded that it would be a mistake to assume that the United States did not feature

in the considerations of other European powers. While not recognised as a great power,

it was accepted by most that the United States was in possession of remarkable potential

in population, if nothing else, and that if given sufficient time, it could emerge as the

dominant power within not merely America, but the world. The eruption of the Civil War then appeared to shatter these expectations.

It was not greeted as wholly unwelcome news, though.

To some powers, this development of Civil War was a net positive.

It meant in the British case that America's burgeoning naval presence

would never emerge as a proper threat.

It meant that British manufacturers and producers would not have to reckon with another

industrial rival. It also meant that Britain would have a free hand in North America and wouldn't

have to concern itself with the defence of Canada, an incredibly demanding task, and nor were the

British the only concerned power.

Napoleon III's France faced its own challenges upon the end of the Crimean War in 1856.

Although that war with Russia alongside its British ally had been technically successful,

the Allies had bogged down in their siege of Sevastopol,

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