The Gathering Storm: The Development of a Remittance System, 1700–06

When Philip V ascended to the Spanish throne in November 1700 the French government needed to move swiftly to ensure it could remit funds to support French forces that were, within a few months, deploying across the Spanish Monarchy’s lands. This was not going to be a matter of spasmodic, ad hoc transfers of money abroad, as it had been in the Nine Years’ War, although nobody at first was sure of the volume of remittances that would be needed. By spring 1702 it was, however, abundantly clear that huge sums were required and Louis XIV and his ministers would need to work very closely, year on year, with the strongest bankers, securing their services in a planned manner to ensure that his strategic goals — largely defensive ones — would be achieved. Part II of this book will therefore consider how the king and his ministers interacted with the leading bankers, what means the bankers used to support their operations, and how the pressures placed upon the banking system both by the king’s demands and by the manipulations of the bankers brought the French state’s entire remittance edifice crashing down in 1709.