Chapter 14: Ships

March 15th, 1894 British Empire, London.

After socializing with the aristocracy of London, Frederick visited Buckingham Palace and met the iconic Queen Victoria. She was sitting on the British throne and Crown Prince Edward was next to her.

"Good afternoon, Your Majesty and Your Highness. My father, Carol I of Romania, sends his regards." greeted respectfully.

"Your Highness, Crown Prince Frederick, enough of formalities. How are you? I had heard a lot about your achievements at such a young age if I still had an unmarried daughter I surely marry her to you" said Queen Victoria with a smile.

After a long chat, Crown Prince Edward interrupted:

"I have prepared a welcoming banquet, do you mind accompanying me?"

"It'd be a pleasure," Frederick answered.

Queen Victoria didn't attend, she might be busy and just had the time to greet a royal prince of another country.

After arriving at the dining hall, they chatted for a bit and Frederick went directly to the main topic. He hoped to purchase a good quantity of ships from the Royal Navy and hire a few experienced sailors.

After discussing for a few minutes, Edward received a list of ships for sale from an attendant and showed it to Frederick. He carefully checked the list, and after 30 minutes he decided to purchase 8 passenger steamships, 4 protected cruisers, 10 gunboats, and 60 of 400 tonnage steam-powered Colliers (bulk cargo ships) the total price of £1.420.000. All the ships need to be maintained and refurbished.

"No problem, the maintenance, refurbishing, and modifying of the ships are free as a gift, We hope to have a good friendship with you and your country Crown Prince Frederick," Edward said with a smile.

These new ships will help a lot in future Balkans wars as well for transporting minerals to Romania, 60 steam-powered Colliers with a capacity of 400 tons each is a bit excessive for our current consumption (more than 3m tons of ores can be imported annually from countries near Romania) but I hope in the future we can increase productivity in our nation. The 8 steam-powered passenger ships each supported 730 passengers, 130 officials and crew, and 1200 long tons of cargo that would be used for colonial purposes.

Romania will soon enter a rapid development phase due to its industrialization. British Empire, the German Empire, and the Third French Republic produced and consumed tens of millions of coal, iron, and other essential minerals every year.

After finishing eating and chatting, Frederick excused himself and went to his hotel room.

The next day, Frederick called the American branch of Sigmaringen Bank, he was curious to know the current economic situation of the US. He often read in newspapers that thousands of businesses failed every year, and numerous farms ceased operations.

It seems that President Grover Cleveland was blamed for the depression. Gold reserves stored in the U.S. Treasury fell to a dangerously low level. This forced President Cleveland to borrow $65 million in gold from Wall Street banker J.P. Morgan and the Rothschild banking family of England

This year of 1894, the rate for a bushel of wheat by rail dropped from 14.70¢ in 1893 to 12.88¢.

Frederick after listening to all the chaos in the U.S. Felt a little guilty but that feeling was quickly dispelled by himself.

'That economic crisis was bound to happen, I just used it for my benefit' thought Frederick.

In the afternoon, Frederick went to an appointment with Princess Marie Louise and her spouse Prince Aribert of Anhalt. Princess Marie is a granddaughter of Queen Victoria, daughter of Princess Helena.

He had been searching for a villa around London, and during the banquet with Prince Edward told me that his cousin was selling a beautiful villa.

"Greetings, Your Highnesses. I'm Frederick Anton Von Hohenzollern" with an aristocratic salute.

Princess Marie nodded her head and was about to introduce themselves but Prince Aribert interrupted:

"Ooh, greetings your Royal Highness, Crown Prince Frederick. You're more handsome than the rumors I heard before, you're even hailed as a genius!" Aribert with a soft voice.

Frederick's expression immediately changed, he turned to Princess Marie who was noticeably embarrassed.

"Nice to meet you two too, Let's skip formalities, shall we? Let's go before the day it turns to night," said Frederick.

After that, they quickly reached an agreement and quickly completed the transaction as a petition of Frederick. After two more hints, Prince Aribert seemed to understand something and stopped asking Frederick to have dinner at their home.

Frederick arrived at his hotel room and ordered a few servants to carry his things to the new villa. Frederick isn't homophobic but in this century is a grave crime to be one, and being suspected of being one is a HUGE scandal, he could even lose the position of crown prince of the Kingdom of Romania. Maybe in the future, he can have someone propose a law that doesn't punish homosexuals, but it has to be carefully planned so as not to touch the nerves of conservative people who think that's a demonic possession or a kind of sickness.

A few days later he received an unexpected letter from Prince Marie Louise, apologizing for the "unsightly events" of that day.

Today, Frederick met the sailors that the admiralty recommended, I asked for a few naval instructors too, and in 3 days we will sail to Romania with my new fleet.

A few days of voyage later, they crossed the Ottoman Strait albeit reluctant but the Ottoman Empire had no energy to meddle with Balkan countries now so everything went smoothly.

The next day, only the stupid Greek government reached out to our embassy in Greece wanting to hear an "explanation" from us. I laughed a lot when heard their exact words "Does Romania want to expand its influence on our Aegean sea?", arrogant and foolish as ever... I firmly believe that because the Ottomans killed all of their intellectuals over the years, only the stupid ones remained.

Such a small fleet only threatened small countries except the Ottoman Empire which still had a powerful fleet.

After dealing with a few minor troubles, Frederick suddenly realized something.

'Mmh, these incidents if you look carefully are planned by someone. It seems our friends can't wait any longer, after forcefully passing the bills for peasants' rights these people had been restless.' thought Frederick

"It's still early, let's collect evidence first and let the other projects start. I'll need to have the army on standby if something happens. I should check again the list of candidates for my marriage, it's a headache that the youngest is still in her mid-teens (15). Anyway, I will marry the smarter and prettiest of the bunch... Maybe I would marry the one who brings more benefits Romania is developing well without obstacles but it can be faster if I marry a wife from an influential house, I can't be rash." murmured Frederick to himself.

April 1st, 1894.

Frederick was busy checking the map for possible colonial targets, it's not as easy to colonize a territory as people of later generations thought. Frederick being a crown prince of a small country like Romania had to be careful and use diplomacy instead of just securing a supply line, enough troops, and a fleet.

Frederick initially thought of reaching out to King Leopold II of Belgium to jointly develop "Congo Free states" since it's his personal property but now checking the map for possible colonization targets

'Almost all African countries have been colonized since the 1884 Berlin conference. There's a lot of territory left in central and west Africa as for South Africa only the Boers for now, also Ethiopia and a small territory adjacent(Uganda)... It's not worth, too much competition and it'll take time to train our soldiers and fleet, we also need to borrow a port for the colonial powers there, supplies... It's a great risk for so little profit. '

Frederick kept checking the huge map on his desk and pointed to the Middle East.

The Persian Gulf is located in the dividing zone of Russia, the British, and even the Ottoman Empire's sphere of influence.

'I don't know exactly where are the oil deposits but I'm 100% sure that there is a lot there, I don't know when it was first discovered but I need to train colonial troops, find capable translators, and make a detailed plan considering the culture, religion, population, and political situation of Persia. As for Arabia, Kuwait, and other territories that are rich in oil, I can't eat all myself it'll require a huge amount of effort to control Persia' thought Frederick

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Special note: Hello readers, I'm just clarifying that it's nothing personal. As promised I will be as realistic as possible. Great inventors like Alan Turing and even the writer of "The Picture of Dorian Gray" Oscar Wilde were homosexual. So, don't feel offended, I heavily emphasized this due to today's "easily offended" society.

Author note: (1) Contrary to what many of you might think, European aristocracy didn't use long greetings nor kneel swearing eternal devotion and health to the monarch, or royals Regardless of whether they were from weaker nations both respected each other, aristocracy might gossip and have a prejudice against some nobles in Europe but not a big deal like attacking their countries or business wars because someone made them lose face.

(2) Did you notice it? Great powers mined millions of tons of minerals from their territories every year for more than a century. Although they had colonies supporting them it was common sense back them to mine the nearest place to save cost, so by now do they still have natural resources? That's interesting...

(3) I did a lot of research on cargo ships, steamships, and battleships weren't as expensive as the later version of "The Dreadnought".