head, had for years been growing weaker and more eccentric.
... In the early part of 1857, symptoms of softening of the
brain began to show themselves. That disorder so developed
itself that in October, 1857, he gave a delegation to the
Prince of Prussia [his brother] to act as regent; but the
first commission was only for three months. ... The Prince's
temporary commission was renewed from time to time; but it
soon became apparent that Frederic William's case was
hopeless, and his brother was formally installed as Regent in
October, 1858.
{1538}
Ultimately, the King died in January, 1861, and his brother
succeeded to the throne as William I." In September, 1862,
Otto von Bismarck became the new King's chief minister, with
General Roon for Minister of War, appointed to carry out a
reorganization of the Prussian army which King William had
determined to effect. Bismarck found his first opportunity for
the aggrandizement of Prussia in a reopening of the
Schleswig-Holstein question, which came about in November,
1863, when "Frederic of Denmark died, and Prince Christian
succeeded to the throne of that kingdom. Already before his
accession, the duchies were possessions of the Danish
monarchy, but had in certain respects a separate
administrative existence. This Denmark, in the year of
Christian's accession, had materially infringed in the case of
Sleswig, by a law which virtually incorporated that duchy with
the Danish monarchy. The German Confederation protested
against this 'Danification' of Sleswig, and having pronounced
a decree of Federal execution against the new King of Denmark
as Duke of Holstein and, in virtue of that duchy, a member of
the German Confederation, sent into Holstein Federal troops
belonging to the smaller States of the Confederation. The
Confederation, as a collective body, favoured the
establishment of the independence of the duchies, and had with
it the wishes probably of the great mass of the German nation.
But the independence of Sleswig and Holstein scarcely suited
the views of Bismarck. He desired the annexation to Prussia of
at all events Holstein, because in Holstein is the great
harbour of Kiel, all important in view of the new fleet with
which he purposed equipping Prussia; if Sleswig could be
compassed along with Holstein, so much the better. But there
were two difficulties in Bismarck's way. Prussia was a
co-signatory of the Treaty of London. If he were to grasp at
the duchies single-handed, a host of enemies might confront
him. England was burning to take up arms in the cause of the
father of the beautiful princess she had adopted as her own.
The German Confederation would oppose Prussia's naked effort
to aggrandise herself; and Austria, in the double character of
a party to the Treaty of London and of a member of the
Confederation, would rejoice in the opportunity to strike a
blow at a power of whose rising pretensions she had begun to
be jealous. The wily Bismarck had to dissemble. He made the
proposal to Austria that the two states should ignore their
participation as individual States in the Treaty of London,
and that as corporate members of the German Confederation they
should constitute themselves the executors of the Federal
decree, and put aside the minor states whose troops had been
charged with that office. Austria acceded. It was a bad hour
for her when she did, yet she moves no compassion for the
misfortunes which befell her as the issue. ... The Diet had to
submit. The Austro-Prussian troops marched through Holstein
into Sleswig, and on the 2nd of February, 1864, struck at the
Danes occupying the Dannewerke. ... The venerable Marshal
Wrangel was commander-in-chief of the combined forces until
after the fall of Düppel, when Prince Frederic Charles
succeeded him in that position; but throughout the campaign
the control of the dispositions was mainly exercised by the
Red Prince. But neither strategy nor tactics were very
strenuously brought into use for the discomfiture of the
unfortunate Danes. Their ruin was wrought partly because of
the overwhelmingly superior force of their allied opponents,
partly because of their own unpreparedness for war in almost
everything save the possession of heroic bravery; but most of
all by the fire of the needle-gun and the Prussian advantage
in the possession of rifled artillery. Only part of the
Prussian infantry had used the needle-gun in the reduction of
the Baden insurrection in 1848; now, however, the whole army
was equipped with it. ... In their retreat from the Dannewerke
into the Düppel position, the Danes suffered severely from the
inclemency of the weather, and fought a desperate rear-guard
engagement with the Austrians. ... The Prussians undertook the
task of reducing Düppel; the Austrians marched northward into
Jutland, and driving back the Danish troops they encountered
in their march, sat down before the fortress of Fredericia,
and swept the Little Belt with their cannon. The sieges, both
of Düppel and of Fredericia, were conducted with extreme
inertness." But the former was taken and the latter abandoned.
"The Danish war was terminated by the Treaty of Vienna on the
30th October, 1864, under which the duchies of Sleswig,
Holstein, and Lauenburg were handed over to the sovereigns of
Austria and Prussia. ... Out of the Danish war of 1864 grew
almost inevitably the war of 1866, between Prussia and
Austria. The wolves quite naturally wrangled over the carcase,
and the astuter wolf had so much the better of the wrangle
that the duller one, unless he chose to be partly bullied,
partly tricked out of his share, had no alternative but to
fight for it, with the result that he clean lost that and a
great deal more besides. The future of the Elbe Duchies was
played at pitch and toss with between Prussia and Austria for
the best part of a year; the details of the game were too
intricate to be followed here. The condominium of the two
Powers in the duchies produced constant friction, which was
probably Bismarck's intention, especially as Prussia had taken
care to keep stationed in them twice as many troops as Austria
had left there. Relations were becoming very strained when in
August, 1865, the Emperor Francis Joseph and King William met
at the little watering-place of Gastein, and from their
interview originated the short-lived arrangement known as the
Convention of Gastein. By that compact, while the two Powers
preserved the common sovereignty over the duchies, Austria
accepted the administration of Holstein, Prussia undertaking
that of Sleswig. Prussia was to have rights of way through
Holstein to Sleswig, was given over the right of construction
of a North Sea and Baltic Canal; and while Kiel was
constituted a Federal harbour, Prussia was authorised to
construct there the requisite fortifications and marine
establishments, and to maintain an adequate force for the
protection of these. Assuming the arrangement to be
provisional, as on all hands it was regarded, Prussia clearly
had the advantage under it. ... But the Gastein Convention
contained another provision--that Austria should sell to
Prussia all her rights in the duchy of Lauenburg (an outlying
appanage of Holstein) for the sum of 2,500,000 thalers: thus
making market of rights of which she was but a trustee for the
German Confederation.
{1539}
The Convention of Gastein pleased nobody, but that mattered
little to Bismarck. ... Bickerings recommenced before the year
1865 was out, and early in 1866 Austria began to arm. ... In
March, 1866, a secret treaty was formed between Italy and
Prussia. ... Prussia threw the Convention of Gastein to the
winds by civilly but masterfully turning the Austrian brigade
of occupation out of Holstein. Then Austria in the Federal
Diet, complaining that by this act Prussia had disturbed the
peace of the German Confederation, moved for a decree of
Federal execution against that state, to be enforced by the
Confederation's armed strength. On the 14th June, Austria's
motion was carried by the Diet, its last act; for Prussia next
day wrecked the flimsy organisation of the German Confederation,
by declaring war against three of its component members,
Hanover, Hesse, and Saxony. There was no formal declaration of
war between Austria and Prussia, only a notification of
intended hostile action sent by the Prussian commanders to the
Austrian foreposts. On the 17th the Emperor Francis Joseph
published his war manifesto; King William on the 18th emitted
his to 'My People;' on the 20th, Italy declared war against
Austria and Bavaria."
_A. Forbes,
William of Germany,
chapters 7-8._
ALSO IN:
_H. von Sybel,
The Founding of the German Empire,
books 9-16 (volumes 3-4)._
_C. Lowe,
Prince Bismarck,
chapters 5-7 (volume 1),
and appendices. A, B, C (volume 2)._
_J. G. L. Hesekiel,
Life of Bismarck,
book 5, chapter 3._
_Count von Beust,
Memoirs,
volume 1, chapters 22-28._
GERMANY: A. D. 1862.
The Schleswig-Holstein question.
See SCANDINAVIAN STATES (DENMARK): A. D. 1848-1862.
GERMANY: A. D. 1866.
The Seven Weeks War.
Defeat of Austria.
Victory and Supremacy of Prussia.
Her Absorption of Hanover, Hesse, Nassau, Frankfort and
Schleswig-Holstein.
Formation of the North German Confederation.
Exclusion of Austria from the Germanic organization.
"Prussia had built excellent railroads throughout the country,
and quietly placed her troops on the frontier; within 14 days
she had 500,000 men under arms. By the end of May they were on
the frontiers ready for action, while Austria was only half
prepared, and her allies only beginning to arm. On the 14th of
June the diet, by a vote of nine to six, had ordered the
immediate mobilization of a federal army; whereupon Prussia
declared the federal compact dissolved and extinguished. In
Vienna and the petty courts men said, 'Within fourteen days
after the outbreak of hostilities the allied armies will enter
Berlin in triumph and dictate peace; the power of Prussia will
be broken by two blows.' The Legitimists were exultant; even
the majority of the democracy in South Germany joined with the
Ultramontane party in shouting for Austria. On the 10th of June,
Bismark laid before the German governments the outlines of a
new federal constitution, but was not listened to; on the 15th
he made proposals to the states in the immediate neighborhood
of Prussia for a peace on these foundations, and demanded
their neutrality, adding that if they declined his peaceful
offers he would treat them as enemies. The cabinets of Dresden
and Hanover, of Cassel and Wiesbaden, declined them.
Immediately, on the night of the 15th and 16th of June,
Prussian troops entered Hanover, Hesse and Saxony. In four or
five days Prussia had disarmed all North Germany, and broken
all resistance from the North Sea to the Main. On the 18th of
June, the Prussian general Bayer entered Cassel; the Elector
was surprised at Wilhelmshöhe. As he still refused all terms
he was arrested by the direct order of the king of Prussia and
sent as a prisoner to Stettin. On the 17th, General Vogel von
Falkenstein entered Hanover. King George with his army of
18,000 men sought to escape to South Germany. After a gallant
struggle at Langensalza on the 27th, his brave troops were
surrounded. The King capitulated on the 29th. His army was
disbanded, he himself allowed to go to Vienna. On the 18th the
Prussians were in Dresden; on the 19th, in Leipzig; by the
20th, all Saxony except the fortress of Königstein was in
their hands. The king and army of Saxony, on the approach of
the Prussians, had left the country by the railroads to
Bohemia to form a junction with the Austrians. The Saxon army
consisted of 23,000 men and 60 cannon. Everyone had expected
Austria to occupy a country of such strategic value as Saxony
before the Prussians could touch it. The Austrian army
consisted of seven corps, 180,000 infantry, 24,000 cavalry,
762 guns. The popular opinion had forced the emperor to make
Benedek the commander-in-chief in Bohemia. Everything there
was new to him. The Prussians were divided into three armies:
the army of the Elbe, 40,000 men, under Herwarth von
Bittenfeld; the first army, 100,000 men, under Prince
Frederick Charles; the second or Silesian army under the Crown
Prince, 116,000 strong. The reserve consisted of 24,000
Landwehr. The whole force in this quarter numbered 280,000 men
and 800 guns. ... The Prussians knew what they were fighting
for. To the Austrians the idea of this war was something
strange. At Vienna, Benedek had spoken against war; after the
first Prussian successes, he had in confidence advised the
emperor to make peace as soon as possible. As he was unable,
from want of means, to attack, he concentrated his army
between Josephstadt and the county of Glatz. He thought only
of defence. ... On the 23rd of June the great Prussian army
commenced contemporaneously its march to Bohemia from the
Riesengebirge, from Lusatia, from Dresden. It advanced from
four points to Josephstadt-Koniggrätz, where the junction was
to take place. Bismarck had ordered, from financial as well as
political reasons, that the war must be short. The Prussian
armies had at all points debouched from the passes and entered
Bohemia before a single Austrian corps had come near these
passes. ... In a couple of days Benedek lost in a series of
fights against the three Prussian advancing armies nearly
35,000 men; five of his seven corps had been beaten. He
concentrated these seven corps at Koniggrätz in the ground
before this fortress; he determined to accept battle between
the Elbe and the Bistritz. He had, however, previously
reported to the emperor that his army after its losses was not
in a condition for a pitched battle. He wished to retire to
Moravia and avoid a battle till he had received
reinforcements. This telegram of Benedek arrived in the middle
of the exultation which filled the court of Vienna after
hearing of the victory over the Italians at Custozza.
See ITALY: A. D. 1862-1866.
{1540}
The emperor replied by ordering him briefly to give battle
immediately. Benedek, on the 1st of July, again sent word to
the emperor, 'Your majesty must conclude peace.' Yet on these
repeated warnings came the order to fight at once. Benedek had
provided for such an answer by his arrangements for July the
2nd. He had placed his 500 guns in the most favorable
positions, and occupied the country between the Elbe and the
little river Bistritz for the extent of a league. As soon as
the Prussians heard of this movement they resolved to attack
the Austrians on the 3d. On the 2d the king, accompanied by
Count Bismarck, Von Roon and Von Moltke, had joined the army.
He assumed command of the three armies. The Crown Prince and
Herwarth were ordered to advance against Königgrätz. Part of
the Crown Prince's army were still five German miles from the
intended battle ground. Prince Frederick Charles and Herwarth
had alone sustained the whole force of Austria in the struggle
around Sadowa, which began at 8 o'clock in the morning.
Frederick Charles attacked in the centre over against Sadowa;
Herwarth on the right at Nechanitz; the Crown Prince was to
advance on the left from Königinhof. The Crown Prince received
orders at four o'clock in the morning; he could not in all
probability reach the field before one or two o'clock after
noon. All depended on his arrival in good time. Prince
Frederick Charles forced the passage of the Bistritz and took
Sadowa and other places, but could not take the heights. His
troops suffered terribly from the awful fire of the Austrian
batteries. The King himself and his staff came under fire,
from which the earnest entreaties of Bismarck induced him to
retire. About one o'clock the danger in the Prussian centre
was great. After five hours of fighting they could not
advance, and began to talk of retreat. On the right, things
were better. Herwarth had defeated the Saxons, and threatened
the Austrian left. Yet, if the army of the Crown Prince did
not arrive, the battle was lost, for the Prussian centre was
broken. But the Crown Prince brought the expected succor.
About two o'clock came the news that a part of the Crown
Prince's army had been engaged since one o'clock. The
Austrians, attacked on their right flank and rear, had to give
way in front. Under loud shouts of 'Forward,' Prince Frederick
Charles took the Wood of Sadowa at three, and the heights of
Lipa at four o'clock. At this very time, four o'clock, Benedek
had already given orders to retreat. ... From the ... first
the Prussians were superior to the Austrians in ammunition,
provisions and supplies. They had a better organization,
better preparation, and the needle-gun, which proved very
destructive to the Austrians. The Austrian troops fought with
thorough gallantry. ... Respecting this campaign, an Austrian
writes: 'Given in Vienna a powerful coterie which reserves to
itself all the high commands and regards the army as its
private estate for its own private benefit, and defeat is
inevitable.' The Austrians lost at Sadowa, according to the
official accounts at Vienna, 174 cannon, 18,000 prisoners. 11
colors, 4,190 killed, 11,900 wounded, 21,400 missing,
including the prisoners. The Prussians acknowledged a loss of
only 10,000 men. The result of the battle was heavier for
Austria than the loss in the action and the retreat. The
armistice which Benedek asked for on the 4th of July was
refused by the Prussians: a second request on the 10th was
also rejected. On the 5th of July the emperor of Austria
sought the mediation of France to restore peace. ... All
further movements were put a stop to by the five days'
armistice, which began on the 22d of July at noon, and was
followed by an armistice for four weeks. ... Hostilities were
at an end on Austrian territory when the war began on the Main
against the allies of Austria. The Bavarian army, under the
aged Prince Charles, distinguished itself by being driven by
the less numerous forces of Prussia under General Falkenstein
across the Saale and the Main. ... The eighth federal army
corps of 50,000 men, composed of contingents from Baden,
Würtemberg, Electoral Hesse, Hesse-Darmstadt, Nassau, and
12,000 Austrians under Prince Alexander of Hesse, was so
mismanaged that the Würtemberg contingent believed itself sold
and betrayed. ... On the 16th of July, in the evening,
Falkenstein entered Frankfort, and in the name of the king of
Prussia took possession of this Free City, of Upper Hesse and
Nassau. Frankfort, on account of its Austrian sympathies, had
to pay a contribution of six millions of gulden to
Falkenstein, and on the 19th of July a further sum of nineteen
millions to Manteuffel, the successor of Falkenstein. The
latter sum was remitted when the hitherto Free City became a
Prussian city. Manteuffel, in several actions from the 23d to
the 26th of July, drove the federal army back to Würzburg;
Göben defeated the army of Baden at Werbach, and that of
Würtemberg at Tauberbischofsheim; before this the eighth
federal army corps joined the Bavarian army, and on the 25th
and 26th of July the united forces were defeated at Gerschheim
and Rossbrunn, and on the 27th, the citadel of Würzburg was
invested. The court of Vienna had abandoned its South German
allies when it concluded the armistice; it had not included
its allies either in the armistice or the truce. ... On the
29th of July, the Baden troops marched off homewards in the
night, the Austrians marched to Bohemia, the Bavarians
purchased an armistice by surrendering Würzburg to the
Prussians. Thus of the eighth army corps, the Würtembergers
and Hessians alone kept the field. On the 2d of August these
remains of the eighth army corps were included in the
armistice of Nicholsburg. ... On the 23d of August peace was
signed between Austria and Prussia at Prague. Bismarck treated
Austria with great consideration, and demanded only twenty
millions of thalers as war indemnity; Würtemberg had to pay
eight millions of gulden, Baden six millions, Hesse-Darmstadt
three millions, Bavaria thirty millions of gulden. The
Würtemberg minister, Varnbüler, and the Baden minister,
Freydorf, offered to form an offensive and defensive alliance
with Prussia for the purpose of saving the ruling families,
and in alarm lest Bavaria and Hesse-Darmstadt might seek in
their territories compensation for cessions to Prussia.
Bavaria also formed an alliance with Prussia, and ceded a
small district in the north. Hesse-Darmstadt ceded
Hesse-Homburg and some pieces of territory, and entered the
North German Confederation, giving to Prussia the right of
keeping a garrison in Mainz.
{1541}
Austria renounced her claims on Schleswig and Holstein,
acknowledged the dissolution of the German Confederation and a
modification of Germany by which Austria was excluded. It
recognized the creation of the North German Confederation, the
union of Venetia to Italy, the territorial alterations in
North Germany. Prussia acknowledged the territorial
possessions of Austria with the sole exception of Venetia; and
also of Saxony; and undertook to obtain the assent of the King
of Italy to the peace. Prussia announced the incorporation of
Schleswig-Holstein, the Free City of Frankfort, the Kingdom of
Hanover, the Electorate of Hesse, and the Duchy of Nassau,
subject to the payment of annual incomes to the deposed
princes. The Kingdom of Saxony, the two Mecklenburgs, the
Hanse-towns, Oldenburg, Brunswick, and the Thuringian states
entered the North German Confederation. Prussia now contained
twenty-four millions of inhabitants, or including the Northern
Confederation, twenty-nine millions. The military forces of
the Confederation were placed under the command of Prussia.
The states north of the Main were at liberty to form a
Southern Confederation, the connection of which with the
Northern Confederation was to be a subject of future
discussion. Moreover, Bavaria, Baden and Würtemberg had
engaged 'in case of war to place their whole military force at
the disposal of Prussia,' and Prussia guaranteed their
sovereignty and the integrity of their territory. Saxony paid
ten millions of thalers as a war indemnity. Prussia received
on the whole, as war indemnities, eighty-two millions of
gulden. Thus ended in the year 1866 the struggle [known as the
Seven Weeks War] between Austria and Prussia for the
leadership of Germany."
_W. Zimmermann,
Popular History of Germany,
book 6, chapter 3 (v. 4)._
ALSO IN:
_H. von Sybel,
The Founding of the German Empire,
books 17-20 (volume 5)._
_Major C. Adams,
Great Campaigns in Europe from 1796 to 1870,
chapter 10._
_Count von Beust,
Memoirs,
volume 1, chapters 29-34._
_G. B. Malleson,
The Refounding of the German Empire,
chapters 6-10._
[Image: Germany after the congress of Vienna.]
GERMANY: A. D. 1866-1867.
Foreshadowings of the new Empire.