THE CRISIS OF 1914
INDEX
MAPS AND PLANS
Campaigns of 1859-71
Sketch Map of the District between Metz and the Rhine
Plan of the Battle of Wörth
Plan of the Battles of Rezonville and Gravelotte
Plan of the Battle of Sedan
Map of Bulgaria
Plan of Plevna
Map of the Treaties of Berlin and San Stefano
Map of Thessaly
Map of Afghanistan
Battle of Maiwand
Battle of Alexandria (Bombardment of, 1882)
Map of the Nile
The Battle of Omdurman
Plan of Khartum
Map of Africa (1902)
INTRODUCTION
"The movements in the masses of European peoples are divided
and slow, and their progress interrupted and impeded, because
they are such great and unequally formed masses; but the
preparation for the future is widely diffused, and . . . the
promises of the age are so great that even the most
faint-hearted rouse themselves to the belief that a time has
arrived in which it is a privilege to live."--GERVINUS, 1853.
The Roman poet Lucretius in an oft-quoted passage describes the
satisfaction that naturally fills the mind when from some safe
vantage-ground one looks forth on travellers tossed about on the stormy
deep. We may perhaps use the poet's not very altruistic words as
symbolising many of the feelings with which, at the dawn of the
twentieth century, we look back over the stormy waters of the century
that has passed away. Some congratulation on this score is justifiable,
especially as those wars and revolutions have served to build up States
that are far stronger than their predecessors, in proportion as they
correspond more nearly with the desires of the nations that
compose them.
As we gaze at the revolutions and wars that form the storm-centres of
the past century, we can now see some of the causes that brought about
those storms. If we survey them with discerning eye, we soon begin to
see that, in the main, the cyclonic disturbances had their origins in
two great natural impulses of the civilised races of mankind. The first
of these forces is that great impulse towards individual liberty, which
we name Democracy; the second is that impulse, scarcely less mighty and
elemental, that prompts men to effect a close union with their kith and
kin: this we may term Nationality.
Now, it is true that these two forces have not led up to the last and
crowning phase of human development, as their enthusiastic champions at
one time asserted that they would; far from that, they are accountable,
especially so the force of Nationality, for numerous defects in the life
of the several peoples; and the national principle is at this very time
producing great and needless friction in the dealings of nations. Yet,
granting all this, it still remains true that Democracy and Nationality
have been the two chief formative influences in the political
development of Europe during the Nineteenth Century.
In no age of the world's history have these two impulses worked with so
triumphant an activity. They have not always been endowed with living
force. Among many peoples they lay dormant for ages and were only called
to life by some great event, such as the intolerable oppression of a
despot or of a governing caste that crushed the liberties of the
individual, or the domination of an alien people over one that
obstinately refused to be assimilated. Sometimes the spark that kindled
vital consciousness was the flash of a poet's genius, or the heroism of
some sturdy son of the soil. The causes of awakening have been
infinitely various, and have never wholly died away; but it is the
special glory of the Nineteenth Century that races which had hitherto
lain helpless and well-nigh dead, rose to manhood as if by magic, and
shed their blood like water in the effort to secure a free and
unfettered existence both for the individual and the nation. It is a
true saying of the German historian, Gervinus, "The history of this age
will no longer be only a relation of the lives of great men and of
princes, but a biography of nations."
At first sight, this illuminating statement seems to leave out of count
the career of the mighty Napoleon. But it does not. The great Emperor
unconsciously called into vigorous life the forces of Democracy and
Nationality both in Germany and in Italy, where there had been naught
but servility and disunion. His career, if viewed from our present
standpoint, falls into two portions: first, that in which he figured as
the champion of Revolutionary France and the liberator of Italy from
foreign and domestic tyrants; and secondly, as imperial autocrat who
conquered and held down a great part of Europe in his attempt to ruin
British commerce. In the former of these enterprises he had the new
forces of the age acting with him and endowing him with seemingly
resistless might; in the latter part of his life he mistook his place in
the economy of Nature, and by his violation of the principles of
individual liberty and racial kinship in Spain and Central Europe,
assured his own downfall.
The greatest battle of the century was the tremendous strife that for
three days surged to and fro around Leipzig in the month of October
1813, when Russians, Prussians, Austrians, Swedes, together with a few
Britons, Hanoverians, and finally his own Saxon allies, combined to
shake the imperial yoke from the neck of the Germanic peoples. This
_Völkerschlacht_ (Battle of the Peoples), as the Germans term it,
decided that the future of Europe was not to be moulded by the imperial
autocrat, but by the will of the princes and nations whom his obstinacy
had embattled against him. Far from recognising the verdict, the great
man struggled on until the pertinacity of the allies finally drove him
from power and assigned to France practically the same boundaries that
she had had in 1791, before the time of her mighty expansion. That is to
say, the nation which in its purely democratic form had easily overrun
and subdued the neighbouring States in the time of their old, inert,
semi-feudal existence, was overthrown by them when their national
consciousness had been trampled into being by the legions of the
great Emperor.
In 1814, and again after Waterloo, France was driven in on herself, and
resumed something like her old position in Europe, save that the throne
of the Bourbons never acquired any solidity--the older branch of that
family being unseated by the Revolution of 1830. In the centre of the
Continent, the old dynasties had made common cause with the peoples in
the national struggles of 1813-14, and therefore enjoyed more
consideration--a fact which enabled them for a time to repress popular
aspirations for constitutional rule and national unity.
Nevertheless, by the Treaties of Vienna (1814-15) the centre of Europe
was more solidly organised than ever before. In place of the effete
institution known as the Holy Roman Empire, which Napoleon swept away in
1806, the Central States were reorganised in the German Confederation--a
cumbrous and ineffective league in which Austria held the presidency.
Austria also gained Venetia and Lombardy in Italy. The acquisition of
the fertile Rhine Province by Prussia brought that vigorous State up to
the bounds of Lorraine and made her the natural protectress of Germany
against France. Russia acquired complete control over nearly the whole
of the former Kingdom of Poland. Thus, the Powers that had been foremost
in the struggle against Napoleon now gained most largely in the
redistribution of lands in 1814-15, while the States that had been
friendly to him now suffered for their devotion. Italy was split up into
a mosaic of States; Saxony ceded nearly the half of her lands to
Prussia; Denmark yielded up her ancient possession, Norway, to the
Swedish Crown.
In some respects the triumph of the national principle, which had
brought victory to the old dynasties, strengthened the European fabric.
The Treaties of Vienna brought the boundaries of States more nearly into
accord with racial interests and sentiments than had been the case
before; but in several instances those interests and feelings were
chafed or violated by designing or short-sighted statesmen. The Germans,
who had longed for an effective national union, saw with indignation
that the constitution of the new Germanic Confederation left them under
the control of the rulers of the component States and of the very real
headship exercised by Austria, which was always used to repress popular
movements. The Italians, who had also learned from Napoleon the secret
that they were in all essentials a nation, deeply resented the
domination of Austria in Lombardy-Venetia and the parcelling out of the
rest of the Peninsula between reactionary kings somnolent dukes, and
obscurantist clerics. The Belgians likewise protested against the
enforced union with Holland in what was now called the Kingdom of the
United Netherlands (1815-30). In the east of Europe the Poles struggled
in vain against the fate which once more partitioned them between
Russia, Austria, and Prussia. The Germans of Holstein, Schleswig, and
Lauenburg submitted uneasily to the Danish rule; and only under the
stress of demonstrations by the allies did the Norwegians accept the
union with Sweden.
It should be carefully noted that these were the very cases which caused
most of the political troubles in the following period. In fact, most of
the political occurrences on the Continent in the years 1815 to
1870--the revolts, revolutions, and wars, that give a special character
to the history of the century--resulted directly from the bad or
imperfect arrangements of the Congress of Vienna and of the so-called
Holy Alliance of the monarchs who sought to perpetuate them. The effect
of this widespread discontent was not felt at once. The peoples were too
exhausted by the terrific strain of the Napoleonic wars to do much for a
generation or more, save in times of popular excitement. Except in the
south-east of Europe, where Greece, with the aid of Russia, Britain, and
France, wrested her political independence from the grasp of the Sultan
(1827), the forty years that succeeded Waterloo were broken by no
important war; but they were marked by oft-recurring unrest and
sedition. Thus, when the French Revolution of 1830 overthrew the
reactionary dynasty of the elder Bourbons, the universal excitement
caused by this event endowed the Belgians with strength sufficient to
shake off the heavy yoke of the Dutch; while in Italy, Germany, and
Poland the democrats and nationalists (now working generally in accord)
made valiant but unsuccessful efforts to achieve their ideals.
The same was the case in 1848. The excitement, which this time
originated in Italy, spread to France, overthrew the throne of Louis
Philippe (of the younger branch of the French Bourbons), and bade fair
to roll half of the crowns of Europe into the gutter. But these
spasmodic efforts of the democrats speedily failed. Inexperience,
disunion, and jealousy paralysed their actions and yielded the victory
to the old Governments. Frenchmen, in dismay at the seeming approach of
communism and anarchy, fell back upon the odd expedient of a Napoleonic
Republic, which in 1852 was easily changed by Louis Napoleon into an
Empire modelled on that of his far greater uncle. The democrats of
Germany achieved some startling successes over their repressive
Governments in the spring of the year 1848, only to find that they could
not devise a working constitution for the Fatherland; and the deputies
who met at the federal capital, Frankfurt, to unify Germany "by
speechifying and majorities," saw power slip back little by little into
the hands of the monarchs and princes. In the Austrian Empire
nationalist claims and strivings led to a very Babel of discordant talk
and action, amidst which the young Hapsburg ruler, Francis Joseph,
thanks to Russian military aid, was able to triumph over the valour of
the Hungarians and the devotion of their champion, Kossuth.
In Italy the same sad tale was told. In the spring of that year of
revolutions, 1848, the rulers in quick succession granted constitutions
to their subjects. The reforming Pope, Pius IX., and the patriotic King
of Sardinia, Charles Albert, also made common cause with their peoples
in the effort to drive out the Austrians from Lombardy-Venetia; but the
Pope and all the potentates except Charles Albert speedily deserted the
popular cause; friction between the King and the republican leaders,
Mazzini and Garibaldi, further weakened the nationalists, and the
Austrians had little difficulty in crushing Charles Albert's forces,
whereupon he abdicated in favour of his son, Victor Emmanuel II.
(1849). The Republics set up at Rome and Venice struggled valiantly for
a time against great odds--Mazzini, Garibaldi, and their volunteers
being finally overborne at the Eternal City by the French troops whom
Louis Napoleon sent to restore the Pope (June 1849); while, two months
later, Venice surrendered to the Austrians whom she had long held at
bay. The Queen of the Adriatic under the inspiring dictatorship of Manin
had given a remarkable example of orderly constitutional government in
time of siege.
It seemed to be the lot of the nationalists and democrats to produce
leaders who could thrill the imagination of men by lofty teachings and
sublime heroism; who could, in a word, achieve everything but success. A
poetess, who looked forth from Casa Guidi windows upon the tragi-comedy
of Florentine failure in those years, wrote that what was needed was a
firmer union, a more practical and intelligent activity, on the part
both of the people and of the future leader:
A land's brotherhood
Is most puissant: men, upon the whole,
Are what they can be,--nations, what they would.
Will therefore to be strong, thou Italy!
Will to be noble! Austrian Metternich
Can fix no yoke unless the neck agree.
* * * * *
Whatever hand shall grasp this oriflamme,
Whatever man (last peasant or first Pope
Seeking to free his country) shall appear,
Teach, lead, strike fire into the masses, fill
These empty bladders with fine air, insphere
These wills into a unity of will,
And make of Italy a nation--dear
And blessed be that man!
When Elizabeth Barrett Browning penned those lines she cannot have
surmised that two men were working their way up the rungs of the
political ladder in Piedmont and Prussia, whose keen intellects and
masterful wills were to weld their Fatherlands into indissoluble union
within the space of one momentous decade. These men were Cavour
and Bismarck.
It would far exceed the limits of space of this brief Introduction to
tell, except in the briefest outline, the story of the plodding
preparation and far-seeing diplomacy by which these statesmen raised
their respective countries from depths of humiliation to undreamt of
heights of triumph. The first thing was to restore the prestige of their
States. No people can be strong in action that has lost belief in its
own powers and has allowed its neighbours openly to flout it. The
history of the world has shown again and again that politicians who
allow their country to be regarded as _une quantité négligeable_
bequeath to some abler successor a heritage of struggle and
war--struggle for the nation to recover its self-respect, and war to
regain consideration and fair treatment from others. However much frothy
talkers in their clubs may decry the claims of national prestige, no
great statesman has ever underrated their importance. Certainly the
first aim both of Cavour and Bismarck was to restore self-respect and
confidence to their States after the humiliations and the dreary
isolation of those dark years, 1848-51. We will glance, first, at the
resurrection (_Risorgimento_) of the little Kingdom of Sardinia, which
was destined to unify Italy.
Charles Albert's abdication immediately after his defeat by the
Austrians left no alternative to his son and successor, Victor Emmanuel
II., but that of signing a disastrous peace with Austria. In a short
time the stout-hearted young King called to his councils Count Cavour,
the second son of a noble Piedmontese family, but of firmly Liberal
principles, who resolved to make the little kingdom the centre of
enlightenment and hope for despairing Italy. He strengthened the
constitution (the only one out of many granted in 1848 that survived the
time of reaction); he reformed the tariff in the direction of Free
Trade; and during the course of the Crimean War he persuaded his
sovereign to make an active alliance with France and England, so as to
bind them by all the claims of honour to help Sardinia in the future
against Austria. The occasion was most opportune; for Austria was then
suspected and disliked both by Russia and the Western Powers owing to
her policy of armed neutrality. Nevertheless the reward of Cavour's
diplomacy came slowly and incompletely. By skilfully vague promises
(never reduced to writing) Cavour induced Napoleon III. to take up arms
against Austria; but, after the great victory of Solferino (June 24,
1859), the French Emperor enraged the Italians by breaking off the
struggle before the allies recovered the great province of Venetia,
which he had pledged himself to do. Worse still, he required the cession
of Savoy and Nice to France, if the Central Duchies and the northern
part of the Papal States joined the Kingdom of Sardinia, as they now
did. Thus, the net result of Napoleon's intervention in Italy was his
acquisition of Savoy and Nice (at the price of Italian hatred), and the
gain of Lombardy and the central districts for the national cause
(1859-60).
The agony of mind caused by this comparative failure undermined Cavour's
health; but in the last months of his life he helped to impel and guide
the revolutionary elements in Italy to an enterprise that ended in a
startling and momentous triumph. This was nothing less than the
overthrow of Bourbon rule in Sicily and Southern Italy by Garibaldi.
Thanks to Cavour's connivance, this dashing republican organised an
expedition of about 1000 volunteers near Genoa, set sail for Sicily, and
by a few blows shivered the chains of tyranny in that island. It is
noteworthy that British war-ships lent him covert but most important
help at Palermo and again in his crossing to the mainland; this timely
aid and the presence of a band of Britons in his ranks laid the
foundation of that friendship which has ever since united the two
nations. In Calabria the hero met with the feeblest resistance from the
Bourbon troops and the wildest of welcomes from the populace. At Salerno
he took tickets for Naples and entered the enemy's capital by railway
train (September 7). Then he purposed, after routing the Bourbon force
north of the city, to go on and attack the French at Rome and proclaim a
united Italy.
Cavour took care that he should do no such thing. The Piedmontese
statesman knew when to march onwards and when to halt. As his
compatriot, Manzoni, said of him, "Cavour has all the prudence and all
the imprudence of the true statesman." He had dared and won in 1855-59,
and again in secretly encouraging Garibaldi's venture. Now it was time
to stop in order to consolidate the gains to the national cause.
The leader of the red-shirts, having done what no king could do, was
thenceforth to be controlled by the monarchy of the north. Victor
Emmanuel came in as the _deus ex machina_; his troops pressed
southwards, occupying the eastern part of the Papal States in their
march, and joined hands with the Garibaldians to the north of Naples,
thus preventing the collision with France which the irregulars would
have brought about. Even as it was, Cavour had hard work to persuade
Napoleon that this was the only way of curbing Garibaldi and preventing
the erection of a South Italian Republic; but finally the French Emperor
looked on uneasily while the Pope's eastern territories were violated,
and while the cause of Italian Unity was assured at the expense of the
Pontiff whom France was officially supporting in Rome. A _plébiscite_,
or mass vote, of the people of Sicily, South Italy, and the eastern and
central parts of the Papal States, was resorted to by Cavour in order to
throw a cloak of legality over these irregular proceedings. The device
pleased Napoleon, and it resulted in an overwhelming vote in favour of
annexation to Victor Emmanuel's kingdom. Thus, in March 1861, the
soldier-king was able amidst universal acclaim to take the title of King
of Italy. Florence was declared to be the capital of the realm (1864),
which embraced all parts of Italy except the Province of Venetia,
pertaining to Austria, and the "Patrimonium Petri"--that is, Rome and
its vicinity,--still held by the Pope and garrisoned by the French. The
former of these was to be regained for _la patria_ in 1866, the latter
in 1870, in consequence of the mighty triumphs then achieved by the
principle of nationality in Prussia and Germany. To these triumphs we
must now briefly advert.
No one who looked at the state of European politics in 1861, could have
imagined that in less than ten years Prussia would have waged three wars
and humbled the might of Austria and France. At that time she showed no
signs of exceptional vigour: she had as yet produced no leaders so
inspiring as Mazzini and Garibaldi, no statesman so able as Cavour. Her
new king, William, far from arousing the feelings of growing enthusiasm
that centred in Victor Emmanuel, was more and more distrusted and
disliked by Liberals for the policy of militarism on which he had just
embarked. In fact, the Hohenzollern dynasty was passing into a "Conflict
Time" with its Parliament which threatened to impair the influence of
Prussia abroad and to retard her recovery from the period of
humiliations through which she had recently passed.
A brief recital of those humiliations is desirable as showing, firstly,
the suddenness with which the affairs of a nation may go to ruin in
slack and unskilful hands, and, secondly, the immense results that can
be achieved in a few years by a small band of able men who throw their
whole heart into the work of national regeneration.
The previous ruler, Frederick William IV., was a gifted and learned man,
but he lacked soundness of judgment and strength of will--qualities
which are of more worth in governing than graces of the intellect. At
the time of the revolutionary outbreaks of 1848 he capitulated to the
Berlin mob and declared for a constitutional régime in which Prussia
should merge herself in Germany; but when the excesses of the democrats
had weakened their authority, he put them down by military force,
refused the German Crown offered him by the popularly elected German
Parliament assembled at Frankfurt-on-Main (April 1849); and thereupon
attempted to form a smaller union of States, namely, Prussia, Saxony,
and Hanover. This Three Kings' League, as it was called, soon came to
an end; for it did not satisfy the nationalists who wished to see
Germany united, the constitutionalists who aimed at the supremacy of
Parliament, or the friends of the old order of things. The vacillations
of Frederick William and the unpractical theorisings of the German
Parliament at Frankfurt having aroused general disgust, Austria found
little difficulty in restoring the power of the old Germanic
Confederation in September, 1850. Strong in her alliance with Russia,
she next compelled Frederick William to sign the Convention of Olmütz
(Nov. 1850). By this humiliating compact he agreed to forbear helping
the German nationalists in Schleswig-Holstein to shake off the
oppressive rule of the Danes; to withdraw Prussian troops from
Hesse-Cassel and Baden, where strifes had broken out; and to acknowledge
the supremacy of the old Federal Diet under the headship of Austria.
Thus, it seemed that the Prussian monarchy was a source of weakness and
disunion for North Germany, and that Austria, backed up by the might of
Russia, must long continue to lord it over the cumbrous Germanic
Confederation.
But a young country squire, named Bismarck, even then resolved that the
Prussian monarchy should be the means of strengthening and binding
together the Fatherland. The resolve bespoke the patriotism of a sturdy,
hopeful nature; and the young Bismarck was nothing if not patriotic,
sturdy, and hopeful. The son of an ancient family in the Mark of
Brandenburg, he brought to his life-work powers inherited from a line of
fighting ancestors; and his mind was no less robust than his body. Quick
at mastering a mass of details, he soon saw into the heart of a problem,
and his solution of it was marked both by unfailing skill and by sound
common sense as to the choice of men and means. In some respects he
resembles Napoleon the Great. Granted that he was his inferior in the
width of vision and the versatility of gifts that mark a world-genius,
yet he was his equal in diplomatic resourcefulness and in the power of
dealing lightning strokes; while his possession of the priceless gift of
moderation endowed his greatest political achievements with a soundness
and solidity never possessed by those of the mighty conqueror who
"sought to give the _mot d'ordre_ to the universe." If the figure of the
Prussian does not loom so large on the canvas of universal history as
that of the Corsican--if he did not tame a Revolution, remodel society,
and reorganise a Continent--be it remembered that he made a United
Germany, while Napoleon the Great left France smaller and weaker than he
found her.
Bismarck's first efforts, like those of Cavour for Sardinia, were
directed to the task of restoring the prestige of his State. Early in
his official career, the Prussian patriot urged the expediency of
befriending Russia during the Crimean War, and he thus helped on that
_rapprochement_ between Berlin and St. Petersburg which brought the
mighty triumphs of 1866 and 1870 within the range of possibility. In
1857 Frederick William became insane; and his brother William took the
reins of Government as Regent, and early in 1861 as King. The new ruler
was less gifted than his unfortunate brother; but his homely common
sense and tenacious will strengthened Prussian policy where it had been
weakest. He soon saw the worth of Bismarck, employed him in high
diplomatic positions, and when the royal proposals for strengthening the
army were decisively rejected by the Prussian House of Representatives,
he speedily sent for Bismarck to act as Minister-President (Prime
Minister) and "tame" the refractory Parliament. The constitutional
crisis was becoming more and more acute when a great national question
came into prominence owing to the action of the Danes in
Schleswig-Holstein affairs.
Without entering into the very tangled web of customs, treaties, and
dynastic claims that made up the Schleswig-Holstein question, we may
here state that those Duchies were by ancient law very closely connected
together, that the King of Denmark was only Duke of Schleswig-Holstein,
and that the latter duchy, wholly German in population, formed part of
the Germanic Confederation. Latterly the fervent nationalists in
Denmark, while leaving Holstein to its German connections, had resolved
thoroughly to "Danify" Schleswig, the northern half of which was wholly
Danish, and they pressed on this policy by harsh and intolerant
measures, making it difficult or well-nigh impossible for the Germans to
have public worship in their own tongue and to secure German teachers
for their children in the schools. Matters were already in a very
strained state, when shortly before the death of King Frederick VII. of
Denmark (November, 1863) the Rigsraad at Copenhagen sanctioned a
constitution for Schleswig, which would practically have made it a part
of the Danish monarchy. The King gave his assent to it, an act which his
successor, Christian IX., ratified.
Now, this action violated the last treaty--that signed by the Powers at
London in 1852, which settled the affairs of the Duchies; and Bismarck
therefore had strong ground for appealing to the Powers concerned, as
also to the German Confederation, against this breach of treaty
obligations. The Powers, especially England and France, sought to set
things straight, but the efforts of our Foreign Minister, Lord John
Russell, had no effect. The German Confederation also refused to take
any steps about Schleswig as being outside its jurisdiction. Bismarck
next persuaded Austria to help Prussia in defeating Danish designs on
that duchy. The Danes, on the other hand, counted on the unofficial
expressions of sympathy which came from the people of Great Britain and
France at sight of a small State menaced by two powerful monarchies. In
fact, the whole situation was complicated by this explosion of feeling,
which seemed to the Danes to portend the armed intervention of the
Western States, especially England, on their behalf. As far as is known,
no official assurance to that effect ever went forth from London. In
fact, it is certain that Queen Victoria absolutely forbade any such
step; but the mischief done by sentimental orators, heedless
newspaper-editors, and factious busybodies, could not be undone. As Lord
John Russell afterwards stated in a short "Essay on the Policy of
England": "It pleased some English advisers of great influence to
meddle in this affair; they were successful in thwarting the British
Government, and in the end, with the professed view, and perhaps the
real intention, of helping Denmark, their friendship tended to deprive
her of Holstein and Schleswig altogether." This final judgment of a
veteran statesman is worth quoting as showing his sense of the mischief
done by well-meant but misguided sympathy, which pushed the Danes on to
ruin and embittered our relations with Prussia for many years.
Not that the conduct of the German Powers was flawless. On January 16,
1864, they sent to Copenhagen a demand for the withdrawal of the
constitution for Schleswig within two days. The Danish Foreign Minister
pointed out that, as the Rigsraad was not in session, this could not
possibly be done within two days. In this last step, then, the German
Powers were undoubtedly the aggressors[1]. The Prussian troops were
ready near the River Eider, and at once invaded Schleswig. The Danes
were soon beaten on the mainland; then a pause occurred, during which a
Conference of the Powers concerned was held at London. It has been
proved by the German historian, von Sybel, that the first serious
suggestion to Prussia that she should take both the Duchies came
secretly from Napoleon III. It was in vain that Lord John Russell
suggested a sensible compromise, namely, the partition of Schleswig
between Denmark and Germany according to the language-frontier inside
the Duchy. To this the belligerents demurred on points of detail, the
Prussian representative asserting that he would not leave a single
German under Danish rule. The war was therefore resumed, and ended in a
complete defeat for the weaker State, which finally surrendered both
Duchies to Austria and Prussia (1864)[2].
[1] Lord Wodehouse (afterwards Earl of Kimberley) was at that time sent
on a special mission to Copenhagen. When his official correspondence is
published, it will probably throw light on many points.
[2] Sybel, _Die Begründung des deutschen Reiches_, vol. iii. pp.
299-344; Débidour, _Hist. diplomatique de l'Europe_, vol. ii. pp.
261-273; Lowe, _Life of Bismarck_, vol. i. chap. vi.; Headlam,
_Bismarck_, chap. viii.; Lord Malmesbury, _Memoirs of an ex-Minister_
pp. 584-593 (small edition); Spencer Walpole, _Life of Lord J. Russell_,
vol. ii. pp. 396-411.
In several respects the cause of ruin to Denmark in 1863-64 bears a
remarkable resemblance to that which produced war in South Africa in
1899, viz. high-handed action of a minority towards men whom they
treated as Outlanders, the stiff-necked obstinacy of the smaller State,
and reliance on the vehement but (probably) unofficial offers of help or
intervention by other nations.
The question of the sharing of the Duchies now formed one of the causes
of the far greater war between the victors; but, in truth, it was only
part of the much larger question, which had agitated Germany for
centuries, whether the balance of power should belong to the North or
the South. Bismarck also saw that the time was nearly ripe for settling
this matter once for all in favour of Prussia; but he had hard work even
to persuade his own sovereign; while the Prussian Parliament, as well as
public opinion throughout Germany, was violently hostile to his schemes
and favoured the claims of the young Duke of Augustenburg to the
Duchies--claims that had much show of right. Matters were patched up for
a time between the two German States, by the Convention of Gastein
(August 1865), while in reality each prepared for war and sought to
gain allies.
Here again Bismarck was successful. After vainly seeking to _buy_
Venetia from the Austrian Court, Italy agreed to side with Prussia
against that Power in order to wrest by force a province which she could
not hope to gain peaceably. Russia, too, was friendly to the Court of
Berlin, owing to the help which the latter had given her in crushing the
formidable revolt of the Poles in 1863. It remained to keep France
quiet. In this Bismarck thought he had succeeded by means of interviews
which he held with Napoleon III. at Biarritz (Nov. 1865). What there
occurred is not clearly known. That Bismarck played on the Emperor's
foible for oppressed nationalities, in the case of Italy, is fairly
certain; that he fed him with hopes of gaining Belgium, or a slice of
German land, is highly probable, and none the less so because he later
on indignantly denied in the Reichstag that he ever "held out the
prospect to anybody of ceding a single German village, or even as much
as a clover-field." In any case Napoleon seems to have promised to
observe neutrality--not because he loved Prussia, but because he
expected the German Powers to wear one another out and thus leave him
master of the situation. In common with most of the wiseacres of those
days he believed that Prussia and Italy would ultimately fall before the
combined weight of Austria and of the German States, which closely
followed her in the Confederation; whereupon he could step in and
dictate his own terms[3].
[3] Busch, _Our Chancellor_, vol. ii. p. 17 (Eng. edit.); Débidour,
_Histoire diplomatique de l'Europe (1814-1878)_, vol ii. pp. 291-293.
Lord Loftus in his _Diplomatic Reminiscences_ (vol. ii. p. 280) says:
"So satisfied was Bismarck that he could count on the neutrality of
France, that no defensive military measures were taken on the Rhine and
western frontier. He had no fears of Russia on the eastern frontier, and
was therefore able to concentrate the military might of Prussia against
Austria and her South German Allies."
Light has been thrown on the bargainings between Italy and Prussia by
the _Memoirs of General Govone_, who found Bismarck a hard bargainer.
Bismarck and the leaders of the Prussian army had few doubts as to the
result. They were determined to force on the war, and early in June 1866
brought forward proposals at the Frankfurt Diet for the "reform" of the
German Confederation, the chief of them being the exclusion of Austria,
the establishment of a German Parliament elected by manhood suffrage,
and the formation of a North German army commanded by the King
of Prussia.
A great majority of the Federal Diet rejected these proposals, and war
speedily broke out, Austria being supported by nearly all the German
States except the two Mecklenburgs.
The weight of numbers was against Prussia, even though she had the help
of the Italians operating against Venetia. On that side Austria was
completely successful, as also in a sea-fight near Lissa in the
Adriatic; but in the north the Hapsburgs and their German allies soon
found out that organisation, armament, and genius count for more than
numbers. The great organiser, von Roon, had brought Prussia's citizen
army to a degree of efficiency that surprised every one; and the
quick-firing "needle-gun" dealt havoc and terror among the enemy. Using
to the full the advantage of her central position against the German
States, Prussia speedily worsted their isolated and badly-handled
forces, while her chief armies overthrew those of Austria and Saxony in
Bohemia. The Austrian plan of campaign had been to invade Prussia by two
armies--a comparatively small force advancing from Cracow as a base into
Silesia, while another, acting from Olmütz, advanced through Bohemia to
join the Saxons and march on Berlin, some 50,000 Bavarians joining them
in Bohemia for the same enterprise. This design speedily broke down
owing to the short-sighted timidity of the Bavarian Government, which
refused to let its forces leave their own territory; the lack of railway
facilities in the Austrian Empire also hampered the moving of two large
armies to the northern frontier. Above all, the swift and decisive
movements of the Prussians speedily drove the allies to act on the
defensive--itself a grave misfortune in war.
Meanwhile the Prussian strategist, von Moltke, was carrying out a far
more incisive plan of operations--that of sending three Prussian armies
into the middle of Bohemia, and there forming a great mass which would
sweep away all obstacles from the road to Vienna. This design received
prompt and skilful execution. Saxony was quickly overrun, and the
irruption of three great armies into Bohemia compelled the Austrians and
their Saxon allies hurriedly to alter their plans. After suffering
several reverses in the north of Bohemia, their chief array under
Benedek barred the way of the two northern Prussian armies on the
heights north of the town of Königgrätz. On the morning of July 3 the
defenders long beat off all frontal attacks with heavy loss; but about 2
P.M. the Army of Silesia, under the Crown Prince Frederick of Prussia,
after a forced march of twelve miles, threw itself on their right flank,
where Benedek expected no very serious onset. After desperate fighting
the Army of Silesia carried the village of Chlum in the heart of the
Austrian position, and compelled Austrians and Saxons to a hurried
retreat over the Elbe. In this the Austrian infantry was saved from
destruction by the heroic stand made by the artillery. Even so, the
allies lost more than 13,000 killed and wounded, 22,000 prisoners, and
187 guns[4].
[4] Sybel, _Die Begründung des deutschen Reiches_, vol. v. pp. 174-205;
_Journals of Field Marshal Count von Blumenthal for 1866 and 1871_ (Eng.
edit.), pp. 37-44.
Königgrätz (or Sadowa, as it is often called) decided the whole
campaign. The invaders now advanced rapidly towards Vienna, and at the
town of Nikolsburg concluded the Preliminaries of Peace with Austria
(July 26), whereupon a mandate came from Paris, bidding them stop. In
fact, the Emperor of the French offered his intervention in a manner
most threatening to the victors. He sought to detach Italy from the
Prussian alliance by the offer of Venetia as a left-handed present from
himself--an offer which the Italian Government subsequently refused.
To understand how Napoleon III. came to change front and belie his
earlier promises, one must look behind the scenes. Enough is already
known to show that the Emperor's hand was forced by his Ministers and by
the Parisian Press, probably also by the Empress Eugénie. Though
desirous, apparently, of befriending Prussia, he had already yielded to
their persistent pleas urging him to stay the growth of the Protestant
Power of North Germany. On June 10, at the outbreak of the war, he
secretly concluded a treaty with Austria, holding out to her the
prospect of recovering the great province of Silesia (torn from her by
Frederick the Great in 1740) in return for a magnanimous cession of
Venetia to Italy. The news of Königgrätz led to a violent outburst of
anti-Prussian feeling; but Napoleon refused to take action at once, when
it might have been very effective.
The best plan for the French Government would have been to send to the
Rhine all the seasoned troops left available by Napoleon III.'s
ill-starred Mexican enterprise, so as to help the hard-pressed South
German forces, offering also the armed mediation of France to the
combatants. In that case Prussia must have drawn back, and Napoleon III.
could have dictated his own terms to Central Europe. But his earlier
leanings towards Prussia and Italy, the advice of Prince Napoleon
("Plon-Plon") and Lavalette, and the wheedlings of the Prussian
ambassador as to compensations which France might gain as a set-off to
Prussia's aggrandisement, told on the French Emperor's nature, always
somewhat sluggish and then prostrated by severe internal pain; with the
result that he sent his proposals for a settlement of the points in
dispute, but took no steps towards enforcing them. A fortnight thus
slipped away, during which the Prussians reaped the full fruits of their
triumph at Königgrätz; and it was not until July 29, three days after
the Preliminaries of Peace were signed, that the French Foreign
Minister, Drouyn de Lhuys, worried his master, then prostrate with pain
at Vichy, into sanctioning the following demands from victorious
Prussia: the cession to France of the Rhenish Palatinate (belonging to
Bavaria), the south-western part of Hesse Darmstadt, and that part of
Prussia's Rhine-Province lying in the valley of the Saar which she had
acquired after Waterloo. This would have brought within the French
frontier the great fortress of Mainz (Mayence); but the great mass of
these gains, it will be observed, would have been at the expense of
South German States, whose cause France proclaimed her earnest desire to
uphold against the encroaching power of Prussia.
Bismarck took care to have an official copy of these demands in writing,
the use of which will shortly appear; and having procured this precious
document, he defied the French envoy, telling him that King William,
rather than agree to such a surrender of German land, would make peace
with Austria and the German States on any terms, and invade France at
the head of the forces of a united Germany. This reply caused another
change of front at Napoleon's Court. The demands were disavowed and the
Foreign Minister, Drouyn de Lhuys, resigned[5].
[5] Sybel, _op. cit._ vol. v. pp. 365-374. Débidour, _op. cit._ vol. ii.
pp. 315-318. See too volume viii. of Ollivier's work, _L'Empire
libéral_, published in 1904; and M. de la Gorce's work, _Histoire du
second Empire_, vol. vi. (Paris 1903).
The completeness of Prussia's triumph over Austria and her German
allies, together with the preparations of the Hungarians for revolt,
decided the Court of Vienna to accept the Prussian terms which were
embodied in the Treaty of Prague (Aug. 23); they were, the direct
cession of Venetia to Italy; the exclusion of Austria from German
affairs and her acceptance of the changes there pending; the cession to
Prussia of Schleswig-Holstein; and the payment of 20,000,000 thalers
(about £3,000,000) as war indemnity. The lenience of these conditions
was to have a very noteworthy result, namely, the speedy reconciliation
of the two Powers: within twenty years they were firmly united in the
Triple Alliance with Italy (see Chapter X.).
Some difficulties stood in the way of peace between Prussia and her late
enemies in the German Confederation, especially Bavaria. These last were
removed when Bismarck privately disclosed to the Bavarian Foreign
Minister the secret demand made by France for the cession of the
Bavarian Palatinate. In the month of August, the South German States,
Bavaria, Würtemberg and Baden, accepted Prussia's terms; whereby they
paid small war indemnities and recognised the new constitution of
Germany. Outwardly they formed a South German Confederation; but this
had a very shadowy existence; and the three States by secret treaties
with Prussia agreed to place their armies and all military arrangements,
in case of war, under the control of the King of Prussia. Thus within a
month from the close of "the Seven Weeks' War," the whole of Germany was
quietly but firmly bound to common action in military matters; and the
actions of France left little doubt as to the need of these timely
precautions.
On those German States which stood in the way of Prussia's territorial
development and had shown marked hostility, Bismarck bore hard. The
Kingdom of Hanover, Electoral Hesse (Hesse-Cassel), the Duchy of Nassau,
and the Free City of Frankfurt were annexed outright, Prussia thereby
gaining direct contact with her Westphalian and Rhenish Provinces. The
absorption of Frankfurt-on-the-Main, and the formation of a new league,
the North German Confederation, swept away all the old federal
machinery, and marked out Berlin, not Vienna or Frankfurt, as the future
governing centre of the Fatherland. It was doubtless a perception of the
vast gains to the national cause which prompted the Prussian Parliament
to pass a Bill of Indemnity exonerating the King's Ministers for the
illegal acts committed by them during the "Conflict Time"
(1861-66)--acts which saved Prussia in spite of her Parliament.
Constitutional freedom likewise benefited largely by the results of the
war. The new North German Confederation was based avowedly on manhood
suffrage, not because either King William or Bismarck loved democracy,
but because after lately pledging themselves to it as the groundwork of
reform of the old Confederation, they could not draw back in the hour of
triumph. As Bismarck afterwards confessed to his Secretary, Dr. Busch,
"I accepted universal suffrage, but with reluctance, as a Frankfurt
tradition" (_i.e._ of the democratic Parliament of Frankfurt in
1848)[6]. All the lands, therefore, between the Niemen and the Main were
bound together in a Confederation based on constitutional principles,
though the governing powers of the King and his Ministers continued to
be far larger than is the case in Great Britain. To this matter we shall
recur when we treat of the German Empire, formed by the union of the
North and South German Confederations of 1866.
[6] Busch, _Our Chancellor_, vol. ii. p. 196 (English edit.).
Austria also was soon compelled to give way before the persistent
demands of the Hungarian patriots for their ancient constitution, which
happily blended monarchy and democracy. Accordingly, the centralised
Hapsburg monarchy was remodelled by the _Ausgleich_ (compromise) of
1867, and became the Dual-Monarchy of Austria-Hungary, the two parts of
the realm being ruled quite separately for most purposes of government,
and united only for those of army organisation, foreign policy, and
finance. Parliamentary control became dominant in each part of the
Empire; and the grievances resulting from autocratic or bureaucratic
rule vanished from Hungary. They disappeared also from Hanover and
Hesse-Cassel, where the Guelf sovereigns and Electors had generally
repressed popular movements.
Greatest of all the results of the war of 1866, however, was the gain to
the national cause in Germany and Italy. Peoples that had long been
divided were now in the brief space of three months brought within sight
of the long-wished-for unity. The rush of these events blinded men to
their enduring import and produced an impression that the Prussian
triumph was like that of Napoleon I., too sudden and brilliant to last.
Those who hazarded this verdict forgot that his political arrangements
for Europe violated every instinct of national solidarity; while those
of 1866 served to group the hitherto divided peoples of North Germany
and Italy around the monarchies that had proved to be the only possible
rallying points in their respective countries. It was this harmonising
of the claims and aspirations of monarchy, nationality, and democracy
that gave to the settlement of 1866 its abiding importance, and fitted
the two peoples for the crowning triumph of 1870.
CHAPTER I
THE CAUSES OF THE FRANCO-GERMAN WAR
"After the fatal year 1866, the Empire was in a state of
decadence."--L. GREGOIRE, _Histoire de France_.
The irony of history is nowhere more manifest than in the curious
destiny which called a Napoleon III. to the place once occupied by
Napoleon I., and at the very time when the national movements,
unwittingly called to vigorous life by the great warrior, were attaining
to the full strength of manhood. Napoleon III. was in many ways a
well-meaning dreamer, who, unluckily for himself, allowed his dreams to
encroach on his waking moments. In truth, his sluggish but very
persistent mind never saw quite clearly where dreams must give way to
realities; or, as M. de Falloux phrased it, "He does not know the
difference between dreaming and thinking[7]." Thus his policy showed an
odd mixture of generous haziness and belated practicality.
[7] _Notes from a Diary, 1851-1872_, by Sir M.E. Grant Duff, vol. i. p.
120.
Long study of his uncle's policy showed him, rightly enough, that it
erred in trampling down the feeling of nationality in Germany and
elsewhere. The nephew resolved to avoid this mistake and to pose as the
champion of the oppressed and divided peoples of Italy, Germany, Poland,
and the Balkan Peninsula--a programme that promised to appeal to the
ideal aspirations of the French, to embarrass the dynasties that had
overthrown the first Napoleon, and to yield substantial gains for his
nephew. Certainly it did so in the case of Italy; his championship of
the Roumanians also helped on the making of that interesting
Principality (1861) and gained the good-will of Russia; but he speedily
forfeited this by his wholly ineffective efforts on behalf of the Poles
in 1863. His great mistakes, however, were committed in and after the
year 1863, when he plunged into Mexican politics with the chimerical aim
of founding a Roman Catholic Empire in Central America, and favoured the
rise of Prussia in connection with the Schleswig-Holstein question. By
the former of these he locked up no small part of his army in Mexico
when he greatly needed it on the Rhine; by the latter he helped on the
rise of the vigorous North German Power.
As we have seen, he secretly advised Prussia to take both Schleswig and
Holstein, thereby announcing his wish for the effective union of Germans
with the one great State composed almost solely of Germans. "I shall
always be consistent in my conduct," he said. "If I have fought for the
independence of Italy, if I have lifted up my voice for Polish
nationality, I cannot have other sentiments in Germany, or obey other
principles." This declaration bespoke the doctrinaire rather than the
statesman. Untaught by the clamour which French Chauvinists and ardent
Catholics had raised against his armed support of the Italian national
cause in 1859, he now proposed to further the aggrandisement of the
Protestant North German Power which had sought to partition France
in 1815.
The clamour aroused by his leanings towards Prussia in 1864-66 was
naturally far more violent, in proportion as the interests of France
were more closely at stake. Prussia held the Rhine Province; and French
patriots, who clung to the doctrine of the "natural frontiers"--the
Ocean, Pyrenees, Alps, and Rhine--looked on her as the natural enemy.
They pointed out that millions of Frenchmen had shed their blood in the
Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars to win and to keep the Rhine boundary;
and their most eloquent spokesman, M. Thiers, who had devoted his
historical gifts to glorifying those great days, passionately declaimed
against the policy of helping on the growth of the hereditary foe.
We have already seen the results of this strife between the pro-Prussian
foibles of the Emperor and the eager prejudices of Frenchmen, whose love
of oppressed and divided nations grew in proportion to their distance
from France, and changed to suspicion or hatred in the case of her
neighbours. In 1866, under the breath of ministerial arguments and
oratorical onslaughts Napoleon III.'s policy weakly wavered, thereby
giving to Bismarck's statecraft a decisive triumph all along the line.
In vain did he in the latter part of that year remind the Prussian
statesman of his earlier promises (always discreetly vague) of
compensation for France, and throw out diplomatic feelers for Belgium,
or at any rate Luxemburg[8]. In vain did M. Thiers declare in the
Chamber of Deputies that France, while recognising accomplished facts in
Germany, ought "firmly to declare that we will not allow them to go
further" (March 14, 1867). Bismarck replied to this challenge of the
French orator by publishing five days later the hitherto secret military
alliances concluded with the South German States in August 1866.
Thenceforth France knew that a war with Prussia would be war with a
united Germany.
[8] In 1867 Bismarck's promises went so far as the framing of a secret
compact with France, one article of which stated that Prussia would not
object to the annexation of Belgium by France. The agreement was first
published by the _Times_ on July 25, 1870, Bismarck then divulging the
secret so as to inflame public opinion against France.
In the following year the Zollverein, or German Customs' Union (which
had been gradually growing since 1833), took a definitely national form
in a Customs' Parliament which assembled in April 1868, thus unifying
Germany for purposes of trade as well as those of war. This sharp rebuff
came at a time when Napoleon's throne was tottering from the utter
collapse of his Mexican expedition; when, too, he more than ever needed
popular support in France for the beginnings of a more constitutional
rule. Early in 1867 he sought to buy Luxemburg from Holland. This action
aroused a storm of wrath in Prussia, which had the right to garrison
Luxemburg; but the question was patched up by a Conference of the Powers
at London, the Duchy being declared neutral territory under the
guarantee of Europe; the fortifications of its capital were also to be
demolished, and the Prussian garrison withdrawn. This success for French
diplomacy was repeated in Italy, where the French troops supporting the
Pope crushed the efforts of Garibaldi and his irregulars to capture
Rome, at the sanguinary fight of Mentana (November 3, 1867). The
official despatch, stating that the new French rifle, the _chassepôt_,
"had done wonders," spread jubilation through France and a sharp
anti-Gallic sentiment throughout Italy.
And while Italy heaved with longings for her natural capital, popular
feelings in France and North Germany made steadily for war.
Before entering upon the final stages of the dispute, it may be well to
take a bird's-eye view of the condition of the chief Powers in so far as
it explains their attitude towards the great struggle.
The condition of French politics was strangely complex. The Emperor had
always professed that he was the elect of France, and would ultimately
crown his political edifice with the corner-stone of constitutional
liberty. Had he done so in the successful years 1855-61, possibly his
dynasty might have taken root. He deferred action, however, until the
darker years that came after 1866. In 1868 greater freedom was allowed
to the Press and in the case of public meetings. The General Election of
the spring of 1869 showed large gains to the Opposition, and decided the
Emperor to grant to the Corps Législatif the right of initiating laws
concurrently with himself, and he declared that Ministers should be
responsible to it (September 1869).
These and a few other changes marked the transition from autocracy to
the "Liberal Empire." One of the champions of constitutional principles,
M. Emile Ollivier, formed a Cabinet to give effect to the new policy,
and the Emperor, deeming the time ripe for consolidating his power on a
democratic basis, consulted the country in a _plébiscite_, or mass vote,
primarily as to their judgment on the recent changes, but implicitly as
to their confidence in the imperial system as a whole. His skill in
joining together two topics that were really distinct, gained him a
tactical victory. More than 7,350,000 affirmative votes were given, as
against 1,572,000 negatives; while 1,900,000 voters registered no vote.
This success at the polls emboldened the supporters of the Empire; and
very many of them, especially, it is thought, the Empress Eugénie,
believed that only one thing remained in order to place the Napoleonic
dynasty on a lasting basis--that was, a successful war.
Champions of autocracy pointed out that the growth of Radicalism
coincided with the period of military failures and diplomatic slights.
Let Napoleon III., they said in effect, imitate the policy of his uncle,
who, as long as he dazzled France by triumphs, could afford to laugh at
the efforts of constitution-mongers. The big towns might prate of
liberty; but what France wanted was glory and strong government. Such
were their pleas: there was much in the past history of France to
support them. The responsible advisers of the Emperor determined to take
a stronger tone in foreign affairs, while the out-and-out Bonapartists
jealously looked for any signs of official weakness so that they might
undermine the Ollivier Ministry and hark back to absolutism. When two
great parties in a State make national prestige a catchword of the
political game, peace cannot be secure: that was the position of France
in the early part of 1870[9].
[9] See Ollivier's great work, _L'Empire libéral_, for full details of
this time.
The eve of the Franco-German War was a time of great importance for the
United Kingdom. The Reform Bill of 1867 gave a great accession of power
to the Liberal Party; and the General Election of November 1868 speedily
led to the resignation of the Disraeli Cabinet and the accession of the
Gladstone Ministry to power. This portended change in other directions
than home affairs. The tradition of a spirited foreign policy died with
Lord Palmerston in 1865. With the entry of John Bright to the new
Cabinet peace at all costs became the dominant note of British
statesmanship. There was much to be said in favour of this. England
needed a time of rest in order to cope with the discontent of Ireland
and the problems brought about by the growth of democracy and
commercialism in the larger island. The disestablishment and partial
disendowment of the Protestant Church in Ireland (July 1869), the Irish
Land Act (August 1870), and the Education Act of 1870, showed the
preoccupation of the Ministry for home affairs; while the readiness with
which, a little later, they complied with all the wishes of the United
States in the "Alabama" case, equally proclaimed their pacific
intentions. England, which in 1860 had exercised so powerful an
influence on the Italian national question, was for five years a factor
of small account in European affairs. Far from pleasing the combatants,
our neutrality annoyed both of them. The French accused England of
"deserting" Napoleon III. in his time of need--a charge that has lately
been revived by M. Hanotaux. To this it is only needful to reply that
the French Emperor entered into alliance with us at the time of the
Crimean War merely for his own objects, and allowed all friendly feeling
to be ended by French threats of an invasion of England in 1858 and his
shabby treatment of Italy in the matter of Savoy and Nice a year later.
On his side, Bismarck also complained that our feeling for the German
cause went no further than "theoretical sympathy," and that "during the
war England never compromised herself so far in our favour as to
endanger her friendship with France. On the contrary." These vague and
enigmatic charges at bottom only express the annoyance of the combatants
at their failure to draw neutrals into the strife[10].
[10] Hanotaux, _Contemporary France_, vol. i. p. 9 (Eng. ed.);
_Bismarck: his Reflections and Reminiscences,_ vol. ii. p. 61. The
popular Prussian view about England found expression in the comic paper
_Kladderdatsch_:--
Deutschland beziehe billige Sympathien Und Frankreich theures
Kriegsmateriel.
The traditions of the United States, of course, forbade their
intervention in the Franco-Prussian dispute. By an article of their
political creed termed the Monroe Doctrine, they asserted their resolve
not to interfere in European affairs and to prevent the interference of
any strictly European State in those of the New World. It was on this
rather vague doctrine that they cried "hands off" from Mexico to the
French Emperor; and the abandonment of his _protégé_, the so-called
Emperor Maximilian, by French troops, brought about the death of that
unhappy prince and a sensible decline in the prestige of his patron
(June 1867).
Russia likewise remembered Napoleon III.'s championship of the Poles in
1863, which, however Platonic in its nature, caused the Czar some
embarrassment. Moreover, King William of Prussia had soothed the Czar's
feelings, ruffled by the dethroning of three German dynasties in 1866,
by a skilful reply which alluded to his (King William's) desire to be of
service to Russian interests elsewhere--a hint which the diplomatists of
St. Petersburg remembered in 1870 to some effect.
For the rest, the Czar Alexander II. (1855-81) and his Ministers were
still absorbed in the internal policy of reform, which in the sixties
freed the serfs and gave Russia new judicial and local institutions,
doomed to be swept away in the reaction following the murder of that
enlightened ruler. The Russian Government therefore pledged itself to
neutrality, but in a sense favourable to Prussia. The Czar ascribed the
Crimean War to the ambition of Napoleon III., and remembered the
friendship of Prussia at that time, as also in the Polish Revolt of
1863[11]. Bismarck's policy now brought its reward.
[11] See Sir H. Rumbold's _Recollections of a Diplomatist_ (First
Series), vol. ii. p. 292, for the Czar's hostility to France in 1870.
The neutrality of Russia is always a matter of the utmost moment for the
Central Powers in any war on their western frontiers. Their efforts
against Revolutionary France in 1792-94 failed chiefly because of the
ambiguous attitude of the Czarina Catherine II.; and the collapse of
Frederick William IV.'s policy in 1848-51 was due to the hostility of
his eastern neighbour. In fact, the removal of anxiety about her open
frontier on the east was now worth a quarter of a million of men
to Prussia.
But the Czar's neutrality was in one matter distinctly friendly to his
uncle, King William of Prussia. It is an open secret that unmistakable
hints went from St. Petersburg to Vienna to the effect that, if Austria
drew the sword for Napoleon III. she would have to reckon with an
irruption of the Russians into her open Galician frontier. Probably this
accounts for the conduct of the Hapsburg Power, which otherwise is
inexplicable. A war of revenge against Prussia seemed to be the natural
step to take. True, the Emperor Francis Joseph had small cause to like
Napoleon III. The loss of Lombardy in 1859 still rankled in the breast
of every patriotic Austrian; and the suspicions which that enigmatical
ruler managed to arouse, prevented any definite agreement resulting from
the meeting of the two sovereigns at Salzburg in 1867.
The relations of France and Austria were still in the same uncertain
state before the War of 1870. The foreign policy of Austria was in the
hands of Count Beust, a bitter foe of Prussia; but after the concession
of constitutional rule to Hungary by the compromise (_Ausgleich_) of
1867, the Dual Monarchy urgently needed rest, especially as its army was
undergoing many changes. The Chancellor's action was therefore clogged
on all sides. Nevertheless, when the Luxemburg affair of 1867 brought
France and Prussia near to war, Napoleon began to make advances to the
Court of Vienna. How far they went is not known. Beust has asserted in
his correspondence with the French Foreign Minister, the Duc de Gramont
(formerly ambassador at Vienna), that they never were more than
discussions, and that they ended in 1869 without any written agreement.
The sole understanding was to the effect that the policy of both States
should be friendly and pacific, Austria reserving the right to remain
neutral if France were compelled to make war. The two Empires further
promised not to make any engagement with a third Power without informing
the other.
This statement is not very convincing. States do not usually bind
themselves in the way just described, unless they have some advantageous
agreement with the Power which has the first claim on their alliance. It
is noteworthy, however, that the Duc de Gramont, in the correspondence
alluded to above, admits that, as Ambassador and as Foreign Minister of
France, he never had to claim the support of Austria in the war with
Prussia[12].
[12] _Memoirs of Count Beust_, vol. ii. pp. 358-359 (Appendix D, Eng.
edit.).
How are we to reconcile these statements with the undoubted fact that
the Emperor Napoleon certainly expected help from Austria and also from
Italy? The solution of the riddle seems to be that Napoleon, as also
Francis Joseph and Victor Emmanuel, kept their Foreign Ministers in the
dark on many questions of high policy, which they transacted either by
private letters among themselves, or through military men who had their
confidence. The French and Italian sovereigns certainly employed these
methods, the latter because he was far more French in sympathy than his
Ministers.
As far back as the year 1868, Victor Emmanuel made overtures to Napoleon
with a view to alliance, the chief aim of which, from his standpoint,
was to secure the evacuation of Rome by the French troops, and the gain
of the Eternal City for the national cause. Prince Napoleon lent his
support to this scheme, and from an article written by him we know that
the two sovereigns discussed the matter almost entirely by means of
confidential letters[13]. These discussions went on up to the month of
June 1869. Francis Joseph, on hearing of them, urged the French Emperor
to satisfy Italy, and thus pave the way for an alliance between the
three Powers against Prussia. Nothing definite came of the affair, and
chiefly, it would seem, owing to the influence of the Empress Eugénie
and the French clerics. She is said to have remarked: "Better the
Prussians in Paris than the Italian troops in Rome." The diplomatic
situation therefore remained vague, though in the second week of July
1870, the Emperor again took up the threads which, with greater firmness
and foresight, he might have woven into a firm design.
[13] _Revue des deux Mondes_ for April 1, 1878.
The understanding between the three Powers advanced only in regard to
military preparations. The Austrian Archduke Albrecht, the victor of
Custoza, burned to avenge the defeat of Königgrätz, and with this aim in
view visited Paris in February to March 1870. He then proposed to
Napoleon an invasion of North Germany by the armies of France, Austria,
and Italy. The French Emperor developed the plan by more specific
overtures which he made in the month of June; but his Ministers were so
far in the dark as to these military proposals that they were then
suggesting the reduction of the French army by 10,000 men, while
Ollivier, the Prime Minister, on June 30 declared to the French Chamber
that peace had never been better assured[14].
[14] Seignobos, _A Political History of Contemporary Europe_, vol. ii.
pp. 806-807 (Eng. edit.). Oncken, _Zeitalter des Kaisers Wilhelm_ (vol.
i. pp. 720-740), tries to prove that there was a deep conspiracy against
Prussia. I am not convinced by his evidence.
And yet on that same day General Lebrun, aide-de-camp to the Emperor,
was drawing up at Paris a confidential report of the mission with which
he had lately been entrusted to the Austrian military authorities. From
that report we take the following particulars. On arriving at Vienna, he
had three private interviews with the Archduke Albrecht, and set before
him the desirability of a joint invasion of North Germany in the autumn
of that year. To this the Archduke demurred, on the ground that such a
campaign ought to begin in the spring if the full fruits of victory were
to be gathered in before the short days came. Austria and Italy, he
said, could not place adequate forces in the field in less than six
weeks owing to lack of railways[15].
[15] _Souvenirs militaires_, by General B.L.J. Lebrun (Paris 1895), pp.
95-148.
Developing his own views, the Archduke then suggested that it
would be desirable for France to undertake the war against
North Germany not later than the middle of March 1871, Austria
and Italy at the same time beginning their mobilisations, though not
declaring war until their armies were ready at the end of six weeks. Two
French armies should in the meantime cross the Rhine in order to sever
the South Germans from the Confederation of the North, one of them
marching towards Nuremberg, where it would be joined by the western army
of Austria and the Italian forces sent through Tyrol. The other Austrian
army would then invade Saxony or Lusatia in order to strike at Berlin.
He estimated the forces of the States hostile to Prussia as follows:--
+------------------------------------------------------------------+
| |Men. |Horses. |Cannon. |
+-------------------------------+------------+----------+----------+
|France |309,000 |35,000 |972 |
|Austria (exclusive of reserve) |360,000 |27,000 |1128 |
|Italy |68,000 |5000 |180 |
|Denmark |260,000 (?) |2000 |72 |
+-------------------------------+------------+----------+----------+
He thus reckoned the forces of the two German Confederations:--
+-------------------------------+------------+----------+----------+
| |Men. |Horses. |Cannon. |
|North |377,000 |48,000 |1284 |
|South |97,000 |10,000 |288 |
+-------------------------------+------------+----------+----------+
but the support of the latter might be hoped for. Lebrun again urged the
desirability of a campaign in the autumn, but the Archduke repeated that
it must begin in the spring. In that condition, as in his earlier
statement that France must declare war first, while her allies prepared
for war, we may discern a deep-rooted distrust of Napoleon III.
On June 14 the Archduke introduced Lebrun to the Emperor Francis Joseph,
who informed him that he wanted peace; but, he added, "if I make war, I
must be forced to it." In case of war Prussia might exploit the national
German sentiment existing in South Germany and Austria. He concluded
with these words, "But if the Emperor Napoleon, compelled to accept or
to declare war, came with his armies into South Germany, not as an enemy
but as a liberator, I should be forced on my side to declare that I
[would] make common cause with him. In the eyes of my people I could do
no other than join my armies to those of France. That is what I pray you
to say for me to the Emperor Napoleon; I hope that he will see, as I do,
my situation both in home and foreign affairs." Such was the report
which Lebrun drew up for Napoleon III. on June 30. It certainly led that
sovereign to believe in the probability of Austrian help in the spring
of 1871, but not before that time.
The question now arises whether Bismarck was aware of these proposals.
If warlike counsels prevailed at Vienna, it is probable that some
preparations would be made, and the secret may have leaked out in this
way, or possibly through the Hungarian administration. In any case,
Bismarck knew that the Austrian chancellor, Count Beust, thirsted for
revenge for the events of 1866[16]. If he heard any whispers of an
approaching league against Prussia, he would naturally see the advantage
of pressing on war at once, before Austria and Italy were ready to enter
the lists. Probably in this fact will be found one explanation of the
origin of the Franco-German War.
[Footnote 16: _Bismarck: his Reflections and Reminiscences_, vol. ii. p.
58.]
Before adverting to the proximate cause of the rupture, we may note that
Beust's despatch of July 11, 1870, to Prince Metternich, Austrian
ambassador at Paris, displayed genuine fear lest France should rush
blindly into war with Prussia; and he charged Metternich tactfully to
warn the French Government against such a course of action, which would
"be contrary to all that we have agreed upon. . . . Even if we wished, we
could not suddenly equip a respectably large force. . . . Our services are
gained to a certain extent [by France]; but we shall not go further
unless events carry us on; and we do not dream of plunging into war
because it might suit France to do so."
Again, however, the military men seem to have pushed on the
diplomatists. The Archduke Albrecht and Count Vitzthum went to Paris
charged with some promises of support to France in case of war.
Thereafter, Count Beust gave the assurance at Vienna that the Austrians
would be "faithful to our engagements, as they have been recorded in the
letters exchanged last year between the two sovereigns. We consider the
cause of France as ours, and we will contribute to the success of her
arms to the utmost of our power[17]."
[Footnote 17: _Memoirs of Count Beust,_ vol. ii. p. 359. _The Present
Position of European Politics_ p. 366 (1887). By the author of _Greater
Britain._]
In the midst of this maze of cross-purposes this much is clear: that
both Emperors had gone to work behind the backs of their Ministers, and
that the military chiefs of France and Austria brought their States to
the brink of war while their Ministers and diplomatists were unaware of
the nearness of danger.
As we have seen, King Victor Emmanuel II. longed to draw the sword for
Napoleon III., whose help to Italy in 1859-60 he so curiously overrated.
Fortunately for Italy, his Ministers took a more practical view of the
situation; but probably they too would have made common cause with
France had they received a definite promise of the withdrawal of French
troops from Rome and the satisfaction of Italian desires for the Eternal
City as the national capital. This promise, even after the outbreak of
war, the French Emperor declined to give, though his cousin, Prince
Napoleon, urged him vehemently to give way on that point[18].
[Footnote 18: See the _Rev. des deux Mondes_ for April 1, 1878, and
"Chronique" of the _Revue d'Histoire diplomatique_ for 1905, p. 298;
also W.H. Stillman, _The Union of Italy, 1815-1895_, p. 348.]
In truth, the Emperor could not well give way. An Oecumenical Council
sat at Rome from December 1869 to July 1870; its Ultramontane tendencies
were throughout strongly marked, as against the "Old Catholic" views;
and it was a foregone conclusion that the Council would vote the dogma
of the infallibility of the Pope in matters of religion--as it did on
the day before France declared war against Prussia. How, then, could the
Emperor, the "eldest son of the Church," as French monarchs have proudly
styled themselves, bargain away Rome to the Italian Government, already
stained by sacrilege, when this crowning aureole of grace was about to
encircle the visible Head of the Church? There was no escape from the
dilemma. Either Napoleon must go into war with shouts of "Judas" hurled
at him by all pious Roman Catholics; or he must try his fortunes without
the much-coveted help of Austria and Italy. He chose the latter
alternative, largely, it would seem, owing to the influence of his
vehemently Catholic Empress[19]. After the first defeats he sought to
open negotiations, but then it was too late. Prince Napoleon went to
Florence and arrived there on August 20; but his utmost efforts failed
to move the Italian Cabinet from neutrality.
[Footnote 19: For the relations of France to the Vatican, see _Histoire
du second Empire_, by M. De la Gorce, vol. vi. (Paris, 1903); also
_Histoire Contemporaine_ (_i.e._ of France in 1869-1875), by M. Samuel
Denis, 4 vols. The Empress Eugénie once said that she was "deux fois
Catholique," as a Spaniard and as French Empress. (Sir M.K. Grant Duff,
_Notes from a Diary, 1851-1872_, vol. i. p. 125.)]
Even this brief survey of international relations shows that Napoleon
III. was a source of weakness to France. Having seized on power by
perfidious means, he throughout his whole reign strove to dazzle the
French by a series of adventures, which indeed pleased the Parisians for
the time, but at the cost of lasting distrust among the Powers. Generous
in his aims, he at first befriended the German and Italian national
movements, but forfeited all the fruits of those actions by his
pettifogging conduct about Savoy and Nice, the Rhineland and Belgium;
while his final efforts to please French clericals and Chauvinists[20]
by supporting the Pope at Rome, lost him the support of States that
might have retrieved the earlier blunders. In brief, by helping on the
nationalists of North Germany and Italy he offended French public
opinion; and his belated and spasmodic efforts to regain popularity at
home aroused against him the distrust of all the Powers. Their feelings
about him may be summarised in the _mot_ of a diplomatist, "Scratch the
Emperor and you will find the political refugee."
[Footnote 20: Chauvinist is a term corresponding to our "Jingo." It is
derived from a man named Chauvin, who lauded Napoleon I. and French
glory to the skies.]
How different were the careers of Napoleon III. and of Bismarck! By
resolutely keeping before him the national aim, and that only, the
Prussian statesman had reduced the tangle of German affairs to
simplicity and now made ready for the crowning work of all. In his
_Reminiscences_ he avows his belief, as early as 1866, "that a war with
France would succeed the war with Austria lay in the logic of history";
and again, "I did not doubt that a Franco-German War must take place
before the construction of a United Germany could take place[21]." War
would doubtless have broken out in 1867 over the Luxemburg question, had
he not seen the need of delay for strengthening the bonds of union with
South Germany and assuring the increase of the armies of the Fatherland
by the adoption of Prussian methods; or, as he phrased it, "each year's
postponement of the war would add 100,000 trained soldiers to our
army[22]." In 1870 little was to be gained by delay. In fact, the
unionist movement in Germany then showed ominous signs of slackening. In
the South the Parliaments opposed any further approach to union with the
North; and the voting of the military budget in the North for that year
was likely to lead to strong opposition in the interests of the
overtaxed people. A war might solve the unionist problem which was
insoluble in time of peace; and a _casus belli _was at hand.
[Footnote 21: Bismarck, _Reminiscences_, vol. ii. pp. 41, 57 (Eng.
edit.).]
[Footnote 22: _Ib._ p. 58.]
Early in July 1870, the news leaked out that Prince Leopold of
Hohenzollern was the officially accepted candidate for the throne of
Spain, left vacant since the revolution which drove Queen Isabella into
exile in 1868[23]. At once a thrill of rage shot through France; and the
Duc de Gramont, Foreign Minister of the new Ollivier Ministry, gave
expression to the prevailing feeling in his answer to a question on the
subject in the Chamber of Deputies (July 6):--
[Footnote 23: The ex-queen Isabella died in Paris in April 1904.]
We do not think that respect for the rights of a neighbouring
people [Spain] obliges us to allow an alien Power [Prussia],
by placing one of its princes on the throne of Charles V., to
succeed in upsetting to our disadvantage the present
equilibrium of forces in Europe, and imperil the interests
and honour of France. We have the firm hope that this
eventuality will not be realised. To hinder it, we count both
on the wisdom of the German people and on the friendship of
the Spanish people. If that should not be so, strong in your
support and in that of the nation, we shall know how to
fulfil our duty without hesitation and without weakness[24].
[Footnote 24: Sorel, _Hist. diplomatique de la Guerre Franco-Allemande_,
vol. i. p. 77.]
The opening phrases were inaccurate. The prince in question was Prince
Leopold of the Swabian and Roman Catholic branch of the Hohenzollern
family, who, as the Duc de Gramont knew, could by no possibility recall
the days when Charles V. reigned as Emperor in Germany and monarch in
Spain. This misstatement showed the intention of the French Ministry to
throw down the glove to Prussia--as is also clear from this statement in
Gramont's despatch of July 10 to Benedetti: "If the King will not advise
the Prince of Hohenzollern to withdraw, well, it is war forthwith, and
in a few days we are at the Rhine[25]."
[Footnote 25: Benedetti, _Ma Mission en Prusse_, p.34. This work
contains the French despatches on the whole affair.]
Nevertheless, those who were behind the scenes had just cause for anger
against Bismarck. The revelations of Benedetti, French ambassador at
Berlin, as well as the Memoirs of the King of Roumania (brother to
Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern) leave no doubt that the candidature of
the latter was privately and unofficially mooted in 1868, and again in
the spring of 1869 through a Prussian diplomatist, Werthern, and that it
met with no encouragement whatever from the Prussian monarch or the
prince himself. But early in 1870 it was renewed in an official manner
by the provisional Government of Spain, and (as seems certain) at the
instigation of Bismarck, who, in May-June, succeeded in overcoming the
reluctance of the prince and of King William. Bismarck even sought to
hurry the matter through the Spanish Cortes so as to commit Spain to the
plan; but this failed owing to the misinterpretation of a ciphered
telegram from Berlin at Madrid[26].
[Footnote 26: In a recent work, _Kaiser Wilhelm und die Begründung des
Reichs, 1866-1871_, Dr. Lorenz tries to absolve Bismarck from complicity
in these intrigues, but without success. See _Reminiscences of the King
of Roumania_ (edited by S. Whitman), pp. 70, 86-87, 92-95; also
Headlam's _Bismarck_, p. 327.]
Such was the state of the case when the affair became known to the
Ollivier Ministry. Though not aware, seemingly, of all these details,
Napoleon's advisers were justified in treating the matter, not as a
private affair between the Hohenzollerns and Spain (as Germans then
maintained it was) but as an attempt of the Prussian Government to place
on the Spanish throne a prince who could not but be friendly to the
North German Power. In fact, the French saw in it a challenge to war;
and putting together all the facts as now known, we must pronounce that
they were almost certainly right. Bismarck undoubtedly wanted war; and
it is impossible to think that he did not intend to use this candidature
as a means of exasperating the French. The man who afterwards declared
that, at the beginning of the Danish disputes in 1863, he made up his
mind to have Schleswig-Holstein for Prussia[27], certainly saw in the
Hohenzollern candidature a step towards a Prusso-Spanish alliance or a
war with France that might cement German unity.
[Footnote 27: Busch, _Our Chancellor_, vol. i. p. 367.]
In any case, that was the outcome of events. The French papers at once
declaimed against the candidature in a way that aroused no less passion
on the other side of the Rhine. For a brief space, however, matters
seemed to be smoothed over by the calm good sense of the Prussian
monarch and his nephew. The King was then at Ems, taking the waters,
when Benedetti, the French ambassador, waited on him and pressed him
most urgently to request Prince Leopold to withdraw from the candidature
to the Spanish Crown. This the King declined to do in the way that was
pointed out to him, rightly considering that such a course would play
into the hands of the French by lowering his own dignity and the
prestige of Prussia. Moreover, he, rather illogically, held the whole
matter to be primarily one that affected the Hohenzollern family and
Spain. The young prince, however, on hearing of the drift of events,
solved the problem by declaring his intention not to accept the Crown of
Spain (July 12). The action was spontaneous, emanating from Prince
Leopold and his father Prince Antony, not from the Prussian monarch,
though, on hearing of their decision, he informed Benedetti that he
entirely approved it.
If the French Government had really wished for peace, it would have let
the matter end there. But it did not do so. The extreme
Bonapartists--_plus royalistes que le roi_--all along wished to gain
prestige for their sovereign by inflicting an open humiliation on King
William and through him on Prussia. They were angry that he had evaded
the snare, and now brought pressure to bear on the Ministry, especially
the Duc de Gramont, so that at 7 P.M. of that same day (July 12) he sent
a telegram to Benedetti at Ems directing him to see King William and
press him to declare that he "would not again authorise this
candidature." The Minister added: "The effervescence of spirits [at
Paris] is such that we do not know whether we shall succeed in mastering
it." This was true. Paris was almost beside herself. As M. Sorel says:
"The warm July evening drove into the streets a populace greedy of shows
and excitements, whose imagination was spoiled by the custom of
political quackery, for whom war was but a drama and history a
romance[28]." Such was the impulse which led to Gramont's new demand,
and it was made in spite of the remonstrances of the British ambassador,
Lord Lyons.
[Footnote 28: Sorel, _Hist. diplomatique de la Guerre Franco-Allemande_,
vol. i. chap. iv.; also for the tone of the French Press, Giraudeau, _La
Vérité sur la Campagne de 1870_, pp. 46-60.
Ollivier tried to persuade Sir M.E. Grant Duff (_Notes from a Diary,
1873-1881_, vol. i. p. 45) that the French demand to King William was
quite friendly and natural.]
Viewing that demand in the clearer light of the present time, we must
say that it was not unreasonable in itself; but it was presented in so
insistent a way that King William declined to entertain it. Again
Gramont pressed Benedetti to urge the matter; but the utmost that the
King would do was to state: "He gives his approbation entirely and
without reserve to the withdrawal of the Prince of Hohenzollern: he
cannot do more." He refused to see the ambassador further on this
subject; but on setting out to return to Berlin--a step necessitated by
the growing excitement throughout Germany--he took leave of Benedetti
with perfect cordiality (July 14). The ambassador thereupon returned
to Paris.
Meanwhile, however, Bismarck had given the last flick to the restive
courses of the Press on both sides of the Rhine. In his _Reminiscences_
he has described his depression of spirits on hearing the news of the
withdrawal of Prince Leopold's candidature and of his nearly formed
resolve to resign as a protest against so tame a retreat before French
demands. But while Moltke, Roon, and he were dining together, a telegram
reached him from the King at Ems, dated July 13, 3.50 P.M., which gave
him leave to inform the ambassadors and the Press of the present state
of affairs. Bismarck saw his chance. The telegram could be cut down so
as to give a more resolute look to the whole affair. And, after gaining
Moltke's assurance that everything was ready for war, he proceeded to
condense it. The facts here can only be understood by a comparison of
the two versions. We therefore give the original as sent to Bismarck by
Abeken, Secretary to the Foreign Office, who was then at Ems:--
His Majesty writes to me: "Count Benedetti spoke to me on the
promenade, in order to demand from me, finally in a very
importunate manner, that I should authorise him to telegraph
at once that I bound myself for all future time never again
to give my consent if the Hohenzollerns should renew their
candidature. I refused at last somewhat sternly, as it is
neither right nor possible to undertake engagements of this
kind _à tout jamais_. Naturally I told him that I had as yet
received no news, and as he was earlier informed about Paris
and Madrid than myself, he could see clearly that my
Government once more had no hand in the matter." His Majesty
has since received a letter from the Prince. His Majesty
having told Count Benedetti that he was awaiting news from
the Prince, has decided, with reference to the above demand,
upon the representation of Count Eulenburg and myself, not to
receive Count Benedetti again, but only to let him be
informed through an aide-de-camp: "That his Majesty had now
received from the Prince confirmation of the news which
Benedetti had already received from Paris, and had nothing
further to say to the ambassador." His Majesty leaves it to
your Excellency whether Benedetti's fresh demand and its
rejection should not be at once communicated both to our
ambassadors and to the Press.
Bismarck cut this down to the following:--
After the news of the renunciation of the hereditary Prince
of Hohenzollern had been officially communicated to the
Imperial Government of France by the Royal Government of
Spain, the French ambassador at Ems further demanded of his
Majesty, the King, that he would authorise him to telegraph
to Paris that his Majesty, the King, bound himself for all
future time never again to give his consent if the
Hohenzollerns should renew their candidature. His Majesty,
the King, thereupon decided not to receive the French
ambassador again, and sent to tell him through the
aide-de-camp on duty that his Majesty had nothing further to
communicate to the ambassador.
Efforts have been made to represent Bismarck's "editing" of the Ems
telegram as the decisive step leading to war; and in his closing years,
when seized with the morbid desire of a partly discredited statesman to
exaggerate his influence on events, he himself sought to perpetuate this
version. He claims that the telegram, as it came from Ems, described the
incident there "as a fragment of a negotiation still pending, and to be
continued at Berlin." This claim is quite untenable. A careful perusal
of the original despatch from Ems shows that the negotiation, far from
being "still pending," was clearly described as having been closed on
that matter. That Benedetti so regarded it is proved by his returning at
once to Paris. If it could have been "continued at Berlin," he most
certainly would have proceeded thither. Finally, the words in the
original as to the King refusing Benedetti "somewhat sternly" were
omitted, and very properly omitted, by Bismarck in his abbreviated
version. Had he included those words, he might have claimed to be the
final cause of the War of 1870. As it is, his claim must be set aside as
the offspring of senile vanity. His version of the original Ems despatch
did not contain a single offensive word, neither did it alter any
statement. Abeken also admitted that his original telegram was far too
long, and that Bismarck was quite justified in abbreviating it as
he did[29].
[Footnote 29: _Heinrich Abeken_, by Hedwig Abeken, p. 375. Bismarck's
successor in the chancellory, Count Caprivi, set matters in their true
light in a speech in the Reichstag shortly after the publication of
Bismarck's _Reminiscences_.
I dissent from the views expressed by the well-informed reviewer of
Ollivier's _L'Empire libéral_ (vol. viii.) in the _Times_ of May 27,
1904, who pins his faith to an interview of Bismarck with Lord Loftus on
July 13, 1870. Bismarck, of course wanted war; but so did Gramont, and I
hold that _the latter_ brought it about.]
If we pay attention, not to the present more complete knowledge of the
whole affair, but to the imperfect information then open to the German
public, war was the natural result of the second and very urgent demand
that came from Paris. The Duc de Gramont in dispatching it must have
known that he was playing a desperate game. Either Prussia would give
way and France would score a diplomatic triumph over a hated rival; or
Prussia would fight. The friends of peace in France thought matters
hopeless when that demand was sent in so insistent a manner. As soon as
Gladstone heard of the second demand of the Ollivier Ministry, he wrote
to Lord Granville, then Foreign Minister: "It is our duty to represent
the immense responsibility which will rest upon France, if she does not
at once accept as satisfactory and conclusive the withdrawal of the
candidature of Prince Leopold[30]."
[Footnote 30: J. Morley, _Life of Gladstone_, vol. ii. p. 328.]
On the other hand, we must note that the conduct of the German Press at
this crisis was certainly provocative of war. The morning on which
Bismarck's telegram appeared in the official _North German Gazette_, saw
a host of violent articles against France, and gleeful accounts of
imaginary insults inflicted by the King on Benedetti. All this was to be
expected after the taunts of cowardice freely levelled by the Parisian
papers against Prussia for the last two days; but whether Bismarck
directly inspired the many sensational versions of the Ems affair that
appeared in North German papers on July 14 is not yet proven.
However that may be, the French Government looked on the refusal of its
last demand, the publication of Bismarck's telegram, and the insults of
the German Press as a _casus belli_. The details of the sitting of the
Emperor's Council at 10 P.M. on July 14, at which it was decided to call
out the French reserves, are not yet known. Ollivier was not present.
There had been a few hours of wavering on this question; but the tone of
the Parisian evening papers--it was the French national day--the loud
cries of the rabble for war, and their smashing the windows of the
Prussian embassy, seem to have convinced the Emperor and his advisers
that to draw back now would involve the fall of the dynasty. Report has
uniformly pointed to the Empress as pressing these ideas on her
consort, and the account which the Duc de Gramont later on gave to Lord
Malmesbury of her words at that momentous Council-meeting support
popular rumour. It is as follows:--
Before the final resolve to declare war the Emperor, Empress,
and Ministers went to St. Cloud. After some discussion
Gramont told me that the Empress, a high-spirited and
impressionable woman, made a strong and most excited address,
declaring that "war was inevitable if the honour of France
was to be sustained." She was immediately followed by Marshal
Leboeuf, who, in the most violent tone, threw down his
portfolio and swore that if war was not declared he would
give it up and renounce his military rank. The Emperor gave
way, and Gramont went straight to the Chamber to announce the
fatal news[31].
[Footnote 31: This version has, I believe, not been refuted. Still, I
must look on it with suspicion. No Minister, who had done so much to
stir up the war-feeling, ought to have made any such confession--least
of all against a lady, who could not answer it. M. Seignobos in his
_Political History of Contemporary Europe_, vol. i. chap. vi. p. 184
(Eng edit.) says of Gramont: "He it was who embroiled France in the war
with Prussia." In the course of the parliamentary inquiry of 1872
Gramont convicted himself and his Cabinet of folly in 1870 by using
these words: "Je crois pouvoir déclarer que si on avait eu un doute, un
seule doute, sur notre aptitude à la guerre, on eût immédiatement arrêté
la négociation" (_Enquête parlementaire_, I. vol. i. p. 108).]
On the morrow (July 15) the Chamber of Deputies appointed a Commission,
which hastily examined the diplomatic documents and reported in a sense
favourable to the Ollivier Ministry. The subsequent debate made strongly
for a rupture; and it is important to note that Ollivier and Gramont
based the demand for warlike preparations on the fact that King William
had refused to see the French ambassador, and held that that alone was a
sufficient insult. In vain did Thiers protest against the war as
inopportune, and demand to see all the necessary documents. The Chamber
passed the war supplies by 246 votes to 10; and Thiers had his windows
broken. Late on that night Gramont set aside a last attempt of Lord
Granville to offer the mediation of England in the cause of peace, on
the ground that this would be to the harm of France--"unless means were
found to stop the rapid mobilisation of the Prussian armies which were
approaching our frontier[32]." In this connection it is needful to state
that the order for mobilising the North German troops was not given by
the King of Prussia until late on July 15, when the war votes of the
French Chambers were known at Berlin.
[Footnote 32: Quoted by Sorel, _op. cit_. vol. i. p. 196.]
Benedetti, in his review of the whole question, passes the following
very noteworthy and sensible verdict: "It was public opinion which
forced the [French] Government to draw the sword, and by an irresistible
onset dictated its resolutions[33]." This is certainly true for the
public opinion of Paris, though not of France as a whole. The rural
districts which form the real strength of France nearly always cling to
peace. It is significant that the Prefects of French Departments
reported that only 16 declared in favour of war, while 37 were in doubt
on the matter, and 34 accepted war with regret. This is what might be
expected from a people which in the Provinces is marked by prudence
and thrift.
[Footnote 33: Benedetti, _Ma Mission en Prusse,_ p. 411.]
In truth, the people of modern Europe have settled down to a life of
peaceful industry, in which war is the most hateful of evils. On the
other hand, the massing of mankind in great cities, where thought is
superficial and feelings can quickly be stirred by a sensation-mongering
Press, has undoubtedly helped to feed political passions and national
hatred. A rural population is not deeply stirred by stories of slights
to ambassadors. The peasant of Brittany had no active dislike for the
peasant of Brandenburg. Each only asked to be left to till his fields in
peace and safety. But the crowds on the Parisian boulevards and in
_Unter den Linden_ took (and seemingly always will take) a very
different view of life. To them the news of the humiliation of the rival
beyond the Rhine was the greatest and therefore the most welcome of
sensations; and, unfortunately, the papers which pandered to their
habits set the tone of thought for no small part of France and Germany
and exerted on national policy an influence out of all proportion to its
real weight.
The story of the Franco-German dispute is one of national jealousy
carefully fanned for four years by newspaper editors and popular
speakers until a spark sufficed to set Western Europe in a blaze. The
spark was the Hohenzollern candidature, which would have fallen harmless
had not the tinder been prepared since Königgratz by journalists at
Paris and Berlin. The resulting conflagration may justly be described as
due partly to national friction and partly to the supposed interests of
the Napoleonic dynasty, but also to the heat engendered by a
sensational Press.
It is well that one of the chief dangers to the peace of the modern
world should be clearly recognised. The centralisation of governments
and of population may have its advantages; but over against them we must
set grave drawbacks; among those of a political kind the worst are the
growth of nervousness and excitability, and the craving for
sensation--qualities which undoubtedly tend to embitter national
jealousies at all times, and in the last case to drive weak dynasties or
Cabinets on to war. Certainly Bismarck's clever shifts to bring about a
rupture in 1870 would have failed had not the atmosphere both at Paris
and Berlin been charged with electricity[34].
[Footnote 34: Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern died at Berlin on June 8,
1905. He was born in 1835, and in 1861 married the Infanta of Portugal.]
CHAPTER II
FROM WÖRTH TO GRAVELOTTE
"The Chief of the General Staff had his eye fixed from the
first upon the capture of the enemy's capital, the possession
of which is of more importance in France than in other
countries. . . . It is a delusion to believe that a plan of war
may be laid for a prolonged period and carried out in every
point."--VON MOLTKE, _The Franco-German War_.
In olden times, before the invention of long-range arms of precision,
warfare was decided mainly by individual bravery and strength. In the
modern world victory has inclined more and more to that side which
carefully prepares beforehand to throw a force, superior alike in
armament and numbers, against the vitals of its enemy. Assuming that the
combatants are fairly equal in physical qualities--and the spread of
liberty has undoubtedly lessened the great differences that once were
observable in this respect among European peoples--war becomes largely
an affair of preliminary organisation. That is to say, it is now a
matter of brain rather than muscle. Writers of the school of Carlyle may
protest that all modern warfare is tame when compared with the
splendidly rampant animalism of the Homeric fights. In the interests of
Humanity it is to be hoped that the change will go on until war becomes
wholly scientific and utterly unattractive. Meanwhile, the
soldier-caste, the politician, and the tax-payer have to face the fact
that the fortunes of war are very largely decided by humdrum costly
preparations in time of peace.
The last chapter set forth the causes that led to war in 1870. That
event found Germany fully prepared. The lessons of the campaign of 1866
had not been lost upon the Prussian General Staff. The artillery was
improved alike in _matériel_ and in drill-tactics, Napoleon I.'s plan of
bringing massed batteries to bear on decisive points being developed
with Prussian thoroughness. The cavalry learnt to scout effectively and
act as "the eyes and ears of an army," as well as to charge in brigades
on a wavering foe. Universal military service had been compulsory in
Prussia since 1813; but the organisation of territorial army corps now
received fuller development, so that each part of Prussia, including,
too, most of the North German Confederation, had its own small army
complete in all arms, and reinforced from the Reserve, and, at need,
from the Landwehr[35]. By virtue of the military conventions of 1866,
the other German States adopted a similar system, save that while
Prussians served for three years (with few exceptions in the case of
successful examinees), the South Germans served with the colours for a
shorter period. Those conventions also secured uniformity, or harmony,
in the railway arrangements for the transport of troops.
[Footnote 35: By the Prussian law of November 9, 1867, soldiers had to
serve three years with the colours, four in the reserve, and five in the
Landwehr. Three new army corps (9th, 10th, and 11th) were formed in the
newly annexed or confederated lands, Hanover, Hesse-Cassel, Saxony, etc.
(Maurice, _The Franco-German War_, 1900).]
The General Staff of the North German Army had used these advantages to
the utmost, by preparing a most complete plan of mobilisation--so
complete, in fact, that the myriad orders had only to be drawn from
their pigeon-holes and dated in the last hours of July 15. Forthwith the
whole of the vast machinery started in swift but smooth working.
Reservists speedily appeared at their regimental depôts, there found
their equipment, and speedily brought their regiments up to the war
footing; trains were ready, timed according to an elaborate plan, to
carry them Rhinewards; provisions and stores were sent forward, _ohne
Hast, ohne Rast_, as the Germans say; and so perfect were the plans on
rail, river, and road, that none of those blocks occurred which
frequently upset the plans of the French. Thus, by dint of plodding
preparation, a group of federal States gained a decisive advantage over
a centralised Empire which left too many things to be arranged in the
last few hours.
Herein lies the true significance of the War of 1870. All Governments
that were not content to jog along in the old military ruts saw the need
of careful organisation, including the eventual control of all needful
means of transport; and all that were wise hastened to adapt their
system to the new order of things, which aimed at assuring the swift
orderly movement of great masses of men by all the resources of
mechanical science. Most of the civilised States soon responded to the
new needs of the age; but a few (among them Great Britain) were content
to make one or two superficial changes and slightly increase the number
of troops, while leaving the all-important matter of organisation almost
untouched; and that, too, despite the vivid contrast which every one
could see between the machine-like regularity of the German mobilisation
and the chaos that reigned on the French side.
Outwardly, the French army appeared to be beyond the reach of criticism.
The troops had in large measure seen active service in the various wars
whereby Napoleon III. fulfilled his promise of 1852--"The Empire is
peace"; and their successes in the Crimea, Lombardy, Syria, and China,
everywhere in fact but Mexico, filled them with warlike pride. Armed
with the _chassepôt_, a newer and better rifle than the needle-gun,
while their artillery (admittedly rather weak) was strengthened by the
_mitrailleuse_, they claimed to be the best in the world, and burned to
measure swords with the upstart forces of Prussia.
[Illustration: SKETCH MAP OF THE DISTRICT BETWEEN METZ AND THE RHINE.]
But there was a sombre reverse to this bright side. All thinking
Frenchmen, including the Emperor, were aware of grave defects--the lack
of training of the officers[36], and the want of adaptability in the
General Staff, which had little of that practical knowledge that the
German Staff secured by periods of service with the troops. Add to this
the leaven of republicanism working strongly in the army as in the
State, and producing distrust between officers and men; above all, the
lack of men and materials; and the outlook was not reassuring to those
who knew the whole truth. Inclusive of the levies of the year 1869,
which were not quite ready for active service, France would have by
August 1, 1870, as many as 567,000 men in her regular army; but of these
colonial, garrison, and other duties claimed as many as 230,000--a
figure which seems designed to include the troops that existed only on
paper. Not only the _personnel_ but the _matériel_ came far below what
was expected. General Leboeuf, the War Minister, ventured to declare
that all was ready even to the last button on the gaiters; but his boast
at once rang false when at scores of military depôts neither gaiters,
boots, nor uniforms were ready for the reservists who needed them.
[Footnote 36: M. de la Gorce in his _Histoire du second Empire_, vol.
vi., tells how the French officers scouted study of the art of war,
while most of them looked on favouritism as the only means of promotion.
The warnings of Colonel Stoffel, French Military Attaché at Berlin, were
passed over, as those of "a Prussomane, whom Bismarck had fascinated."]
Even where the organisation worked at its best, that best was slow and
confused. There were no territorial army corps in time of peace; and the
lack of this organisation led to a grievous waste of time and energy.
Regiments were frequently far away from the depôts which contained the
reservists' equipment; and when these had found their equipment, they
often wandered widely before finding their regiments on the way to the
frontier. One general officer hunted about on the frontier for a command
which did not exist. As a result of this lack of organisation, and of
that control over the railways which the Germans had methodically
enforced, France lost the many advantages which her compact territory
and excellent railway system ought to have ensured over her more
straggling and poorer rival.
The loss of time was as fatal as it was singular under the rule of a
Napoleon whose uncle had so often shattered his foes by swift movements
of troops. In 1870 Napoleonic France had nothing but speed and dash on
which to count. Numbers were against her. In 1869 Marshal Leboeuf had
done away with the Garde Mobile, a sort of militia which had involved
only fifteen days' drill in the year; and the Garde Nationale of the
towns was less fit for campaigning than the re-formed Mobiles proved to
be later on in the war. Thus France had no reserves: everything rested
on the 330,000 men struggling towards the frontiers. It is doubtful
whether there were more than 220,000 men in the first line by August 6,
with some 50,000 more in reserve at Metz, etc.
Against them Germany could at once put into the field 460,000 infantry,
56,000 cavalry, with 1584 cannon; and she could raise these forces to
some 1,180,000 men by calling out all the reserves and Landwehr. These
last were men who had served their time and had not, as a rule, lost
their soldierly qualities in civil life. Nearly 400,000 highly trained
troops were ready to invade France early in August.
In view of these facts it seems incredible that Ollivier, the French
Prime Minister, could have publicly stated that he entered on war with a
light heart. Doubtless, Ministers counted on help from Austria or Italy,
perhaps from both; but, as it proved, they judged too hastily. As was
stated in Chapter I. of this work, Austria was not likely to move as
long as Russia favoured the cause of Prussia; for any threatening
pressure of the Muscovites on the open flank of the Hapsburg States,
Galicia, has sufficed to keep them from embarking on a campaign in the
West. In this case, the statesmen of Vienna are said to have known by
July 20 that Russia would quietly help Prussia; she informed the
Hapsburg Government that any increase in its armaments would be met by a
corresponding increase in those of Russia. The meaning of such a hint
was clear; and Austria decided not to seek revenge for Königgrätz unless
the French triumph proved to be overwhelming. As for Italy, her alliance
with France alone was very improbable for the reasons previously stated.
Another will o' the wisp which flitted before the ardent Bonapartists
who pushed on the Emperor to war, was that the South German States would
forsake the North and range their troops under the French eagles, as
they had done in the years 1805-12. The first plan of campaign drawn up
at Paris aimed at driving a solid wedge of French troops between the two
Confederations and inducing or compelling the South to join France; it
was hoped that Saxony would follow. As a matter of fact, very many of
the South Germans and Saxons disliked Prussian supremacy; Catholic
Bavaria looked askance at the growing power of Protestant Prussia.
Würtemberg was Protestant, but far too democratic to wish for the
control of the cast-iron bureaucrats of Berlin. The same was even more
true of Saxony, where hostility to Prussia was a deep-rooted tradition;
some of the Saxon troops on leaving their towns even shouted _Napoleon
soll leben_[37]. It is therefore quite possible that, had France struck
quickly at the valleys of the Neckar and Main, she might have reduced
the South German States to neutrality. Alliance perhaps was out of the
question save under overwhelming compulsion; for France had alienated
the Bavarian and Hessian Governments by her claims in 1866, and the
South German people by her recent offensive treatment of the
Hohenzollern candidature. It is, however, safe to assert that if
Napoleon I. had ordered French affairs he would have swept the South
Germans into his net a month after the outbreak of war, as he had done
in 1805. But Nature had not bestowed warlike gifts on the nephew, who
took command of the French army at Metz at the close of July 1870. His
feeble health, alternating with periods of severe pain, took from him
all that buoyancy which lends life to an army and vigour to the
headquarters; and his Chief of Staff, Leboeuf, did not make good the
lack of these qualities in the nominal chief.
[Footnote 37: _I.e._ "Long live Napoleon." The author had this from an
Englishman who was then living in Saxony.]