The Seven Weeks' War
Page 5
As had already been remarked in Berlin through Count Karolyi, (Austrian Ambassador at Berlin), Austria could agree to an incorporation of the duchies in Prussia only as an equivalent for an increase of her own German territory; that if Count Bismark spoke of the obligations of his own country, the Austrian Cabinet might say the same of itself; that Austrian blood had not been spilt to destroy the balance of power of the two great German States by a one-sided aggrandizement of Prussia. The despatch, in conclusion, let the Prussian Government understand that it ought to place no difficulties in the way of the rapid solution of this important question.
The Austrian Government was now in error. This despatch demonstrated that the avowed champion of the smaller States was about to betray their cause for the sake of individual advantage, and threw a trump card into the hand of Count Bismark. By some means this despatch was communicated to an Austrian newspaper, the Presse, and appeared openly in public print The Vienna police failed to discover from what sources the editor of the Presse had been supplied with a copy of the official document, but strong suspicions have ever since prevailed that the publication was due to Prussian agency, which had acted with the object of shaking the confidence of the minor States in the leading power. In effect, several of the representatives of the smaller States sought from Count Mensdorf a declaration of what portion of territory the Austrian Government had in view in making the demand for an equivalent. (It is now supposed that the equivalent Austria wished to obtain was the county of Glatz, in Prussian Silesia).
During the winter several addresses were got up by Prussian partisans in the duchies, with the object of soliciting the Cabinets of Berlin and Vienna to agree to the incorporation of the duchies with the kingdom of Prussia. These were strongly negatived by protests directed to the Prussian House of Commons, and were generally considered to be due more to the electioneering tactics of Prussian agents than to any popular desire for annexation. Such of the late parliamentary representatives of the duchies as could meet together energetically protested against the addresses as exponents of the national will, but no means were taken for gauging the true desires of the population. No parliamentary estates were assembled to act as the mouth-piece of the influential and educated classes; no popular vote was allowed to declare the wishes of the people. Either step might have shown that the standard of Prussia was waving over a nation which aspired to hoisting the flag of independence.
Prussia, unable without a public violation of decency to monopolise the Elbe duchies, appeared in the early spring of 1865 desirous to lay aside the idea of annexation, and, instead, to pave the way for the accession of a prince to the government of the country, who might be a feudatory at least of the Court of Berlin. On the 21st of February, 1865, a despatch was sent by the Prussian Ministry to the Cabinet of Vienna, which professed to propose the measures which the Prussian Cabinet desired to see carried out in the duchies for the security of the interests of Prussia and of Germany, as well as what restraints should be placed upon the future sovereign of Schleswig-Holstein, both in his own and the general interest The substance of this despatch was, that Prussia desired the following guarantees from the new State of Schleswig-Holstein, which was about to be established. (For literal translation of this despatch see Appendix 2 B).
1. That this State should conclude a perpetual offensive and defensive alliance with Prussia, by which Prussia would guarantee the protection and defence of the duchies against every hostile attack, while the whole naval and military power of the duchies should form an integral portion of the Prussian fleet and army.
2. The Prussian fleet—reinforced in the manner mentioned in Article 1—is to be entitled to the right of freely circulating and being stationed in all Schleswig-Holstein waters; and the Prussian Government is to have the control on the Schleswig-Holstein coasts of pilot dues, tonnage-dues, and lighthouse-dues.
3. Schleswig-Holstein is to pay Prussia a tribute, which is to be settled on an equitable basis, for the support of its army and navy, of which Prussia will undertake the whole administration. The Prussian Government will contract for the transport of war material, &c., with the Schleswig-Holstein railways, on the same terms as it does at present with the private railway companies of Prussia. (Railways not in the hands of the government.)
4. The fortresses of the duchies are to be regulated according to agreement between the Prussian and Ducal Governments, and, according to the requirements of the former, for general military purposes.
5. The duties of the new sovereign of Schleswig-Holstein with regard to the German Confederation remain the same as those of the former for Holstein. Prussia will find the Holstein Federal contingent out of parts of her army which do not form her own contingent.
6. Rendsburg, in accordance with the wishes of all concerned, is to be declared a Federal fortress. Until that is done, it is to be occupied by Prussia.
7. Inasmuch as Prussia takes upon herself the duties of the military and maritime protection of the duchies, she requires that certain territories should be given up to her for the cost of fortifications, with full rights of sovereignty over them. The territories required would be at least—
a. Sonderburg, with as much territory on both banks of the Sound of Alsen as may be necessary for a naval harbour at Hjörupshaff, and the security of the same.
b. The territory necessary for the security of the harbour of Kiel, near the fort of Friedericsort.
c .Territories at both mouths of the proposed North Sea and Baltic Canal, and, besides, the right of free navigation along this canal.
d. Schleswig-Holstein is to enter into the Zollverein, and the administration of the railways and telegraphs of the duchies is to be amalgamated with that of Prussia.
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The Zollverein, or General Customs Union, was entered into by most of the German States under the guidance of Prussia. The object of this union was to free the trade of Germany from the restrictions under which it lay from the conflicting interests and custom-house regulations of so many independent States. By the Zollverein Treaty, which was re-established on the 1st January, 1854, tolls or customs were collected once for all at the common frontier of the united States, and the produce divided among them in equitable proportions. The Zollverein included Prussia, and all the minor German States except Holstein, Lauenburg, and the principality of Lichtenstein. Austria was not included in the Zollverein, but became connected with it in 1853 by a commercial treaty with Prussia, by which both sides contracted to do nothing to prevent the free circulation of articles of trade in their respective territories, or the transit of any article of merchandise, except tobacco, salt, gunpowder, playing-cards, and almanacs; the principal of these exceptions, tobacco, being a government monopoly in Austria, and not in the other States.
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These propositions showed that the government of Prussia was determined to attempt to establish Prussian supremacy in the Elbe duchies. The aims of the Cabinet of Berlin were clear to the Austrian Government; and Count Mensdorf, in the name of the latter, by a despatch of the 5th March, 1865, informed Count Bismark that a duke of Schleswig-Holstein, under such restrictions as would be entailed by an acceptance of the Prussian proposals, could not enter the Confederation of German princes on terms of equality, and with the power of a free vote in the diet; that the Prussian propositions were calculated to forward the special interests of Prussia alone, but; that Austria and the whole Germanic Confederation had a claim to the disposition of Schleswig-Holstein.
Austria in the same despatch, however, declared herself willing to concede to Prussia the right of occupation of Kiel harbour, and would agree to Rendsburg being declared a Federal fortress, to the commencement of a North Sea and Baltic Canal, and to the entrance of Schleswig-Holstein into the Zollverein. Further, Austria would not go; and she declared that treaties to settle the details of the above concessions could be entered into with profit only after the question of the sovereignty of the duchies was decided. Austria also ex
pressed a wish to terminate negotiations from which there could be little hope that an agreement would result Prussia and Austria had both spoken out their designs. That of Prussia was now manifestly the annexation of Schleswig-Holstein, that of Austria to thwart, hinder, and prevent the execution of Prussia’s intention. Austria wished to carry out the project of establishing the duchies as a separate German State, under an independent prince, and thus to fulfil the object with which the German war against Denmark had been undertaken, and to satisfy the unanimous sympathy of Germany evoked for that war. This was doubly Austria’s interest, in order to both impede the aggrandizement of her rival, and to I raise up another small State, a fresh unit of German nationality, a fresh obstacle to the German unity which she had found could not be effected under her own supremacy.
But the question of the Elbe duchies could not have been laid to rest in this condition, even if Austria and Prussia had both earnestly desired such a consummation. The whole Germanic people was nervously interested in its solution. In April, 1865, a motion brought forward in the diet at Frankfort by the representatives of Bavaria, Saxony, and Hesse Darmstadt, which proposed that Holstein should be given over to the prince of Augustenburg, was accepted by the majority. (This motion was brought forward on the 27th March, by Barons Von der Pfordten, Beust, and Dalwigk, the representatives of Bavaria, Saxony, and Hesse Darmstadt). This vote could, under the circumstances, have no practical result, but it showed that the current of feeling of the small States was setting strongly against the threatened preponderance of Prussia, and made Prussia feel that henceforth her policy must be antagonistic to, and subversive of the dynasties of the minor Germanic States.
Another element of discord had been in existence ever since Austria and Prussia had undertaken the joint government of the duchies, but it was not till the summer of 1865 that the quarrels between the commissioners of the two powers became so frequent and so stormy that they threatened to lead to a German war, through which the results of the conflict of 1866 might have been anticipated by a year. The Austrian Hahlhuber and the Prussian Zedlitz, engaged in a joint government, and primed by their own cabinets to support diametrically opposite lines of policy, could not fail often and seriously to disagree. The Austrian wished to encourage the expression of popular feeling in the duchies, and to support the manifestation of popular sympathy for the prince of Augustenburg: the Prussian desired to repress all expressions of political feeling, except such as emanated from the partisans of incorporation with Prussia.
These difficulties in the administration of the German provinces at the mouth of the Elbe were reflected in the society of Vienna and Berlin. Feelings rose high, and an appeal to arms seemed more than probable, when Prussia deemed it prudent to reopen negotiations with Austria. The celebrated personal meeting of the sovereigns of the two countries was arranged. The Emperor Francis Joseph and King William met at the little town of Gastein, on the banks of the Achen, about forty miles south of Salzburg, and from their interview originated the Convention of Gastein, which was concluded on the 14th, ratified on the 20th August, 1865. This convention consisted of the following heads:
1. Both Powers, Prussia and Austria, reserved to themselves the common sovereignty over the duchies Schleswig and Holstein, but Austria takes upon herself the provisional administration of Holstein, Prussia takes upon herself that of Schleswig.
2. Prussia and Austria will propose that a German fleet should be established, and Kiel declared a Federal harbour. Until the resolutions of the Germanic Confederation are carried out the navies of Prussia and Austria are to use the harbour of Kiel; but Prussia is to have the command in that harbour, to regulate the police there, and to acquire all territorial rights necessary for the security of this harbour.
Austria and Prussia will propose at Frankfort that Rendsburg be declared a Federal fortress; until Rendsburg is recognised as a Federal fortress, it will be occupied by Austria and Prussia in common. (The Parliament of the Germanic Confederation assembled at Frankfort).
4. As long as the division of the administration of Schleswig and Holstein between Austria and Prussia endures, Prussia is to retain two high roads through Holstein, one from Lübeck to Kiel, the other from Hamburg to Rendsburg.
5. Prussia, on her side, takes upon herself the care of a telegraphic communication and postal line to Kiel and to Rendsburg, and also the construction of a direct railway from Lübeck by Kiel through Holstein, without raising claims to sovereign rights over the line.
6. Schleswig-Holstein is to enter the Zollverein.
7. The construction of the North Sea and Baltic Canal, with the results naturally accruing therefrom, is given over to Prussia.
8. With reference to the financial arrangements established by the Treaty of Vienna of the 30th October, 1864, all remains as of old. Only the duchy of Lauenburg is to pay no share in the expenses of the war, and the tributes of Schleswig and Holstein are to be divided in proportion to the amount of their populations.
9. The Emperor of Austria gives up the duchy of Lauenburg, with all rights as gained by the treaty of Vienna, to the King of Prussia, who will pay for this 2,500,000 Danish dollars in the Prussian silver currency, four weeks after the ratification of this Convention.
Thus by the Convention of Gastein the administration of the duchies was territorially divided between Prussia and Austria: Prussia obtained certain proprietary and administrative rights of great importance in Holstein; and, what is most notable, Austria sold her rights to the duchy of Lauenburg, which she had acquired by conquest in common with Prussia, and thus tacitly recognised the validity of the Austro-Prussian conquest of the Danish duchies, and of the right of either power to dispose of the conquest as it might desire, were the concurrence of the other obtained.
The Convention of Gastein was opposed on many sides. The princes of the small Thuringian states of Weimar, Meiningen, and Coburg protested against the clause by which Lauenburg was ceded to Prussia. The national party in Germany expressed loud disapprobation of the severance of Schleswig from Holstein. The French and English Ministers for Foreign Affairs in confidential notes expressed unfavourable opinions of the convention. The Prussian House of Commons was loud in its censure of the convention, and of the government which by concluding it menaced a heavy demand from the Prussian finances for the purchase of Lauenburg. The King of Prussia, however, paid for the ceded rights of Austria over the duchy out of his own private purse; the protestations of foreigners were disregarded; and, on the 15th September, Lauenburg was occupied by the Prussians.
In the few succeeding days the Prussian troops, except those whose retention in that duchy had been specially agreed to, withdrew from Holstein into Schleswig and Lauenburg. The Austrian force which had been in the two duchies concentrated itself in Holstein, under the command of General Gablenz, who was made Governor of Holstein by the Emperor Francis Joseph. General Gablenz retained Herr Von Hahlhuber as Civil Commissioner, but after a short time the latter was replaced by Herr Von Hofman.
The King of Prussia nominated General Von Manteuffel as Governor of Schleswig, to whom Herr Von Zedlitz was attached as civil commissioner.
CHAPTER 2: Fruitlessness of the Gastein Convention
The Convention of Gastein silenced that portion of the German Press which had, during the summer of 1865, openly anticipated a rupture between Prussia and Austria, and had indulged in calculations as to which side Bavaria, Saxony, Hesse, and Hanover would be forced to espouse. It seemed that civil war between divisions of the Germanic people would be avoided; and for a time the two great Powers of Central Europe, by acting cordially in common, led many men to believe that community of interests and unity of policy was secured between them. Thus, when the diet assembled at Frankfort declared against the Convention of Gastein, the Governments of Austria and Prussia alike sent warning notes to the Frankfort Senate.
Again, when in November, 1865, the representatives of Bavaria, Saxony, and Hesse brought a motion before the diet which propose
d that Austria and Prussia should now call an assembly of the estates of Schleswig and Holstein, which might participate in the solution of the question of the duchies, Austria and Prussia alike protested against this motion. Still, those who looked forward into the future foresaw that there were latent circumstances which foretold an approaching dissolution of the cordiality of the great Powers. One of these circumstances was the rising amity between Prussia and Italy; but more important was the jealousy for supremacy in Germany which the present position of affairs in the duchies was only too well calculated to rouse to action.
Prussia published, in the beginning of October, 1865, the opinion of the law officers of the crown with respect to the question of the duchies. This opinion was practically that all rights over the duchies originated in the Treaty of Vienna of the 30th October, 1864, and that all rightful claims of the House of Augustenburg to the crown of these provinces would have been annulled by this treaty, even if such claim had ever existed; but that, in fact, no rightful claim ever had existed.
The Austrian administration in Holstein, notwithstanding this publication, allowed the rights of the Prince of Augustenburg to be continually treated of by the press, and at public assemblies, as a matter on which no doubt could be entertained, and suffered considerable agitation to take place in favour of his rights. The Prussian administration in Schleswig, on the other hand, allowed it to be understood that all such agitation would be regarded as treasonable, since it was calculated to thwart the aims of the temporary sovereign.