The Seven Weeks' War

by H M Hozier

  A little before eleven, the hour arranged for the troops to enter the town, the king left the palace, and, followed by his staff, rode up the avenue towards the Brandenburg Gate, outside of which he was to meet the troops. He was enthusiastically greeted, and a loud swell of shouts of welcome traced his path till he disappeared through the gate. The queen and the crown princess, with the royal children, followed in a carriage, and met with a similar reception from the people, and in other carriages, which were equally cheered, the Queen Dowager, the Princess Frederick Charles, and the Princess of the Netherlands, who all drove out to the place where the soldiers assembled before their entrance into the town.

  Outside the gate the king was received by the troops with due honours and some ringing cheers, which had hardly died away before he had passed along the line, quickly followed by the carriages which contained the ladies of the court, and then took up his post in front of the troops. The line of march was rapidly formed, and the head of the column began moving towards the Brandenburg Gate, while the royal carriages turned and drove quickly back again down to the Linden Avenue, where their occupants were again loudly greeted, so that the ladies might from the windows of the crown prince’s palace witness the parade in front of Blücher’s statue.

  A few minutes after the carriages had passed down, the head of the triumphal column began to wind in at the gate, led by Field Marshal Count Wrangel, behind whom came a large mass of staff-officers and the military attaches to the various embassies. After a short interval rode General von Roon, the Minister of War, and General von Moltke, the chief of the staff of the king. The greeting accorded to these two, the organiser and the director of the movements of the army, was loud and long, as also that to the two generals who immediately followed them, Von Voigt-Rhetz and Blumenthal, who had been the chiefs of the staff of the First and Second Armies during the campaign. Behind these generals came their adjutants, assistants, and aides-de-camp, and the whole of the staff-officers of the two armies.

  There was then a pause, and an interval of some hundreds of yards in the column, for the king had halted inside the gate to receive an address from the magistracy of the town, and it was some minutes before he himself appeared. But when he came, and close behind him the crown prince and Prince Frederick Charles were seen riding side by side, the enthusiasm of the people rose high. Hats were taken off and waived in the air, handkerchiefs fluttered from every window, and the cheering went up from the crowded street, and was echoed by the houses with that mighty roar which rises from a great multitude when its heart is touched. Behind the commanders-in-chief of the First and Second Armies rode Prince Charles, the commander of the whole artillery, Prince Albrecht, the leader of the cavalry crops of the First Army, Prince Alexander, and Prince Adalbert.

  The troops followed, preceded by a small detachment carrying the standards taken in the war, which were borne this day through Berlin by the men who had taken them in battle. Close behind came the Potsdam regiment of Guards, with the Prince of Würtemberg at its head, but the usual fine marching of this splendid regiment was spoilt by the narrowness of way along which it moved, and by the anxiety of the soldiers to exchange greetings with their friends in the crowd, a lack of discipline which today was excused. Nor did the big men of this regiment present the same imposing appearance as usual, for most spectators saw them from windows raised above the street, the result of which was to give even these large men a dwarfed appearance, and it was only by comparing them with the lines of people through whom they passed that one could actually realise their true stature. Behind these followed the 3rd infantry regiment of the Guard.

  These two regiments formed the first brigade of the Guard, and were commanded by General Alvensleben. The second brigade consisted of the fusiliers of the Guard and of the 2nd Infantry regiment The latter marched into Berlin without helmets, for the cumbersome head-dresses of which they undertook to relieve themselves at the action of Trautenau had not yet been replaced; but the people cheered them enthusiastically, for they were the heroes of Rosberitz, and the regiment which left so many of its soldiers round the spot where General Hiller fell.

  The next brigade was composed of the Jägers of the Guard— riflemen recruited from all the foresters and gamekeepers of Prussia, renowned marksmen, who had done much hard duty during the campaign, and reaped their reward in the loud applause of the people of Berlin—and of a battalion of the Guard of the Grand Duke of Mecklenburg. The entrance of this battalion was a compliment on the part of the Prussian Government to Mecklenburg in return for the loyal manner in which that State stood by Prussia before and during the war, and the people ratified the compliment by the loud greeting they gave to these troops as they passed down the Linden by bursts of cheering, which were renewed again and again.

  After the infantry dame the scarlet and gold regiment of hussars of the Guard, followed by small detachments which represented the 12th light blue and silver Weissenfels Hussars, who suffered so severely at Königgrätz, the 3rd Dragoons, who were nearly cut to pieces by their rough mêlée with the Austrian cuirass brigade at the same battle, and the Magdeburg hussars, who cleared the way for the Prussian infantry at Blumenau; after these the artillery, in a long column, which marched with two guns abreast, decorated with flowers and garlands. As the troops came out of the Linden Avenue and entered the wide, open space in front of the Palace, they formed upon a broader front, and marched past the king, who took his place in front of the statue of Blücher, with his staff around him, when by an accidental but curious coincidence General Moltke as placed below the statue of Gneisenau, the chief of the staff in the War of Independence. Here the whole of the force passed before the sovereign, and then filed across the bridge over the Spree, and their glittering bayonets and shining helmet spikes disappeared into the streets beyond, still cheered by the crowds in the street and houses until the last were lost sight of. By one o’clock the whole of the troops had passed, and the people quickly separated to go to their homes, for every citizen of Berlin entertained a detachment of the men who made their entry—the rich larger, the poorer smaller numbers, but all some.

  A fall of rain during the night of the 20th laid the dust, which the previous day blew unpleasantly about the streets. A cloudy morning allowed the people who took up their places early to see the entry of the second portion of the troops who marched publicly into the town to pass the hours of waiting without being incommoded by the glare which the day before was dazzling to the eyes, and after a time became almost painful. Those who had wished to obtain good places from which to see the troops pass did not this morning take up their positions so very early as they did the day before, since it was found that the crowd was not so great as might have been expected, and many discovered that they had taken a needless precaution by being in the Linden before daybreak. The consequence was that the people were more animated, since they were not already weary before the proceedings commenced. The enthusiasm was greater, the cheering was louder, and there was generally an appearance of more vivacity, enjoyment, and relish on the part of both the populace and the soldiery.

  The arrangements and general decorations were much the same as on the previous day. The ground between the Brandenburg Gate and the schloss, or old palace of Berlin, which is now not inhabited by the Sovereign, but used for official and state occasions, was divided into four portions. The first was the Pariser Platz, which lies just inside the Brandenburg Gate, and was used as the place of the formal greeting of the king by the magistracy and a detachment of fifty-five young ladies, who presented an address in poetry. The second portion was the Linden Avenue, in the centre of the Linden Street, down which the troops marched, and which in the Berlin triumph played the same part as the Via Sacra in those of Ancient Rome. The third portion was the open space which extends from the statue of Frederick the Great to the bridge over the Spree, in which the troops marched past the king; and the fourth was the open place and garden in front of the schloss, which was used for the celebratio
n of the Te Deum, which this afternoon was sung after the last of the troops had marched past.

  On each side of the Pariser Platz tribunes were raised for spectators, which were entirely draped with the red and white colours of the town of Berlin. Behind these, numerous masts were raised, which bore gonfalons of the black and white Prussian colours, with silver-coloured shields devised with the eagle of Prussia or the bear of Berlin. On either side of the entrance to the Linden Avenue from the Pariser Platz tall trophies were erected, which bore groups of alternate Prussian and Berlin flags, raised above pedestals formed of gilt cannon. Along either side of the Linden Avenue were raised on pedestals, hidden in masses of garlands of laurels and oak leaves, gilt bronze figures of Victory, each of which bore upon a shield with azure ground the name and date of one of the actions of the war, inscribed in golden letters; round these shields were bronze borders, on the top of which was placed the Prussian eagle, while above the head of the figure drooped the national flag, supported on either side by the more cheerful colours of the metropolis. The height from the ground to the top of the flagstaff over each figure was thirty-two feet.

  The names of the battles inscribed on these shields were:—June 26, Liebenau, Türnau, Podoll; June 27, Nachod; June 27, Langensalza; June 27, Oswiecin; June 27, Hünerwasser; June 28, Münchengrätz; June 28, Soor; June 28, Trautenau; June 28, Skalitz; June 29, Gitschin; June 29, Königinhof; June 29, Jaromier, Schweinschädel; July 3, Königgrätz; July 4, Dermbach; July 5, Hünfeld; July 5, Zell; July 10, Waldaschach, Hausen; July 10, Hammelburg, Friedericshall; July 10, Kissingen; July 13, Laufach; July 14, Aschaffenburg; July 15, Tobitschau; July 22, Blumenau; July 23, Hof; July 24, Tauber-Bischofsheim; July 24, Werbach, Hochhausen; July 25, Neubrunn, Helmstadt; July 25, Gerchshein; July 26, Roszbrünn; July 28, Würzburg; July 28, Baireuth.

  In the alternate spaces between these figures stood on each side of the avenue square pedestals ten feet high, each crowned with a gilt eagle with wings outspread. On the sides of these pedestals were inscribed, as a memorial of the manner in which Berlin heard of the successes of the army, the telegrams received from the seat of war which told of each victory. In the space of each of these pedestals and the trophies on either side bearing the names of the battles were placed two candelabra, each ten feet high, formed of a bronze stalk, standing on a triangular pedestal swathed with laurel wreaths, and terminating at the summit in a gilt basin, which was used in the illumination for burning coloured lights.

  All these trophies, pedestals, and candelabra were connected together by festoons of green foliage, which drooped down so as almost to kiss the bright barrels of the captured guns, which were placed between the works of art, and were themselves wreathed with garlands. Two hundred and eight guns, one hundred and four on each side, stood in the Linden Avenue, with their muzzles still begrimed with powder, in a line with the pedestals and figures, and their trails just inside the lines of linden trees which give the name to the street. More cannon might have been exhibited as spoils of the war, for many more were taken; but it was resolved that only those which were captured in open battle should be here, and those which were seized in arsenals or fortified places that fell into the hands of the victors were not brought out for this festival.

  Only at the places where cross streets cut the Linden Avenue were these festoons interrupted. At the four corners of each crossing four tall obelisks were raised on triangular bases, which were wound round with spirals of foliage and decorated with the flags of the provinces and allies of Prussia, while from the top of each the national standard floated fifty feet above the ground. On each comer of the triangular pedestal was placed a golden eagle, and diagonally from obelisk to obelisk festoons were stretched, from which hung shields carrying the arms of Prussia and Berlin on either side.

  From the end of the Linden Avenue to the bridge over the river the open space was left clear for the marching past of the troops, but tall masts were raised on either side, from the summits of which long streamers fluttered, and festoons were led from one to the other. On either parapet of the bridge four marble statues of Victory were placed, behind which hung flags and drapery, supported by masts raised from rafts anchored in the river.

  The large square in front of the schloss beyond the bridge was surrounded with black and white painted poles, each of which carried the Hohenzollern shield, surmounted by a banner. In the centre was placed the altar for the public Te Deum. A square pedestal, four feet high and forty-eight feet long, supported at each corner a figure of the Angel of Peace, with a palm branch in her hand, and in the centre of each side a statue of Victory distributing laurel crowns, while between the figures flights of low and easy steps, covered with rich carpeting, were placed for the officiating priests. Further steps led from the pedestals to the altar-place, which was raised seven feet higher, and, surrounded by golden candelabra, supported the altar, draped in velvet, above which stood the golden cross, heavy with mouldings of exquisite workmanship.

  Behind the altar, between it and the heavy pile of the dome-topped schloss, rose a towering statue of Borussia, the classical cognomen of Prussia. With eagle-crowned helmet on her head, the sceptre with the iron cross grasped in her left hand, and her right stretching forth the crown of victory, the figure was placed there as a token to signify that their country considered that her warriors had done well. On either side stood tall trophies of drooped flags and intermingled arms, the pedestals of which bore the names of the most glorious deeds of Prussian arms in the last two centuries.

  Emblazoned in letters of gold beside Königgrätz, Kissingen, and Skalitz, were Fehrbellin, 1675; Stralsund, 1678; Hohenfriedberg, 1745; Prague, 1757; Rossbach, 1757; Leuthen, 1757; Zorndorf, 1758; Leipzig, 1813; Paris, 1814; Belle-Alliance, 1815. On either side these trophies were ranged figures of the Electors of Brandenburg and Kings of Prussia; under each was written his motto, war-cry, or favourite expression, with the date of his accession and death. Some of the most striking of these were those of Albrecht Achilles, 1470—1486, “Nowhere is it more glorious to die than on the field of battle;” of Friederich Wilhelm, 1640—1688, “Mit Gott;” and Friederich Wilhelm III., 1797—1840, “My time in trouble, my hope in God.”

  A few minutes before eleven, the king, at the head of his staff, and closely followed by the crown prince and Prince Frederick Charles, passed quickly up the Linden towards the Brandenburg Gate. A long, rolling cheer marked his approach, which swelled into a louder and louder shout as he came nearer; from every window handkerchiefs were waved and Prussian colours fluttered, while in the street below every head was uncovered, and the exultant people, with all the strength of their hundred thousand voices, roared out their greeting to their sovereign. The king stopped for a few minutes in the Pariser Platz, and spoke to the wounded, who, still not recovered sufficiently to march in the ranks, were seated in front of the tribunes on either side, then went through the Brandenburg Gate, to place himself at the head of the troops and lead them into the town.

  The carriages of the ladies of the Royal family followed soon after, and met with an equally enthusiastic reception as the king himself, both as they went up toward the Brandenburg Gate and on their return after a short inspection of the troops outside the town. Soon the Count Wrangel, who again led the column, came down the avenue, and was greeted very warmly. After him the king’s staff followed in the same order as before, last of whom rode side by side the triumvirate to whom so much of Prussians success was due—Bismarck, Roon, and Moltke, today all three generals, for the prime minister was promoted to that rank the previous day.

  A considerable space separated the staff from the king himself, for he had to hear again today the address of the magistracy which he had already received on the former day, and to listen to the poetical welcome delivered by the chief of the detachment of fifty-one young ladies. When he came he was welcomed as loudly, or even more so, than before, more loudly than the day before, for the people were less fatigued by waiting, and were not annoyed by t
he dust which blew about among them yesterday. From the time the king came down the avenue with the crown prince and Prince Frederick Charles close behind him one incessant shout was maintained until the whole of the troops had passed, which sometimes rose very loud, sometimes slightly fell, but never died away entirely.

  The troops which marched in this day were the brigades of the Guards which did not come in before, and some detachments as representatives of line regiments. All were greeted loudly, especially the 2nd Dragoons of the Guard, who defeated the Austrian cavalry at Tischnowitz. To those, however, who had seen the same troops in the field, or directly after the campaign, their appearance was disappointing. The soldiers marched carelessly, and did not preserve either the even formation or the measured swinging stride which distinguishes the Prussian infantry on its usual parades. The day seemed to be regarded only as a holiday and festival, and much more attention was paid to friends in the houses, or alongside the avenue, than to the maintenance of that perfect order in the ranks which is generally so rigidly observed.

  After the troops had marched by the king, a portion of them were formed up in the square in front of the schloss around the altar. The king, the prince, the staff, and the generals came to the same place, and in the name of the army and nation yielded up their hearts in thanksgiving to Heaven, while hundreds of priests burst forth into the noblest of all songs of praise to the Lord of Hosts and the God of Victories.