War in Germany 2018 Lecture 7 Prussia and the overthrow of Napoleon.

1. War in Germany 2018 Lecture 7 Prussia and the overthrow of Napoleon. Adam Tooze Columbia University 2018

2. Gerhard Johann David Waitz von Scharnhorst (12 November 1755 – 28 June 1813), Enlightenment military man: Hanoverian officer who transferred to artillery and founded military journals 1801 commissioned in the Prussian army and began teaching at the Prussian Military Academy. Fought the losing battles of the coalition forces v. the revolutionary French and in 1795 produced an essay: "The Origins of the Good Fortune of the French in the Revolutionary War" Scharnhorst takes up Montesquieu’s challenge: “There are general causes, whether moral or physical, that operate in every monarchy, raising it up, maintaining it in power, or dashing it to the ground; all seeming ‘accidents’ are the result of deeper causes, and if the chance of a battle, that is to say of a particular cause, has been known to ruin a state, there has always been a general cause that meant that that state had to perish in a single battle.” Montesquieu, Considérations sur les causes de la grandeur des Romains et de leur décadence (1734)

3. Ability of French revolutionary army to fight off its enemies 1792-1795 was not down to luck! Scharnhorst: ‘the reasons for the defeat of the allied powers must be deeply enmeshed in their internal conditions and in those of the French nation’.” • Scharnhorst’s list of reasons that the French revolutionary armies were able to survive the onslaught directed against them: • interior lines • their superior numbers • Use of swarms of light infantrymen to shield the massed columns. • Unified political and military command • Coherent and aggressive strategy serving national interest not a dynasty • Speed and energy • their ruthless acceptance of unlimited casualties; • nihilistic do-or-die, all-or-nothing approach–‘the struggle was indeed too unequal: one side had everything to lose, the other little’.

4. Furthermore, for Scharnhorst: ‘The terrible position the French found themselves in, surrounded by several armies which sought (or so they believed) to enslave them and condemn to eternal misery, inspired the soldier with courage, induced the citizen to make voluntary sacrifices, gathered supplies for the army and attracted the civilian population to the colours.’ ‘The French nation has always deemed itself to be the only people which is enlightened, intelligent, free and happy, despising all other nations as uncultured, bestial and wretched.’ defeat was not an option

5. The response of German intellectuals to French victory was ambiguous e.g. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel 1770 – November 14, 1831: Celebrated 14th July 1798-1802 essay: “German constitution” - Germany under Holy Roman Empire is “no longer a state” It lacked everything necessary to secured: ‘the peace of states, the security of governments, and the liberty of peoples.’ Defeat of Prussia in 1806 no surprise: “But what [sort of] life and what aridity prevails in …Prussia, will strike anyone who enters its first village or observes its complete lack of scientific and artistic genius, and who does not measure its strength in terms of the transient energy which a solitary genius (Frederick the Great) was able to extract from it.”

6. Hegel on Napoleon ‘I adhere to the view that the world spirit has given the age marching orders. The world spirit, this essential [power], proceeds irresistibly like a closely drawn armored phalanx advancing with imperceptible movement, much as the sun through thick and thin.’ Hegel to Niethammer 5 July 1816 How Harper’s Magazine in 1895 imagined Hegel’s encounter with Napoleon at Jena following Prussia devastating defeat

7. Perhaps Hegel’s stance has something to do with his origins in what became the Kingdom of Württemberg created in 1805 Württemberg expands and consolidates thanks to French favor between 1805 and 1813 from fragmented mess of 9.500 square km and population of 650.000 to 19.508 km square and 1.38 m population Pre-Napoleonic Württemberg König Friedrich von Württemberg nach einem Gemälde von Johann Baptist Seele 1806

8. Bavaria also benefited from Napoleon’s overthrow of existing order in Germany. It was raised to status of Kingdom in 1805 Maximilian von Montgelas 1759-1838: Savoyard, French-speaking and French-educated modernizing chief minister of Bavaria until 1817. Dismissed as too pro-Napoleon.

9. Germany reconfigured, Poland restored and connected to Saxony – Europe under the Bonaparte dynasty – Prussia encircled, occupied and isolated

10. Leading figures of the Prussian crisis and reform period after 1806 are recruited from all over Germany Military Reformers Civilian Reformers PM Hardenberg, Hanover Scharnhorst, Hanover PM Stein, Nassau Gneisenau, Saxony Boyen, East Prussia Leaders of an educated service class, generally from gentry but not defined by aristocratic standing in Prussia.

11. Heinrich Friedrich Karl Reichsfreiherr vom und zum Stein (25 October 1757 – 29 June 1831) Stein Nassau Memorandum June 1807: “The nation, despite all of its flaws, possesses a noble pride, energy, valour, and willingness to sacrifice itself for fatherland and freedom … the government’s purpose, in establishing new institutions and in forming a constitution, will be to guide and direct these energies and convictions, not to suppress them … If the nation is to be ennobled, the oppressed part of it must be given freedom, independence and property, and this oppressed part must be granted the protection of the laws.”

12. Overcoming separation of citizens from the Frederician state, overcoming the lifelessness and aridity of Prussian state = overriding preoccupation of “Prussian reformers”

13. On October 9th1807, Stein issued a decree stating that as of November 11th, 1810, after the harvest was safely in, all forms of serfdom would be abolished. There would be “only free people” throughout the Prussian realm, free to pursue economic pursuits and equal before the law. City burghers were given the right to buy landed estates, while nobles were free to pursue bourgeois professions.

14. The Military Reform Commission featuring Gneisenau and Scharnhorst at centre and Stein to right. Amongst their staff was the ambitious young officer Carl von Clausewitz, only 26 in 1806. Karl Röchling c. 1900 Hardenberg

15. 1808, having discovered the Prussian plans for rebellion, the French force the resignation of Stein as PM and tighten their grip on Prussia by imposing tougher terms. August Wilhelm Antonius Graf Neidhardt von Gneisenau (27 October 1760 – 23 August 1831) Grew up in poverty. Works his way through College, commissioned by Frederick the Great. In 1808 Gneisenau called upon the Prussian monarch to launch an all-out campaign of national resistance following Spanish example. Accept destruction of state so as to continue national resistance. Any officer or aristocrat found to be abetting French rule would be stripped of his hereditary rank and privileges. Any peasant willing to resist would not only be freed, but also endowed with ownership of their land. = national revolution through war.

16. In 1809 it is not Prussia but Austria that leads resistance to France. In June 1808 Austria established a popular Landwehr militia on French model. In April 1809 it declares war on France and appeals for a general German rally. If it had succeeded German future might have looked very different. Uprisings in Prussia (May 1809) and Tyrol (April-November 1809) But French with their Bavarian and Saxon-Polish allies fight back  Austrians crushed, Vienna occupied and now face huge reparations, occupation and forced dynastic marriage.

17. Forced to accept the permanence of French power, Stein’s replacement as the Prussian prime minister is the more conservative Hardenberg: He is an ardent disciple of Adam Smith In October and November 1810 introduced measures to equalize the tax burden between estates, reform the tariff and excises, create freedom and enterprise and secularize land belonging to the churches. Anyone can enter any trade so long as they pay the trade tax that goes into a fund to pay the French. Karl August von Hardenberg 1750-1822 Hanoverian aristocrat, civil servant and diplomat.

18. Continental System: Napoleon’s war against British trade is fought across Europe. Despite Hardenberg’s ambition, under pressure of the continental system, Prussian reforms had no real chance of working. Burning English cloth in Frankfurt 1810

19. Continental system hurts Prussia but it is powerless. What is decisive is that in December 1810 Tsar Alexander I takes Russia out of the continental system agreed at Tilsit in the summer of 1807. It is not that he favors trade with Britain, but that system is hurting Russia too badly and French are not permitting trade with neutrals. Further causes of Franco-Russian tension: Polish expansion under French protection. Installation of Bernadotte as king of Sweden.  By October 1811 Napoleon is gathering an invasion force along the borders of Poland and Prussia. It is only a matter of time before France attacks Russia.

20. in August 1811, facing imminence of attack on Russia that will decide future of Europe, Gneisenau again proposed to the Prussian king an organized plan for guerilla resistance placing North Germany under protection of British with aid from Russia An exchange in August 1811 between the King and Gneisenau sums up the stakes: To Gneisenau's contention that the people's love of its King and country and its hatred of the foreign oppressor would make a popular militia effective even against a trained foe, the king noted 'Good as poetry'. Gneisenau responded eloquently that no great things were possible in politics without poetry, that everything depended finally on unseen but deeply felt ties between a people and its state and sovereign, and that the security of the throne itself rested on poetry.

21. The poetry that Gneisenau has in mind is “Sturm und Drang” e.g. correspondence between Alexander von der Marwitz and Rahel Varnhagen leading salonnier in Berlin in June 1811

22. Instead of taking up cause of anti-Napoleonic resistance, February 24th 1812, Prussia surrendered again to Napoleon. To feed the French invasion of Russia 20,000 Prussians were conscripted. Huge economic levies would be raised on the ailing Prussian economy, In the fall of 1812 Gneisenau could declare, “at this juncture of great events and possibilities I am entirely indifferent to dynastic interest.” The cream of Prussia’s military reform movement, including Gneisenau and the young Clausewitz, formally resigned their commissions in the army of His Majesty the Prussian King and offered their services to the Tsar of Russia.

23. “Everyone knows, you should never invade Russia”. But In World War I, the German army, advancing in a series of measured bounds between 1914 and 1918, did in fact defeat Russia comprehensively. It occupied as much territory as in 1942, and but for its defeat in the West in 1918 would have presided over a wholesale rearrangement comparable only to the collapse of Soviet power in 1991.

24. Certainly there was never a more favorable situation for the invaders than in 1812. It was not just Napoleonic France, but Napoleonic Germany as well that invaded Russia. With Germany and France combined in a single block with a population of 50 million, Napoleon controlled a population barely smaller than the 54 million in the territory of the Tsar. Furthermore, the west Europeans were at a far higher level of economic development than the Russians.

25. Of Napoleon’s Grande Armée of 614000, only 60 percent were French. Of the rest the overwhelming majority were German. Prussia, Baden, Bavaria, Wuerttemberg, Westphalia, Saxony all contributed contingents of upwards of 20,000 each. The actual invasion force known as the army of twenty nations numbered 449,000 of whom only one third were french the rest being

26. The attrition of Napoleon’s main force during the extraordinary Russian campaign 1812 (Charles Joesph Minard, 1869) Overwhelmingly due to desertion and disease. Only major battle en route at Borodino on 7 September cost 28000 killed and wounded. Reach Moscow on 14 September.

27. Moscow in flames 15 September 1812 Shaded area of Moscow is burned

28. Napoleon’s army abandons Moscow on 18/19 October 1812 and begins retreat that amplifies the attrition

29. Disaster of Beresina river crosing 27-28 November 1812 reduced army to rabble.

30. The remnants of Grand Armée December 1812 Only 60,000-80,000 survivors make it back Of 30.000 men in Bavarian corps 68 were ready for duty 13 December 2012 Of 27,000 Westphalians 800 return. Of 15.800 Württembergern 387 return. Baden division of 7000 men consists of 40 survivors and 100 sick. Of Saxony cavalry brigade Thielmann 55 survive. Of 2.000 Mecklenburger 59 return

31. Now was the moment to act. But the risk of rising against Napoleon was very real. As one conservative councilor put it to the Prussian king, “I hear the cry: Germany, Germany … let us recall that we are Prussians, first and foremost.” General Hans von Yorck von Wartenburg takes his Prussian contingent over to the Russian side 30 December 1812 with the convention of Tauroggen. Tauroggen agreement negotiated by Germans on both sides. Diebitsch and von Clausewitz for the “Russian” side. The Prussians act without monarchical approval.

32. General Yorck mobilizes the gentry estates of East Prussia in Koenigsberg 5 February 1813. Call out a popular militia or Landwehr  by February 2/3 of Prussian Army have gone over to other side without their King. Otto Brausewetter (1835–1904) aus dem Jahre 1888

33. Waiting for the Russians: Russian cavalry reach Berlin 20 February 1813 Everything continue to depend on Russia. The Tsar had thrown Napoleon out of Russia. Would he seek peace or would he continue the campaign into Germany and France? If Russia did agree to drive west, how far would it go? Would Russia itself emerge as the new hegemon? Finally on February 27th-28th 1813 in the Treaty of Kalisch, the Prussian King had the promise from Russia he wanted. Russia and Prussia would wage war on France with a view to restoring Prussia to its pre-Tilsit borders, the expanded Prussian state before the disaster of 1806.

34. Appeal of Prussian king to his people 20 March 1813 There is no need to explain to my trusty people any more than to Germans the war that is now beginning. .... we were defeated by France’s dominant power. The peace that tore away half my people gave us no blessing; it struck us deeper wounds than the war. .... the country was pillaged and impoverished. Through strictly fulfilling its demands I hoped to provide relief to my people and to convince the French Emperor that it was to his advantage to allow Prussia its independence. But my purest intentions were thwarted by ambition and lack of trust ... The moment has come in which all deceptions about situation must cease. – Brandenburgers, Prussians, Silesians, Pommerians and Lithuanians! You know what you have suffered for the last seven years; You know what will be your sorry lot unless we end this struggle with honour. Remember past times, remember the Great Elector, Frederick the Great. Call to mind the goods which under their leadership our predecessors won in bloody struggle: freedom of conscience, honour, independence, trade, artistic diligence and science – Think of the great example of our powerful ally, the Russians; think of the Spanish and Portugese. Even smaller peoples have gone to battle more powerful enemies for these goods and have emerged victorious. Think of the heroic Swiss and Dutch. – Great sacrifices will be demanded of every estate ... You will more gladly make these sacrifices for fatherland and your native king than for a foreign ruler, who we have learned, would sacrifice your sons and your last strength to goals that are quite alien to you. ... (these are) holy posessions for which we must struggle and prevail if we are not to cease to be Prussians and Germans. It is the last decisive struggle which we must sustain for our existence, our independence our prosperity. There is no alternative but an honorable peace or a glorious demise. ... the Prussian and German cannot live without honour.“

35. “Unworthy is the nation that will not stake all on its honor” Anton von Werner 1870 The founding institution of the new nation, according to the national myth, was the Landwehr, the conscript army so long called for by the reformers. It was called up on March 17th 1813, beginning with the independent action of the east Prussian gentry, enrolling all men between the ages of 17 and 40 not already called to the colors of their regular line regiments.

36. Conscription was by lot, organized by local committees composed of all classes. The middle class volunteer rifle units, or so-called Freikorps, provided the officers. Unlike in France there was no possibility of buying yourself out of military service. The East Prussian Militia Takes to the Field in 1813 after Receiving a Blessing in the Church (1860-61, Gustav Graef).

37. Prussian Army August 1813 Total strength 245,000 men 110,000 regular line troops 113,000 in the conscript landwehr 11,000 in freikorps units plus 9000 volunteer Jaeger riflemen All Prussian. Army is twice the size of 1806. 10 % of male population of Prussia as opposed to 2 % in 1806. In April 1813, the radical Prime Minister Stein was placed in charge of the Central Administrative Department for all the allied powers to coordinate policy across Germany. Huge quantities of supplies are shipped into Baltic ports from Britain.

38. The central (Silesian army) commanded by Bluecher “nudges” Bernadotte into a wider encirclement Outdoing Napoleon. The allied encirclement of the French army at Leipzig

39. Fighting is brutal: The Battle of the Rifle Butts Hagelberg 27 August 1813

40. Völkerschlacht (Peoples’ battle) of Leipzig 15-18 October, 1813 The largest battle in world history. On the first day of the battle, the forces numbered 400,000 mounting to 600,000 at the climax of the struggle.

41. The drama of Leipzig Each side suffered more casualties than fought in many of the battles of the Thirty Years War: 50,000 on allied side, 75000 on Napoleon’s

42. Napoleon refused offers of peace and raised one last giant levy of 960,000 men of all ages. December 31st, 1813 allied forces crossed the Rhine into France. In February 1814, Napoleon inflicted a series of stinging defeats on the Allied armies as they closed on Paris. But he was now no longer able to devastate a vastly superior force. At Laon on March 9th and 10th, 1814 the humiliation of Prussia of 1806 was avenged. Marshall Bluecher leading the entire team of Prussian military reformers: Gneisenau, Kleist, Yorck, Buelow, Grolman and Boyen crushed a French army.

43. Russian infantry storming Montmartre 30 March 1814

44. Emperor Alexander I enters Paris 31 March 1814

45. Peace conference at Vienna begins  allied evacuation of France 1815  Napoleon returns from Elba. On March 13th, 1815 he was declared an outlaw by the combined British, Prussian, Austrian and Russian governments each committing 150,000 men to destroy his resurrected regime. On June 16th, he inflicted a serious, but not decisive defeat, on the Prussians at Ligny. On June 18th, 1815 in a desperate effort to finish off his enemies before they could join forces he attacked the British at Waterloo.

46. Wellington and Bluecher (with Gneisenau as his chief of staff) converge at Waterloo

48. Bluecher and Wellington contain Napoleon

49. It was a triumphant Prussian recovery. Quadriga returns to Berlin

50. They had given Prussia its “poetry” back. At the Outpost, Kersting, 1829 – glamourizing the Freikorps volunteers.