The Collapse
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"Blood and blood everywhere! Brother will slay brother and nation nation, in a frenzy. Houses will be marked with crosses of blood for burning."
- Count István Széchenyi, during the opening stages of the Hungarian War of Independence
3 September 1848
Dissolution of the Hapsburg Empire
The Collapse
The end of the Austrian Hapsburg Empire in late 1848 ushered in an era of conflict unforeseen on the European continent since the Napoleonic period some thirty years earlier. The first such event, the Hungarian War of Independence, was a brief clash which took place during the final years of the dissolution of the empire. The war...
... As early as 29 August during the radicalization of the Magyars Palatine Stephen wrote to the Austrian garrison commander in the fortress of Komárom, upstream from Budapest, telling him to be ready to move on the capitol against the 'planned machinations on the unruly party...'
... Uneasy with Batthyány's government and the 'treachery' of Stephen the Magyar radicals planned a second insurgency. The standard-bearer of the revolutionary cause, the newspaper
March Fifteenth, along with the Society for Equality and their own journal, the
Radical Democrat, scheduled an enormous French-style banquet for 8 September. The radicals hoped to pressure the resignation of most governmental ministers, excluding only Kossuth and the Minister of the Interior Bertalan Szemere. (
1) However, Kossuth learned of the radical's plans, and on 2 September speaking before the parliament he was able to persuade the radicals to postpone the gathering. Kossuth argued that the Hungarian government was currently engaged in delicate negotiations in Vienna, trying hard to avert open war, and any insurrection would provide Stephen the pretext he needed to bring in imperial troops. If Kossuth had known the truth of the matter, perhaps his arguments would have gone the other way. As it was the brilliant Magyar orator was caught flat-footed when only two days later Emperor Ferdinand reinstated Jelačić to his former position as Ban of Dalmatia, Croatia and Slavonia; though this was merely a formal procedure as Jelačić had continued to serve in this position throughout the summer, with tactic Austrian support. (
2) The true shift in policy was when later the same day Ferdinand issued a manifesto formally declaring his opposition to Hungarian independence; 'a 'Hungarian Kingdom' separate from the Austrian Empire is a political impossibility.' The conservative court in Vienna continued to attempt to strengthen its footing with the imperial peasantry when on 7 September an imperial decree was issued resolving the question of serfdom throughout the empire. Landlords were to be compensated for dues that steamed from property ownership, but not for any obligations that implied personal servitude...
... The real hammer-blow to Hungarian independence, however, came when on 11 September, while Batthyány was still in Vienna arguing before the imperial court, Jelačić returned to Serbia and gathered his 50,000-strong army. Marching across the Drava river, Jelačić's troops launched an offensive against the Magyars; Hungary and Croatia, both nominally still a part of the Austrian Empire, were now at war. Even as Jelačić launched his country and himself down the road that would lead to their own independence, he sent word back to Vienna promising to deliver Hungary 'from the yoke of an incapable, odious, and rebel government.' Against Jelačić's forces the Hungarians had only some five thousand active troops, mostly raw recruits and National Guards commanded by Count Ádám Teleki, an aristocratic career soldier who was squeamish about taking the field against fellow officers who had sworn an oath to the Hapsburg Emperor. Suffice it to say that among the Magyar political elites, Teleki was not considered reliable. Of course, it also widely acknowledged that there was not much Teleki could possibly do in the face of overwhelming Hapsburg power. Therefore it was no surprise when on 15 September Teleki executed a tactical retreat to Budapest, declaring that was morally bound not to fight the invading Croats. Consequently the Hungarian parliament asked the Palatine Archduke Stephen to command Hungary's forces; however, under orders from Emperor Ferdinand not to resist Jelačić, Stephen refused the command. By the time the Palatine made his noncompliance known to the Diet, Jelačić was less than forty miles from Budapest. As citizens began digging entrenchments outside of the city, inside however Kossuth proposed that a parliamentary committee should be established to deal with confidential military matters, since the responsibility was too much for Batthyány alone, who still had no cabinet due to Ferdinand's rejection of all non-conservatives candidates in favor of only those with a pro-Hapsburg view. Over Batthyány's protest the Diet voted in favor within the hour; Kossuth and his radical allies quickly took control of the new six-man Committee of National Defense. By 23 September Stephen resigned as Palatine and returned to Vienna; historians widely consider that from this moment forward Hungary was a de-facto independent state...
... Kossuth spent the later weeks of September touring the central Hungarian plains, drawing volunteers to the new national army. When he returned to Budapest he claimed that some 15,000 (
3) recruits were preparing to join the capitol...
... On 24 September some 20,000 Austrian peasants celebrated the abolition of 'feudalism' throughout the empire. While the celebrations were largely orchestrated by the conservative Austrian nobility, it is important to note that the peasants were largely indifferent to, or opposed, the radicals and reformers throughout the empire; many of whom had originally fought for the peasant's new found rights. The next day in what was meant to be a conciliatory gesture Ferdinand appointed Count Lamberg Ferenc Fülöp (
4) as royal commissioner and commander of all forces in Hungary, and Baron Miklós Vay (
5) as Prime Minister. However, both of these appointments were illegal under the new Hungarian constitution, because they had not been previously approved by the Hungarian parliament. What was meant to ensure at least some measure of Hapsburg power in Hungary instead only drove the Magyars further away. Three days later the Hungarian Diet officially sent a resolution to Vienna rejecting the appointments of Lamberg and Vay, and declared its determination to uphold the constitution. Further, the new Committee of National Defense ordered the Hungarian forces to uphold only orders sent by the Committee itself or the Hungarian Diet. Lamberg, of course, had no idea of the events happening around him as he entered Hungary. Tragically, on 28 September as Lamberg's carriage was crossing the pontoon bridge over the Danube into Budapest a mob formed at the scene. Made up mostly of artisans, students and soldiers, the rabble dragged Lamberg out of his coach and stabbed him to death. Only the late arrival of the National Guards prevented the crowd from hanging his corpse. The Hungarian Diet, in an effort to avert war, condemned the death of Lamberg the next day, vowing to bring those responsible to justice. However unknown to them at the same time Hungarian forces made a stand against the Croatian invades at the village of Pákozd, only thirty miles from Budapest. There Jelačić's forces, though vastly outnumbering the Magyars, were routed by honvéd units aided by a startling uprising of the local peasantry against the invaders. Jelačić quickly asked for a three-day truce to withdraw his troops to Vienna, claiming doing so to support the Hapsburg monarchy against 'restive elements' in the imperial capitol. The Hungarians agreed, and 'escorted' his forces back to the border. Upon hearing the news that night the situation in Budapest dramatically changed. Boisterous with victory, the radicals converted a meeting of the Committee of National Defense into an emergency, provisional, government with Kossuth as its President. In a power-sharing scheme with the moderates the committee's membership was expanded from six to twelve, drawing in new members from the moderately liberal upper house of the Diet. As well, most of the radical leadership, including Petőfi and Vasvári, left the Committee to join the Honvéd units...
... As early as 30 September, General Anton von Puchner, the Austrian governor of Transylvania and commander of the imperial forces in the province, allowed Romanian nationalist to hold a second great Congress at Blaj. Over two weeks later, on 18 October, Puchner declared the government in Budapest illegal, and called on all 'loyal' Transylvanians to 'rise to the last man, one for all and all for one.' However the Székely, ethnic Magyars living in multicultural eastern Transylvania, declared their loyalty to Hungary, and some 30,000 of them including border regiments took up arms against Puchner. The general was saved though, as the Romanian nationalists backed his move in a bid to unite Transylvania with the Danubian principalities, though by this point it was unclear if the nationalist meant the Russian controlled Moldavians or the autonomous Wallachians within the Turkish Empire. Regardless, groups of Romanians peasants soon tracked down and slaughtered the Magyars fighting for an independent Hungary, as well as several pro-reform Saxon landlords and government officials. In retaliation the Székely and Honvéd chased down Romanian peasants throughout Transylvania, mass executing them; hundreds of villages were razed to the ground as both sides committed themselves into a spiral of increasingly brutal reprisals. By the end of 1849 some 60,000 (
6) people had been killed in what later historians consider to be the first modern instance of a
Verbunkos. (
7) Count Karl-Leiningen-Westerburg, a moderately liberal Saxon magnate with large estates in the Voivodina and the Banat who commanded a Hungarian unit that captured the city of Temesvár after skirmishing with a band of armed peasants, wrote that;
"Then began work which filled me with disgust. In a few moments the village was in flames at various points; and the men started pillaging and committed various offenses. (
8) We had the greatest difficulty in getting the flames under control. Yet these villainous Romanians deserved the punishment they got, for they are daily threatening the poor Hungarians who live among them. As I was slowly riding back out of the village, an officer brought thirty prisoners, truly deplorable wretches! As soon they reached me, the officer shouted to them in Romanian (so I was told afterwards) 'Down on your knees before the gentlemen! Kill the dust from the hoofs of his horse!' Disgusted at the sight, I cast a look of derision at the officer and rode away, leaving them to their fate."
Pavel, Teodor. "Transylvanian Saxons."
Encyclopedia of 1848 Revolutions. 2005 Ed.
The Germans of Transylvania, commonly called Saxons, settled in the 12th and 13th centuries eastern portions of the principality. They were given special royal privileges in the Andrean Diploma in 1224, and by 1848 the
Fundus Regius territory of the Saxons contained 271 villages, boroughs and towns populated by some 275,000 inhabitants (172,000 Saxons and 203,000 Romanians) ruled by an autonomous territorial-administrative entity called the
Universitats Saxonum, with its political, administrative and religious center at Hermannsdadt (Romanian: Sibiu). The majority of Saxons were freemen, though a number of Saxon serf villages existed. Some 40,000 Romanian serfs also existed in the region, which had to pay rent in kind and also give 100 days of forced labor a year. The Saxons tended to defend Hapsburg absolutism, and therefore news of the events from Vienna, Budapest, Prague, Milan and Venice was received with hostility and anxiety by the authorities in Hermannsdadt, and with hope and expectations by reformers and among the ordinary population. The abolition of censorship and the institution of freedom of the press and assembly gave birth to unprecedented political activity in the region. Apprehension over the possible accession of the Romanian population to the status of a political nation on the one hand and reaction to the efforts of Magyar liberals to unite Transylvania with Hungary on the other had a moderating effect on Saxon reform and at the same time strengthened the conservative attachment to the Habsburg court.
The Saxons faced a dilemma. Though many recognized the legitimacy of Romanian aspirations in Transylvania, they also feared for their future as a national-confessional entity in a modern, centralized, national state. The Saxons came to see the union of Transylvania with Hungary as the key, a Magyar programmatic step which both Saxon reformers and the Universitas rejected. They also feared the specter of violent battle in Transylvania as a result. The Romanian national assembly at Blaj (15-17 May 1848), which produced the Romanian revolutionary program, had deeply and favorably influenced the Saxons. Stephan Ludwig Roth, who was present on the Field of Liberty in Blaj, eulogized the event, and the Saxon press began to support recognition of the Romanian cause. An 18 May meeting of Saxon regional delegates met in Hermannsdadt, declared against the union, and sent the emperor another anti-unionist message. One of their arguments was that the opposition to union (Romanian and Saxon) constituted 71% of the Transylvanian population, while support for it (Hungarian and Szekler) was only 26%.
The Saxons started organizing and training guards units in the villages and towns and obtaining munitions for them. The youth were organized into a
Jugendbund led by Stephan Ludwig Roth and the student Theodor Fabini. A Romanian-Saxon conference was held in Hermannsdadt on 6 September which reaffirmed the illegality of the union and the authority of Hungarian legislation in Transylvania. Two more proclamations were sent to Vienna that same month, announcing the decision of the Saxons to defend themselves against the Magyars and requesting protection from the emperor. The Third Romanian assembly in Blaj in September, 1848, now called for an armed rising in Transylvania. A committee was set up composed of six Romanians (led by Simion Barnutiu) and three Saxons (C. Müller, P. Lange, Stephan Ludwig Roth) to organize the armed resistance. A Saxon
Jäger battalion was added to the Romanian forces that began to form. General Puchner declared a state of war and took over the leadership of the anti-Magyar forces gathering in Transylvania. In the violent battle which devastated Transylvania for the next ten months (November 1848-August 1849) the Saxons fought together with the Romanians under the imperial flag for the defense of the autonomy and liberties which were contested by the Hungarian government...
Final Showdown
... In response to Lamberg's death Emperor Ferdinand formally declared war between the Austrian empire and the Kingdom of Hungary on 3 October. However, the radicals within Vienna supported the Magyars for a multitude of reasons. Without Hungary and with Italy increasingly looking to achieve its own independence there would be no great territorial blocs left to prevent Austria from joining the new Germany. As well a Magyar victory would be a great defeat for the Hapsburg monarchy, and with royal power depleted the radicals would once again hold the reins of power as they had following the imperial flight to Innsbruck. Therefore within hours of the imperial proclamation of war Viennese workers and radical units of the National Guards gathered at the University of Vienna's commons to declare their unconditional support to the Academic Legion. The city swiftly entered another phase of insurrection, with workers attacking factories, while Austrians wearing the Hapsburg black-gold cockades were beaten in the streets. Three days later, in the midst of mounting insurgent behavior, Latour ordered troops to board trains for the Hungarian frontier in the small hours of the morning on 6 October, many of whom refused. Workers, students and National Guards swiftly moved to block the trains from leaving the capitol. In the Gumpendorf, a working class district, a grenadier battalion mutinied and joined the insurrection, demolishing the barracks behind them. Latour called out more troops, which forced the grenadiers into a running action to retreat towards the radical-held railway station. However, National Guard units repeatedly intervened on the grenadiers’ behalf, while the retreating troops themselves use their unit drums to rally the people in their support. Soon a huge crowd had gathered at the railway depot, where workers proceeded to tear up the rails to prevent imperial soldiers from leaving, or reinforcements from entering the city swiftly. When officers of the units giving chase prodded their reluctant troops across the Tabor Bridge towards the first station though they found that several arches had been torn apart and the lumber and masonry used to build a massive barricade. General Hugo von Bredy, the imperial commander in Vienna, attempted to use sappers to destroy the obstacle and restore the bridge; however workers at the barricade took the opportunity to seize one of the army's unguarded cannon. As the insurgents dragged off the gun Bredy ordered his troops to open fire; the Academic Legion returned fire, and Bredy himself was shot dead in the cross-fire, his body falling from his force. However in those same brief moments thirty mutinied grenadiers were cut down in the deadly exchange. The insurgents had numerical superiority, and with their commanding officer dead the imperials were quickly forced to fall back. The insurgents quickly marched further into the city with their newly captured cannons...
... Elsewhere in the city moderate units of the National Guard barricade themselves inside Saint Stephen's Cathedral until radical units of the Guard battered down the doors, stormed the building, and executed the moderate officers. The survivors were given a choice; join the radicals, or meet the same fate...
... Throughout the morning of 6 October across the city imperial standard troops were attacked by both the citizenry and radicalized units of the National Guard. Barricades sprouted up throughout the imperial capitol 'like mushrooms on a fallen timber,' raised by both conservative elements and radicals alike. While Latour was protected by a cordon of soldiers outside the War Minister, the parliament was not, and looking to stop the bloodshed the deputies ordered the military to pull back. Unfortunately for the War Minister as soon as the soldiers left a crowd broke into his ministry with axes, pikes, iron bars, and makeshift weapons from the insurgent-held factories shouting, above all else; 'Where is Latour? He must die!' A deputation from the Reichstag rushed to the ministry to attempt to save Latour, but the mob found him first; cowering in the building's attic. Dragged into the streets, before thousands of witnesses, conservatives, radicals, and innocent bystanders alike, the horde beat the man to death. His head was caved in with a hammer, and then being cleaved off by a saber, before a bayonet sliced into the corpse's heart. His body was then set upon until it was unrecognizable; at which point it was dragged to the square of Am Hof, hung from a lamp post, and set ablaze. With this moral blow, the insurgents swiftly captured the city's arsenal. Though the imperial troops guarding it inflicted terrible casualties using grapeshot, the insurgent struck back by bombarding the building with Congreve rockets. As the arsenal burned the royalists fled, allowing thousands of muskets to be captured by the insurgents before the roof collapsed.
At this point the imperial government completely abandoned Vienna, pulling all of its troops outside of the city. The victorious radicals issued their demands as the sun set, including a reversal of the war against Hungary, the deposition of Ban Jelačić, and the appointment of a 'new and popular government' However, the Emperor, theoretically the only person with the power to make such reforms, was in too busy for such an action in flight to the fortress of Olmütz with the imperial family under heavy military escort. By the end of the night most of the remaining government ministers had joined him, including figures such as Hübner, recently returned from Italy. Importantly the moderate members of the Reichstag also fled Vienna, leaving it entirely in the radical's hands. Perhaps most importantly though, the entire Czech delegation left, returning to Prague a few days later. This left the Austrian Reichstag dominated not only by radicals, but also by Germans and pro-German supporters. Before the end of the night this rump parliament created a permanent emergency committee to deal with the crisis; in theory it only answered to the Reichstag but its powers included the right to issue orders freely. In the imperial power vacuum, the radicals had simply created another position around which their demanded reforms could be initiated.
Victorious celebrations after the Battle for Vienna
The next morning Hungarian forces under General János Móga, but relying on the brilliant tactician Artúr Görgey, (
9) engaged a Croat army at Orzora. By this point in the war the tables had turned, and Jelačić's forces were much weaker than the Hungarians, mostly because as his Croats had looted and pillaged across the countryside to feed their bellies and their greed the Magyar peasantry had once again risen up to attack his army's rear, weakening and slowing the Croats. Therefore while it was a surprise to the Magyars, after just a few hours at Orzora the famished and bedraggled Croats retreated from the field...
... On 8 October Emperor Ferdinand authorized a build-up of troops outside of Vienna, to add to the already 12,000-strong garrison under Count Maximilen Auersperg camped just outside the city's walls. Auersperg quickly sent a courier to Jelačić, pleading for assistance; this was the first word Jelačić had received of the uprising, and retrospectively justified his retreat, an action he had spent the last several days deeply troubled by how he was to present the news to the imperial court. Jelačić immediately detached a small section of his army which moved rapidly to the imperial capitol, with the main force coming up behind. As dawn broke on the morning of 9 October Jelačić's main force was just two hours marching time away from the imperial capitol; however a Hungarian legion was in hot pursuit; time was of the essence. The Hungarian parliament sent word to Vienna offering military assistance; however the rump parliament within still claimed to be the legal, constitutional, and loyal authority of the Hapsburg Empire. While the radicals had gained everything that they had originally sought, replying positively to the Magyar offer would mean accepting the fact that they were in rebellion against the Hapsburg monarchy. While most of the deputies were astute enough to recognize they could not depend on the Emperor's good will any longer, no one within the city was willing to take the poisoned chalice. The parliament and city council spent much of the day passing the question of Magyar assistance back and forth to each other. However, the students, bourgeois and workers who had actually taken control of the capitol sent a deputation to the Hungarian forces; unfortunately the Magyars would only respond to a request from the legal authorities within the city. The Hungarians believed, right so, that they would have to explain their actions to the rest of the European community if they made any move to export their revolutionary war of independence beyond their own borders. Meanwhile in a rather foolish move the rump parliament sent a delegation of radical Reichstag deputies to the Emperor at Olmütz, asking him to withdraw his troops from around Vienna. Ferdinand soundly rejected the offer, and took the delegation prisoner. One week later Ferdinand further gave the commanded of the Vienna siege to Windischgrätz, the general who had successfully put down the Prague Uprising, giving him full powers to restore imperial authority. Within days Windischgrätz had issued orders to 30,000 of his most loyal troops in Bohemia to march double-time to Vienna...
... The Austrian struggles were not unnoticed throughout the rest of Germany. On 10 October two delegates arrived in the Olmütz from Frankfurt, sent by Archduke John, to mediate between the court and Vienna. However the imperial government was not determined to crush the revolution, and Ferdinand along with all the members of the Staatskonferenz refused to meet with the deputies. Seven days later Robert Blum (
10) and Julius Fröbel (
11) arrived in Vienna from Frankfurt as a two-man delegation from the German radicals to offer their support for the Viennese revolution and to discuss Austria's new place within Germany...
... On 20 October in a proclamation written by Hübner Emperor Ferdinand warned that measures would be taken to curb the press, freedom of assemblies and the militias in the fact of the continuing problems Austria was facing after flirting with the 'liberal experiment.' Alarmed by this move the Czech deputies at Olmütz persuaded Ferdinand to offer reassurances that a constitution would still be drafted. However, two days later Ferdinand ordered the Austrian parliament to relocate from Vienna to Kremsier in Moravia by 15 November - an order which the rump parliament in Vienna predictably rejected within hours of receiving. By the morning of 23 October Windischgrätz's and Jelačić's forces surrounded the city, some 70,000 strong; Vienna was now completely cut off from the outside world, including its water and gas lines, which Windischgrätz ordered cut. The Marshal issued his 'simple' demand to the radicals; that the city surrender within 48 hours. The insurrectionaries responded by sortieing against the imperial outposts around the city in throughout the night, probing for a weak point. Although the Magyar forces are only twenty-eight miles away on the Hungarian-Austrian border, they continued to sit still and wait for a formal request from the rump Austrian parliament, with Kossuth expressing the Hungarian position that 'We are not entitled to force out air upon people who do not express their willingness to accept it.' On the morning of 26 October Windischgrätz kept his promise and ordered his troops to take Vienna. While the revolutionary outposts outside the city walls were taken easily, importantly with the insurgent-captured gun batteries dug into the Schmeltz cemetery captured after a brief bombardment by Hapsburg artillery, the city itself is a much harder nut to crack. Jelačić led the main assault, and after twelve-hours of constant street-to-street fighting had only managed to advance into the city's eastern suburbs. Baron Pillersdorf, now a member of the Austrian parliament, asked Windischgrätz to offer some concessions in return for a Viennese surrender. When he was rebuffed Pillersdorf remarked 'Well then, may the responsibility of all the blood shed fall on your head,' to which Windischgrätz gravely replied 'I accept the responsibility.'
However as early as 27 October an undeclared cease-fire was in-affect as fighting came to a lull in the early morning hours. That day (
12) Kossuth joined the Hungarian forces along the border; with him came 15,000 volunteers, bringing the total force up to 31,000 men. That night every battery around the city opened fire on the insurrectionary entrenchments still manned outside. At nine o'clock Windischgrätz himself led his troops from Schönbrunn and broke into the industrial suburbs, while Jelačić consolidated his grip on the eastern suburbs. For this Jelačić used his elite troops, the Montenegrins, who, wrapped in their traditional fiery red cloaks and carrying curbed blades clamped in their mouths, clambered over the insurgent's fortifications in the dead of the night, clearing or capturing thirty barricades in hand-to-hand fighting. By the middle of the night imperial troops stood in front of the walls of the inner city, while the suburbs were mostly ashes and rubble. Seeing the flames of Vienna in the night sky Kossuth decided that the time for legalities was over; 'Vienna still stands. The courage of her inhabitants, our most faithful allies against the attacks of the reactionaries, is still unshaken.' The Hungarian army quickly and non-too-quietly crossed into Austria. Within the imperial capitol, the revolutionary General Wenzel Messenhauser, commanded of the remaining Viennese National Guard, who had spent the past two days uninterrupted in the cathedral tower of Saint Stephen's directing his forces, spotted the approach of the Magyars by their torch lights, and was the among the first to hear their cannon open up in the rear of the imperial forces outside the city. Repudiating the city council's peace overtures the Viennese radicals, National Guards, Academic Legion and workers sortied against the imperial forces outside the inner-city walls. In response to this new threat, Windischgrätz detached Jelačić and Auersperg with 28,000 men to meet the Hungarians.
As the Austrians hurried to meet the Magyar threat, they rushed straight into an ambush just a few miles outside of the city. The lead Hapsburg forces marched straight into the mouths of twenty Hungarian cannon, which were hidden behind the heights of Schwechat. (
13) Auersperg was killed in the slaughter, and after the fact Jelačić wrote that, as the Hungarian artillery opened fire it was 'truly murderous at so short a distance.' Within an hour the Hapsburgs were routed and fell back to Vienna. Joyous Viennese revolutionaries saw and heard the massacre as it happened from the towers of the inner-city; over half a dozen sorties swiftly occurred over the next several hour as the Viennese desperately attempted to keep the reactionary forces out of the city before the Magyars could arrive in time. Windischgrätz was no fool, and knew that against the Magyars with the insurgent Viennese behind his back his forces could not win in a fair stand-up fight. As well with the only road large enough to transport his host effectively blocked by the rapidly approaching Magyars, he knew it was only a matter of time before the last large Hapsburg force between the capitol and imperial court was crushed between the revolutionary anvil and the Hungarian hammer. With the only two options left before either to capture the city and fortify in before the Magyars arrived or to surrender and wring some concessions out of the radicals, just as the Magyar forces began to close on him Windischgrätz sent out the white flag of peace and offered a truce on two simple conditions; one, that the Hapsburg monarchy be retained in the peace settlement, and two, that he and his forces were not to be harmed. Kossuth, and the radicals within Vienna, quickly accepted...
... By as early as 12 November the imperial court had surrendered to the radicals, both German and Magyar. While several historians have argued that the imperial family could have taken flight once more and rallied further forces to their aid, this is generally disregarded as a well-wishing theory of Hapsburg-enthusiasts. The Hapsburg court had already spent most of the 1848 period putting down various uprisings throughout its empire, meaning there was no safe haven to turn to, perhaps save Jelačić's Banship, however this was soon revealed to be a false Eden when in early 1849...
... As well, the imperial court also faced the mounting pressure of German unification. The court worried that with such a loss as had been suffered at Vienna, it was only a matter of time before German freischärlers began to storm south from the northern states; worriedly even the strong imperial ally-vassal of Bavaria showed signs of such restlessness...
... Finally it should be remembered that these events did not take place within a vacuum. The court at Olmütz worried that if the Hapsburg civil war continued, as it was being taken to refer to already, that surrounding powers such as France, Russia, or the dreaded Turk might intervene. Russia in particular had...
Dawles, Richard. Trans. William McKnight.
The Victorian Era. Brussels: Writer's Guild, 2007.
After the revolutionary fighting and unrest in Frankfurt and other German capitols throughout the summer and early autumn came the largest popular uprising in Germany in Vienna on 6 October 1848. The rebellion began when Austrian soldiers refused to fight against the revolutionary government in Budapest. Within a few hours a movement arose in the politically charged Hapsburg capitol, in particular among proletariat workers, skilled craftsmen, students, and the petite bourgeoisie. The rage of the people focused swiftly on the government quarters and on the counter-revolutionary ('reactionary') troops which people feared would advance on progressive forces in the city. Thus the ministry of war was stormed, and as a result of this assault the Minister Theodor von Latour was killed. By the end of the day the government, with the exception of the Minister of Finance Philipp von Krauss, and the emperor had fled to the fortress of Olmütz. These events brought about a risky confrontation. In Vienna the city council took power and drew on the revolutionary workers, burghers and students for support. The Viennese revolutionaries declared their solidarity with the Hungarian people, but ultimately underestimated the important of the Slav's struggle...
... The government camp rallied around the military and the aristocracy who supported tough measures against the revolution and the full restoration of Hapsburg absolutism, including Hapsburg power in the resurgent Reich. On 23 October a force of 70,000 imperial soldiers commanded by Field Marshal Alfred von Windischgrätz and Croatian Ban Josip Jelačić completed the siege of Vienna. The defenders of the capitol were able to muster an armed force of thirty to forty thousand armed men (National Guard, Academic Legion, and revolutionary corps) under the command of General Wenzel Messenhauser, but many of the fighters were poorly armed or untrained. The insurgents only chance was reinforcement from outside; i.e. military relief from Hungary. The defenders put up courageous resistance in their almost hopeless struggle, especially after their faith was aroused by the approach of the Hungarian army. With the defeat of the Austrians by this Magyar force the Hapsburg's last hope vanished. The number of army casualties in Vienna during the October Revolution was less than two hundred, while over three thousand revolutionaries gave up their lives...
German nationalist Robert Blum on the Viennese barricades
... Prince Felix zu Schwarzenberg, Windischgrätz's brother-in-law whose sister had been killed in the Prague Uprising, was asked to form a new government. Though tainted by his familial connections to Windischgrätz, Schwarzenberg was a moderate that believed in the Hapsburg tradition, but believed above all in reform. In his acceptance letter Schwarzenberg wrote that 'Democracy must be tamed and its excesses must be challenged but in the absence of other means of help that can only be done by the government itself.' His cabinet included other moderate or liberal, pro-German nobles, including Franz Stadion, Alexander Bach, and Philipp von Krauss. Notably none of the new appointments included reactionaries who had fought for the Hapsburg throne, either in Bohemia, Italy, Hungary, or the imperial capitol, and many of them, Stadion in particular, were remarked upon for their survival due to giving into the
liberal demands at first, before the radicalization of the reform movement...
... Over the next few weeks the rump parliament in Vienna incorporated the liberal and few conservatives deputies who had fled the capitol and traveled to Kremsier; however the true authority in the empire was by this time wrapped in a complex and delicate power-sharing arrangement in Vienna between the radical workers, bourgeoisie, Academic Legion, National Guard, and the radical delegates who had stayed at the Reichstag in Vienna. Over the next several months the parliament worked to produce a liberal constitution, though the early drafts largely had to be rewritten following Austria's ascension to...
... The fighting did not stop throughout the Hapsburg Empire with the surrender of the Hapsburg throne however. On 30 November, Puchner, disregarding early reports of the events of Vienna as Magyar lies, led a force of imperial troops and Romanian volunteers into Hungary proper; however they were swiftly checked by a hastily assembled Hungarian force under Polish exile General Józef Bem, who had fought at Vienna in October. On a one-day long battle Puchner's forces were devastated and by early December Bem led a conquering invasion of Transylvania...
... As well in early January of 1849 the Hungarian forces turned their attention south towards Jelačić, and…
... On 2 December, with a heavy heart, Schwarzenberg persuaded the ill and weakening Emperor Ferdinand to abdicate in order to break the liberal promises he had made earlier in the year so that the new regime could begin with a clean slate. The crown therefore passed to Ferdinand's younger brother, Archduke Franz Karl. (
14) Under the Vienna Accord, signed by all parties in mid-1849, the Hapsburg Empire was transformed into a confederation; Austria, Bohemia, Illryia, Hungary all became separate but equal Kingdoms within the loose imperial framework, while much of the smaller imperial territories were absorbed in one way or another by these four Kingdoms. Galicia-Lodomeria, Bukovina, Silesia, and Transylvania fell to the Hungarians, while Carinthia, Salzburg, Styria, Tyrol, Vorarlberg joined the Austrian Archduchy proper; Moravia was fused into Bohemia, and finally Carniola, Gorizia-Gradisca, Istria, Trieste were incorporated into Illyria. For this reason after the 1848 period the Hapsburg confederation is sometimes referred to as the 'Quadruple Monarchy.' Notably in the territorial shuffle while Hungary also officially gained the Voivodeship, the Banat and the former Dalmatia, Croatia and Slavonia were merged into a new Banship, a military province directly controlled by the official liaison of the Hapsburg monarchy; Jelačić. The Magyars were initially opposed to such a move, especially considering the on-going war between the Hungarians and the Croats, however the maneuvers of the Turks along the border throughout the year, and in Wallachia in 1848, finally convinced the Hungarian Diet to agree after one final...
... under the Accord, Franz Karl became Archduke Karl V of Austria and the Hapsburg Empire, while his eldest sons became Kings of the realms by age and importance, though nominally they were all subservient to their father the Archduke. Therefore his eldest son Franz Joseph became King of Bohemia, the middle son Maximilian became King of Hungary, and the youngest son Karl Ludwig became King of Illyria...
... Obviously of course, the Hapsburg Kingdom of Lombardy-Venetia was explicitly
not mentioned in the document, due to that region's...
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1) Born of a poor noble family, Szemere was originally a poet before becoming involved in the reform movement in the 1830s. After traveling abroad throughout the European capitols in 1835, Szemere published his diary
Utazás külföldön ('Traveling abroad'), in which Szemere revealed how backward Hungary was in relation to the rest of Europe, as well as other Europeans prejudices about Magyars. The journal made Szemere an over-night celebrity, and, previously having studied law, Szemere became a judge in Borsod county between 1841 and 1847, before being elected to the Hungarian Diet in early 1848.
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2) See
Chapter #10 for details.
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3) Roughly three thousand more volunteers than IOTL.
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4) Also known by his Austrian name of 'Count Franz Philipp von Lamberg,' Lamberg had served in the War of the Six Coalition, and became a career military man. By 1842 he was a
Feldmarschallleutnant, and in 1847 had been a member of the Magyar reform diet. Though a conservative, he was no reactionary. As an upper member of the Hungarian nobility, Lamberg was trusted as both a loyal Magyar and Hapsburg supporter.
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5) Vay had been previously appointed as Palatine Stephen's plenipotentiary commissioner in Transylvania in June. Though liberals rejected his conservative stance, many respected him for his 'upright and straightforward character.'
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6) 1.5x times more than OTL; the Hungarians, the Saxons (Germans) and the Romanians are much more politically united, radicalized, nationalized, and organized than OTL. The entire Balkan area is just as much a potential powder-keg ITTL as it was IOTL.
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7)
AKA a genocide, or ethnic cleansing. IOTL the word 'genocide' was coined in 1944 by a Jewish survivor of the Holocaust, and come from the Greek word
génos ('race') and the Latin
-cidium ('cutting') via French -cide. ITTL the equivalent term is Verbunkos, an early 18th century Magyar word culturally transposed from the German
Werbung, or
Werben, meaning to recruit, and initially referred to the traditional music played during such an occasion. ITTL the phrase means to 'recruit via terror,' and could possibly be more aptly compared to OTL's civil wars in parts of Africa and Southeast Asia where factions will recruit new 'volunteers' from among the survivors of their destruction. Broadly ITTL any complex ethnic, cultural or religious conflict would be referred to as a Verbunkos.
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8) Read: rape, random killings, blackmail, theft, etc. You should get the picture.
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9) Born of a Magyar noble, Görgey entered the Bodyguard of Hungarian Nobles at Vienna in 1837, where he combined military service with courses at the university. In 1845 he left the army to study chemistry at the University of Prague and manage the family estates in Hungary after his father's death. Görgey was one of the few Hungarian nobles to call for independence immediately during the start of the 1848 period, and after entering the Honvéd Army quickly become a major and commandant of the National Guard units north of the Tisza River. IOTL after the failure of Hungarian independence Görgey was remarkably not court-martialed, but did spend several years kept in confinement at Klagenfurt. He spent the least years of his life as a railway engineer, and it was only after his death that his important role during the war and unique natural military talent was widely acknowledged throughout what had then become Austria-Hungary.
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10) Seen throughout
Chapter #5, Blum was the leader of the nascent German democrats, a movement which sought to bring 'all' the people of Germany together, including the outcast Jews, Poles, etc. Born in poverty in Cologne, the son of a failed theologian, Blum worked as a craftsman through several trades before moving to Berlin to continue his, admittedly lackluster, education. After serving his required time in the Prussian army Blum returned to Cologne, where he entered the republican movement, contributing to the liberal
Zeitung für die elegante Welt ('Newspaper for the elegant world'). During an abortive uprising in 1845 in Saxony Blum dissuaded the armed rebels from storming the barracks of Leipzig, ultimately peacefully winding down the entire insurrection, a feat which resulted in him later being elected a representative in Leipzig's city council. IOTL Blum was arrested during the Vienna siege and executed by the Austrians; becoming a martyr for the German liberal movement.
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11) Nephew of the founder of the kindergarten system (of which I plan to write of later), Fröbel had been born within the Prussian Province of Saxony, and later he become a naturalized Swiss citizen in 1833. Though he moved to Dresden in 1846, just year ahead of the ITTL Swiss Civil War, Fröbel had been apart of the Free Democratic Party, and editor of their newspaper
Der schweizerische Republikaner ('The Swiss Republican'), during which time he issued several scientific works and political pamphlets, many of which were heavily censored or suppressed throughout the German states.
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12) IOTL Kossuth arrived one day later, on 28 October, which had grave consequences for both the Magyars and the Viennese. ITTL though the Hungarian military position is stronger, and so Kossuth feels more comfortable joining the honvéd army earlier.
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13) This is, very roughly, the opposite of IOTL. Due to the earlier movement of the Hungarians they are able to position themselves much more effectively.
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14) IOTL Ferdinand did abdicate, however Franz Karl's wife Sophie was able to persuade her husband to renounce his claim and the throne passed to Karl's eldest son, the eighteen-year old Franz Joseph. ITTL though with Hapsburg authority suffering such a serious blow Franz Karl accepts the responsibility of rebuilding the House's base of power.