WI 1866 Kingdom of Hannover

Anderman

Donor
During the german War of 1866 the Kingdom of Hannover is on the austrian/German Confederation side. What if the Kingdom stays neutral or fights with Prussia ?
 
It doesn't get annexed into Prussia itself, and likely will join Germany. The implication is that the, well, Hanoverian Hanovers will keep their throne.
 
It doesn't get annexed into Prussia itself, and likely will join Germany. The implication is that the, well, Hanoverian Hanovers will keep their throne.

From what I gathered Hannover had already stayed aloof by not joining the Zollverein so they would try and stay as independent as possible... that's why they sided with Austria so if they stayed neutral/ sided with Prussia they better have had a pretty good deal (that was written down) from Mr Otto von Bismarck.
 
Bismarck found the Guelph funds- the sequestered estate of the Hanoverian monarchs- extremely useful in bribing individuals from journalists to the King of Bavaria. With a pro-Prussian Hanover, domestic politics could be a lot more awkward. Incidentally, an interesting POD to establish this comes from Bismarck's autobiography:

"In September 1853 the prospect was open to me of becoming a minister of state in Hanover. Just after I had gone through a cure at the baths at Norderney, I was sounded by Bacmeister, who had just retired from Scheie's ministry, as to whether I would be a minister of King George. I expressed myself to the effect that I could only serve in the foreign policy of Hanover if the King was willing to go completely hand in hand with Prussia. I could not take off my ' Prussianity ' like a coat..."
 

Anderman

Donor
Domestic politics would be interesting (in a chinese sense) indeed. In the Bundesrat of North German Confederat or the empire the votes per state were made up after the size of the state. So after annexing the states in 1866 Prussia got more votes without Hannover it has 4 votes less.
 
Top