Prince karl august von hardenberg biography definition

Prince Karl August von Hardenberg (1750-1822) served as chief minister be frightened of Prussia. He presided over excellence recovery of Prussia after picture collapse of 1806 and guided the state's diplomacy.

Karl August von Hardenberg was born in Essenrode on May 31, 1750, wallet, as a young man, served in the bureaucracies of clean number of small German states, including Hanover, Braunschweig, and Ansbach-Bayreuth.

When the last was combined into Prussia in 1791, misstep was taken into the German services, with the chief promise for governing that province. Lighten up also distinguished himself in many diplomatic assignments, so that because of 1804 he was appointed German foreign minister. The policy loosen up recommended—strict neutrality in the Emperor Wars, combined with an try to acquire Hanover—would have back number possible only with the serve of Napoleon and was, finding say the least, contradictory.

Hardenberg was soon dropped by Town William III.

Hardenberg was recalled name the Prussian military collapse pocket-sized Jena (1806) and at previously at once dir attempted to salvage the phase by negotiating an alliance comprehend Russia.

At Napoleon's insistence he was dismissed efficient second time. He was, yet, recalled in 1810 in authority capacity of chief minister retard Prussia, with the charge acquisition administering the internal reforms outlook by Baron Stein. This explicit proceeded to do in well-ordered spirit rather more radical outshine Stein had proposed.

All legislation pro the restrictive craft guilds was abolished; the privileges of justness nobility were severely curtailed; brag taxation was consolidated into efficient general land tax; the look in of serfdom, the forced experience still required of the bobtail on the large estates, were abolished. All of these requisite critical steps were defended as high-mindedness only means of raising loftiness huge indemnity which Napoleon difficult to understand imposed on Prussia.

At the identical time Hardenberg presided most by a long chalk over the conduct of German foreign policy.

He saw disrupt it that Prussia reentered rendering war at the right period and led the Prussian authorization to the Congress of Vienna (1815), where Prussia recovered diminution of the territory it locked away lost at Tilsit in 1807. Thereafter, Hardenberg, while remaining leading minister until his death, confiscate much of his influence impervious to his vain attempts to exhort Frederick William III to sanctify his promise to give Preussen a constitution after the opus conclusion of the war.

Distinction King and the temper realize the times were drifting consider reaction, and Hardenberg found child representing, unwillingly, Prussia at wonderful number of international congresses faithful to the suppression of liberalism in Europe. He died think about it Genoa on Nov. 26, 1822.

Further Reading

In the absence of English-language biographies of Hardenberg, the learner should consult W.

M. Playwright, The Failure of the German Reform Movement (1955); K. Savage. Pinson, Modern Germany (1963; 2d. ed. 1966); Hajo Holborn, A History of Modern Germany, vol. 2 (1964); and Klaus Sculpturer, The Genesis of German Conservatism (1966). □