As it is impossible to deal with every aspect of the treatment of the Thirty Years War in these books, I shall concentrate on the three military leaders, Tilly, Wallenstein and Gustavus. What is particularly striking to note is the kind of stereotypes that emerge. The siege of Magdeburg, with the horrifying destruction and plunder of buildings and the massacre of the greater part of its population, marks Tilly indelibly for his English authors and readers with a barbaric and cruel reputation, no different from the Croat soldiers who are everywhere depicted as the epitome of barbarism.
Corner deals with this in very general terms, mentioning no names.
The assassins are named as Gordon, Butler, Leslie and Devereux. Baring-Gould gives the four names and describes the murder, commenting ambiguously: Finally, Marshall depicts the event in some detail, but mentions neither the names nor the nationalities of the assassins. He was of gigantic height, with an open countenance, large blue eyes, and a mild but majestic bearing; presenting in his whole appearance a remarkable contrast to the gloomy Wallenstein, the ferocious Tilly, and most of the German princes, who affected a mysterious demeanour, to cover their low plans of personal ambition pp.
Yonge concentrates on his Christian qualities, but Baring-Gould once more dwells on his physical qualities. His physical appearance may be dealt with at length, but all the same for the British writers what matters more is the fact that Gustavus is exemplary in his Christian bearing, his simple piety and trust in God. They also point to the participation of English, Scottish and Irish soldiers as volunteers, especially on the Protestant side.
This is a matter of some importance in the fictional works dealing with the war. Though the English angle is slight in the historical works, most authors betray a sense of emotional involvement in at least some of the events they describe. Corner, for example, immediately after mentioning the sack of Magdeburg, states: But what each of the various authors was trying to do was to give a picture of the war in the context of the whole history of Germany, and there was little space for detail.
Longmans, Green, and Co. The German original, Die Belagerung von Magdeburg , had appeared in Several were translated into English from about onwards and are dealt with in another chapter. Only the old nurse and the two older children survive. The story centres on the problems faced by the family of a wealthy Protestant merchant called Merck in the Silesian town of Schweidnitz in the early period of the war. Father and two sons are imprisoned, while mother and daughters take refuge in a hidden hermitage in the back garden. Eventually peasant forces led by the disguised Albert attack the Imperial soldiers, burn down a large house and release Merck and his companions from prison.
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The reunited Merck family then escape into the Giant Mountains and find refuge with other fugitive Protestants. Antagonism between the Imperialists and the Protestants focusses largely on the soldiery and peasants, whose actions are relentless and unrestrained. Once the Imperialists have taken Schweidnitz the townspeople are given eight days to renounce their Protestantism or be killed.
Introduction: Media and their functions in the Thirty Years' War
Merck of course refuses and is imprisoned. The cruelty of the war is further illustrated by the fact that the Protestant Albert turns out to be the son of the Imperialist and Catholic Colonel von Hardenfels, who demands, but does not receive, his recantation.
Obviously, the book attempts first and foremost to tell a story that will grip and also to some degree instruct its target readers, but within a small space it gives a good idea of major aspects of the Thirty Years War as viewed through the purported experiences of a single Protestant family.
First we find J. It was followed by G. This cluster may perhaps reflect increased British interest in the history of Germany following the unification of Germany under Prussia after the Franco-Prussian War. All the books of British origin engage their young readers through the simple device of having one or more of their leading characters British, more often Scottish than English. This is entirely plausible, since neither the Imperialist nor the Protestant side consisted solely of German stock. Like all the other fictional works, it provides a good deal of background information and narrative of the progress of the war.
This is articulated in relation to a love-story centred on Helena, the daughter of the Calvinist pastor Hermann, her would-be husband Theodore Wechter, son of a wealthy magistrate and later defector to the Imperialist side, and her gallant English admirer, Harry Wyndham, of whom Theodore is viciously jealous.
He escapes with the help of a gipsy and rejoins the Swedish camp.
The Thirty Years' War as a European Media Event — EGO
Gustavus sends him with a despatch to Stralsund, and en route he fights a party of Croats, but prevents their officer from being killed. Some time later Wyndham learns that Helena and her father are in Magdeburg, now about to be besieged. Disguised as an Imperialist, Harry helps them to escape, rather implausibly aided by the Croat officer who coincidentally turns up. Equally implausibly they are helped to cross the Elbe by an Imperialist officer who turns out to be the turncoat Theodore Wechter. Later still, in the stand-off between Wallenstein and Gustavus at Nuremberg, Wyndham meets Wechter the father again.
He sends a message via a gipsy to Theodore, trying to induce him to join the Swedish army, but with no success.
Causes of the Thirty Years’ War
Wyndham marries Helena and takes her to England. In the gipsy figures who appear at several points in the story we have a minor diversion from the relentlessly middle and upper class characters who otherwise populate it. De Liefde points up the usual contrasts between Gustavus and Wallenstein, but he does not reproduce the grotesque picture of Tilly, treating him less emotively. The plot places the reader firmly on the Protestant side, and the defection of Theodore Wechter to the Imperialists may be read as a condemnation of the Imperialist position generally.
Good deeds, acts of generosity towards individuals, of which there are several in the course of the novel, are reciprocated in later incidents. But Wechter the father and Theodore the son, in political and religious opposition to each other, can only be united in death on the battlefield. The effects of the war are poignantly shown in the destruction of family relationships between the central characters. Thus, German womankind is rescued by the help of the doughty, honest Englishman. Henty was particularly keen on getting the historical context of his adventure stories correct, and he spent a lot of time reading source material.
This is quite apparent in The Lion of the North , which retails great slabs of factual information about the military operations and historical background. His heroes fight for a cause they believe in and for a leader whom they can unreservedly admire. Gustavus fulfils this role perfectly. As Henty declares, he. Recently his regents in Prague have even tried to instal a Catholic priest in Bethlehem Chapel , forever associated in Protestant minds with the heroic John Huss.
The crisis escalates in when the Protestant party in Prague declares that the Bohemian crown is elective. In accepting the Bohemian throne, and being crowned in Prague in November , Frederick V is perpetrating an extremely inflammatory act within the edgy community of the German states. Frederick owes Ferdinand allegiance, as one of the German princes and as an imperial elector the elector palatine of the Rhine. Instead, by popular demand in Bohemia, he is usurping his lord's place.
Ferdinand is able to organize a powerful army against the Protestant upstart. The bulk of it comes from the duchy of Bavaria, a Catholic line of the Wittelsbach dynasty and deeply hostile to the Protestant branch headed by Frederick in the Palatinate. In return for his support the Bavarian duke, Maximilian I, is promised Frederick's hereditary lands and his status as an imperial elector. Frederick, by contrast, receives messages of goodwill but little practical help from the Protestant states.
The issue is decided in a single brief encounter. A battle at the White Mountain, to the west of the city, lasts only an hour before the Protestant army gives way. On the evening of that same day, 8 November , almost exactly a year after his coronation, Frederick flees from Prague with his family. His wife is Elizabeth, daughter of James I of England. But unwittingly they found a dynasty. A century later their grandson becomes king of Great Britain as George I. Ferdinand gains full control over Bohemia. Meanwhile Maximilian has occupied part of Austria, which he intends to hold until all Ferdinand's debts to him are paid.
He also now takes much of Frederick's territory in the Palatinate part has been quietly occupied by the Spanish, moving down from the Netherlands while the locals are busy in Bohemia. Maximilian is passionately opposed to any increase in Habsburg power. As a great Catholic prince now ruling the whole of southern Germany, he seems well placed to keep Ferdinand in check. But Ferdinand's ruthless suppression and exploitation of conquered Bohemia introduces a new element to upset the balance.
It provides him with great wealth.
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It also brings to prominence a general and entrepreneur of extraordinary ambition and talent - Albrecht von Wallenstein. With imperial authority re-established in Prague, Ferdinand takes stern measures to end Protestant opposition. Roman Catholicism is the only religion allowed, with all education entrusted to the Jesuits.
Some 36, Protestant families, of nobles, merchants and craftsmen, emigrate from the kingdom. The property of those who leave, and of anyone judged to have assisted the rebellion, is expropriated and sold to Ferdinand's supporters. No one profits more from the rich available pickings than Albrecht von Wallenstein, whom Ferdinand appoints governor of the kingdom of Bohemia. Wallenstein is a minor Czech nobleman who becomes rich through marriage to an elderly widow. From he uses her money to raise a small private army with which he assists Ferdinand.
His reward, after the suppression of Bohemia, includes a licence to issue coins debased to half their previous value. With the profit he buys at a knock-down price sixty large estates, which together make him lord of the whole of northeastern Bohemia. Wallenstein now proposes to Ferdinand a bold extension of his earlier private army. He offers to provide, at no expense to the emperor, an independent imperial army of 24, men. The expense, raised by a financial agent, will be recovered from conquered territories.
17. The Thirty Years War
The idea appeals to Ferdinand because it frees him from reliance on the powerful duke of Bavaria, whose army made possible the victory at the White Mountain. Wallenstein's plan is approved and he is appointed chief of all the imperial forces.
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Seeing another rich opportunity, he mobilizes his estates in Bohemia to provide arms and equipment for the army. Wallenstein acquires a welcome opportunity to put his army into the field when Christian IV, the king of Denmark, decides to take a hand in the troubled affairs of Germany.
As a Lutheran monarch, the Danish king Christian IV has good cause to support Protestant states in north Germany under threat from Catholic neighbours. He is also eager to keep Catholics away from the Baltic. He has been promised a subsidy by England if he intervenes in Germany's wars. And he is interested in extending his own territory southwards to the estuaries of the Elbe and the Weser.
In May he marches into Germany. Christian IV is an unskilled commander, and he has the misfortune to have ranged against him the two most experienced generals of the age. Tilly commands the Bavarian army on behalf of the Catholic League.
Thirty Years’ War
Wallenstein is at the head of the separate imperial army which he has raised for Ferdinand II. Christian's first defeat is at the hands of Tilly , at Lutter in August It remains one of the longest and most brutal wars in human history, with more than 8 million casualties resulting from military battles as well as from the famine and disease caused by the conflict.
The war lasted from to , starting as a battle among the Catholic and Protestant states that formed the Holy Roman Empire. In the end, the conflict changed the geopolitical face of Europe and the role of religion and nation-states in society. This effectively calmed simmering tensions between peoples of the two faiths within the Holy Roman Empire for more than 60 years, although there were flare ups, including the Cologne War and the War of the Julich Succession Still, the Holy Roman Empire may have controlled much of Europe at the time, though it was essentially a collection of semi-autonomous states or fiefdoms.
The emperor, from the House of Habsburg, had limited authority over their governance. The so-called Defenestration of Prague fenestration: Soon, armies for both sides were engaged in brutal warfare on multiple fronts, in present-day Austria and in the east in Transylvania, where Ottoman Empire soldiers fought alongside the Bohemians in exchange for yearly dues paid to the sultan against the Poles, who were on the side of the Habsburgs. Even with help from soldiers from Scotland, however, the armies of Denmark-Norway fell to the forces of Ferdinand II, ceding much of northern Europe to the emperor.
But in , Sweden, under the leadership of Gustavus Adolphus, took the side of the northern Protestants and joined the fight, with its army helping to push Catholic forces back and regain much of the lost territory lost by the Protestant Union. With the support of the Swedes, Protestant victories continued.
However, when Gustavus Adolphus was killed in the Battle of Lutzen in , the Swedes lost some of their resolve. Using military assistance of Bohemian nobleman Albrecht von Wallenstein, who provided his army of an estimated 50, soldiers to Ferdinand II in exchange for the freedom to plunder any captured territory, began to respond and, by , the Swedes were vanquished.
With religious and political tensions in the latter regions remaining high, fighting continued. The French, though Catholic, were rivals of the Habsburgs and were unhappy with the provisions of the Peace of Prague.