Tore’s Tuesday. Sorry to be so late today.
Today’s blog is about a small medal. Not made of precious metals, not a unique and expensive item, but a strangely prophetic medal, though the designer could not have known that.
This medal, from the year 1888 shows three emperors. And, as it would turn out, it shows every single emperor that ever ruled the German empire.
There was Wilhelm I. Born 1797, died 1888. He was king of Prussia from 1861, and with the unification of Germany he became the Emperor of Germany in 1971 following the Franco-Prussian war.
His successor was Friedrich III, who was a veteran of the war against Denmark in 1864 and the Franco-Prussian war. He was, unusual for a king of Prussia and German emperor, not in favor of war. But, he died the same year as he became emperor, of throat cancer.
So, the third emperor of the year 1888 was Wilhelm II. There is a lot to be said of him, his disability, his inferiority complex brought about by that and his upbringing, but anyway, he became emperor too, and presided over the German Reich until his abdication in 1918. He died in the Netherlands in 1940.
So, in the German Reich there were only ever three emperors altogether, and 1888 was the year of the three emperors, the year that all of them reigned.
This medal says “Unser Schmerz und Stolz“, our sorrow and pride, and refers to the two dead emperors and the new one…