Hanover – the fifth kingdom
(1813-1866: Hannover)
The Electorate of Hanover (Hannover) was a German state originating from the fifteenth century Principality of Calenberg-Göttingen. In 1714, George Louis of Hanover became George I, who ruled both Great Britain and Hanover. Four successive monarchs ruled both Great Britain and Hanover. After the fall of Napoleon, it was renamed the Kingdom of Hanover in 1814. The ruling family was the Guelphs. The friction between the Guelphs and the Prussian royal house was felt in every aspect of life—land, religion, and politics. Hanover was a member state of the Germanic Confederation between 1815 and 1866. There was a personal union (where the ruler of two houses or states is the same person) between Hanover and the United Kingdom. As a member of the British royal family, the King of Hanover was also the Duke of Cumberland. This union ended in 1837 on the accession of Queen Victoria because the succession laws (Salic Laws) in Hanover prevented a female inheriting the title of King of Hanover, if there was any surviving male heir. This separated the crowns of Great Britain and Hanover after a union of 123 years and brought Ernest August, Duke of Cumberland, to the Hanoverian throne. He acted quickly to annul the constitution. The Göttingen Seven (two of whom were the brothers Grimm) actively argued against any changes.
In 1849, after the failure of St. Paul’s Parliament at Frankfurt, the King of Hanover joined with the sovereigns of Prussia and Saxony to form the “Three Kings’ Alliance.” This union with Prussia was a short-term failure, and the King of Hanover and the King of Saxony, soon transferred their support to Austria and became a member of the “Four Kings’ Alliance.” Hanover joined the Zollverein in 1851.
George V, the new King of Hanover (1851), was totally blind and tried to sweep away the constitution of 1848. He knew the Hanoverian parliament would resist, so the king appealed to the Germanic Confederation in 1855. The diet of the German Confederation declared the Hanoverian constitution of 1848 to be invalid. Hanover supported the German Confederation during the wars with Denmark.
As war approached in 1866, George V vacillated between Prussia and Austria. Over the objections of his parliament, he threw his lot in with Austria. The decision was made after the Diet of the German Confederation voted to mobilize against Prussia on 14 June 1866. Prussia requested Hanover remain neutral during the war but King George refused. Prussian troops then crossed his frontier, but the Hanoverians were victorious at the ensuing battle of Langensalza on 27 June 1866. Langensalza is of particular interest since it is one of the very few battles where an army equipped with muzzle-loaded rifles won over the Prussian army equipped with breech-loaded Dreyse rifles. The arrival of overwhelming reinforcements from Prussia compelled Hanover to capitulate two days later. What is regularly glossed over is that the Prussians came at them from two sides. Prussia geographically surrounded Hanover and classically out-maneuvered the armies of King George.
By the terms of this surrender, the king was not to reside in Hanover; his officers were to take no further part in the war; and his stores became the property of Prussia. Prussia saw a great opportunity to connect their Eastern lands to their Western possessions. Prussia could be geographically contiguous, but a few pieces of real estate stood in the way, and Hanover was the biggest. The decree of 10 September 1866 formally annexed Hanover to Prussia. King George appealed in vain from exile in Austria to the powers of Europe to restore his kingdom. In 1867, King George V of Hanover agreed to accept Prussian bonds as compensation for the confiscation of his estates in Hanover. In 1868, due to his continued hostility to Prussia, the Prussian government sequestrated this property. Known as the Welfenfonds, or Reptilienfonds, it was employed as a secret fund to combat the intrigues of the Guelphs in various parts of Europe. In 1892, it was arranged that the interest should be paid to the Duke of Cumberland. It was this secret fund that Bismarck used in 1871 to bribe the Bavarian King Ludwig II to write to Wilhelm I of Prussia and urge him to take the imperial crown.
Reptilienfonds is still used today in German language as a kind of nickname for secret funds spent by the government beyond Parliamentarian control and the control of auditors. It is said that Bismarck himself, (who wanted to use the money to “chase the reptiles back into their caves”) defined the name Bismarck used parts of these funds to bribe journalists and to systematically swing public opinion—not only against the Guelphs, but also other political enemies. It was well-known that Bismarck had systematically bribed the biggest news agencies of Imperial Germany, Wolffs Telegraphisches Bureau (W.T.B.).
Many of the Hanoverians remained loyal to their Hanoverian sovereign. A substantial political party in the Imperial Reichstag, the Guelph party, continued to agitate and to hope for a restoration. This nostalgia and loyalty failed to bring about the return of the king to Hanover. George died in June 1878. His son, Ernest August III maintained his claim to the crown of Hanover. He refused to reconcile with Prussia. Consequently, the imperial German government refused to allow him to take possession of the Duchy of Brunswick, which he inherited on the extinction of the elder branch of his family in 1884. The Empire also refused to allow him to take possession of the Duchy of Brunswick when Prince Albert of Prussia, the Regent, died. You always see pictures of Hanoverian male royalty wearing the uniform of Austria until Ernest August married the daughter of Kaiser Wilhelm II, Princess Viktoria Luise on 13 May 1913. Ernest August swore his oath of allegiance to the Kaiser, was promoted to the rank of a Rittmeister and took command over the 4th squadron of Husaren-Regiment von Zieten (Brandenburgisches) Nr. 3, a regiment, which one was under the honorary command of his grandfather King George V.
The Kingdom contained an area of 14,869 square miles and the total population, was approximately 3,000,000 in 1914. The proportion of urban to rural population was roughly three to one. Religious statistics show that 84 percent of the inhabitants belonged to the Evangelical Lutheran Church, 15 percent to the Roman Catholic, and less than one percent to the Jewish communities. Hanover as a province of Prussia had 19 members in the Reichstag and 36 in the Prussian parliament (Landtag).