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throne, probably because Wenceslaus refused to fulfil a promise | daughter of Albert, duke of Bavaria-Munich (d. 1508), was born to give him his sister Anna in marriage. The danger to Germany from the Hussites induced Frederick to ally himself with the German and Bohemian king Sigismund; and he took a leading part in the war against them, during the earlier years of which he met with considerable success. In the prosecution of this enterprise Frederick spent large sums of money, for which he received various places in Bohemia and elsewhere in pledge from Sigismund, who further rewarded him in January 1423 with the vacant electoral duchy of Saxe-Wittenberg; and Frederick's formal investiture followed at Ofen on the 1st of August 1425. Thus spurred to renewed efforts against the Hussites, the elector was endeavouring to rouse the German princes to aid him in prosecuting this war when the Saxon army was almost annihilated at Aussig on the 16th of August 1426. Returning to Saxony, Frederick died at Altenburg on the 4th of January 1428, and was buried in the cathedral at Meissen. In 1402 he married Catherine of Brunswick, by whom he left four sons and two daughters. In 1409, in conjunction with his brother William, he founded the university of Leipzig, for the benefit of German students who had just left the university of Prague. Frederick's importance as an historical figure arises from his having obtained the electorate of Saxe-Wittenberg for the house of Wettin, and transformed the margraviate of Meissen into the territory which afterwards became the kingdom of Saxony. In addition to the king of Saxony, the sovereigns of England and of the Belgians are his direct descendants.

There is a life of Frederick by G. Spalatin in the Scriptores rerum Germanicarum praecipue Saxonicarum, Band ii., edited by J. B. Mencke (Leipzig, 1728-1730). See also C. W. Böttiger and Th. Flathe, Geschichte des Kurstaates und Königreichs Sachsen (Gotha, 1867-1873) and J. G. Horn, Lebens- und Heldengeschichte Friedrichs des Streitbaren (Leipzig, 1733).

FREDERICK II. (1411-1464), called "the Mild," elector and duke of Saxony, eldest son of the elector Frederick I., was born on the 22nd of August 1411. He succeeded his father as elector in 1428, but shared the family lands with his three brothers, and was at once engaged in defending Saxony against the attacks of the Hussites. Freed from these enemies about 1432, and turning his attention to increasing his possessions, he obtained the burgraviate of Meissen in 1439, and some part of Lower Lusatia after a struggle with Brandenburg about the same time. In 1438 it was decided that Frederick, and not his rival, Bernard IV., duke of Saxe-Lauenburg, was entitled to exercise the Saxon electoral vote at the elections for the German throne; and the elector then aided Albert II. to secure this dignity, performing a similar service for his own brother-in-law, Frederick, afterwards the emperor Frederick III., two years later. Family affairs, meanwhile, occupied Frederick's attention. One brother, Henry, having died in 1435, and another, Sigismund (d. 1463), having entered the church and become bishop of Würzburg, Frederick and his brother William (d. 1482) were the heirs of their childless cousin, Frederick "the Peaceful," who ruled Thuringia and other parts of the lands of the Wettins. On his death in 1440 the brothers divided Frederick's territory, but this arrangement was not satisfactory, and war broke out between them in 1446. Both combatants obtained extraneous aid, but after a desolating struggle peace was made in January 1451, when William received Thuringia, and Frederick Altenburg and other districts. The remainder of the elector's reign was uneventful, and he died at Leipzig on the 7th of September 1464. By his wife, Margaret (d. 1486), daughter of Ernest, duke of Styria, he left two sons and four daughters. In July 1455 occurred the celebrated Prinzenraub, the attempt of a knight named Kunz von Kaufungen (d. 1455) to abduct Frederick's two sons, Ernest and Albert. Having carried them off from Altenburg, Kunz was making his way to Bohemia when the plot was accidentally discovered and the princes restored.

See W. Schäfer, Der Montag vor Kiliani (1855); J. Gersdorf, Einige Aktenstücke zur Geschichte des sächsischen Prinzenraubes (1855); and T. Carlyle, Critical and Miscellaneous Essays, vol. iv. (London, 1899).

FREDERICK III. (1463-1525), called "the Wise," elector of Saxony, eldest son of Ernest, elector of Saxony, and Elizabeth,

at Torgau, and succeeded his father as elector in 1486. Retaining the government of Saxony in his own hands, he shared the other possessions of his family with his brother John, called "the Stedfast" (1468-1532). Frederick was among the princes who pressed the need of reform upon the German king Maximilian I. in 1495, and in 1500 he became president of the newly-formed council of regency (Reichsregiment). He took a genuine interest in learning; was a friend of Georg Spalatin; and in 1502 founded the university of Wittenberg, where he appointed Luther and Melanchthon to professorships. In 1493 he had gone as a pilgrim to Jerusalem, and had been made a knight of the Holy Sepulchre; but, although he remained throughout life an adherent of the older faith, he seems to have been drawn into sympathy with the reformers, probably through his connexion with the university of Wittenberg. In 1520 he refused to put into execution the papal bull which ordered Luther's writings to be burned and the reformer to be put under restraint or sent to Rome; and in 1521, after Luther had been placed under the imperial ban by the diet at Worms, the elector caused him to be conveyed to his castle at the Wartburg, and afterwards protected him while he attacked the enemies of the Reformation. In 1519, Frederick, who alone among the electors refused to be bribed by the rival candidates for the imperial throne, declined to be a candidate for this high dignity himself, and assisted to secure the election of Charles V. He died unmarried at Langau, near Annaberg, on the 5th of May 1525ie Zeitgeschichte Friedrichs des See G. Spalatin, Das Leben und

Weisen, edited by C. G. Neudecker and L. Preller (Jena, 1851); M. M. Tutzschmann, Friedrich der Weise, Kurfürst von Sachsen (Grimma, 1848); and T. Kolde, Friedrich der Weise und die Anfänge der Reformation (Erlangen, 1881).

FREDERICK, a city and the county-seat of Frederick county, Maryland, U.S.A., on Carroll's Creek, a tributary of the Monocacy, 61 m. by rail W. by N. from Baltimore and 45 m. N.W. from Washington. Pop. (1890) 8193; (1900) 9296, of whom 1535 were negroes; (1910 census) 10,411. It is served by the Baltimore & Ohio and the Northern Central railways, and by two interurban electric lines. Immediately surrounding it is the rich farming land of the Monocacy valley, but from a distance it appears to be completely shut in by picturesque hills and mountains; to the E., the Linga ore Hills; to the W., Catoctin Mountain; and to the S., Sugar Loaf Mountain. It is built for the most part of brick and stone. Frederick is the seat of the Maryland school for the deaf and dumb and of the Woman's College of Frederick (1893; formerly the Frederick Female Seminary, opened in 1843), which in 1907-1908 had 212 students, 121 of whom were in the Conservatory of Music. Francis Scott Key and Roger Brooke Taney were buried here, and a beautiful monument erected to the memory of Key stands at the entrance to Mount Olivet cemetery. Frederick has a considerable agricultural trade and is an important manufacturing centre, its industries including the canning of fruits and vegetables, and the manufacture of flour, bricks, brushes, leather goods and hosiery. The total value of the factory product in 1905 was $1,937,921, being 34.7% more than in 1900. The municipality owns and operates its water-works and electric-lighting plant. Frederick, so named in honour of Frederick Calvert, son and afterward successor of Charles, Lord Baltimore, was settled by Germans in 1733, and was laid out as a town in 1745, but was not incorporated until 1817. Here in 1755 General Braddock prepared for his disastrous expedition against the French at Fort Duquesne (Pittsburg). During the Civil War the city was occupied on different occasions by Unionists and Confederates, and was made famous by Whittier's poem "Barbara Frietchie.'

FREDERICK AUGUSTUS I. (1750-1827), king of Saxony, son of the elector Frederick Christian, was born at Dresden on the 23rd of December 1750. He succeeded his father under the guardianship of Prince Xavier in 1763, and was declared of age in 1768. In the following year (January 17, 1769) he married Princess Maria Amelia, daughter of Duke Frederick of Zweibrücken, by whom he had only one child, Princess Augusta (born June 21, 1782). One of his chief aims was the reduction

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of taxes and imposts and of the army. He was always extremely | collection of engravings on copper. He was twice marriedmethodical and conscientious, and a good example to all his in 1819 (October 7) to the duchess Caroline, fourth daughter officials, whence his surname the Just." On account of the of the emperor Francis I. of Austria (d. May 22, 1832), and in claims of his mother on the inheritance of her brother, the elector 1833 (April 4) to Maria, daughter of Maximilian I. of Bavaria. of Bavaria, he sided with Frederick the Great in the short There were no children of either marriage. During the governBavarian succession war of 1778 against Austria. At the peace ment of his uncles (Frederick Augustus I. and Anthony) he of Teschen, which concluded the war, he received 6 million florins, took no part in the administration of the country, though he which he employed partly in regaining those parts of his kingdom was the sole heir to the crown. In 1830 a rising in Dresden led which had been lost, and partly in favour of his relatives. In to his being named joint regent of the kingdom along with King 1785 he joined the league of German princes (Deutscher Fürsten- | Anthony on the 13th of September; and in this position his bund) formed by Prussia, but without prejudice to his neutrality. popularity and his wise and liberal reforms (for instance, in Thus he remained neutral during the quarrel between Austria arranging public audiences) speedily quelled all discontent. and Prussia in 1790. In the following year he declined the On the 6th of June 1836 he succeeded his uncle. Though he crown of Poland. He refused to join the league against France administered the affairs of his kingdom with enlightened liberality (February 7, 1792), but when war was declared his duty to the Saxony did not escape the political storms which broke upon Empire necessitated his taking part in it. Even after the peace Germany in 1848. He elected Liberal ministers, and he was at of Basel (April 5, 1795) he continued the war. But when the first in favour of the programme of German unity put forward French army, during the following year, advanced into the heart at Frankfort, but he refused to acknowledge the democratic of Germany, he was compelled by General Jourdan to retreat constitution of the German parliament. This attitude led to (August 13, 1796). He maintained his neutrality during the the insurrection at Dresden in May 1849, which was suppressed war between France and Austria in 1805, but in the following by the help of Prussian troops. From that time onward his year he joined Prussia against France. After the disastrous reign was tranquil and prosperous. Later Count Beust, leader battle of Jena he concluded a treaty of peace with Napoleon at of the Austrian and feudal party in Saxony, became his principal Posen (December 11, 1806), and, assuming the title of king, minister and guided his policy on most occasions. His death he joined the Confederation of the Rhine. But he did not alter occurred accidentally through the upsetting of his carriage the constitution and administration of his new kingdom. After near Brennbühel, between Imst and Wenns in Tirol (August 9, the peace of Tilsit (July 9, 1807) he was created by Napoleon 1854). Frederick Augustus devoted his leisure hours chiefly to grand-duke of Warsaw, but his sovereignty of Poland was little the study of botany. He made botanical excursions into different more than nominal. There was a kind of friendship between countries, and Flora Marienbadensis, oder Pflanzen und GebirgsFrederick Augustus and Napoleon. In 1809 Frederick Augustus arten, gesammelt und beschrieben, written by him, was published fought with him against Austria. On several occasions (1807, at Prague by Kedler, 1837. 1812, 1813) Napolcon was entertained at Dresden, and when, on his return from his disastrous Russian campaign, he passed through Saxony by Dresden (December 16, 1812), Frederick Augustus remained true to his friend and ally. It was only during April 1813 that he made overtures to Austria, but he soon afterwards returned to the side of the French. He returned to Dresden on the 10th of May and was present at the terrible battle of August 26 and 27, in which Napoleon's army and his own were defeated. He fell into the hands of the Allies after their entry into Leipzig on the 19th of October 1813; and, although he regained his freedom after the congress of Vienna, he was compelled to give up the northern part-three-fifths of his kingdom to Prussia (May 21, 1814). He entered Dresden on the 7th of July, and was enthusiastically welcomed by his people. The remainder of his life was spent in repairing the damages caused by the Napoleonic wars, in developing the agricultural, commercial and industrial resources of his kingdom, reforming the administration of justice, establishing hospitals and other charitable institutions, encouraging art and science and promoting education. He had a special interest in botany, and originated the beautiful park at Pillnitz. His reign throughout was characterized by justice, probity, moderation and prudence. He died on the 5th of May 1827.

See Böttiger-Flathe, History of Saxony, vol. iii.; R. Freiherr von
Friesen, Erinnerungen (2 vols., Dresden, 1881); F. F. Graf von
Beust, Aus drei-viertel Jahrhunderten (2 vols., 1887); Flathe, in
Allg. deutsche Biogr.
(J. HN.)

FREDERICK CHARLES (FRIEDRICH KARL NIKOLAUS), PRINCE (1828-1885), Prussian general field marshal, son of Prince Charles of Prussia and grandson of King Frederick William III., was born in Berlin on the 20th of March 1828. He was educated for the army, which he entered on his tenth birthday as second lieutenant in the 14th Foot Guards. He became first lieutenant in 1844, and in 1846 entered the university of Bonn, where he stayed for two years, being accompanied throughout by Major von Roon, afterwards the famous war minister. In 1848 he became a company commander in his regiment, and soon afterwards served in the Schleswig-Holstein War on the staff of Marshal von Wrangel, being present at the battle of Schleswig (April 23, 1848). Later in 1848 he became Rittmeister in the Garde du Corps cavalry regiment, and in 1849 major in the Guard Hussars. In this year the prince took part in the campaign against the Baden insurgents, and was wounded at the action of Wiesenthal while leading a desperate charge against entrenched infantry. After this experience the wild courage of his youth gave place to the unshakable resolution which afterwards characterized the prince's generalship. In 1852 he became colonel, and in 1854 major-general and commander of a cavalry brigade. In this capacity he was brought closely in touch with General von Reyher, the chief of the general staff, and with Moltke. He married, in the same year, Princess Marie Anne of Anhalt. In 1857 he became commander of the 1st Guard Infantry division, but very shortly afterwards, on account of disputes concerned with the training methods then in force, he resigned the appointment.

BIBLIOGRAPHY.-The earlier lives, by C. E. Weisse (1811), A. L. Herrmann (1827), Pölitz (1830), are mere panegyrics. On the other side see Flathe in Allgemeine deutsche Biographie, and BottigerFlathe, History of Saxony (2nd ed., 1867 ff.), vols. ii. and iii.; A Bonnefons, Un Allié de Napoléon, Frédéric Auguste, premier roi de Saxe... (Paris, 1902); Fritz Friedrich, Politik Sachsens 18011803 (1898); P. Rühlmann, Öffentliche Meinung 1806-1813 (1902). There are many pamphlets bearing on the Saxon question and on Frederick Augustus during the years 1814 and 1815. J. HN.) FREDERICK AUGUSTUS II. (1797-1854), king of Saxony, eldest son of Prince Maximilian and of Caroline Maria Theresa of Parma, was born on the 18th of May 1797. The unsettled times in which his youth was passed necessitated his frequent change of residence, but care was nevertheless taken that his education should not be interrupted, and he also acquired, through his journeys in foreign states (Switzerland 1818, Monte-post he was given the liberty of action which had previously been negro 1838, England and Scotland 1844) and his intercourse with men of eminence, a special taste for art and for natural science. He was himself a good landscape-painter and had a fine

In 1858 he visited France, where he minutely investigated the state of the French army, but it was not long before he was recalled, for in 1859, in consequence of the Franco-Austrian War, Prussia mobilized her forces, and Frederick Charles was made a divisional commander in the II. army corps. In this

denied to him. About this time (1860) the prince gave a lecture to the officers of his command on the French army and its methods, the substance of which (Eine militärische Denkschrift

62

FREDERICK HENRY-FREDERICK LOUIS

von P. F.K., Frankfort on Main, 1860) was circulated more widely than the author intended, and in the French translation gave rise to much indignation in France. In 1861 Frederick Charles became general of cavalry. He was then commander of the III. (Brandenburg) army corps. This post he held from 1860 to 1870, except during the campaigns of 1864 and 1866, and in it he displayed his real qualities as a troop leader. His self-imposed task was to raise the military spirit of his troops to the highest possible level, and ten years of his continuous and thorough training brought the III. corps to a pitch of real efficiency which the Guard corps alone, in virtue of its special recruiting powers, slightly surpassed. Prince Frederick Charles' work was tested to the full when von Alvensleben and the III. corps engaged the whole French army on the 16th of August 1870. In 1864 the prince once more fought against the Danes under his old leader Papa" Wrangel. The Prussian contingent under Frederick Charles formed a corps of the allied army, and half of it was drawn from the III. corps. After the storming of the Düppel lines the prince succeeded Wrangel in the supreme command, with Lieutenant-General Freiherr von Moltke as his chief of staff. These two great soldiers then planned and brilliantly carried out the capture of the island of Alsen, after which the war came to an end.

66

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near Berlin, and was buried at the adjacent church of Nikolskoe.
His third daughter, Princess Louise Margareta, was married,
in March 1879, to the duke of'Connaught.
youngest child of William the Silent, was born at Delft about
FREDERICK HENRY (1584-1647), prince of Orange, the
six months before his father's assassination on the 29th of January
1584. His mother, Louise de Coligny, was daughter of the famous
Huguenot leader, Admiral de Coligny, and was the fourth wife
of William the Silent. The boy was trained to arms by his elder
brother, Maurice of Nassau, one of the first generals of his age.
On the death of Maurice in 1625, Frederick Henry succeeded
him in his paternal dignities and estates, and also in the stadt-
holderates of the five provinces of Holland, Zeeland, Utrecht,
Overysel and Gelderland, and in the important posts of captain
and admiral-general of the Union.
himself scarcely inferior to his brother as a general, and a far
Frederick Henry proved
years he remained at the head of affairs in the United Provinces,
more capable statesman and politician. During twenty-two
and in his time the power of the stadtholderate reached its highest
point. The " Period of Frederick Henry," as it is usually styled
by Dutch writers, is generally accounted the golden age of the
republic. It was marked by great military and naval triumphs,
wonderful outburst of activity in the domains of art and literature.
The chief military exploits of Frederick Henry were the sieges
by world-wide maritime and commercial expansion, and by a
and captures of Hertogenbosch in 1629, of Maastricht in 1632,
of Breda in 1637, of Sas van Ghent in 1644, and of Hulst in 1645.
During the greater part of his administration the alliance with
France against Spain had been the pivot of Frederick Henry's
foreign policy, but in his last years he sacrificed the French
by which the United Provinces obtained from that power all the
alliance for the sake of concluding a separate peace with Spain,
advantages for which they had for eighty years been contending.
Frederick Henry died on the 14th of March 1647, and was buried
with great pomp beside his father and brother at Delft. The
treaty of Münster, ending the long struggle between the Dutch
and the Spaniards, was not actually signed until the 30th of
January 1648, the illness and death of the stadtholder having
caused a delay in the negotiations. Frederick Henry was married
in 1625 to Amalia von Solms, and left one son, William II. of
Orange, and four daughters.

vol. iv. chap. 24, and the bibliography on p. 931.
Frederick Henry left an account of his campaigns in his Mémoires
de Frédéric Henri (Amsterdam, 1743). See Cambridge Mod. Hist.

In 1866 came the Seven Weeks' War with Austria. Prince Frederick Charles was appointed to command the I. Army, which he led through the mountains into Bohemia, driving before him the Austrians and Saxons to the upper Elbe, where on the 3rd of July took place the decisive battle of Königgrätz or Sadowa. This was brought on by the initiative of the leader of the I. Army, which had to bear the brunt of the fighting until the advance of the II. Army turned the Austrian flank. the peace he returned to the III. army corps, which he finally After left, in July 1870, when appointed to command the II. German Army in the war with France. In the early days of the advance the prince's ruthless energy led to much friction between the I. and II. Armies (see FRANCO-GERMAN WAR), while his strategical mistakes seriously embarrassed the great headquarters staff. The advance of the II. Army beyond the Saar to the Moselle and from that river to the Meuse displayed more energy than careful strategy, but herein at least the "Red Prince" (as he was called from the colour of his favourite hussar uniform) was in thorough sympathy with the king's headquarters on the one hand and the feelings of the troops on the other. Then came the discovery that the French were not in front, but to the right rear of the II. Army (August 16). Alvensleben with the III. corps held the French to their ground at Vionville while the prince of George II., was born at Hanover on the 20th of January 1707. hurried together his scattered forces. He himself directed with After his grandfather, George I., became king of Great Britain FREDERICK LOUIS (1707-1751), prince of Wales, eldest son superb tactical skill the last efforts of the Germans at Vionville, and Ireland in 1714, Frederick was known as duke of Gloucester1 and the victory of St Privat on the 18th was due to his leadership and made a knight of the Garter, having previously been be(see METZ), which shone all the more by contrast with the failures trothed to Wilhelmina Sophia Dorothea (1709-1758), daughter of the I. Army at Gravelotte. The prince was left in command of of Frederick William I., king of Prussia, and sister of Frederick the forces which blockaded Bazaine in Metz, and received the the Great. Although he was anxious to marry this lady, the surrender of that place and of the last remaining field army of the match was rendered impossible by the dislike of George II. and enemy. He was promoted at once to the rank of general field Frederick William for each other. Soon after his father became marshal, and shortly afterwards the II. Army was despatched king in 1727 Frederick took up his residence in England and in to aid in crushing the newly organized army of the French republic on the Loire. Here again he retrieved strategical errors George II. and his son were very unfriendly, and there existed by energy and tactical skill, and his work was in the end crowned between them the jealousy which Stubbs calls the "incurable 1729 was created prince of Wales; but the relations between by the victory of Le Mans on the 12th of January 1871. Of bane of royalty." The faults were not all on one side. all the subordinate leaders on the German side none enjoyed a prince's character was not attractive, and the king refused to greater and a better deserved reputation than the Red Prince. He now became inspector-general of the 3rd "army inspection," or inspired the writing of, the Histoire du prince Tili, a book and a little later inspector of cavalry, and in the latter post he was containing offensive caricatures of both king and queen; and make him an adequate allowance. In 1735 Frederick wrote, largely instrumental in bringing the German cavalry to the degree losing no opportunity of irritating his father, " he made," says of perfection in manœuvre and general training which it gradually Lecky, "his court the special centre of opposition to the governattained in the years after the war. his own soldierly qualities by further study and by the conduct of After a marriage between the prince and Lady Diana Spencer, He never ceased to improvement, and he exerted all his influence for the ruin of Walpole.' manœuvres on a large scale. him aloof from the court and from his own family, and he spent frustrated by Walpole, Frederick was married in April 1736 to His sternness of character kept afterwards the wife of John, 4th duke of Bedford, had been his leisure months chiefly on his various country estates. 1872 and in 1882 he travelled in the Mediterranean and the Near East. He died on the 15th of June 1885 at Klein-Glienicke

In

The

when he was raised to the peerage in 1736 it was as duke of Edinburgh only. See G. E. C(okayne), Complete Peerage, sub "Gloucester." Frederick was never actually created duke of Gloucester, and

Augusta (1719-1772), daughter of Frederick II., duke of Saxe- | succeeded in obtaining the consent of Sweden to the cession of Gotha, a union which was welcomed by his parents, but which that part of Pomerania which he had occupied (Usedom, Wollin, led to further trouble between father and son. George proposed Stettin, Hither Pomerania, east of the Peene) in return for a to allow the prince £50,000 a year; but this sum was regarded payment of 2,000,000 thalers. as insufficient by the latter, whose appeal to parliament was unsuccessful. After the birth of his first child, Augusta, in 1737, Frederick was ordered by the king to quit St James' Palace, and the foreign ambassadors were requested to refrain from visiting him. The relations between the two were now worse than before. In 1745 George II. refused to allow his son to command the British army against the Jacobites. On the 20th of March 1751 the prince died in London, and was buried in Westminster Abbey. He left five sons and two daughters. The sons were George (afterwards King George III.), Edward Augustus, duke of York and Albany (1739-1767), William Henry, duke of Gloucester and Edinburgh (1743-1805), Henry Frederick, duke of Cumberland (1745-1790), and Frederick William (1750-1765); the daughters were Augusta (1737-1813), wife of Charles William Ferdinand,duke of Brunswick,ånd Caroline Matilda (1751-1775), wife of Christian VII., king of Denmark.

See Lord Hervey of Ickworth, Memoirs of the Reign of George II., edited by J. W. Croker (London, 1884); Horace Walpole, Memoirs of the Reign of George II. (London, 1847); and Sir N. W. Wraxall, Memoirs, edited by H. B. Wheatley, vol. i. (London, 1884). FREDERICK WILLIAM I. (1688-1740), king of Prussia, son of Frederick I. by his second marriage was born on the 15th of August 1688. He spent a considerable time in early youth at the court of his grandfather, the elector Ernest Augustus of Hanover. On his return to Berlin he was placed under General von Dohna and Count Finkenstein, who trained him to the energetic and regular habits which ever afterwards characterized him. He was soon imbued with a passion for military life, and this was deepened by acquaintance with the duke of Marlborough (1709), Prince Eugene, whom he visited during the siege of Tournai, and Prince Leopold of Anhalt (the "Old Dessauer "). In nearly every respect he was the opposite of his father, having frugal, simple tastes, a passionate temper and a determined will. Throughout his life he was always the protector of the church and of religion. But he detested religious quarrels and was very tolerant towards his Catholic subjects, except the Jesuits. His life was simple and puritanical, being founded on the teaching of the Bible. He was, however, fond of hunting and somewhat given to drinking. He intensely disliked the French, and highly disapproved of the imitation of their manners by his father and his court. When he came to the throne (February 25, 1713) his first act was to dismiss from the palace every unnecessary official and to regulate the royal household on principles of the strictest parsimony. The greater part of the beautiful furniture was sold. His importance for Prussia is twofold: in internal politics he laid down principles which continued to be followed long after his death. This was a province peculiarly suited to his genius; he was one of the greatest administrators who have ever worn the Prussian crown. His foreign policy was less successful, though under his rule the kingdom acquired some extension of territory. Thus at the peace of Utrecht (April 11, 1713), after the War of the Spanish Succession, he acquired the greater part of the duchy of Gelderland. By the treaty of Schwedt, concluded with Russia on the 6th of October, he was assured of an important influence in the solution of the Baltic question, which during the long absence of Charles XII. had become burning; and Swedish Pomerania, as far as the Peene, was occupied by Prussia. But Charles XII. on his return' turned against the king, though without success, for the Pomeranian campaign of 1715 ended in favour of Prussia (fall of Stralsund, December 22). This enabled Frederick William I. to maintain a more independent attitude towards the tsar; he refused, for example, to provide him with troops for a campaign (in Schonen) against the Swedes. When on the 28th of May 1718, in view of the disturbances in Mecklenburg, he signed at Havelberg the alliance with Russia, he confined himself to taking up a defensive attitude, and, on the other hand, on the 14th of August 1719 he.also entered into relations with his former enemies, England and Hanover. And so, by the treaty of Stockholm (February 1, 1720), Frederick William

While Frederick William I. succeeded in carrying his wishes into effect in this direction, he was unable to realize another project which he had much at heart, namely, the Prussian succession to the Lower Rhine duchies of Jülich and Berg. The treaty concluded in 1725 at Vienna between the emperor and Spain brought the whole of this question up again, for both sides had pledged themselves to support the Palatinate-Sulzbach succession (in the event of the Palatinate-Neuberg line becoming extinct). Frederick William turned for help to the western powers, England and France, and secured it by the treaty of alliance signed at Herrenhausen on the 3rd of September 1725 (League of Hanover). But since the western powers soon sought to use the military strength of Prussia for their own ends, Frederick again turned towards the east, strengthened above all his relations with Russia, which had continued to be good, and finally, by the treaty of Wüsterhausen (October 12,1726; ratified at Berlin, December 23, 1728), even allied himself with his former adversary, the court of Vienna; though this treaty only imperfectly safeguarded Prussian interests, inasmuch as Frederick William consented to renounce his claims to Jülich. But as in the following years the European situation became more and more favourable to the house of Habsburg, the latter began to try to withdraw part of the concessions which it had made to Frederick William. As early as 1728 Düsseldorf, the capital, was excluded from the guarantee of Berg. Nevertheless, in the War of the Polish Succession against France (1734-1735), Frederick William remained faithful to the emperor's cause, and sent an auxiliary force of 10,000 men. The peace of Vienna, which terminated the war, led to a reconciliation between France and Austria, and so to a further estrangement between Frederick William and the emperor. Moreover, in 1738 the western powers, together with the emperor, insisted in identical notes on the recognition of the emperor's right to decide the question of the succession in the Lower Rhine duchies. A breach with the emperor was now inevitable, and this explains why in a last treaty (April 5, 1739) Frederick William obtained from France a guarantee of a part, at least, of Berg (excluding Düsseldorf).

But Frederick William's failures in foreign policy were more than compensated for by his splendid services in the internal administration of Prussia. He saw the necessity of rigid economy not only in his private life but in the whole administration of the state. During his reign Prussia obtained for the first time a centralized and uniform financial administration. It was the king himself who composed and wrote in the year 1722 the famous instruction for the general directory (Generaldirektorium) of war, finance and domains. When he died the income of the state was about seven million thalers (£1,050,000). The consequence was that he paid off the debts incurred by his father, and left to his successor a well filled treasury. In the administration of the domains he made three innovations: (1) the private estates of the king were turned into domains of the crown (August 13, 1713); (2) the freeing of the serfs on the royal domains (March 22, 1719); (3) the conversion of the hereditary lease into a short-term lease on the basis of productiveness. His industrial policy was inspired by the mercantile spirit. On this account he forbade the importation of foreign manufactures and the export of raw materials from home, a policy which had a very good effect on the growth of Prussian industries.

The work of internal colonization he carried on with especial zeal. Most notable of all was his rétablissement of East Prussia,to which he devoted six million thalers (c. £900,000). His policy in respect of the towns was motived largely by fiscal considerations, but at the same time he tried also to improve their municipal administration; for example, in the matter of buildings, of the letting of domain lands and of the collection of the excise in towns. Frederick William had many opponents among the nobles because he pressed on the abolition of the old feudal rights, introduced in East Prussia and Lithuania a general land tax (the General

hufenschoss), and finally in 1739 attacked in a special edict the Legen, i.e. the expropriation of the peasant proprietors. He did nothing for the higher learning, and even banished the philosopher Christian Wolff at forty-eight hours' notice “on pain of the halter," for teaching, as he believed, fatalist doctrines. Afterwards he modified his judgment in favour of Wolff, and even, in 1739, recommended the study of his works. He established many village schools, which he often visited in person; and after the year 1717 (October 23) all Prussian parents were obliged to send their children to school (Schulzwang). He was the especial friend of the Franckische Stiftungen at Halle on the Saale. Under him the people flourished; and although it stood in awe of his vehement spirit it respected him for his firmness, his honesty of purpose and his love of justice. He was devoted also to his army, the number of which he raised from 38,000 to 83,500, so that under him Prussia became the third military power in the world, coming next after Russia and France. There was not a more thoroughly drilled or better appointed force. The Potsdam guard, made up of giants collected from all parts of Europe, sometimes kidnapped, was a sort of toy with which he amused himself. The reviewing of his troops was his chief pleasure. But he was also fond of meeting his friends in the evening in what he called his Tobacco-College, where amid clouds of tobacco smoke he not only discussed affairs of state but heard the newest "guard-room jokes." He died on the 31st of May 1740, leaving behind him his widow, Sophia Dorothea of Hanover, whom he had married on the 26th of November 1706. His son was Frederick the Great, who was the opposite of Frederick William. This opposition became so strong in 1730 that the crown prince fled from the court, and was later arrested and brought before a court-martial. A reconciliation was brought about, at first gradually. In later years the relations between father and son came to be of the best (see FREDERICK II., king of Prussia).

BIBLIOGRAPHY.-D. Fassmann, Leben und Thaten Friedrich Wilhelms (2 vols., Hamburg and Breslau, 1735, 1741); F. Förster, Friedrich Wilhelm I. (3 vols., Potsdam, 1834 and 1835); C. v. Noorden, Historische Vorträge (Leipzig, 1884); O. Krauske, "Vom Hofe Friedrich Wilhelms 1.," Hohenzollernjahrbuch, v. (1902); R. Koser, Friedrich der Grosse als Kronprinz (2nd ed., Stuttgart, 1901); W. Oncken, "Sir Charles Hotham und Friedrich Wilhelm 1. im Jahre 1730," Forschungen zur brandenburgischen Geschichte, vol. vii. et seq.; J. G. Droysen in the Allgemeine deutsche Biographie, vii. (1878), and in Geschichte der preussischen Politik, section iv., vols. ii.iv. (2nd ed., 1868 et seq.); L. v. Ranke, Zwölf Bucher preussischer Geschichte (1874 et seq.); Stenzel, Geschichte des preus sischen Staates, ii. (1841); F. Holke, "Strafrechtspflege unter Friedrich Wilhelm 1., Beiträge zur brandenburgischen Rechtsgeschichte, iii. (1894); V. Loewe, "Allodifikation der Leben unter Friedrich Wilhelm I.," Forschungen zur brandenburgischen Geschichte, xi.; G. Schmoller, Epochen der preuss, Finanzpolitik," Umrisse und Untersuchungen (Leipzig, 1898), "Innere Verwaltung unter Friedrich Wilhelm I.," Preuss. Jahrbücher, xxvi., "Städtewesen unter Friedrich Wilhelm 1.," Zeitschrift für preussische Geschichte, x. et seq.; B. Reuter," König Friedrich Wilhelm I. und das GeneralDirektorium," ibid. xii.; V. Loewe, "Zur Grundungsgeschichte des General-Direktoriums," Forschungen, &c., xiii.; R. Stadelmann, Preussens Könige in ihrer Tätigkeit für die Landeskultur, vol. i. "Friedrich Wilhelm I." (1878); M. Beheim-Schwarzbach, Hohenzollern'sche Kolonizationen (Leipzig, 1874); W. Naude, "Die merkantilistische Wirtschaftspolitik Friedrich Wilhelms I.," Historische Zeitschrift, xc.; M. Lehmann, "Werbung, &c., im Heere Friedrich Wilhelms I.," ibid. lxvii.; Isaacson, "Erbpachtsystem in der preussischen Domänenverwaltung," Zeitschrift für preuss. Gesch. xi. Cf. also Hohenzollernjahrbuch, viii. (1905). for particulars of his education and death; letters to Prince Leopold of Anhalt-Dessau in the Acta Borussica (1905). English readers will find a picturesque account of him in Thomas Carlyle's Frederick the Great. (J. HN.) FREDERICK WILLIAM II. (1744-1797), king of Prussia, son of Augustus William, second son of King Frederick William I. and of Louise Amalie of Brunswick, sister of the wife of Frederick the Great, was born at Berlin on the 25th of September 1744, and became heir to the throne on his father's death in 1757. The boy was of an easy-going and pleasure-loving disposition, averse from sustained effort of any kind, and sensual by nature. His marriage with Elisabeth Christine, daughter of Duke Charles of Brunswick, contracted in 1765, was dissolved in 1769, and he soon afterwards married Frederika Louisa, daughter of the land

grave Louis IX. of Hesse-Darmstadt. Although he had a numerous family by his wife, he was completely under the influence of his mistress, Wilhelmine Enke, afterwards created Countess Lichtenau, a woman of strong intellect and much ambition. He was a man of singularly handsome presence, not without mental qualities of a high order; he was devoted to the arts-Beethoven and Mozart enjoyed his patronage and his private orchestra had a European reputation. But an artistic temperament was hardly that required of a king of Prussia on the eve of the Revolution; and Frederick the Great, who had | employed him in various services-notably in an abortive confidential mission to the court of Russia in 1780-openly expressed his misgivings as to the character of the prince and his surroundings.

The misgivings were justified by the event. Frederick William's accession to the throne (August 17, 1786) was, indeed, followed by a series of measures for lightening the burdens of the people, reforming the oppressive French system of tax-collecting introduced by Frederick, and encouraging trade by the diminution of customs dues and the making of roads and canals. This gave the new king much popularity with the mass of the people; while the educated classes were pleased by his removal of Frederick's ban on the German language by the admission of German writers to the Prussian Academy, and by the active encouragement given to schools and universities. But these reforms were vitiated in their source. In 1781 Frederick William, then prince of Prussia, inclined, like many sensual natures, to mysticism, had joined the Rosicrucians, and had fallen under the influence of Johann Christof Wöllner (1732-1800), and by him the royal policy was inspired. Wöllner, whom Frederick the Great had described as a "treacherous and intriguing priest," had started life as a poor tutor in the family of General von Itzenplitz, a noble of the mark of Brandenburg, had, after the general's death and to the scandal of king and nobility, married the general's daughter, and with his mother-in-law's assistance settled down on a small estate. By his practical experiments and by his writings he gained a considerable reputation as an economist; but his ambition was not content with this, and he sought to extend his influence by joining first the Freemasons and afterwards (1779) the Rosicrucians. Wöllner, with his impressive personality and easy if superficial eloquence, was just the man to lead a movement of this kind. Under his influence the order spread rapidly, and he soon found himself the supreme director (Oberhauptdirektor) of some 26" circles," which included in their membership princes, officers and high officials. As a Rosicrucian Wöllner dabbled in alchemy and other mystic arts, but he also affected to be zealous for Christian orthodoxy, imperilled by Frederick II.'s patronage of "enlightenment," and a few months before Frederick's death wrote to his friend the Rosicrucian Johann Rudolph von Bischoffswerder (1741-1803) that his highest ambition was to be placed at the head of the religious department of the state" as an unworthy instrument in the hand of Ormesus" (the prince of Prussia's Rosicrucian name) "for the purpose of saving millions of souls from perdition and bringing back the whole country to the faith of Jesus Christ."

Such was the man whom Frederick William II., immediately after his accession, called to his counsels. On the 26th of August 1786 he was appointed privy councillor for finance (Geheimer Oberfinanzrath), and on the end of October was ennobled. Though not in name, in fact he was prime minister; in all internal affairs it was he who decided; and the fiscal and economic reforms of the new reign were the application of his theories. Bischoffswerder, too, still a simple major, was called into the king's counsels; by 1789 he was already an adjutant-general. These were the two men who enmeshed the king in a web of Rosicrucian mystery and intrigue, which hampered whatever healthy development of his policy might have been possible, and led ultimately to disaster. The opposition to Wöllner was, indeed, at the outset strong enough to prevent his being entrusted with the department of religion; but this too in time was overcome, and on the 3rd of July 1788 he was appointed active privy councillor of state and of justice and head of the spiritual

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