Friedrich von Holstein
Encyclopedia
Friedrich August von Holstein (April 24, 1837 – May 8, 1909) was a statesman of the German Empire
and served as the head of the political department of the German Foreign Office (the Auswärtiges Amt) for more than thirty years.
, Province of Brandenburg
on April 24, 1837, the son of a Prussian
military officer. He studied jurisprudence
at the Frederick William University
of Berlin
, from which he was graduated in 1856. Holstein joined the diplomatic service and in 1860 became an attaché
at the Prussian embassy in Saint Petersburg
under the authority of Otto von Bismarck
and later served as a member of the legations at Rio de Janeiro
, London
, Washington
, Florence
, and Copenhagen
. During his time at Washington, 1866-1867, his relationship with Alice Mason Hooper, wife of Senator Charles Sumner
, led to Holstein's withdrawal and the divorce of the couple.
With the establishment of the German Empire in 1871, Holstein became secretary of the ambassador in Paris
, Harry von Arnim, a patroniser of the French royalists and a fierce opponent of Chancellor Bismarck, who finally enforced Arnim's discharge and conviction for breach of secrecy. Thereafter Holstein returned to Berlin, where he assumed office as legation secretary in the Auswärtiges Amt in 1876, both an essential and a suspiciously eyed associate of Bismarck, who behind his back called him a "hyena". Holstein's career as an éminence grise was promoted by Bismarck's dismissal in 1890. The new chancellor, Leo von Caprivi
, was ignorant of foreign affairs; and Holstein, as a repository of the Bismarckian tradition, became indispensable.
Holstein remained a bachelor all his life, regarded as a skillful though devious man. His reluctance to emerge into publicity has been ascribed to the part he had played under Bismarck in the Arnim scandal, which had made him powerful enemies; it was, however, possibly due to a shrinking from the responsibility of office. Yet the weakness of his position lay just in the fact that he was not ultimately responsible. He protested against the despatch of the Kruger telegram
, but protested in vain. On the other hand, where his ideas were acceptable, he was generally able to realize them. Thus it was almost entirely due to him that Germany acquired Tsingtao (now Qingdao
) and asserted her interests in China
; the acquisition of Samoa
was also largely his work.
If the skill and pertinacity with which Holstein carried through his plans in these matters was learned in the school of Bismarck, he had not acquired Bismarck's faculty for foreseeing their ultimate consequences. This is true of the abandonment of the Reinsurance Treaty
with the Russian Empire
in 1890, his Chinese policy, and also of his part in the Moroccan crisis
which led to the Algeciras Conference
in 1906. The Emperor William II's journey to Tangier
was undertaken on his advice, as a protest against the supposed attempt at the isolation of Germany; but of the later developments of German policy in the Morocco question he did not approve, on the ground that the result would merely be to strengthen the Anglo-French entente. From March 12, 1906, onward he took no active part in the matter and resigned one month later.
To the last he believed that the position of Germany would remain unsafe until an understanding had been arrived at with British Empire
, and it was this belief that determined his attitude towards the expansion of the Imperial Navy
: beside this, he wrote in February of 1909, all other questions were of lesser account. His views on this question were summarized in a memorandum of December, 1907, of which Rath gives a resumé: Holstein objected to the programme of Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz
and the Navy League
on three main grounds: the ill-feeling likely to be aroused in South Germany, the inevitable dislocation of the finances through the huge additional charges involved, and the suspicion of Germany's motives in foreign countries, which would bind Britain still closer to France
. As for the idea that Germany's power would be increased, he wrote in reply to a letter from Tirpitz's opponent Admiral Karl Galster, this was a simple question of arithmetic: for how would the sea-power of Germany be relatively increased if for every new German ship Britain built two?
Holstein died on May 8, 1909, in Berlin and his body was buried in the Invalidenfriedhof Cemetery
. His assets included extensive secret dossiers concerning German statesmen that were not published until 1956. Rumours that he may have been an informant of journalist Maximilian Harden
in the Harden-Eulenburg Affair
have never been conclusively established.
German Empire
The German Empire refers to Germany during the "Second Reich" period from the unification of Germany and proclamation of Wilhelm I as German Emperor on 18 January 1871, to 1918, when it became a federal republic after defeat in World War I and the abdication of the Emperor, Wilhelm II.The German...
and served as the head of the political department of the German Foreign Office (the Auswärtiges Amt) for more than thirty years.
Biography
Holstein was born in SchwedtSchwedt
Schwedt is a city in Brandenburg, Germany. It is the largest city of the district Uckermark near the Oder river on the border with Poland.-Overview:...
, Province of Brandenburg
Province of Brandenburg
The Province of Brandenburg was a province of the Kingdom of Prussia and the Free State of Prussia from 1815 to 1946.-History:The first people who are known to have inhabited Brandenburg were the Suevi. They were succeeded by the Slavonians, whom Henry II conquered and converted to Christianity in...
on April 24, 1837, the son of a Prussian
Kingdom of Prussia
The Kingdom of Prussia was a German kingdom from 1701 to 1918. Until the defeat of Germany in World War I, it comprised almost two-thirds of the area of the German Empire...
military officer. He studied jurisprudence
Jurisprudence
Jurisprudence is the theory and philosophy of law. Scholars of jurisprudence, or legal theorists , hope to obtain a deeper understanding of the nature of law, of legal reasoning, legal systems and of legal institutions...
at the Frederick William University
Humboldt University of Berlin
The Humboldt University of Berlin is Berlin's oldest university, founded in 1810 as the University of Berlin by the liberal Prussian educational reformer and linguist Wilhelm von Humboldt, whose university model has strongly influenced other European and Western universities...
of Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
, from which he was graduated in 1856. Holstein joined the diplomatic service and in 1860 became an attaché
Attaché
Attaché is a French term in diplomacy referring to a person who is assigned to the diplomatic or administrative staff of a higher placed person or another service or agency...
at the Prussian embassy in Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...
under the authority of Otto von Bismarck
Otto von Bismarck
Otto Eduard Leopold, Prince of Bismarck, Duke of Lauenburg , simply known as Otto von Bismarck, was a Prussian-German statesman whose actions unified Germany, made it a major player in world affairs, and created a balance of power that kept Europe at peace after 1871.As Minister President of...
and later served as a member of the legations at Rio de Janeiro
Rio de Janeiro
Rio de Janeiro , commonly referred to simply as Rio, is the capital city of the State of Rio de Janeiro, the second largest city of Brazil, and the third largest metropolitan area and agglomeration in South America, boasting approximately 6.3 million people within the city proper, making it the 6th...
, London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, Washington
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
, Florence
Florence
Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....
, and Copenhagen
Copenhagen
Copenhagen is the capital and largest city of Denmark, with an urban population of 1,199,224 and a metropolitan population of 1,930,260 . With the completion of the transnational Øresund Bridge in 2000, Copenhagen has become the centre of the increasingly integrating Øresund Region...
. During his time at Washington, 1866-1867, his relationship with Alice Mason Hooper, wife of Senator Charles Sumner
Charles Sumner
Charles Sumner was an American politician and senator from Massachusetts. An academic lawyer and a powerful orator, Sumner was the leader of the antislavery forces in Massachusetts and a leader of the Radical Republicans in the United States Senate during the American Civil War and Reconstruction,...
, led to Holstein's withdrawal and the divorce of the couple.
With the establishment of the German Empire in 1871, Holstein became secretary of the ambassador in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, Harry von Arnim, a patroniser of the French royalists and a fierce opponent of Chancellor Bismarck, who finally enforced Arnim's discharge and conviction for breach of secrecy. Thereafter Holstein returned to Berlin, where he assumed office as legation secretary in the Auswärtiges Amt in 1876, both an essential and a suspiciously eyed associate of Bismarck, who behind his back called him a "hyena". Holstein's career as an éminence grise was promoted by Bismarck's dismissal in 1890. The new chancellor, Leo von Caprivi
Leo von Caprivi
Georg Leo Graf von Caprivi de Caprera de Montecuccoli was a German major general and statesman, who succeeded Otto von Bismarck as Chancellor of Germany...
, was ignorant of foreign affairs; and Holstein, as a repository of the Bismarckian tradition, became indispensable.
Holstein remained a bachelor all his life, regarded as a skillful though devious man. His reluctance to emerge into publicity has been ascribed to the part he had played under Bismarck in the Arnim scandal, which had made him powerful enemies; it was, however, possibly due to a shrinking from the responsibility of office. Yet the weakness of his position lay just in the fact that he was not ultimately responsible. He protested against the despatch of the Kruger telegram
Kruger telegram
The Kruger telegram was a message sent by Germany's Kaiser Wilhelm II to Stephanus Johannes Paulus Kruger, president of the Transvaal Republic, on 3 January 1896. The Kaiser congratulated the president on repelling the Jameson Raid, a sortie by 600 British irregulars from Cape Colony into the...
, but protested in vain. On the other hand, where his ideas were acceptable, he was generally able to realize them. Thus it was almost entirely due to him that Germany acquired Tsingtao (now Qingdao
Qingdao
' also known in the West by its postal map spelling Tsingtao, is a major city with a population of over 8.715 million in eastern Shandong province, Eastern China. Its built up area, made of 7 urban districts plus Jimo city, is home to about 4,346,000 inhabitants in 2010.It borders Yantai to the...
) and asserted her interests in China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
; the acquisition of Samoa
Samoa
Samoa , officially the Independent State of Samoa, formerly known as Western Samoa is a country encompassing the western part of the Samoan Islands in the South Pacific Ocean. It became independent from New Zealand in 1962. The two main islands of Samoa are Upolu and one of the biggest islands in...
was also largely his work.
If the skill and pertinacity with which Holstein carried through his plans in these matters was learned in the school of Bismarck, he had not acquired Bismarck's faculty for foreseeing their ultimate consequences. This is true of the abandonment of the Reinsurance Treaty
Reinsurance Treaty
The Reinsurance Treaty of June 18, 1887 was an attempt by German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck to continue to ally with Russia after the League of the Three Emperors had broken down in the aftermath of the 1885 Serbo-Bulgarian War....
with the Russian Empire
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...
in 1890, his Chinese policy, and also of his part in the Moroccan crisis
First Moroccan Crisis
The First Moroccan Crisis was the international crisis over the international status of Morocco between March 1905 and May 1906. Germany resented France's increasing dominance of Morocco, and insisted on an open door policy that would allow German business access to its market...
which led to the Algeciras Conference
Algeciras Conference
The Algeciras Conference of 1906 took place in Algeciras, Spain, and lasted from January 16 to April 7. The purpose of the conference was to find a solution to the First Moroccan Crisis between France and Germany, which arose as Germany attempted to prevent France from establishing a protectorate...
in 1906. The Emperor William II's journey to Tangier
Tangier
Tangier, also Tangiers is a city in northern Morocco with a population of about 700,000 . It lies on the North African coast at the western entrance to the Strait of Gibraltar where the Mediterranean meets the Atlantic Ocean off Cape Spartel...
was undertaken on his advice, as a protest against the supposed attempt at the isolation of Germany; but of the later developments of German policy in the Morocco question he did not approve, on the ground that the result would merely be to strengthen the Anglo-French entente. From March 12, 1906, onward he took no active part in the matter and resigned one month later.
To the last he believed that the position of Germany would remain unsafe until an understanding had been arrived at with British Empire
British Empire
The British Empire comprised the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom. It originated with the overseas colonies and trading posts established by England in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. At its height, it was the...
, and it was this belief that determined his attitude towards the expansion of the Imperial Navy
Kaiserliche Marine
The Imperial German Navy was the German Navy created at the time of the formation of the German Empire. It existed between 1871 and 1919, growing out of the small Prussian Navy and Norddeutsche Bundesmarine, which primarily had the mission of coastal defense. Kaiser Wilhelm II greatly expanded...
: beside this, he wrote in February of 1909, all other questions were of lesser account. His views on this question were summarized in a memorandum of December, 1907, of which Rath gives a resumé: Holstein objected to the programme of Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz
Alfred von Tirpitz
Alfred von Tirpitz was a German Admiral, Secretary of State of the German Imperial Naval Office, the powerful administrative branch of the German Imperial Navy from 1897 until 1916. Prussia never had a major navy, nor did the other German states before the German Empire was formed in 1871...
and the Navy League
Navy League (Germany)
The Navy League or Fleet Association in Imperial Germany was an interest group formed on April 30 1898 on initiative of Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz through the German Imperial Naval Office which he headed to support the expansion of the Imperial Navy ...
on three main grounds: the ill-feeling likely to be aroused in South Germany, the inevitable dislocation of the finances through the huge additional charges involved, and the suspicion of Germany's motives in foreign countries, which would bind Britain still closer to France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
. As for the idea that Germany's power would be increased, he wrote in reply to a letter from Tirpitz's opponent Admiral Karl Galster, this was a simple question of arithmetic: for how would the sea-power of Germany be relatively increased if for every new German ship Britain built two?
Holstein died on May 8, 1909, in Berlin and his body was buried in the Invalidenfriedhof Cemetery
Invalidenfriedhof Cemetery
The Invalids' Cemetery is one of the oldest cemeteries in Berlin. It was the traditional resting place of the Prussian Army, and is regarded as particularly important as a memorial to the German Wars of Liberation of 1813-15.-History:...
. His assets included extensive secret dossiers concerning German statesmen that were not published until 1956. Rumours that he may have been an informant of journalist Maximilian Harden
Maximilian Harden
Maximilian Harden was an influential German journalist and editor.- Biography :...
in the Harden-Eulenburg Affair
Harden-Eulenburg Affair
The Harden-Eulenburg affair, often simply Eulenburg affair, was the controversy surrounding a series of courts-martial and five civil trials regarding accusations of homosexual conduct, and accompanying libel trials, among prominent members of Kaiser Wilhelm II's cabinet and entourage during...
have never been conclusively established.
Primary sources
- The Holstein Papers. Vol. I. Memoirs and Political Observations, edited by Norman Rich and M. H. Fisher (Cambridge Univ. Press, 1955).