The End Of The German Monarchy

Drawing on a wide range of contemporary sources, this biography examines the complex personality of Germany's last emperor. Born in 1859, the eldest grandchild of Queen Victoria, Prince Wilhelm was torn between two cultures - that of the Prussian Junker and that of the English liberal gentleman.

The origins of World War I were different and varied. But it was Austria-Hungary which unleashed the war. After more than four years the Habsburg Monarchy was defeated and ended as a failed state.

Kaiser Wilhelm II (1859-1941) ruled Imperial Germany from his accession in 1888 to his enforced abdication in 1918 at the end of the First World War. This book, based on a wealth of previously unpublished archival material, provides the most detailed account ever written of the first half of his reign. Following on from John Röhl's definitive and highly acclaimed Young Wilhelm: The Kaiser's Early Life, 1859-1888 (1998), the volume demonstrates the monarch's dynastic arrogance and the wounding abuse he showered on his own people as, step by step, he built up his personal power. His thirst for glory, his overweening nationalism and militarism and his passion for the navy provided the impetus for a breathtaking long-term goal: the transformation of the German Reich into the foremost power in the world. Urgent warnings from all sides, both against the revival of a semi-absolute Personal Monarchy on the threshold to the twentieth century and against the challenge his goal of 'world power' implied for the existing World Powers Great Britain, France and Russia were brushed aside by the impetuous young ruler with his faithful military retinue and blindly devoted court favourites. Soon the predicted consequences - constitutional crisis at home and diplomatic isolation abroad - began to make their alarming appearance.

This book explores the development and viability of Germany’s sub-national monarchies in the decades before their sudden demise in 1918. It does so by focusing on the men who turned out to be the last ones to inherit the crowns of the country’s three smaller kingdoms: Prince Ludwig of Bavaria, Prince Friedrich August of Saxony and Prince Wilhelm of Württemberg. Imperial Germany was not a monolithic block, but a motley federation of more than twenty allied regional monarchies, headed by the Kaiser. When the German Reich became a republic at the end of the First World War, all of these kings, grand dukes, dukes and princes were swept away within a fortnight. By examining the lives, experiences and functions of these three men as heirs to the throne during the decades when they prepared themselves for their predestined role as king, this study investigates what the future of the German model of constitutional monarchy looked like before it was so abruptly discarded.

In 1806, the Holy Roman Empire ceased to exist when Francis II became Emperor of Austria. 112 years later, the Habsburg empire collapsed after the First World War after surviving many tribulations. During the year of revolutions in 1848 the much-loved but incompetent Emperor Ferdinand had abdicated in favour of his young nephew Francis Joseph. His long reign was marked by defeat in several wars, family tragedies and scandals including the execution of his brother Maximilian, Emperor of Mexico, the suicide of his son Crown Prince Rudolf, and the assassinations of his wife Empress Elizabeth, and nephew Francis Ferdinand. He was succeeded in 1916 by the succession of his great-nephew Charles, who abdicated in 1918 and died after two unsuccessful attempts to regain the throne of Hungary, but his eldest son Otto remained head of the family and Member of the European Parliament for twenty years. This book looks at the final chapter of the Habsburgs, from the Napoleonic era to the age of the dictators and post-war Europe.