November 9, 1918: Abdication of Wilhelm II, German Emperor and King of Prussia.

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Abdication, Friedrich Ebert, Friedrich III of Germany, German Chancellor, German Empire, Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany, Prince Maximilian of Baden, Victoria Princess Royal, Wilhelm II of Germany, World War I

Wilhelm II (Friedrich Wilhelm Viktor Albert; January 27, 1859 – June 4, 1941) was the last German Emperor and King of Prussia, ruling the German Empire and the Kingdom of Prussia from June 15, 1888 to his abdication November 9, 1918. He was the eldest grandchild of Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and related to many monarchs and princes of Europe, most notably King George V of the United Kingdom and Emperor Nicholas II of Russia.

Wilhelm was born at the Crown Prince’s Palace, Berlin, to Prince Friedrich-Wilhelm of Prussia (the future Friedrich III) and his wife, Victoria, Princess Royal, the eldest daughter of Britain’s Queen Victoria and Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha.

At the time of his birth, his great-uncle Friedrich-Wilhelm IV was king of Prussia, and his grandfather and namesake Wilhelm was acting as Regent. He was the first grandchild of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, but more important, as the first son of the Crown Prince of Prussia, Wilhelm was second in the line of succession to Prussia, from 1861 onwards and also, after 1871, to the newly created German Empire, which, according to the constitution of the German Empire, was ruled by the King of Prussia. At the time of his birth, he was also sixth in the line of succession to the British throne, after his maternal uncles and his mother.

 

Accession and Reign

Kaiser Wilhelm I died in Berlin on 9 March 1888, and Prince Wilhelm’s father ascended the throne as Friedrich III. He was already suffering from an incurable throat cancer and spent all 99 days of his reign fighting the disease before dying. On June 15 of that same year, his 29-year-old son succeeded him as German Emperor and King of Prussia.

His reign would last to November 9, 1918. Despite strengthening Germany’s position as a great power by building a blue-water navy and promoting scientific innovation, his tactless public statements and reckless foreign policy greatly antagonized the international community and ultimately plunged his country into World War I. When the German war effort collapsed after a series of crushing defeats on the Western Front in 1918, he was forced to abdicate, thereby bringing an end to the Hohenzollern dynasty’s three hundred year rule.

Abdication

Wilhelm was at the Imperial Army headquarters in Spa, Belgium, when the uprisings in Berlin and other centres took him by surprise in late 1918. Mutiny among the ranks of his beloved Kaiserliche Marine, the imperial navy, profoundly shocked him. After the outbreak of the German Revolution, Wilhelm could not make up his mind whether or not to abdicate. Up to that point, he accepted that he would likely have to give up the imperial crown, but still hoped to retain the Prussian kingship.

However, this was impossible under the imperial constitution. Wilhelm thought he ruled as emperor in a personal union with Prussia. In truth, the constitution defined the empire as a confederation of states under the permanent presidency of Prussia. The imperial crown was thus tied to the Prussian crown, meaning that Wilhelm could not renounce one crown without renouncing the other.

Wilhelm’s hope of retaining at least one of his crowns was revealed as unrealistic when, in the hope of preserving the monarchy in the face of growing revolutionary unrest, Chancellor Prince Max of Baden announced Wilhelm’s abdication of both titles on 9 November 1918. Prince Max himself was forced to resign later the same day, when it became clear that only Friedrich Ebert, leader of the SPD, could effectively exert control. Later that day, one of Ebert’s secretaries of state (ministers), Social Democrat Philipp Scheidemann, proclaimed Germany a republic.

Wilhelm consented to the abdication only after Ludendorff’s replacement, General Wilhelm Groener, had informed him that the officers and men of the army would march back in good order under Paul von Hindenburg’s command, but would certainly not fight for Wilhelm’s throne on the home front. The monarchy’s last and strongest support had been broken, and finally even Hindenburg, himself a lifelong royalist, was obliged, with some embarrassment, to advise the Emperor to give up the crown.

On 10 November, Wilhelm crossed the border by train and went into exile in the Netherlands, which had remained neutral throughout the war. Upon the conclusion of the Treaty of Versailles in early 1919, Article 227 expressly provided for the prosecution of Wilhelm “for a supreme offence against international morality and the sanctity of treaties”, but the Dutch government refused to extradite him, despite appeals from the Allies. King George V wrote that he looked on his cousin as “the greatest criminal in history”, but opposed Prime Minister David Lloyd George’s proposal to “hang the Kaiser”.

It was reported, however, that there was little zeal in Britain to prosecute. On January 1, 1920, it was stated in official circles in London that Great Britain would “welcome refusal by Holland to deliver the former kaiser for trial,” and it was hinted that this had been conveyed to the Dutch government through diplomatic channels.

Wilhelm first settled in Amerongen, where on November 28, 1918 he issued a belated statement of abdication from both the Prussian and imperial thrones, thus formally ending the Hohenzollerns’ 500-year rule over Prussia. Accepting the reality that he had lost both of his crowns for good, he gave up his rights to “the throne of Prussia and to the German Imperial throne connected therewith.”

He also released his soldiers and officials in both Prussia and the empire from their oath of loyalty to him. He purchased a country house in the municipality of Doorn, known as Huis Doorn, and moved in on May 15, 1920. This was to be his home for the remainder of his life. The Weimar Republic allowed Wilhelm to remove twenty-three railway wagons of furniture, twenty-seven containing packages of all sorts, one bearing a car and another a boat, from the New Palace at Potsdam.

Wilhelm died of a pulmonary embolus in Doorn, Netherlands, on June 4, 1941, at the age of 82, just weeks before the Axis invasion of the Soviet Union.

HIM German Emperor Wilhelm II: Part 3

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Crown Prince Wilhelm, Field Marshall, Friedrich Ebert, General Erich Ludendorff, German Empire, Grand Duchy of Baden, Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany, King Edward VII of the United Kingdom of Great Britain, Kingdom of Prussia, Morocco, Otto von Bismark, Paul von Hindenburg, Philipp Scheidemann, Prince Maximilian of Baden, Princess Augusta Viktoria of Schleswig-Holstein, Social Democrats, Sultan Abdelaziz of Morocco, Tangier, The First Moroccan Crisis, Triple Alliance, Triple Entente, Wilhelm Groener, Woodrow Wilson, World War I

This is the final part of my feature on Germany’s Kaiser. Today I will look at his abdication and then look more on the personal side of the Kaiser along with his life in exile and his legacy.

As World War I raged on the Kaiser lost most of his political power and influence. By 1916 Field Marshall Paul von Hindenburg and General Erich Ludendorff were the virtual military dictators of the German Empire. Toward the end of the war it was evident how much power the Kaiser had lost and how much power Hindenburg and Ludendorff wielded. Throughout the spring and summer of 1918 the German staff could no longer deny that the war was lost and that peace should be sought after.

Georg von Hertling was the Chancellor of the German Empire and seen as a puppet of Hindenburg and Ludendorff and when it was realized he could no longer control the splintering empire on the verge of collapse he was forced to resign. The Kaiser, whose responsibility it was to appoint the Chancellor had no say in selecting von Hertling’s replacement. Prince Maximilian of Baden, heir to the Grand Duchy of Baden. Prince Max was seen as a liberal and by amending the constitution to where it would favor a Parliamentary system instead of the authoritarian system constructed by Bismark. Prince Max also included the Social Democrats, Friedrich Ebert and Philipp Scheidemann in the formation of the government. These were steps that were thought would make it easier for the allies to sue for peace. It was well known that US President Wilson would not deal with a Germany with the Kaiser at its head.

By November the German Empire was on the verge of collapse. There were socialist uprisings as well as rumblings in the military of mutiny. There were calls for the Kaiser to abdicate but that he refused to do so. In 1918 the German Staff had moved its headquarters to Spa, Belgium and it was there that Wilhelm spent his last days as emperor. All attempts to save the monarchy were lost but Wilhelm was not convinced. On November 9, 1918 Prince Max was in Berlin and the only thing he could do to stave off complete collapse and revolution was to announce the abdication of the Kaiser himself. When word reached Wilhelm that his abdication had been announced in Berlin he was outraged and never forgave Prince Max. Prince Max knew that he himself also had to go as it was seen that only Friedrich Ebert could restore order so the very same day the Kaiser’s abdication was announced Prince Max turned over the Chancellorship to Ebert.

Wilhelm was still not convinced all was lost. Ever the Prussian militarist Wilhelm had a delusional idea that he would lead the German Army, who was ever loyal to him, back into Berlin to crush any rebellion and restore his power. It took General Wilhelm Groener, Ludendorff’s replacement, to convince the emperor that the Army would not support him. It was only then that he agreed to seek exile and leave. The night of July 10th the Kaiser left Spa by train to seek asylum in the Netherlands. He was granted asylum by Queen Wilhelmina () and eventually settled in Doorn where he stayed for the rest of his life. His cousin, George V of the United Kingdom, called him the worst criminal in history. Many nations called for his extradition and wanted the Kaiser hung for war crimes. Eventually even president Wilson agreed that to extradite the Kaiser would destabilize the tentative peace.

Bismark mention in how he saw the Kaiser: he wanted every day to be his birthday—romantic, sentimental and theatrical, unsure and arrogant, with an immeasurably exaggerated self-confidence and desire to show off, a juvenile cadet, who never took the tone of the officers’ mess out of his voice, and brashly wanted to play the part of the supreme warlord, full of panicky fear of a monotonous life without any diversions, and yet aimless, pathological in his hatred against his English mother.

Reading one of the leading biographers of the Kaiser, John C. G. Röhl, found he blamed many others for his downfall and he had a streak of antisemitism in him as well.

Kaiserin August Victoria of Germany

He had married for the first time in 1881, HSH Princess Augusta Viktoria of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Augustenburg (1858-1921). There have not been many kind words written about her. She was devoted to her husband in an almost hero-worshiping fashion and was seen as rather plain and unintelligent. Her devout Christian conservative views also created more negative images of her. She bore the Kaiser 6 sons and one daughter to whom he was devoted to. His eldest son, Crown Prince Wilhelm, was a womanizing playboy and this did not sit well with the emperor. The two strong willed men had many conflicts. One son, Prince Joachim, who was divorced shortly after the war never recovered from his loss of position and life as a royal and committed suicide in 1920. A year later his wife, Empress Augusta Victoria, died at the age of 62.

The Kaiser remarried in 1922. On his birthday in January of that same year Wilhelm received a birthday card from a son of the late Prince Johann George of Schönaich-Carolath. Wilhelm invited the boy and his mother, born Princess Hermine Reuss of Greiz, to Doorn. While meeting the former kaiser Wilhelm found Hermine very attractive and the two got on well. They were wed November 9, 1922 in spite of very vocal objections his children, who were about the same age as their new stepmother, and also from Wilhelm’s monarchist supporters who were eager for the restoration of the monarchy. Hermine, who was called the empress within the corridors of Huis Doorn was similarly devoted to her husband as was his first wife.

The Kaiser passed away on June 4, 1941. He saw the first few years of World War II. He eventually distance himself from Hitler and would not allow himself to be used for Nazi Propaganda and would not allow himself to be buried in Germany unless the monarchy was restored. To this day his remains lie in a mausoleum on the grounds of Huis Doorn.

Although I didn’t have a lot of positive things to say about the last Kaiser yet I do find him fascinating. He was a complex character that was steering the ship when the German Empire ran aground. Historians say that World War I changed a way of life for the aristocracy that had existed in Europe for centuries. There are also some historians who say that the 20th century didn’t actually begin until the end of the First World War. As a monarchist it presents an opportunity to understand why the monarchy ended. I am of the belief that if the kaiser had been more open to change and willing to go the way of constitutionalism that the other monarchies had gone, there is a strong chance that Germany would still be a monarchy today.