Archduke Albert of Austria

“ Austria was not raised to the dignity of an electorate by the Golden Bull of 1356, did not shrink from a contest with Charles. In 1361, however, he abandoned his pretensions, but claimed the title of archduke (q.v.) and in 1364 declared that the possessions of the Habsburgs were indivisible. Meanwhile the acquisition of neighbouring territories had been steadily pressed on. In 1335 the duchy of Carinthia, and a part of Carniola, were inherited by Dukes Albert II. and Otto, and in 1363 Rudolph IV. obtained the county of Tirol. In 1364 Carniola was made into an hereditary duchy ”

“ In 1288 he suppressed a rising of the people of Vienna, and he made the fullest use of the ducal power in asserting his real or supposed rights. At this time the principle of primogeniture was unknown in the house of Habsburg, and for many years the duchies were ruled in common by two, or even three, members of the family. After Albert became German king, his two elder sons, Rudolph and Frederick, were successively associated with him in the government, and after his death in 1308, his four younger sons shared at one time or another in the administration of Austria and Styria. ”

“ ALBERT (FRIEDRICH RUDOLF ALBRECHT) , Archduke (1817–1895) , Austrian field-marshal, was the eldest son of the archduke Charles (Karl Friedrich) , and was born on the 3rd of August 1817 at Vienna. After being educated under the careful superintendence of his father, he entered the Austrian (K.K.) army as a colonel of infantry in 1837, and was transferred to the cavalry arm in 1839, becoming a major-general in 1840. A brief period of leave in this year he spent at the great manœuvres in Italy, to learn the art of troop-leading from the first soldier in Europe, Radetzky. ”

“ Your majesty, the people cheer the archdukes because they are the brothers of the emperor, and because the confidence of your majesty has placed them at the head of the Austrian armies to lead them to battle, and, if it please God, to victory. It is your majesty alone that appointed the Archduke Charles generalissimo of all your forces, and the Archduke John commander of the army of Lower Austria. ”

“ From year to year the Archduke had acquired [8] more and more weight in the governance of the Empire, in proportion as his uncle's will grew weaker beneath the burden of advancing age. Thus he had succeeded in his efforts to provide Austria-Hungary with a new navy, the counterpart, on a more modest scale, of the German fleet, and to reorganize the effective army, here again taking Germany for his model. ”

“ Strange to say, Archduke Francis Ferdinand, the heir to the throne, agreed with the Emperor. He considered that the forward movement in the Balkans planned by Aehrenthal was ill-judged. He was aware that Kaiser Wilhelm and the “German” party in Austria desired to open the road to the East. The Archduke, however, took a much clearer view of the political situation than the Kaiser and his advisers. He grasped the very obvious fact that Italy was not a willing member of the Triple Alliance. She was only waiting for an excuse that would sound at all plausible to break loose from her bonds. ”

“ The desire now arose for better protection for the people; and a deputation tried to persuade the burgomaster of Vienna to call out the City Guard. Czapka, the burgomaster, was, however, a mere tool of the Government; and he declared that the Archduke Albert, as Commander-in-Chief of the Army, had alone the power of calling out the guard. The Archduke Albert was, perhaps next to Louis, the most unpopular of the royal house. ”

“ He was always anxious to transform the Austrian Navy into one worthy of a Great Power. In regard to foreign policy, the Archduke was always in favour of a Triple Alliance of the three Emperors. The chief motive of this idea must have been that, in the three then apparently so powerful monarchs at Petersburg, Berlin and Vienna, he saw the strongest support against revolution, and wished thereby to build up a strong barrier against disorganisation. ”

“ This fame I now seek, not from ambition, but from love to my subjects. You all know Albert, Duke of Austria, to whom in preference to all other princes I gave my daughter in marriage, and whom I adopted as my son. You know that he possesses experience and every virtue becoming a prince. He found Austria in a state of disorder, and he has restored it to tranquillity. He is now of an age in which judgment and experience attain their perfection, and he is sovereign of Austria, which, lying between Hungary and Bohemia, forms a connecting link between the two kingdoms. ”

“ Can it be questioned that loyalty to the highest interests of civilization required that Germany and Austria, when they determined to make the murder of the Archduke by an irresponsible assassin the pretext for bringing up for final decision the long-standing troubles between Austria and Servia, should have given all the European nations some intimation of their intention, so that their confrères in the family of nations could coöperate to adjust this trouble, as they had adjusted far more difficult questions after the close of the Balko-Turkish War? ”

“ And it was for the advantage of the whole German Empire further to its west that it should be thus strong, because only by its strength could it act as an effective defence against these eastern enemies. Therefore it was granted privileges. Its ruler was raised to the rank of Duke, and later to Archduke. The situation of its capital, Vienna, on that great waterway, the Danube River, brought wealth. All through the fourteenth century Austria was gradually adding to {214} her territory by conquest of weaker States along her borders. ”

“ He also lectured at the Military Club on the Austrian system of military education, which he declared to be wooden, and to deprive the soldiers of all initiative and resource. That lecture was a veiled attack upon the Archduke Albert, the victor of Custozza; so the Archduke John Salvator was once more politely exiled—this time to a command at Linz.
Decidedly this Archduke was frondeur, with inclinations towards Liberalism; and there were precedents for those inclinations in his family. He was the grandson of that Grand Duke of Tuscany who put an end to the Inquisition in his dominions ”

“ He must have known already the inevitable slowness of the Austrian mobilisation from his conversations with the Archduke. It would appear that the Austrian Emperor had promised more in their earlier correspondence. The limitation of the quarrel to a single issue selected by Austria compelled him to follow a policy which was not his own, and which Ollivier had emphatically repudiated. Besides, if the ally would only fight for one cause, what if the vigilant enemy should raise a conflict on another? ”

“ On the death of Louis the same strenuous competition for the vacant throne was aroused as before his father’s accession, and this time the Archduke Ferdinand, brother of the reigning Emperor, Charles of Austria, was chosen. Ferdinand became also King of Hungary and Archduke of Austria, thus uniting in the person of a common ruler three kingdoms inhabited by different nationalities. This settled the matter as to the succession for a while, for the throne passed from Ferdinand’s son to his grandson Rudolph. Rudolph was eventually deposed in favour of his brother Matthias. ”

“ I cannot say how much we like the Archduke; he is charming, so clever, natural, kind and amiable, so English in his feelings and likings, and so anxious for the best understanding between Austria and England. With the exception of his mouth and chin, he is good-looking; and I think one does not the least care for that, as he is so very kind and clever and pleasant. I wish you really joy, dearest Uncle, at having got such a husband for dear Charlotte, as I am sure he will make her happy, and is quite worthy of her. He may, and will do a great deal for Italy.19... ”

“ The facts presented in that article beginning with the open breach between Franz Joseph and the Archduke on his marriage to Sophie Chotek; the entente between Kaiser and Archduke at Eckartzau and Potsdam; the seizure of the Archduke's papers by the Austrian government after the assassination; the instructions to the Sarajevo police from the military authorities of Austria-Hungary to make no special arrangements for the Archduke's protection; the fact that no evidence has ever been adduced proving the complicity of the Serbian government ”

“ The young prince found himself the most unpopular man in Italy, for while the Liberals looked on him as a traitor, to the king and the Conservatives he was a dangerous revolutionist. At the Congress of Verona (1822) the Austrian chancellor, Prince Metternich, tried to induce Charles Felix to set aside Charles Albert’s rights of succession. But the king was piqued by Austria’s interference, and as both the grand-duke of Tuscany and the duke of Wellington supported him, Charles Albert’s claims were respected. ”

“ Most of us learn to bear our sorrows in our own hearts, without laying our burdens upon others, finding, sooner or later, that the world has enough of its own.
He talked of returning to Italy, but Archduke Albert and Isabella, proud of his genius and his attainments, invited him to court, sat for their portraits, and made him their official painter. One of his first works for them was a "Holy Family," which was so much admired that the Society of St. Ildefonso of Brussels, Archduke Albert being its head, ordered an altar-piece for the Chapel of the order of St. ”

“ The imperial generals were reduced to this extremity by the loss of the army, consisting of from thirty to thirty-five thousand men, who had been detached under Wurmser to support the remains of Beaulieu's forces, and reinstate the Austrian affairs in Italy, and who were now on their march through the Tyrol for that purpose. But the archduke was an excellent and enterprising officer, and at this important period he saved the empire of Austria by a bold and decided manœuvre. ”

“ Pressure such as this being frequently brought to bear on superiors, they could scarcely be said to exercise undivided control over their own subjects.
Driven into a corner, Aquaviva was obliged to leave the archduke's confessor where he was, accommodating matters by making him Provincial of Austria, in place of Father Maggio, Father Emerich Torsler replacing Father Blyssem as rector of the college at Gratz. The archduke expressed himself content with the arrangement, provided that Father Blyssem did not absent himself on the business of the province when he required him at his side. ”

“ And in thy camp alone is Austria.”
From Verona, too, it was that the Austrian troops took train in the July of 1866, under Archduke Albrecht, to go up into Moravia to the assistance of Benedek’s army; and from Verona it was that the Archduke’s historic telegram was despatched, on receipt of the news of Sadowa, to the Emperor at Vienna, bidding him take heart and have no fear for the outcome of the struggle: “Nothing is lost yet so if only both Army and People will spurn discouragement from them. ”

“ Indeed, there are but two scions of the reigning house of Austria, who can be said to have won any kind of fame as composers, namely, the missing Archduke John, who was the author of an exceedingly pretty and catchy ballet that still figures on the repertoire of the imperial opera, and Archduke Joseph, so well known by the name of the "Gypsy Archduke," who has done more than anyone else in Europe to place on record, both in writing and in print, the weird music and extraordinary quaint melodies of the Tziganes, melodies which he has arranged exquisitely for orchestral use. ”

“ But the shadow of the Holy Empire, immemorially associated with the house of Habsburg, still darkened the counsels of German statesmen. The Austrian archduke John had been appointed regent, pending the election of an emperor; and the political leaders could neither break loose from the tradition of Austrian hegemony, nor reconcile themselves with the idea of a mutilated Germany, till it was too late, and Austria was once more in a position to re-establish the system devised by her diplomacy at the congress of Vienna. ”

“ He did not wish the Archduke to go to Bosnia. He was much too unpopular to take such a risk. When Emperor Francis Joseph heard that Duchess Hohenberg was to accompany her husband, his wrath knew no bounds. The ladies of the Imperial family never accompanied their husbands on such occasions. If the Archduke and his wife went213 to Bosnia she would be received as the future Empress of Austria. ”

“ Truchsess had every reason to be satisfied with this result, for from all sides appeals were pouring in for help. In the Hegau Radolfzell was besieged; to the south-east the cardinal archbishop of Salzburg, Matthew Lang, was soon shut up in his castle by his subjects of the city and neighbouring country, while the Archduke Ferdinand himself would not venture outside the walls of Innsbruck. Forty thousand peasants had risen in the Vorarlberg; Tyrol was in ferment from end to end; and in Styria Dietrichstein's Bohemian troops could not save him from defeat at the hands of the peasants. ”

“ When Austria, regarding the murder of the Archduke as a National affront, precipitated the conflict which has convulsed the universe, she marked the way easy for Imperial Germany to put into effect a long-contemplated plan for territorial expansion, and to wage a warfare so insidious, so brutal and so ruthless in its character as to amaze the civilized world. ”