Hildegard von Spitzemberg

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Hildegard Freifrau v. Spitzemberg
(painting by Wilhelm von Kaulbach , 1869)

Hildegard Freifrau von Spitzemberg (born January 20, 1843 in Hemmingen , † January 30, 1914 in Berlin ) was a Berlin salonnière of the Bismarckian and Wilhelmine times .

Life

Hildegard was born as the daughter of the Württemberg statesman Karl Freiherr von Varnbuler and his wife Henriette, nee Freiin von Süsskind . In 1864, although a Protestant, she married the Catholic diplomat Carl Freiherr von Spitzemberg , a son of the Stuttgart court official Franz Xaver Freiherr von Spitzemberg . The following year she accompanied her husband, the new Württemberg ambassador to the Prussian royal court, to Berlin.

Since then, "the Swabian, who had become a Berliner and followed current events with a lot of heart but with a critical eye", ran a political salon until her death , in whose attitude and group of people the intellectual situation of the political elite of Prussia and, after 1871, was reflected , of the newly founded German Empire .

She died in Berlin on January 30, 1914. She was buried in Stuttgart.

family

Marriage and offspring

Hildegard Freiin von Varnbüler married the then Württemberg ambassador in St. Petersburg , Carl Freiherr von Spitzemberg , on September 18, 1864 . They had three children:

Famous relatives

Hildegard's brother was Axel von Varnbuler , from 1894 to 1918 Wuerttemberg envoy to the Federal Council in Berlin, confidante of Kaiser Wilhelm II and Prince Eulenburg and member of the " Liebenberger Round Table ".

Her niece Amélie von Soden , the daughter of her brother-in-law Wilhelm von Spitzemberg and wife of the highly decorated General Franz von Soden , was a member of the constituent assembly of the newly founded People's State of Württemberg as a member of the German Center Party in 1919 .

Through her sister Anna she was the great-aunt of the later resistance fighter Caesar von Hofacker (1896–1944).

Social role

Friendship with Bismarck

Otto von Bismarck , who had an almost fatherly friendship with Baroness Spitzemberg. Portrait of Franz von Lenbach , around 1889

A sharp opponent of Prussia until 1866, after the Prussian victory over Austria and the southern German states (see German War ) , Baroness Spitzemberg soon turned into an enthusiastic supporter of German unification under Prussian leadership and an ardent admirer of Bismarck . The Danish writer Georg Brandes , who traveled to Berlin around 1880, describes, without giving her name, a conversation with the baroness that impressively documents this change of attitude:

“In a large company a few days ago, the wife of a south German envoy spoke to a stranger about this peculiarity of the north German to subordinate his individuality to the state idea; personally she felt repulsed by the uniformity of minds; but she recognized this renunciation, which was always ready to sacrifice: 'Because it has become the flesh and blood of the Prussians, they have become what they are, and because we lack them, we are one with all our dear individual characteristics Became nothing. ' [...] Such a statement is a sign of the times. Her father was a South German premier, one of those who before 1866 offered the most stubborn resistance to Bismarck and had great confidence in Austria's victory [...] The daughter is now one of Bismarck's inner circle and one of his most ardent admirers. "

Since the early 1870s, “Higa” was received by Bismarcks and the founder of the empire became a trusted friend and conversation partner, as did his wife Johanna . However, after Bismarck's dismissal in 1890 and his retreat to Schloss Friedrichsruh , her contact decreased considerably, as she herself sadly summed up in 1895:

“Personally, I wrote to the prince with little prospect of reading the letter - in his loneliness and old age he is probably gradually forgetting the people who do not come back to his eyes more often, and since the princess has died, I have lacked personality through which I could assert my wishes and rights. Marie [v. Bismarck] is completely alien to me, the sons [Herbert and Wilhelm v. Bismarck] were a long way off from me while the Bismarcks were still here. If I were a man, I would sit somewhere near Friedrichsruh and enjoy everything that is going on there from A to Z! So I have to be content with experiencing it in my mind. "

The opinions about the relationship of Frau v. Spitzemberg zu Bismarck after his release are, however, divided. According to the, however not always reliable, memoirs of Prince Bülow it belonged

“Among the first to turn away from the fallen Bismarck [...] Hildegard von Spitzemberg joined Bismarck's successor with such enthusiasm that it was mockingly claimed in the grumbling Friedrichsruh that she wanted Hagestolz Caprivi [the unmarried successor of Bismarck as Chancellor General Leo von Caprivi to marry to become Chancellor. "

In any case, she is critical of Bismarck - increasingly over time; in her diary she laments "the brutality and ruthlessness with which [the Bismarck family] stepped into the dust so many people, big and small," Bismarck's "violence and petty domination", "a lot of human sin" and "many little ones." petty sides ”of their“ hero ”.

Position at the German imperial court

She was also in personal contact with Kaiser Wilhelm I and Empress Augusta as a diplomatic wife and later widow with excellence ; as her husband, the envoy v. Spitzemberg, died in 1880, the old Empress personally condoled her in her apartment. When she died again in January 1890, she noted in her diary:

“If it is carried out at midnight today, then the life that has moved these rooms for so long, long years will be finally over, and all of us who went in and out there so much, we the faithful from the old days of Kaiser Wilhelm and Empress Augustas take the last farewell to our dear majesties and to the old days that were good for us! There are lived lives that come to an end, it is a great time that has passed. "

affair

In 1896 an affair between Hildegard's daughter Johanna and Duke Ernst Günther of Schleswig-Holstein , the brother of the German Empress Auguste Victoria , moved the minds at the German imperial court. The duke wanted to marry the baroness, which was met with bitter opposition from the imperial couple. After the emperor had made his position clear to both his brother-in-law and Johanna's uncle, Axel von Varnbuler , the Duke and Fraulein von Spitzemberg withdrew from the project.

salon

Marie Countess Schleinitz , the great antipode of the Spitzemberg. Painting by Lenbach , 1872

Not remarried after her husband's death in 1880, the baroness Spitzemberg, widowed at 37, continued to play a leading and influential role in Berlin court society. In her later years she criticized the personal regiment of Wilhelm II more and more and shared the skepticism of many older contemporaries, who had been socialized at the old Prussian court of Wilhelm I, against the young emperor's new course . In particular, her salon, which she ran without interruption since around 1870 - first on Potsdamer , then Magdeburger Strasse - contributed significantly to the spread of the Bismarck legend , which the former chancellor constructed after his dismissal in 1890 and which it did not always launch considerately in public. Their basic political and private attitudes remained elitist , conservative and nationally patriotic throughout their lives . About their social role and importance it says: "Until 1914, younger diplomats liked to visit them for their memories of Bismarck and their knowledge of Berlin society." Her big competitor in the salon world was the art-loving Marie Countess Schleinitz , while she and Anna von Helmholtz , the third large Salonnière of the Wilhelminian era, was on good terms.

Well-known habitués

Empress Augusta . Painting by Bernhard Plockhorst , 1888

diary

Baroness Spitzemberg is known today for her diary , which she kept from her early youth until immediately before her death and in which she continuously and in detail described, commented and criticized the situation of the social elite of the Empire and the political mood, especially of her own social class. In addition to the facts - such as court events, personal changes and family circumstances - the reading gives the reader the impression that changes in the political elite and court society caused the author and her acquaintances. Personal emotions that went beyond a level of strict bourgeois reticence, on the other hand, play no role, unless they concern phenomena from politics and society.

Not least because of this, the conclusion that at least the mature woman v. Spitzemberg deliberately wrote her journal for posterity, which is also indicated by his upscale, unusually sedate and consistently "presentable" style; In any case, it was published by the historian Rudolf Vierhaus in 1960, the year the author's daughter died , and has been reissued several times to this day. However, since it was only edited in excerpts, i.e. some of its records are still in private and public archives, this assumption cannot be completely confirmed.

Since numerous aristocrats, civil servants, officers and politicians were among the habitués of the Spitzemberg, and she herself associated with all the important Berlin personalities, her records represent a relatively dense panorama and an authentic moral picture of the Berlin beau monde , which spanned the entire period from the establishment of the Reich 1871 until the outbreak of war 1914. So the diary is to be "highly valued" for historical studies as a historical source for researching the political and social mentalities of the empire to this day :

“A personally determined, but significant section of German history is captured here in the mirror of the consciousness of a clever fellow and of the Berlin court society, which was taken personally, but still demands general interest [...] The historical value of the diary of Baroness Spitzemberg is based on this that it is a source for people's awareness, for their political and social self-image. "

expenditure

  • Rudolf Vierhaus (ed.): The diary of the Baroness Spitzemberg, b. Freiin v. Varnbuler. Records from the court society of the Hohenzollern Empire . Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1960. (5th edition. 1989, ISBN 3-525-35811-3 )
  • Rudolf Vierhaus (ed.): At the court of the Hohenzollern. From the diary of Baroness Spitzemberg 1865–1914 . dtv documents. Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, Munich 1965. (2nd edition. 1979, ISBN 3-525-35811-3 )

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ So Karl-Heinz Janßen, The discharge. In: Zeit -Punkte No. 2/1992, p. 19.
  2. ↑ See Brandes, Marriage and Modesty. In: Berlin as the German capital. Memories from the years 1877–1883. (German by Peter Urban-Halle ), Berlin 1989, p. 88 (February 18, 1878).
  3. ↑ Bernhard von Bülow reports from a conversation with the Bismarcks in 1884 ( Memoirs , Volume 4, Berlin 1931, p. 554): “The talk came about Berlin's social conditions. The princess raved about Frau von Spitzemberg, the wife of the Württemberg ambassador in Berlin, with whom she had been friends for over twenty years, since the time when they were both ambassadors in St. Petersburg, and whom she had always found loyal. "
  4. ↑ See diary. P. 335 f. (April 1, 1895).
  5. ↑ See Bülow, Memoirs , Volume 1, Berlin 1931, p. 316.
  6. ^ Diary , March 21, 1890.
  7. ^ Diary , March 25, 1890.
  8. ^ Diary , March 29, 1890.
  9. ^ Diary , July 18, 1892.
  10. ↑ See diary. P. 189 (December 21, 1880).
  11. ↑ See diary. P. 267 (January 9, 1890).
  12. ↑ See John Röhl : Kaiser Hof und Staat. Wilhelm II and German politics. 3. Edition. Munich 1988, p. 106.
  13. ↑ See Wilhelmy, p. 843.
  14. ↑ See Wilhelmy, pp. 844-47.
  15. ↑ Cf. Heinz Gollwitzer : Die Standesherrren. 2nd Edition. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1964, p. 159.
  16. ↑ See Vierhaus: Introduction. In: Diary. P. 34.
personal data
SURNAME Spitzemberg, Hildegard von
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Spitzemberg, Hildegard Freifrau von (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German salonnière
DATE OF BIRTH January 20, 1843
PLACE OF BIRTH Hemmingen , Württemberg
DATE OF DEATH January 30, 1914
Place of death Berlin