Berlin decree

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The articles Berlin Decree and Continental Lock # Berlin Decree of November 21, 1806 overlap thematically. Help me to better differentiate or merge the articles (→  instructions ) . To do this, take part in the relevant redundancy discussion . Please remove this module only after the redundancy has been completely processed and do not forget to include the relevant entry on the redundancy discussion page{{ Done | 1 = ~~~~}}to mark. Vive la France2 ( discussion ) 10:03 am, Nov 11, 2019 (CET)


Wording of the Berlin decree with which Napoleon tightened the continental lock in 1806

A Berlin decree is a decree issued by Napoleon I on November 21, 1806 in Berlin , with which the continental blockade directed against Great Britain was first substantially tightened.

history

As early as 1793, the military conflicts between Great Britain and France were accompanied by an ineffective economic war . With French hegemony over continental Europe and as a result of the defeat at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805, Napoleon sought to wrestle Great Britain through a total economic war. After the lost battles of Jena and Auerstedt on October 14, 1806 against Napoleon during the Fourth Coalition War , King Friedrich Wilhelm III. von Prussia and his family fled the capital Berlin in the direction of East Prussia . Napoleon made a solemn entry into Berlin a little later, on October 27, 1806. He took up quarters in the Berlin palace in the rooms that Friedrich Wilhelm II previously lived in.

Napoleon issued numerous laws and ordinances from his headquarters in the Berlin Palace. So he had the three German princes, the Duke of Nassau, the Elector of Hesse and the Duke of Braunschweig-Lüneburg, deposed and expropriated. He initiated the establishment of the La Madeleine temple of fame in Paris and the naming of the bridge opposite the Paris military school in Pont d'Iéna . The most significant was the decree on November 21, 1806 on the state of blockade of the British Isles. Napoleon drafted and signed the decree without the knowledge of his Foreign Minister Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord . He wanted, as he himself proclaimed, to conquer the sea by the power of the land . A few days earlier he received a delegation of French senators in the palace of Berlin, to whom he also gave a written justification of his intentions.

content

The Berlin decree, in which the term continental barrier is not yet mentioned, is divided into two parts.

The first part contains ten articles justifying or justifying the blockade against Great Britain. For example, England is accused of violating maritime law and international law in numerous accusations . The decree is considered a principle for France and the territories it annexes, as well as France's allies.

In the second part the concrete measures against Great Britain were listed. So z. B. in Article 1 the state of blockade of the British Isles declared, trade and correspondence with Great Britain prohibited (Article 2), every English subject was declared a prisoner of war (Article 3), all camps, goods and all property of an English subject became a Prize (Article 4), no ship from England or its colonies was allowed to call at a port (Article 7). The foreign ministers, war ministers, naval ministers, finance ministers, police ministers and general post directors were charged with executing the decree (Article 11).

Effects

With the Berlin decree, the French Emperor imposed a complete trade embargo on the British Isles. Immediately after the decree came into force, couriers were sent to the governments of Holland, Spain and Italy to implement the ordinances immediately. Marshal Adolphe Édouard Casimir Joseph Mortier was ordered to occupy the Hanseatic cities of Bremen , Hamburg and Lübeck as well as the ports from Mecklenburg and Pomerania to the Oder . He was supposed to confiscate the goods of English origin and capture British traders.

Great Britain responded a short time later with the Orders in Council of January 7th and November 11th 1807, which in fact meant a counter-blockade. On January 7, it was decided that neutral ships would not be allowed to call at ports that belonged to France or its allies or were controlled by them. Failure to do so could result in confiscation of the cargo. On November 11th, the ban was extended to all ports and places of France and its allies, including their colonies, generally to states at war with Great Britain and to those countries which prohibited trade with the British flag. The sale of war opponents' ships to neutral states was also considered illegal. The British government is now actively supporting the smuggling of goods, especially from the island of Heligoland , to the European continent.

The Napoleonic decrees of Milan (1807), Paris (1808), Trianon and Fontainebleau (1810) led to a further escalation of the conflict. If the negative effects of the continental blockade remained largely limited, the continental system, into which Napoleon had been particularly hard- pressed to protect the French economy from the Confederation of the Rhine since 1810 , brought considerable economic disadvantages that provoked popular resistance and fostered the desire for freedom .

Extract from the Berlin decree (second part)

"Art. 1. The British Isles are declared a blockade.

Art. 2. All trade and correspondence with the British Isles is prohibited. That is why letters or parcels which are either addressed to England or to an Englishman, or which are written in English, should not be carried by the post office, but taken away.

Article 3. Every English subject, whatever class or occupation he may belong to, who is found in the countries occupied by our troops or those of our allies, should be made a prisoner of war.

Art. 4. Every warehouse, every commodity, every property of whatever kind that belongs to an English subject is to be declared war booty.

Art. 5: Trade in English goods is prohibited, and any goods belonging to England or coming from its factories and colonies should be declared war booty.

Art. 6. Half of the proceeds from the confiscation of the goods, which have been declared as spoils of war in the above articles, shall be used to compensate the merchants for the loss they suffered in taking away from the English cruisers stolen commercial vehicles.

Art. 7. No craft coming directly from England or the English colonies, or which has been there since the publication of the present decree, may be taken into any port.

Art. 8. Any vessel that violates the above provision by means of a false declaration should be taken away, and the ship and its cargo should be confiscated as if they were English property.

Art. 9. Our prize court in Paris is entrusted with the judgment of all disputes which might arise in our empire or in the countries occupied by the French army with regard to the implementation of the present decree.

Art. 10. The present decree is to be communicated by our Minister for Foreign Affairs to the kings of Spain, Naples, Holland and Etruria, and to our other allies, whose subjects, like ours, are victims of the injustice and barbarism of English maritime law .

Art. 11. Our ministers for foreign affairs, war, the navy, finance, the police, and our general postal directors are charged with the enforcement of the present decree, each as far as he is concerned. "

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b c Walter Demel / Uwe Puschner (eds.): German history in sources and representation . Volume 6: From the French Revolution to the Congress of Vienna. 1789-1815. Reclam, Stuttgart 1995, ISBN 978-3-15-017006-9 , pages 300-306.
  2. ^ A b c Frank Bauer: Napoleon in Berlin. Prussia's capital under French occupation 1806-1808. Berlin-Story-Verlag, Berlin 2006, ISBN 978-3-929829-36-5 , pages 147-152.
  3. Adolphe Thiers : History of the Consulate and the Empire. Volume 2: The Empire. Carl B. Lorck, Leipzig 1849, pages 252-254.
  4. Continental system or continental barrier . In: Brockhaus Konversations-Lexikon 1894–1896, Volume 10, p. 600.
  5. ^ The Correspondence of Napoleon, Volume III. 1806–1815, translated by Heinrich Kurz, Hamburg 2019