Ernst II (Saxe-Coburg and Gotha)

Duke Ernst II of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha

Ernst August Karl Johann Leopold Alexander Eduard , Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (born June 21, 1818 in Coburg , † August 22, 1893 in Reinhardsbrunn near Gotha ).

Family background

Ernst was the eldest son of Duke Ernst of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld and Princess Luise of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg , the last legitimate descendant of the royal house of the same name. The age difference between the two spouses was considerable. At the time of their marriage on July 31, 1817, the bride was 16 years old and the groom 33. They also had a great deal of life experience apart. Ernst's younger brother was Prince Albert , who later became the husband of Queen Victoria .

Separation of parents

Ernst with his brother Albert and his mother Luise

Duchess Luise loved to live with her sons in the small Rosenau palace , as it offered more amenities than Ehrenburg Palace in the royal seat of Coburg. After Ernst and Albert were born, Duke Ernst stayed there only rarely. However, he did not allow the right to extramarital relations that he claimed for himself to apply to his young wife to the same extent. The duchess's probably first more serious affair with the chamberlain Gottfried von Bülow ended before a commission of inquiry, before which the chamberlain admitted that there had been " confidentialities that only marriage justifies ". Luise's second affair with the officer Alexander von Hanstein led to the couple's separation. The Duchess had to leave her sons and the Duchy in 1824. The divorce was postponed by Duke Ernst until the death of Luise's father, Duke August , and the redistribution of the duchies in 1826. As part of the reallocation, Duke Ernst received the Duchy of Saxe-Gotha , which he ruled as Duke Ernst I of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha in personal union, but separately from Saxe-Coburg in terms of territory and administration. After the divorce, Luise von Sachsen-Gotha-Altenburg married Alexander von Hanstein, who had meanwhile become Count of Poelzig. She died of uterine cancer in Paris in 1831 without having seen her sons since the separation.

Little is known about Ernst's feelings after his sudden separation from his mother. As with his brother Albert, neither his memories are meaningful on this point, nor does he comment on it in later letters, although the divorce of his parents and the blackmail attempts by the former ducal lover Pauline Panam were topics of conversation at the European royal courts at the time.

Childhood and youth

Ernst II of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, lithograph 1842

The two sons of the ducal couple were placed in the care of an educator at a very early age. When Johann Christoph Florschütz was appointed "Ducal Councilor and Prince Instructor" on May 4, 1823, Hereditary Prince Ernst was only five years old. Florschütz looked after the brothers for the next 15 years and was their most important contact person for a long time. The educational program that Ernst and Albert went through with him corresponded to that of their princely contemporaries. The classes included German, history, science, philosophy and geography as well as Latin, English and French. Duke Ernst often had breakfast with his sons and occasionally took them with him to hunt, but played only a minor role in their upbringing.

From June 1836 to April 1837 Ernst studied mathematics, philosophy, foreign languages, political and constitutional theory in Brussels and then three semesters of law and philosophy in Bonn . In Dresden he received from November 1839 in the Royal Saxon Guard Cavalry Regiment military training and musical and cultural training at the court there. In 1842 he retired from the Saxon military service as major general of the cavalry.

Political activity

On January 29, 1844, after the death of his father, Duke Ernst I , Ernst II took control of the dual duchy of Saxony-Coburg and Gotha.

Anton Nissen : The sea battle of Eckernförde

In Germany he was best known in 1849 after the victory of the German federal troops against Denmark in the battle near Eckernförde , in which he took part as the highest-ranking commander . The success made Duke Ernst a national hero as the “winner of Eckernförde”. In recognition of his services, he was awarded the Commander's Cross 1st Class of the Military Order of St. Henry on July 6, 1849 .

The proclamation of the German Empire (January 18, 1871) , oil painting by Anton von Werner , 1885. On the podium on the far left in a white uniform, Duke Ernst II.

Duke Ernst II on a club thaler from 1862

The rule of Ernst II was initially characterized by a policy that represented the interests of the liberal bourgeoisie. Thus, essential parts of the basic rights from the constitution of the Frankfurt National Assembly , including the full freedom of association and assembly, were incorporated into the joint constitution of the two duchies in 1852. The general male suffrage as in the Frankfurt Reich Election Act was confirmed therein and retained until 1918 (albeit with indirect voting). As a promoter of the German liberal national movement, Ernst II strived for the renewal and unification of the German people. In 1855 he presented a plan to reform the German Confederation .

Due to his far-reaching international relations with the ruling houses in Europe, he made a name for himself in opposition to Otto von Bismarck's politics , but was nevertheless an ally of Prussia in the German War of 1866 . The Ducal Saxe-Coburg-Gotha Infantry Regiment was involved in the battle of Langensalza and suffered heavy losses. As compensation for war , Ernst received instead of the hoped-for territorial acquisitions, especially Bavarian areas, 8,800 hectares of former Hessian state forests, Prussian areas without sovereign rights, between Oberschönau and Schmalkalden .

His intensive efforts to find a federal unit of the German states under Prussian leadership earned him the respect of King William I a. Immediately before accepting the imperial title in the Hall of Mirrors at Versailles, he publicly paid tribute to Ernst II in front of all other German princes: "I do not forget that I have to thank your efforts for the main part of this day." A reference to the appreciation of Ernsts Contribution to the unity of the empire can also be found in Anton von Werner's well-known painting The Proclamation of the German Empire (January 18, 1871) : Ernst II stands on the pedestal on which the newly proclaimed Emperor is cheered by the German princes.

Ernst II was buried in the ducal mausoleum in Coburg's cemetery on Glockenberg , which he had built from 1853 to 1858 as a burial place for the members of the Princely House.

Artistic and cultural work

Ernst received extensive musical training in piano playing and theory very early on , which he later continued with Heinrich Carl Breidenstein in Bonn and Carl Gottlieb Reissiger in Dresden . In 1846, at the suggestion of Franz Liszt , he composed the opera “ Zaire ” based on the tragedy of the same name by Voltaire . It followed in 1848 " Tony or Die Vergeltung ", 1851 " Casilda " and 1852 to 1854 with the opera " Santa Chiara " his most successful and most ambitious work.

Under Ernst's protectorate, the First German Gymnastics and Youth Festival was held in Coburg in July 1860 (which enabled the gymnastics movement , which had hitherto been suppressed by the government ), and in September the First General Assembly of the German National Association , founded in 1859 under his intellectual patronage , and in Gotha in 1861 1st German shooting festival held and the German shooting association and in 1862 the German singing association in Coburg founded. In 1860, he gave the German Singing Festival space to develop freely. His involvement in making large events possible for the singing, gymnastics and shooting clubs earned him the nickname "gymnast and shooter king".

Ernst was a friend and patron of the most famous German writer at the time, Gustav Freytag, and of the “Waltz King” Johann Strauss . He was also better known to the travel writer Friedrich Gerstäcker and the zoologist Alfred Brehm . With the latter two, among others, he undertook a trip to Africa from February to May 1862, the experiences of which he describes in his book Journey of Duke Ernst von Sachsen-Coburg-Gotha to Egypt and the countries of Habab, Mensa and Bogos .

Ernst significantly expanded the art collections at Veste Coburg and Friedenstein Castle , had the Ducal Museum built in Gotha from 1864 to 1879 and was also active as a director and actor.

In 1857 Ernst II was elected a member of the Leopoldina Scholars' Academy .

Honors

Equestrian monument of Ernst II in Coburg

Ernst was chief of the 7th Cuirassier Regiment since May 1, 1850 and of the 6th Thuringian Infantry Regiment No. 95 of the Prussian Army since August 16, 1876 .

The Freemason Lodge Ernst zum Kompass in Gotha celebrated its 50th anniversary on May 16, 1856 and its 75th anniversary on January 30, 1881, the latter in the ducal residence palace in Gotha, chaired by Duke Ernst II. On his initiative the lodge built its lodge house , which was inaugurated on September 3, 1882.

Ernst II. Is namesake u. a. of the Ernestinum Coburg grammar school and what is now the Herzog-Ernst School in Gotha, founded in 1888 as the Herzog-Ernst-Seminar .

In Coburg, the equestrian monument created by the sculptor Gustav Eberlein in the courtyard garden has been a reminder of the Duke since 1899 .

In Gotha, the slightly larger than life bronze sculpture of Ernst II is in the octagon of the Ducal Museum Gotha, of which he was the builder. The sculpture is a design by the Gotha-based sculptor Christian Behrens (1852–1905) and shows the duke in the clothes of a knight of the Order of the Garter with a sash and a wide, flowing coat. The monument was inaugurated on June 21, 1883 on the occasion of his 65th birthday, but removed from the octagon after 1945. It was not until 1988 that the sculpture, which had been forgotten for decades in a storage room of the museum, was rediscovered (the base is lost) and placed in its original location.

In Oberhof there is a memorial for the Duke am Kurpark, donated by Fritz Fleischer in 1903 by the owner of the Schweizerhof Hotel. The bronze plaque attached to a large natural stone shows the side portrait of Ernst II with a cylinder. After 1945 to 1997 the Oberhof coat of arms replaced the relief.

Family and offspring

Since Ernst's marriage to Princess Alexandrine of Baden remained childless, his nephew Alfred , the second-born son of his brother Prince Albert and Queen Victoria , succeeded him as Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha.

An illegitimate daughter, Helene von Sternheim (1839-1900), he had with a Fraulein Steinpflug and the illegitimate son Karl Raymond von Ketschendorf (1848-1899) with the French opera singer Victorine Noël, known as Rosine Stoltz , (1815-1903) as well the illegitimate son Kamillo Graf Razumovsky von Wigstein (1852–1917) with Rosa Freiin von Löwenstern (1814–1889).

literature

• Gert Melville, Alexander Wolz (Ed.): "The world in an unpredictable development of previously unimagined forces". Studies on Duke Ernst II of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (1818–1893), Coburg 2018 (= series of publications of the Historical Society Coburg e.V. 29), ISBN 978-3-9819391-1-8 .
• Harald Bachmann, Wener Korn, Helmut Claus, Elisabeth Dobritzsch: Duke Ernst II of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, 1818–1893 and his time. Anniversary publication on behalf of the cities of Coburg and Gotha. Maro Verlag, Augsburg 1993, ISBN 3-87512-198-8 .
• Max Berbig:  Ernst II (Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha) . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 48, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1904, pp. 403-413.
• Ernst II of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha: From my life and from my time. 3 volumes. Berlin 1887–1889. Also review: Friedrich Hofmann : A German prince as a historian of his time . In: The Gazebo . Issue 17, 1888, pp. 280–283 ( full text [ Wikisource ]).
• Gerd Fesser : Ernst II. Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (1818-1893). Sympathizer and patron of the Liberals. In: Helmut Bleiber, Walter Schmidt, Susanne Schötz (Hrsg.): Actors of upheaval. Men and women of the revolution of 1848/49 . Fides, Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-931363-11-2 , pp. 223-246.
• Edmund Frey: “I will always remain a dilettante”: Duke Ernst II. (1818-1893) and the arts. In: Edmund Frey, Reinhard Heinritz (Hrsg.): Coburg from the 'Dintenfas'. Literary forays through four centuries , quartus-Verlag, Bucha bei Jena 2005, ISBN 3-936455-32-5 , pp. 182–193.
• Friedrich Knorr:  Ernst II. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 4, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1959, ISBN 3-428-00185-0 , p. 621 f. ( Digitized version ).
• Kurt von Priesdorff : Soldier leadership . Volume 7, Hanseatische Verlagsanstalt Hamburg, undated [Hamburg], undated [1939], DNB 367632829 , pp. 53-58, no. 2146.

Web links

Commons : Ernst II.  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Literature by and about Ernst II in the catalog of the German National Library
• Works by and about Ernst II  in the German Digital Library
• List of stage works by Ernst II (Saxe-Coburg and Gotha) based on the MGG in Operone

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Pakula, p. 9.
2. ↑ Hans-Joachim Netzer: Albert von Sachsen-Coburg and Gotha . Beck, Munich 1988, ISBN 3-406-33000-2 , p. 57.
3. ↑ Netzer, p. 60.
4. ↑ Netzer, p. 64 f.
5. ↑ Barbara Grabmann: Processes of the constitution of collective identity in comparison. Museums in Scotland and Bavaria. Tectum, 2002, ISBN 3-8288-8444-X , p. 427.
6. ↑ The Royal Saxon Military St. Heinrichs Order 1736–1918. An honor sheet of the Saxon Army. Wilhelm and Bertha von Baensch Foundation, Dresden 1937, p. 55.
7. ↑ Ernst II of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha: From my life and from my time , 5th edition, Berlin 1888, vol. I, p. 13.
8. ↑ Theodor Toeche-Mittler: The imperial proclamation in Versailles on January 18, 1871 with a directory of the festival participants. Ernst Siegfried Mittler and Son, Berlin 1896.
9. ↑ H. Schnaebeli: photographs of the imperial proclamation in Versailles. Berlin 1871.
10. ^ Piper's Encyclopedia of Musical Theater . Volume 2. Ed. Carl Dahlhaus and Research Institute for Music Theater of the University of Bayreuth under the direction of Sieghart Döhring. ISBN 3-492-02412-2 , pp. 157/158.
11. ^ Max Döllner : History of the development of the city of Neustadt an der Aisch up to 1933. 1950. 2nd edition. Ph. CW Schmidt, Neustadt an der Aisch 1978, ISBN 3-87707-013-2 , pp. 603-608.
12. ^ Max Döllner : History of the development of the city of Neustadt an der Aisch until 1933. 1950; 2nd Edition. Ph. CW Schmidt, Neustadt an der Aisch 1978, ISBN 3-87707-013-2 , pp. 601 and 636.
13. ↑ Member entry of Ernst II. Von Sachsen-Coburg at the German Academy of Natural Scientists Leopoldina , accessed on April 5, 2015.
14. ↑ Gotha . In: General Handbook of Freemasonry. Third edition of Lenning's Encyclopedia of Freemasonry , Association of German Freemasons, Leipzig , completely revised and brought in line with the new scientific research . Max Hesse's Verlag, 1900, p. 372.
15. ^ Matthias Wenzel : Gothaer monuments and memorial stones , Erfurt 2004, p. 42.
16. ^ Harald Sandner: The House of Saxony-Coburg and Gotha 1826 to 2001; Documentation on the 175th anniversary of the parent company in words and pictures . Druck- und Verlagsanstalt Neue Presse, Coburg 2001, ISBN 3-00-008525-4 , p. 103.

predecessor	Office	successor
Ernst I.	Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha 1844–1893	Alfred