François-Louis de Pesmes de Saint-Saphorin

Johann Rudolf Huber , portrait of François-Louis de Pesmes, Seigneur de Saint-Saphorin, in military armor (c. 1707).

François-Louis de Pesmes de Saint-Saphorin (also Franz-Ludwig ; * February 1668 at St. Saphorin Castle , Saint-Saphorin-sur-Morges ; † July 16, 1737 ibid) was a Swiss diplomat and vice admiral of the Austrian fleet , General Feldwachtmeister (Major General) of the Austrian Army, Lieutenant General of the Army of the Kingdom of Great Britain and British Ambassador in Vienna . He was active in foreign service for around forty years, where he met numerous leaders of his time.

Life

origin

François-Louis, a member of a family based in Geneva , was born in February 1668 to Isaac de Pesmes and his wife Elisabeth Rolaz de Saint-Vincent at Saint Saphorin Castle near Morges. His father accustomed him to military discipline, conscientious work and justice at an early age. In awe of the Christian faith and venerable family traditions, he remained true to the strict principles of his youth throughout his life.

As the youngest of three brothers and not least as a subject of the Gentlemen of Bern, the local aristocracy, he was initially unable to take a public position, contrary to his wishes. The family was aristocratic and established in Geneva, but had no influence on the Bernese patriciate . So he decided to pursue a military career.

Military career

In 1685 he joined the regiment of Duke Ernst August I of Calenberg as a cadet , then for eighteen months in the service of the Roman-German Emperor, where he besieged Maastricht, which had become French, in the Regiment de Frize . He later spent two years as a secretary at the court of Landgrave Karl von Hessen-Kassel . Housed in his hostel, he met the Dutch officer van Assemburg. The two quickly became friends, so that Saint-Saphorin was recommended to the influential Marquis de Fleury. This in turn appointed Saint-Saphorin captain of an Austrian ship, but initially assigned him to an admiral ship. The first campaign in which he took part ended in 1692 with the capture of Großwardein , whereupon he was promoted to commandant of the admiral ship Saint Salvator. In later years, already a squadron leader, he proved himself to be a skilled seaman, an energetic superior and a skilled tactician, according to the fleet management. In 1695, at the age of only 27, Saint-Saphorin was promoted to Vice Admiral of the Austrian Navy after the victorious battles of Peterwardein on the Danube . Although Saint-Saphorin actually held the rank until the beginning of 1700, it never served in the Adriatic Sea , which was the main area of ​​operation of the Austrian Navy at the time. His task was exclusively to exercise the supreme command over the Danube. In an emergency, he was supposed to withstand an invasion of the Hungarians and Turks and secure supplies for field armies by sea. In the Great Turkish War he was able to prove his skills as a vice admiral for the first time in the fight against the Ottoman fleet near Belgrade . With a squadron of only five ships, he held up against ten galleys, thirty frigates and forty other ships and forced them to retreat. In gratitude, he received the supreme command of the Danube fleet and the authorization to appoint and dismiss officers, hire men and build ten ships based on the model he had invented and tested.

In 1704, Saint-Saphorin guaranteed the neutrality of the Chablais and Faucigny regions south of Lake Geneva. In the meantime, he used the Cevennes War to cause additional inconvenience for France. In 1707, with his function as diplomat, he supported the claims of the Prussian Friedrich I to the Neuchâtel succession and worked closely with the leader of the anti-French party in Bern, the later mayor Johann Friedrich Willading . Ultimately, from among the fifteen applicants for the new rule in Neuchâtel, it was not François Louis de Bourbon , a favorite of Louis XIV, but Friedrich, who was nevertheless favored by Bern and Willading. A little later, Saint-Saphorin tried repair the errors committed by localities again when she, after the death of Charles the Bold in the Burgundian Wars to the Franche-Comté had waived. In this way, the province should be returned to the federal government and the neutrality of the Confederation. He got backing from England and the Netherlands. The annexation then failed due to the resistance of some estates that did not want to give up their passive neutrality. Louis XIV, who had expected the hostile army in the Jura, withdrew his troops. In the foreground of this actual conflict between the houses of Bourbon and Habsburg , Switzerland assumed a position of important political importance. Until the end of the War of the Spanish Succession , it was the scene of numerous international intrigues and was flooded by secret agents and special missions from various intelligence services. It was allegedly thanks to Saint-Saphorin that not a single hostile operation in Switzerland had been successful.

In 1712, Saint-Saphorin traveled to Utrecht to represent the Swiss estates and two years later he signed a pact of attack and defense with the United Netherlands . Having achieved satisfactory results for Bern, he was rewarded with a high commission of 10,000 Écu. He rejected the proposal to make him citizen of Bern and thus eligible for public office. In 1712 he was a co-signer of the Peace at Aarau , the negotiations after the Second Villmerger War . He also dealt with negotiating loans to the Netherlands and England. Although Saint-Saphorin's interest was more in the political aspect of the loans, he found the way to make a profit on how to make a profit by sending the loan amount to the capital, Amsterdam . He had cash transported via a detour to Genoa in order to buy bills of exchange on Amsterdam at the local market, which were traded at a discount due to the low demand. Ultimately, the project put him in trouble after English debtors had not paid on time. The Dutch authorities insisted that the payment be made quickly. The loan only reached the partners almost a year late. Notwithstanding these incidents, George I of Great Britain had Saint-Saphorin appointed lieutenant general of his army and the English ambassador to the Habsburg capital Vienna .

Involuntarily, he slipped from one affair to the next. Various Anabaptists captured by Bern refused to swear allegiance to the government and to serve in the militia . The prisoners were to be exiled to New Bern in what is now North Carolina. Saint-Saphorin was entrusted with the transport by ship. The Dutch, inspired by the Mennonite community , had shown solidarity with the prisoners and thwarted their deportation. After sometimes violent verbal disputes between Saint-Saphorin and the Mennonites, Bern was willing to compromise and guaranteed the Anabaptists a voluntary emigration to North America.

In 1722 Saint-Saphorin returned to his homeland and retired. From then on he dealt with the management of his estates - he had a preference for agriculture - and introduced new cultivation methods in Vaud. Surrounded by friends, acquaintances and memories, he also wrote his personal memoirs. François-Louis died in 1737 at the age of 69. He left a wife and daughter.

Unlike most high-ranking Swiss military personnel of his generation, he did not join the French army. As a Vaudois patriot and Protestant, he not only disliked the supremacy of France in Europe claimed by Louis XIV , but also his anti-Protestant policies and the climax of the Huguenot persecution that had reached under him . Leaving his homeland, the Seigneur de Saint-Saphorin, known by many, served first in the Dutch and then in the Austrian army. Numerous great powers, especially Great Britain and Austria, tried to oblige him for a state-carrying office. Friedrich Wilhelm I appointed him a councilor. Eugene of Savoy questioned him before making any decisions. Eberhard Ludwig , Duke of Württemberg, entrusted him with representing his interests.

family

François-Louis de Pesmes was married. His daughter Judith-Louise married Gabriel-Henri de Pampigny from the Mestral family . Their son was Armand François Louis de Mestral de Saint-Saphorin .

literature

• Stefan Altorfer-Ong: François Louis de Pesmes de Saint-Saphorin (1668–1737) and European diplomacy. In: André Holenstein: Bern's golden time . (= Berner Zeiten, Volume 4). Stämpfli Verlag, Bern 2008, ISBN 978-3-7272-1281-9 .
• Paul de Vallière: Loyalty and Honor - History of the Swiss in foreign service. German edition, translation by Oberstlt. Hawk. Les Editions d'art suisse ancien, Lausanne 1940, pp. 389–393. (Paul de Vallière: La part de la Suisse romande dans l'histoire militaire de la Suisse . Original edition. Huber & Cie., Frauenfeld 1917.)
• Theo Gehling: A European diplomat at the Imperial Court of Vienna. François-Louis de Pesme, Seigneur de Saint-Saphorin, as English resident at the Viennese court 1718–1727 . (= Bonn historical research. Volume 25). Bonn 1964.
• Sven Stelling-Michaud: Les aventures de M. de Saint-Saphorin sur le Danube . Attinger, Neuchâtel / Paris 1932.
• Sven Stelling-Michaud: Saint-Saphorin et la politique de la Suisse pendant la guerre de succession d'Espagne (1700-1710) . Lausanne 1934.
• Johann Caspar Bellweger: History of the diplomatic relations between Switzerland and France from 1698 to 1784 . Bern 1849.
• Richard Feller : Switzerland and abroad in the War of the Spanish Succession . Bern 1912.
• Johann Ernst Wohlfender: Switzerland and the allies' undertakings against the Free County in the War of the Spanish Succession . Langensalza 1922.
• Linda Frey, Marsha Frey: The Treaties of the War of the Spanish Succession. An Historical and Critical Dictionary. Greenwood Press, 1995, ISBN 0-313-27884-9 , p. 339.
• André Holenstein, Thomas Maissen , Maarten Prak (eds.): The Republican Alternative. The Netherlands and Switzerland Compared . Amsterdam University Press, 2009, ISBN 978-90-8964-005-5 .
• Caroline Schnyder: Successful Republics. The old Confederation and the Netherlands in comparison . In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung. October 21, 2008.
• A. Lätt: Two Swiss diplomats in the service of Great Britain. In: Basler Zeitschrift für Geschichte und Altertumskunde , Vol. 21, 1923, pp. 127–156. ( e-periodica.ch )

Footnotes

1. ↑ ^{a b} Antonio Schmidt-Brentano: Imperial and Imperial Generals (1618–1815) (PDF; 453 kB), p. 86.

Web links

Commons : François-Louis de Pesmes de Saint-Saphorin  - Album with pictures, videos and audio files

• Rolf Stücheli: Pesmes, François Louis de (de Saint-Saphorin). In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .
• History of the St. Saphorin Castle (with numerous photographs)