Henzi conspiracy

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Presentation of the execution and execution of those conspirators described opposite in Bern. , Execution of Samuel Niklaus Wernier, Samuel Henzi and Emanuel Fueter (1749), possibly an illustration from the magazine Der hinkende Bot, Burgerbibliothek Bern, Mss.hhXIV.70

The Henzi conspiracy (also called Burgerlärm in Bern ) took place in 1749 and was the attempt by some citizens of the city ​​of Bern to overthrow the ruling patrician families .

prehistory

In the 18th century only about 80 families of the 350 or so burger families were represented in the city council of Bern. The sole rule of a few patrician families who occupied the lucrative state offices, aroused more and more the anger of the non-ruling citizen families.

As early as 1710, 1735 and 1744, various dissatisfied citizen families expressed themselves critically about the election mode of the Grand Council. In memoranda, they demanded that the patriciate reopen itself to the citizen families and that they should be involved in the government. In 1744 the patrician republic of Bern reacted harshly and there were fines and bans. Among the exiles were Samuel Henzi , the brothers Johann Samuel König (1712–1757) and Johann Daniel König (1715–1747), sons of the pietistic theologian Samuel Heinrich König .

conspiracy

Johann Friedrich Küpfer (around 1740)

On June 25, 1749, several craftsmen, merchants, city employees, officers and students met, among them the leader Gabriel Fueter (1714–1785), specier, city lieutenant Emanuel Fueter (1703–1749), wood turner, Samuel Niklaus Wernier (1707–1749) ), Kaufmann and Gottfried Kuhn (1709–?), Secretly in Johann Friedrich Küpfer's (1708–1766) India dye works in Sulgenbach . Samuel Henzi, Wernier's brother-in-law, wrote a memorial entitled “Project to give the government a different form”. The focus was on:

  • Establishment of a guild constitution
  • Community assembly as the highest organ
  • Popular election of civil servants, limited term of office
  • Reorganization of the Small Council
  • Publication of the state accounts
  • Opening of the archives
  • All offices and positions in politics, administration and the military should be open to all citizens
  • Compliance with the laws in force by the patriciate

The councilor Johann Anton Tillier was informed of the group's intentions on the evening of July 2, 1749 by the theology student Friedrich Ulrich (1720–1781).

Government response

Manifesto, viewing The Conspiration discovered in July 1749 in the Place of Bern (1749)
In this house, called Henzistock, the group around Henzi met. The house was demolished in 1977 and rebuilt in 1981 at Wittigkofen Castle (photo 2020).

On July 3, Johann Anton Tillier briefed the secret council, which immediately and covertly searched the entire city for the conspirators. The secret council decided to have the arrests carried out by younger members of the Grand Council, including the grand woman Friedrich Willading and the court clerk Niklaus Gatschet. Militias were formed in Stettlen and the members of the councils were asked to arm themselves. Gabriel Fueter and Gottfried Kuhn were able to evade arrest. Henzi, Wernier and Emanuel Fueter were sentenced to death just a few days later and beheaded in front of the Upper Gate on July 17, 1749. According to eyewitnesses, the executioner Joseph Hotz (1691–1762) had to deal several blows with all three convicts, with Fueter the first blow went wrong. Other conspirators were either placed under house arrest or banished.

In 1779, the Bernese government granted the descendants of those arrested and exiled again citizenship rights. In 1780 they were allowed to return.

reception

The foreign press reported extensively and sometimes controversially about the Henzi conspiracy. Gotthold Ephraim Lessing inspired her to write the fragment of the drama Samuel Henzi, dated 1749 and published for the first time in 1753 . A character in The suspicion of Friedrich Dürrenmatt , the rundown writer Fortschig noted, "poor Henzi" to, as evidence wanted to write about the Lessing a tragedy that was in Bern has always been "nested a hopeless dictatorship ...". In 2008, the historian Andreas Würgler described the "program, planning and implementation" of the conspiracy as amateurish.

swell

The historian Johann Anton von Tillier (1792–1854) complained about the lack of documents on burger noise in the archives of the Bernese government. The archive inventory from 1826 mentions documents for cabinet no. 3: “Cahier because of the discovered Conspiration of 1749, 2 volumes. Also: Manual concerning the conspiration discovered in 1749. " The historian and politician Bernhard Rudolf Fetscherin discovered the files were missing in 1834, and the absence was confirmed when the state secretary Albrecht Friedrich May handed over the state archives to his successor Gottlieb Hünerwadel in 1837. Fetscherin kept the tower book from 1749 for a long time, which he returned in 1849 at the request of Ulrich Ochsenbein . In 1892 Heinrich Türler noted that the files that had been missing since 1837 were still missing. On July 10, 2019, the State Archives of the Canton of Bern reported in a media release ( spectacular document has surfaced again ) that looking at the manual the conspiracy discovered in the city of Bern in July 1749 , almost 270 years to the day of the beheading of Samuel Niklaus Wernier, Emanuel Fueters and Samuel Henzis and is now in the possession of the State Archives again.

literature

  • Urs Hafner: In search of civic virtue. The constitution of the Republic of Bern from the perspective of the opposition from 1749. In: Michael Böhler et al. (Hrsg.): Republican virtue. Developing a Swiss national consciousness and raising a new citizen . = Contribution to une nouvelle approche des Lumières helvétiques . Actes du 16e colloque de l'Académie Suisse des Sciences Humaines et Sociales (Ascona, Monte Verità, Centro Stefano Franscini) 7-11 September 1998. Slatkine, Geneva et al. 2000, ISBN 2-05-101828-6 , ( Travaux sur la Suisse des Lumières 2), pp. 283-299.
  • Hans Henzi: Recovered manuscripts on burger noise 1749 from the estate of Prof. Rudolf Henzi, 1794-1829. A contribution to the references by R. Fetscherin, Ch. Monnard and A. von Tillier. In: Berner Zeitschrift für Geschichte und Heimatkunde 13 (1951), pp. 40–52. doi : 10.5169 / seals-242191
  • Hans Henzi: On the trail of executioners in and out of Herzogenbuchsee. In: Jahrbuch des Oberaargaus 1968, pp. 33–51. digibern
  • Gottlieb Kurz: A contribution to the Henzi conspiracy of 1749. In: Blätter für Bernische Geschichte, Kunst und Altertumskunde , Volume 10, Issue 1 (1914), pp. 38–43 doi : 10.5169 / seals-181224
  • Johann Anton von Tillier: History of the Federal Free State of Bern from its origins to its fall in 1798. Volume 5, 1838–1839, pp. 182–188. Google books
  • Andreas Würgler: The «Conspiration de Berne» - a media event of the 18th century . In: Bern's golden age. The 18th century rediscovered, Bern 2008, p. 443.
  • Andreas Würgler: Asking and revolting: Protests against the authorities . In: Bern's golden age. The 18th century rediscovered, Bern 2008, pp. 441–444.
  • Andreas Würgler: Unrest and the public. Urban and rural protest movements in the 18th century. Bibliotheca Academica Verlag, Tübingen 1995, ISBN 3-928471-10-4 , ( Early Modern Research 1), (At the same time: Bern, Univ., Diss., 1994).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Würgler 2008, p. 444.
  2. ↑ Building inventory Bern ( PDF 2017 )
  3. ↑ von Tillier 1839 5, p. 184.
  4. ↑ von Tillier 1839 5, p. 184.
  5. ↑ von Tillier 1839 5, p. 187.
  6. ↑ von Tillier 1839 5, p. 205; Henzi 1968, p. 33.
  7. ↑ Andreas Würgler: Crime or State Reformation? The Bernese "Henzi Conspiracy" of 1749 as a media event in the 18th century. (No longer available online.) In: Historischer Verein des Kantons Bern. Formerly in the original ; accessed on May 8, 2009 (lectures winter semester 1996/97).  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.bzgh.ch  
  8. ↑ Würgler 2008, p. 444.
  9. ↑ Henzi 1951, p. 41.
  10. ↑ Henzi 1951, p. 41.
  11. ↑ Fetscherin's son Rudolf Friedrich Fetscherin was married to Eugenie Louise Fueter (1833–1900), great-great-granddaughter of the “conspirator” Gabriel Fueter (1714-1785).
  12. ↑ Henzi 1951, p. 41.
  13. ↑ Tower book, Volume 1749, B IX 493 in the catalog of the State Archives Bern .
  14. ↑ Henzi 1951, p. 41.
  15. ↑ Henzi 1951, p. 41.
  16. ↑ Press release of July 10, 2019 by the Canton of Bern.