Stick Russians
In the Napoleonic satellite state of the Grand Duchy of Berg, mostly young rebels were designated as stick Russians , who appeared after Napoleon's defeat in the Russian campaign in 1812 . The insurgents were so named because they cheered the Russians and armed themselves with clubs.
After the departure of Grand Duke Joachim Murat in 1808, the population of the Grand Duchy of Berg was de facto under the direct control of Napoleon. Due to Napoleon's continued wars, the authorities drastically increased drafts for military service and the demand for taxes. Thousands of young men from the Bergisches Land had already lost their lives on Napoleon's conquest campaigns in Spain , Italy and Russia. After Napoleon's army sank in Russia in 1812, new soldiers were once again raised in large numbers by decree. Pent-up resentment and hatred in the population led to the so-called Speckrussen uprising at the end of January 1813 .
In the Oberbergischen the rebels were called Speckrussen because their fellow citizens often ate them with sauerkraut and bacon. Elsewhere they were also called stick Russians because they wandered around armed with sticks, expelled recruiting officers, destroyed official files and harassed officials. In their homes, they harassed residents who refused to support them out of fear of the authorities.
The bulk of the rebels were recruited from socially declassed day laborers and those who had become unemployed, who suffered from the consequences of the Napoleonic continental blockade for the local economy. The core, however, was made up of deserters or young men who had evaded the threatened conscription . Characteristically, in several cases they destroyed the civil status registers and other files relevant to the organization of the conscription system in the official bodies.
The most massive acts of resistance took place in the northern and eastern parts of the Grand Duchy of Berg. Around 800 rebels are said to have risen in Wipperfürth in 1813, and as much as 4,000 to 5,000 in Gummersbach . In Waldbröl , resistors led by Johann Wilhelm Pauli plundered the house of a salt and tobacco dealer and then tried to storm the sub-prefecture in Siegen . In Eitorf , the house of Maire Reiner Komp was set on fire by insurgents.
Napoleon, who was informed of the uprising in late January 1813, was outraged and ensured that it was uncompromisingly suppressed by moving troops from the Wesel Citadel into the Bergisches Land. The ringleaders were arrested, almost without exception. In Düsseldorf alone there are said to have been 100 executions. A dubious form of pardon meant renouncing execution in exchange for conscription to the military, as this, realistically speaking, came very close to a death sentence .
Due to the lack of appropriate programmatic announcements, one can hardly speak of a political intention of the insurgents. After all, the actions testified to the first signs of disintegration of Napoleonic rule in Germany. After all, Napoleon's catastrophe in Russia was not hidden from the insurgents. The rebellion initially found no response outside of the Grand Duchy of Berg.
literature
- Mahmoud Kandil: Social protest against the Napoleonic system of rule. Statements by the population of the Grand Duchy of Berg 1808–1813 from the perspective of the authorities , Aachen / Mainz 1995.
- Jörg Engelbrecht: Basics of the social and economic history of the Grand Duchy of Berg , in: Burkhard Dietz (Ed.), The Grand Duchy of Berg as a Napoleonic model state. A regional historical interim balance sheet, Cologne 1995, pp. 54–65.
- SN Iskjul ': The uprising in the Grand Duchy of Berg against Napoleon in 1813 , in: Zeitschrift des Bergisches Geschichtsverein 92 (1986), pp. 57-68.
Web links
Individual proof
- ↑ Klas E. Everwyn : “The Russians will be here soon”. A broken shot glass was the trigger for the popular uprising at the Sieg . The time of February 2, 1990, 8:00 a.m.