Germany from the Earliest Period, Volume 4

by Wolfgang Menzel

The oppressed peasantry revolted as early as 1790 against the ruling cities, the vassal against the aristocrat, in Schaffhausen, on account of the tithes; in Lower Valais, on account of the tyranny of one of the provincial governors. These petty outbreaks and an attempt made by Laharpe to render the Vaud independent of Berne[6] were suppressed, A.D. 1791. The people remained, nevertheless, in a high state of fermentation. The new French republic at first quarrelled with the ancient confederation for having, unmindful of their origin, descended to servility. The Swiss guard had, on the 16th of August, 1792, courageously defended the palace of the unfortunate French king and been cut to pieces by the Parisian mob. At a later period, the Austrians had seized the ambassadors of the French republic, Semonville and Maret, in the Valtelline, in the territory of the Grisons. The Swiss patriots, as they were called, however, gradually fomented an insurrection against the aristocrats and called the French to their aid. In 1793, the vassals of the bishop of Basel at Pruntrut had already planted trees of liberty and placed the bishopric, under the name of a Rauracian republic, under the protection of France, chiefly at the instigation of Gobel, who was, in reward, appointed bishop of Paris, and whose nephew, Rengger, shortly afterward became a member of the revolutionary government in Berne. In Geneva, during the preceding year, the French faction had gained the upper hand. The fickleness of the war kept the rest of the patriots in a state of suspense, but, on the seizure of the left bank of the Rhine by the French, the movements in Switzerland assumed a more serious character. The abbot, Beda, of St. Gall, 1795, pacified his subjects by concessions, which his successor, Pancras, refusing to recognize, he was, in consequence, expelled. The unrelenting aristocracy of Zurich, upon this, took the field against the restless peasantry, surrounded the patriots in Stäfa, threw the venerable Bodmer and a number of his adherents into prison, and inflicted upon them heavy fines or severe corporeal chastisement.

The campaign of 1796 had fully disclosed to Bonaparte the advantage of occupying Switzerland with his troops, whose passage to Italy or Germany would be thereby facilitated, while the line of communication would be secured, and the danger to which he and Moreau had been exposed through want of co-operation would at once be remedied. He first of all took advantage of the dissensions in the Grisons to deprive that republic of the beautiful Valtelline,[7] and, even at that time, demanded permission from the people of Valais to build the road across the Simplon, which he was, however, only able to execute at a later period. On his return to Paris from the Italian expedition, he passed through Basel,[8] where he was met by Talleyrand. Peter Ochs, the chief master of the corporation, was, on this occasion, as he himself relates in his History of Basel, won over, as the acknowledged chief of the patriots, to revolutionize Switzerland and to enter into a close alliance with France. The base characters, at that time the tools of the French Directory, merely acceded to the political plans of Bonaparte and Talleyrand in the hope of reaping a rich harvest by the plunder of the federal cantons, and the Swiss expedition was, consequently, determined upon. The people of Valais, whose state of oppression served as a pretext for interference, revolted, under Laharpe, against Berne, 1798, and demanded the intervention of the French republic, as heir to the dukes of Savoy, on the strength of an ancient treaty, which had, for that purpose, been raked up from the ashes of the past. Nothing could exceed the miserable conduct of the diet at that conjuncture. After having already conceded to France her demand for the expulsion of the emigrants and having exposed its weakness by this open violation of the rights of hospitality, it discussed the number of troops to be furnished by each of the cantons, when the enemy was already in this country. Even the once haughty Bernese, who had set an army, thirty thousand strong, on foot, withdrew, under General Wysz, from Valais to their metropolis, where they awaited the attack of the enemy. There was neither plan[9] nor order; the patriots rose in every quarter and struck terror into the aristocrats, most of whom were now rather inclined to yield and impeded by their indecision the measures of the more spirited party. In Basel, Ochs deposed the oligarchy; in Zurich, the government was induced, by intimidation, to restore Bodmer and his fellow-prisoners to liberty. In Freiburg, Lucerne, Schaffhausen, and St. Gall the oligarchies resigned their authority; Constance asserted its independence.

Within Berne itself, tranquillity was with difficulty preserved by Steiger, the venerable mayor, a man of extreme firmness of character. A French force under Brune had already overrun Vaud, which, under pretext of being delivered from oppression, was laid under a heavy contribution; the ancient charnel-house at Murten was also destroyed, because the French had formerly been beaten on this spot by the Germans. But few of the Swiss marched to the aid of Berne; two hundred of the people of Uri, arrayed in the armor of their ancestors, some of the peasantry of Glarus, St. Gall, and Freiburg.[10] A second French force under Schauenburg entered Switzerland by Basel, defeated the small troops of Bernese sent to oppose it at Dornach and Langnau, and took Solothurn, where it liberated one hundred and eighty self-styled patriots imprisoned in that place. The patriots, at this conjuncture, also rose in open insurrection in Berne, threw everything into confusion, deposed the old council, formed a provisional government, and checked all the preparations for defence. The brave peasantry, basely betrayed by the cities, were roused to fury. Colonels Ryhiner, Stettler, Crusy, and Goumores were murdered by them upon mere suspicion (their innocence was afterward proved), and boldly following their leader, Grafenried, against the French, they defeated and repulsed the whole of Brune's army and captured eighteen guns at the bridge of Neuenegg. But a smaller Bernese corps, which, under Steiger, the mayor, opposed the army of Schauenburg in the Grauen Holz, was routed after a bloody struggle, and, before Erlach, the newly- nominated generalissimo, could hurry back to Berne with the victors of Neuenegg, the patriots, who had long been in the pay of France, threw wide the gates to Schauenburg. All was now lost. Erlach fled to Thun, in order to place himself at the head of the people of the Oberland, who descended in thick masses from the mountains; but, on his addressing the brave Senn peasantry in French, according to the malpractice of the Bernese, they mistook him for a French spy and struck him dead in his carriage. The loss of Berne greatly dispirited them and they desisted from further and futile opposition. Steiger escaped. Hotze, a gallant Austrian general, who, mindful of his Swiss origin, had attempted to place himself at the head of his countrymen, was compelled to retrace his steps. In Berne, the French meanwhile pillaged the treasures of the republic.[11] Besides the treasury and the arsenal, estimated at twenty-nine million livres, they levied a contribution of sixteen million. Bruno planted a tree of liberty, and Frisching, the president of the provisional government, had the folly to say, "Here it stands! may it bear good fruit! Amen!"

Further bloodshed was prevented by the intervention of the patriots. The whole of Switzerland, Schwyz, Upper Valais, and Unterwalden alone excepted, submitted, and, on the 12th of April, the federal diet at Aarau established, in the stead of the ancient federative and oligarchical government, a single and indivisible Helvetian republic, in a strictly democratic form, with five directors, on the French model. Four new cantons, Aargau, Leman (Vaud), the Bernese Oberland, and Constance, were annexed to the ancient ones. Schwyz, Uri, Unterwalden, and Zug were, on the other hand, to form but one canton. Rapinat, a bold bad man, Rewbel's brother-in-law, who was at that time absolute in Switzerland, seized everything that had escaped the pillage of the soldiery in Berne and Zurich, sacked Solothurn, Lucerne, Freiburg, etc., and hunted out the hidden treasures of the confederation, which he sent to France. The protestations of the directors, Bay and Pfyffer, were unheeded; Rapinat deposed them by virtue of a French warrant and nominated Ochs and Dolder in their stead. The patriotic feelings of the Swiss revolted at this tyranny; Schwyz rose in open insurrection; the peasantry, headed by Aloys Reding, seized and garrisoned Lucerne and called the whole country to arms against the French invader. The peasantry of the free cantons also marched against Aarau, but were defeated by Schauenburg at Häcklingen; two hundred of their number fell, among others a priest bearing the colors. Schauenburg then attacked the people of Schwyz at Richtenschwyl, where, after a desperate combat that lasted a whole day, he at length compelled them to give way. They, nevertheless, speedily rallied, and two engagements of equal obstinacy took place on the Schindeleggy and on the mountain of Etzel. The flight of Herzog, the pastor of Einsiedeln, was the sole cause of the discomfiture of the Swiss. Reding, however, reassembling his forces at the Red Tower, in the vicinity of the old battlefield of Morgarten, the French, unable to withstand their fury, were repulsed with immense loss. They also suffered a second defeat at Arth, at the foot of the Rigi. The Swiss, on their part, on numbering their forces after the battle, found their strength so terribly reduced that, although victors, they were unable to continue the contest, and voluntarily recognized the Helvetian republic. The rich monastery of Einsiedeln was plundered and burned; the miraculous picture of the Virgin was, however, preserved. Upper Valais also submitted, after Sion and the whole of the valley had been plundered and laid waste. The peasantry defended themselves here for several weeks at the precipice of the Dala. Unterwalden offered the most obstinate resistance. The peasantry of this canton were headed by Lüssi. The French invaded the country simultaneously on different sides, by water, across the lake of the four cantons, and across the Brünig from the Haslithal; in the Kernwald they were victorious over the masses of peasantry, but a body of three or four thousand French, which had penetrated further down the vale, was picked off by the peasantry concealed in the woods and behind the rocks. A rifleman, stationed upon a projecting rock, shot more than a hundred of the enemy one after another, his wife and children, meanwhile, loading his guns. Both of the French corps coalesced at Stanz, but met with such obstinate resistance from the old men, women and girls left there, that, after butchering four hundred of them, they set the place in flames.[12] The sturdy mountaineers, although numerically weak, proved themselves worthy of their ancient fame.—The four Waldstätte were thrown into one canton, Waldstätten; Glarus and Toggenburg into another, Linth; Appenzell and St. Gall into that of Säntis. The old Italian prefectures, with the exception of the Valtelline, were formed into two cantons, Lugano and Bellinzona (afterward the canton of Tessin). The canton of Vaud also finally acceded to this arrangement, but was shortly afterward, as well as the former bishopric of Basel, Pruntrut,[13] and the city and republic of Genoa, incorporated with France.

The levy of eighteen thousand men (the Helvetlers, Galloschwyzers or eighteen batzmen) for the service of the Helvetian republic occasioned fresh disturbances in the beginning of 1799. The opposition was so great that the recruits were carried in chains to Berne. The Bernese Oberland, the peasantry of Basel, Solothurn, Toggenburg, Appenzell, and Glarus rose in open insurrection, but were again reduced to submission by the military. The spirit of the mountaineers was, however, less easily tamed. In April, 1799, the people of Schwyz took four hundred French prisoners; those of Uri, under their leader, Vincenz Schmid, stormed and burned Altorf, the seat of the French and their adherents; those of Valais, under the youthful Count Courten, drove the French from their valleys, and those of the Grisons surprised and cut to pieces a French squadron at Dissentis. General Soult took the field with a strong force against them in May and reduced them one after the other, but with great loss on his side, to submission. Twelve hundred French fell in Valais, which was completely laid waste by fire and sword; in Uri, stones and rocks were hurled upon them by the infuriated peasantry as they defiled through the narrow gorges; Schmid was, however, taken and shot; Schwyz was also reduced to obedience; in the Grisons, upward of a thousand French fell in a bloody engagement at Coire, and the magnificent monastery of Dissentis was, in revenge, burned to the ground. The beautiful Bergland was reduced to an indescribable state of misery. The villages lay in ashes; the people, who had escaped the general massacre, fell victims to famine. In this extremity, Zschokke, at that time Helvetic governor of the Waldstatte, proposed the complete expulsion of the ancient inhabitants and the settlement of French colonists in the fatherland of William Tell.[14]

The imperial free town of Muhlhausen in the Suntgau, the ancient ally of Switzerland, fell, like her, into the hands of the French. Unable to preserve her independence, she committed a singular political suicide. The whole of the town property was divided among the citizens. A girl, attired in the ancient Swiss costume, delivered the town keys to the French commissioner; the city banner and arms were buried with great solemnity.[15]

The French had also shown as little lenity in their treatment of Italy. Rome was entered and garrisoned with French troops; the handsome and now venerable puppet, Pope Pius VI., was seized, robbed, and personally maltreated (his ring was even torn from his hand), and dragged a prisoner to France, where he expired in the August of 1799.

[Footnote 1: "The peasant, when summoned into the presence of a governor, lord of the council, head of a guild, or preacher, stood there, not as a free Swiss, but as a criminal trembling before his judge."—Lehmann on the imaginary Freedom of the Swiss. 1799.]

[Footnote 2: "The important office of provincial secretary was, in this manner, hereditary in the family of the Beroldingen of Uri."—Lehmann.]

[Footnote 3: "In the Grisons, the constitution was extremely complicated. The lordships of Meyenfeld and Aspermont were, for instance, subject to the three confederated cantons and under the control of the provincial governors nominated by them; they were at the same time members of the whole free state, and, as such, had a right of lordship over the subject provinces, over which, they, in their turn, appointed a governor."—Meyer von Knonau's Geography.]