The Vienna Correspondent of the *Kölnische Zeitung*

Friedrich Engels (18 February 1849)

* Cologne, 17 February. One riddle the less in world history! Herr
No. 225, 18 February 1849
*Neue Rheinische Zeitung.*
Schwanbeck, Δ editor of the *Kölnische Zeitung*, who simultaneously corresponds from Vienna under the sign Δ+Δ+ in the selfsame *Kölnische Zeitung*, has notoriously, under both guises, slandered the Magyars as long as possible, accused them of cowardice and baseness, not
only defeated them, but repeatedly annihilated them, and dithyrambised the court-martial entry of the whole army into the various towns and comitates of Hungary.
Herr Schwanbeck now solves the riddle himself; like Achilles, our Schwanbeck can only heal the wounds he himself has struck.
And the solution of the riddle? – Fear of Welden. Hence the besmirching of the Viennese and Magyars, the miserable lies concerning the Austrian successes in arms, the tail-wagging and ogling of Croats and Pandurs.
For, says the famous Schwanbeck, for, says he:
“One was positively punished with lies and honoured by the Governor Baron Welden with the title of a malicious knave if one dared to doubt the victorious progress of the imperial army on all points of the Monarchy.” (No. 40 of the *Kölnische Zeitung.*)
Out of respect for Welden, the readers of the *Kölnische Zeitung* had for two months to be belied and deceived in the Δ+Δ+ Vienna correspondence on the Hungarian war.
Goethe said of Pustkuchen: “Even the whale has its louse; I too must have mine.” Kossuth can say the same of Schwanbeck.

The *Kölnische Zeitung* on the Magyar Struggle
* Cologne, 17 February.
No. 225, 18 February 1849
*Neue Rheinische Zeitung.*
“I have now found the ground
Wherein my anchor holds for ever” –
sings the brave Schwanbeck with the Protestant hymnal. The affronted champion of virtue, despite the “Austrian Note” and the “feeling of deepest outrage”, finally appears on the front page of the *Kölnische Zeitung* for Windischgrätz.
Hear this:
“The so-called democratic press in Germany has in the Austro-Hungarian struggle taken the side of the Magyars ... Strange enough indeed! The German democrats on the side of that high-aristocratic caste for which its own nation, despite the 19th century, never ceased to be the *misera contribuens plebs*, the German democrats on the side of the most presumptuous oppressors of the people!”
We do not exactly recall whether we have already drawn the public’s attention to a peculiar characteristic of the brave Schwanbeck, namely, that he is in the habit of making nothing but consequent clauses without the antecedent clauses. The above sentence is one of these consequent clauses, whose antecedent clause never saw the light of day.
And were the Magyars a “high-aristocratic caste” of the “most presumptuous oppressors of the people”, what would that prove? Is Windischgrätz, the murderer of Robert Blum, one hair’s breadth better on that account? Do the knights of the “gesammt monarchy”, the particular enemies of Germany and friends of Schwanbeck, the Windishgrätzes, Jellachiches, Schlicks, etc., intend to suppress the “high-aristocratic caste” and introduce the freedom of peasant landed property? Are the Croats and Czechs fighting for the partitioning of land in the Rhineland and the Code Napoléon?

The *Kölnische Zeitung* on the Magyar Struggle
When in 1830 the Poles rose against Russia, was there any question then whether it was merely a “high-aristocratic caste” at their head? What was at stake then, first of all, was the expulsion of the foreigner. All Europe sympathised with the “high-aristocratic caste”, which indeed opened the movement; for the Polish aristocratic republic was always a gigantic advance over Russian despotism. And was not the French census, the monopoly of the 250,000 electors of 1830, in substance just as great a political bondage of the *misera contribuens plebs* as the Polish rule of the aristocracy?
Let us assume that the Hungarian March Revolution was a purely aristocratic revolution. Does the Austrian “Gesammt” monarchy for that reason have the right to suppress the Hungarian nobility, and thereby the Hungarian peasants, in the way it suppressed the Galician nobility, and through them (see the Lemberg Diet proceedings of 1818) the Galician peasants? But of course, the great Schwanbeck is not obliged to know that the greater part of the Hungarian nobility, exactly like the greater part of the Polish nobility, consists of mere proletarians, whose aristocratic privilege is confined to the fact that they may not be subjected to cudgelling.
The great Schwanbeck is even far less obliged to know that Hungary is the only country in which the feudal burdens for the peasants have since the March Revolution legally and actually ceased entirely to exist. The great Schwanbeck declares the Magyars to be a “high-aristocratic caste”, the “most presumptuous oppressors of the people”, “aristocrats” – and this same great Schwanbeck does not know, or does not wish to know, that the Magyar magnates, the Esterhazys, etc., deserted right at the beginning of the war and came to Olmütz to pay homage, and that it is precisely the “high-aristocratic” officers of the Magyar army who, from the start of the struggle to this day, have daily practised fresh treason against the cause of their nation! Or why is the majority of the House of Representatives still today with Kossuth in Debreczin, while only eleven magnates are to be found there?
So much for the Schwanbeck of the front page, the lead-dithyrambist Schwanbeck. But the man of the third page, the man who stormed Leopoldstadt six times, took Eszek four times and crossed the Theiss several times, the strategist Schwanbeck, had to take his revenge, as well.
“But now the war took a pitiful, truly lamentable course. Unstoppably, almost without a fight, the Magyars withdrew from all their positions; without resistance, they even evacuated their fortified royal city, withdrew before Jellachich’s Croats back beyond the Theiss.”

“Almost without a fight” – that is to say, after they had held up the Austrians from the Leitha to the Theiss for two full months, they withdrew “almost without a fight”. Good old Schwanbeck, who judges the greatness of a commander not by his material results but by how many men he has had put to the sword!
“Without resistance they evacuated their fortified royal city!” Now, one must know that Ofen is indeed fortified on its western side, but not on its eastern side. The Danube was frozen, so that the Austrians could march across with horse and waggon, occupy Pesth and from there shoot to pieces the defenceless Ofen.
If Deutz were not fortified, and the Rhine were frozen, and if accordingly a French army were to march across the Rhine at Wesseling and Worringen, and train 100 cannon upon Cologne from Deutz, the bold Schwanbeck would then advise Colonel Engels to defend Cologne to the last man. Brave Schwanbeck!
The Magyars “withdrew before Jellachich’s Croats back beyond the Theiss”. And will the great Schwanbeck dispute that these “Croats” consist of 250–300,000 men, counting the corps of Windischgrätz, Jellachich, Götz, Csorich, Simunich, Nugent, Todorovich, Puchner, etc., etc., including the irregular troops on the Drau and in the Banat? And all that are “Jellachich’s Croats”? That, by the way, a Schwanbeck, who is himself a tribal relative of the Croats and little at home in history and geography, is enthusiastic about the Croats, is easy to comprehend.
But, of course: “even we are far from seeing in the official reports from the Austrian headquarters precisely a gospel”. On the contrary, Schwanbeck finds, from time to time, in the reports, for instance those of Schlick, “a gap which the reader must fill in with all sorts of conjectures, and it is, after all, no wonder (!!) if these conjectures turn out more alarming than they ought to!!! ” “We also suspect Puchner of being accustomed to colour his bulletins somewhat too rosily. According to them, he was in the finest course of victory against the ‘rebel general’. Then, suddenly, we read, to our greatest astonishment (!), a proclamation of his, in which he implores Saxons and Wallachians, for Heaven’s sake, still to take courage; then we find the defeated Bem suddenly before Hermannstadt, in the midst of the Saxon land, and the poor Germans (!!) finally know no other way to help themselves than to seek protection with the Russians. Here is a little conflict between the official reports and the events, which can only be attributed to the inaccuracy (!!) of the former.”

The *Kölnische Zeitung* on the Magyar Struggle
Citizen Schwanbeck admits that the Austrian bulletins and, following them, the *Kölnische Zeitung*, have lied most shamelessly about the alleged progress of the Austrians; when the lie can afterwards no longer be denied, the truth-loving Schwanbeck calls that: “a little conflict between the official reports and the events”!
“If, however, we by no means regard the Austrian army reports as oracles, the Magyar victory bulletins have for that reason not gained the least in our (occupied as we are with the above ‘little conflicts’) eyes. They are dictated by phantasy and would read quite pleasantly, if they were not so terribly ridiculous.”
These “bulletins” are so “terribly ridiculous” that they have so far asserted nothing but what the great Schwanbeck himself must in substance admit. Or is Tokaj in the hands of Schlick? Has a single Austrian got across the Theiss at Szolnok? Have the imperial troops, in the last 14 days, advanced even by a single step?
The 22nd Austrian bulletin, which has just come to hand (see below), will save Citizen Schwanbeck the trouble of replying. It enlightens us that the Austrians have not even got as far as the 20th and 21st bulletins asserted.
“It cannot be otherwise: the war in Hungary is approaching its end with giant strides.” That is clear. Schwanbeck said it already once 14 days ago: “The war in Hungary is coming to an end. *Parturiunt montes, nascetur ridiculus mus*.” This was on the same day that he first made the Austrians enter Debreczin in triumph.
Since then, 14 days have passed, and despite the fact that the Magyars have “frightfully blustered”, the Austrians still have not crossed the Theiss, let alone set foot in Debreczin.
“That Bem’s bands have swelled, through the fugitive hordes of Hungarians pressing in from all sides, into an army which the meagre imperial forces in Transylvania are not adequate to meet, can surprise no one.”
Not at all. But it can surprise us how mention can be made of “fugitive hordes of Hungarians pressing in from all sides”, so long as the Hungarians hold the line of the Theiss and the Marosz and Citizen Schwanbeck, despite the most fervent prayer, cannot smuggle a single imperial trooper across; furthermore, that “fugitive hordes” suddenly form an army without the armies that are pursuing them being at the same time on hand to drive them out of each new position. But, of course, the great Schwanbeck believes that the Hungarians,

once beaten in his misty fantasy, would immediately run from the Danube to the Aluta, without looking round to see whether they are being pursued or not?

Citizen Schwanbeck has made himself the Carnot of the 19th century by discovering the new maneuvre: how fugitive bands, rushing in from all sides, can suddenly form a victorious army.

This new victorious army could, to be sure, bring about serious complications. However, says Schwanbeck:
“We shall see in what manner Russia will speak its veto here.”

The brave Schwanbeck, who here calls upon Russia for help against the Magyars, is the very same Schwanbeck who, on March 22 of last year, published an article of moral indignation against the Emperor of Russia, and at that time declared that if Russia were to interfere in our affairs (and the Magyar affair is surely ours), he, Schwanbeck, would raise a cry before which the throne of the Tsar should tremble! He is the same Schwanbeck who, from time immemorial at the “Kölnische Ztg.,” had the office of salvaging the paper’s liberal reputation by means of opportune hatred of Russia and obligatory seasoned free-thinking in harmless East European countries. But the East European complications appear to bore him, and so that he can give himself over entirely to his “sentiment of profound indignation” over the Austrian Note, he calls the Russians into Transylvania to put an end to the struggle.

The best reply to the whole morally-Windischgrätz-ranting article is – the 22nd Army Bulletin, which the reader will find below. So that Schwanbeck, who in geography and strategy is, down to the final sentence of his article, partly boundlessly ignorant and partly dependent on the “Neue Rheinische Zeitung,” may know what to make of this bulletin, we at the same time provide the commentary on it.