"Neue Rheinische Zeitung" — The Kölnische Zeitung on the Magyar Struggle

The "Kölnische Zeitung" on the Magyar Struggle

["Neue Rheinische Zeitung" No. 225, February 18, 1849]

*
Cologne
, February 17.

"I have now found the ground
Wherein my anchor ever holds" —
thus sings the valiant Schwanbeck with the Protestant hymnal. The indignant hero of virtue, despite the "Austrian note" and the "feeling of deepest indignation", finally appears on the front page of the "Kölnische Zeitung" in favour of Windischgrätz.

Let the reader listen:

"The so-called democratic press in Germany has taken the side of the Magyars in the Austro-Hungarian struggle. ... Strange enough, indeed! The German democrats on the side of that high-aristocratic caste for whom their own nation, despite the 19th century, never ceased to be the misera contribuens plebs <wretched tax-paying populace (above all, peasants)>, the German democrats on the side of the most arrogant oppressors of the people!"

We do not recall exactly whether we have already drawn the public's attention to a peculiar characteristic of the valiant Schwanbeck, namely, that he is accustomed to producing nothing but consequent clauses without any antecedent clauses. The above sentence is one of these consequent clauses, the antecedent clause of which has never seen the light of day.

And even if the Magyars were a "high-aristocratic caste" of the "most arrogant oppressors of the people", what would that prove? Is Windischgrätz, the murderer of Robert Blum, a single hair's breadth better on that account? Do the knights of the "Gesamtmonarchie", the special enemies of Germany and friends of Schwanbeck, the Windischgrätzes, Jellachichs, Schlicks, etc., intend perchance to suppress the "high-aristocratic caste" and introduce the freedom of peasant property in land? Are the Croats and Czechs fighting for the Rhenish parcellisation and the Code Napoléon?

When the Poles rose against Russia in 1830, was the talk all about whether only a "high-aristocratic caste" stood at their head? The primary concern then was the expulsion of the foreigner. The whole of Europe sympathised with the "high-aristocratic caste" which did, after all, open the movement; for the Polish aristocratic republic was always a giant step forward in comparison with Russian despotism. And was not the French census, the monopoly of the 250,000 voters of 1830, in point of fact just as great a political bondage of the misera contribuens plebs as the Polish aristocratic rule?

Let us assume that the Hungarian March revolution was a purely aristocratic revolution. Does the Austrian "Gesamt"-Monarchie therefore have the right to oppress the Hungarian aristocracy, and through them the Hungarian peasants, as it oppressed the Galician aristocracy and through them (cf. the proceedings of the Lemberg Diet of 1818) the Galician peasants? But of course, the great Schwanbeck is not obliged to know that the greater part of the Hungarian aristocracy, exactly like the greater part of the Polish aristocracy, consists of mere proletarians, whose aristocratic privilege is confined to the fact that they are not to be cudgelled.

The great Schwanbeck is still far less obliged to know that Hungary is the only country in which, since the March revolution, feudal burdens on the peasant have legally and in fact completely ceased to exist. The great Schwanbeck declares the Magyars to be a "high-aristocratic caste", the "most arrogant oppressors of the people", "aristocrats" — and the same great Schwanbeck does not know, or does not want to know, that the Magyar magnates, the Esterházys, etc., deserted right at the outset of the war and came to Olmütz to pay homage, and that precisely the "high-aristocratic" officers of the Magyar army have, from the beginning of the struggle down to the present day, daily committed fresh acts of treason against the cause of their nation! Or why is it that the majority of the House of Representatives today is still with Kossuth in Debreczin, while only eleven magnates are there?

So much for the Schwanbeck of the front page, the leading dithyrambist Schwanbeck. But the man of page three, the man who stormed Leopoldstadt six times, captured Eszek four times and crossed the Theiss several times, the strategist Schwanbeck, also had to have his revenge.

"But now the war took a wretched, truly pitiful course. Unarrestably, almost without fighting, the Magyars gave way from all their positions; without resistance they evacuated even their fortified royal city, retreated before Jellachich's Croats back behind the Theiss."

"Almost without fighting" — that is to say, after holding up the Austrians from the Leitha to the Theiss for two full months, they retreated "almost without fighting". The good Schwanbeck, who judges the stature of a general not by his material results but by how many men he has allowed to be slaughtered!

"Without resistance they evacuated their fortified royal city!" Now one must know that Ofen is indeed fortified on the western side, but not on the eastern side. The Danube was frozen, so that the Austrians could march across with horse and wagon, occupy Pesth, and from there batter down defenceless Ofen.

If Deutz were not fortified and the Rhine were frozen, if accordingly a French army were to march across the Rhine at Wesseling and Worringen and plant 100 cannon at Deutz against Cologne, the bold Schwanbeck would then advise Colonel Engels to defend Cologne to the last man. Valiant Schwanbeck!

The Magyars "retreated before Jellachich's Croats back behind the Theiss". And will the great Schwanbeck dispute that these "Croats" consist of 250,000–300,000 men, including the corps of Windischgrätz, Jellachich, Götz, Csorich, Simunich, Nugent, Todorovich, Puchner, etc., etc., and the irregular troops on the Drau and in the Banat? And all of these are "Jellachich's Croats"? That Schwanbeck, who is himself a tribal relative of the Croats and little at home in history and geography, is enthusiastic for the Croats is, incidentally, easy to understand.

But, of course: "... we too are far from viewing the official reports from the Austrian headquarters as a kind of gospel." On the contrary, Schwanbeck finds from time to time in the reports, e.g., Schlick's,

"a gap which the reader must fill in with all kinds of suppositions, and it is in the end no wonder (!!) if these suppositions turn out more alarming than they ought to (!!!). We also suspect Puchner of tending to keep his bulletins somewhat too rose-coloured. According to them, he was on the most splendid victorious course against the 'rebel general'. Then suddenly, to our greatest astonishment (!), we read a proclamation from him in which he implores Saxons and Wallachians by everything in the world still to have courage, then we find the defeated Bem suddenly before Hermannstadt, right in the middle of the Saxon territory, and the poor Germans (!!) know in the end of no other way to help themselves than to seek protection from the Russians. Here there is a small conflict between the official reports and the events, which can only be blamed on the inaccuracy (!!) of the former."

Citizen Schwanbeck admits that the Austrian bulletins and, following them, the "Kölnische Zeitung" have lied most shamelessly about the alleged advances of the Austrians; once the lie can no longer be denied, the truth-loving Schwanbeck calls it: "a small conflict between the official reports and the events"!

"But if we by no means regard the Austrian army reports as oracles, the Magyar victory bulletins have not for that reason gained the slightest in our" (preoccupied with the above "small conflicts") "eyes. They are dictated by fantasy and would read quite pleasantly if only they were not so terribly ridiculous."

These "bulletins" are so "terribly ridiculous" that to date they have asserted nothing other than what the great Schwanbeck himself is compelled in fact to admit. Or is Tokay in Schlick's hands? Has a single Austrian crossed the Theiss at Szolnok? Have the imperial forces advanced a single step in a fortnight?

The 22nd Austrian bulletin, which has just reached us (see below), will save Citizen Schwanbeck the trouble of replying. It informs us that the Austrians are not yet even as far as the 20th and 21st bulletins claimed.

"It is simply a fact: the war in Hungary is striding to its end by giant steps." That is clear. Schwanbeck said it already a fortnight ago: "The war in Hungary is coming to an end. Parturiunt montes, nascetur ridiculus mus. <The mountains are in labour, and a ridiculous mouse is born.>" This was on the same day as he made the Austrians enter Debreczin victorious for the first time. A fortnight has passed since then, and despite the fact that the Magyars have "boasted dreadfully", the Austrians are still not across the Theiss, let alone in Debreczin.

"That Bem's troops have been swollen by the fugitive bands of Hungarians pressing in from all sides into an army to which the meagre imperial forces in Transylvania are not equal can surprise no one."

Not at all. But what can surprise us is that talk of "fugitive bands of Hungarians pressing in from all sides" is possible, as long as the Hungarians are holding the line of the Theiss and the Maros and citizen Schwanbeck, despite the most fervent prayers, cannot manage to smuggle a single imperial soldier across; furthermore, that "fugitive bands" suddenly form an army without the armies pursuing them being at hand simultaneously to drive them out of every new position. But of course, the great Schwanbeck believes that the Hungarians, once defeated 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 turned himself into the Carnot of the 19th century by discovering the new manoeuvre of how fugitive bands pressing in from all sides can suddenly form a victorious army.

This new victorious army could indeed entail serious complications. Meanwhile, Schwanbeck says:

"We shall see in what way Russia will pronounce its veto here."

The valiant Schwanbeck, who here calls on Russia to aid against the Magyars, is the same Schwanbeck who on 22 March of last year issued a morally indignant article against the Emperor of Russia and then declared that if Russia interfered in our affairs (and the Magyar affair is surely ours), he, Schwanbeck, would raise a cry that would cause the Tsar's throne to tremble! He is the same Schwanbeck who from time immemorial had the post at the "Kölnische Zeitung" of salvaging the paper's liberal reputation by means of timely Russophobia and obligatory, knowing liberal-mindedness in non-dangerous Eastern European countries. But the Eastern European complications seem to bore him, and so that he can abandon himself entirely to his "feeling of deepest indignation" over the Austrian note, he summons the Russians to Transylvania to put an end to the struggle.

The best reply to the entire moralising-Windischgrätz-bombastic article is — the 22nd army bulletin, which the reader will find below. So that Schwanbeck, who right into the final sentence of his article is partly boundlessly ignorant in geography and strategy and partly dependent on the "Neue Rheinische Zeitung", may know where he stands with this bulletin, we at the same time provide the commentary on it.