356 



FRIEDEICII WILHELM NICOLAUS KAEL. 



burg. The Castle of Lichtenburg was taken 

 by the Wiirtemberg division, and Pfalsburg 

 was in vested by the Bavarians. After the bat- 

 tles of Mars-le-Tour and Gravelotte, between 

 Prince Friedrich Karl and Marshal Bazaine, 

 the Crown-Prince began his march toward 

 Paris, and laid siege to the fortresses of Toule 

 and Verdun, and finally reached Chalons. 

 MacMahon now endeavored to make a circuit 

 to the north, and by forced marches to reach 

 and relieve Metz in an attack upon Friedrioh 

 Karl. The Crown-Prince set out in pursuit, 

 and although MacMahon had four days' start, 

 lie was overtaken at the fortified town of Se- 

 dan, which he had occupied with 110,000 men 

 and 230 guns. The joint forces of the Crown- 

 Prince and Prince Friedrich Karl surrounded 

 him with an army of 250,000 men and 800 

 guns, and on September 1 the battle took place 

 which resulted in the defeat of the French 

 forces, and the capture of the Emperor Napo- 

 leon III. The Crown-Prince now pushed rap- 

 idly on to Paris, and on September 19 his army 

 occupied Versailles, and laid siege to the capi- 

 tal. From this time until the termination of 

 the siege, the prince personally directed the 

 operations around the city, including the repulse 

 of the French under Gen. Vinoy, on Septem- 

 ber 30. In recognition of the victories that he 

 had gained at Weissenbourg, Worth, and Se- 

 dan, the King raised him to the rank of field- 

 marshal, which was the first instance of that 

 rank being conferred on a prince of the reign- 

 ing family. On March 7, 1871, after the con- 

 clusion of peace, the prince issued his farewell 

 manifesto to his soldiers of the Third Army 

 Corps, and, rejoining the Emperor at Nancy, 

 returned to Berlin in a blaze of triumph. On 

 arriving there he was decorated by the Empe- 

 ror with the grand cross of the Iron Cross. 



" Unser Fritz," as he was affectionately 

 called, returned unquestionably the most popu- 

 lar commander of the war. He was the idol 

 of his soldiers, and his subsequent triumphant 

 reception in South Germany, as Inspector-Gen- 

 eral of the Fourth German Army Corps, proved 

 how complete was the union between the north 

 and the south, which his military achievements 

 had helped to bring about. 



The Crown-Prince manifested keen interest 

 in the development of Germany, and in scien- 

 tific, industrial, and patriotic undertakings, the 

 Kaiser-Wilhehn-Stiftung for invalid soldiers, 

 and the excavations at Olympia, being notable 

 instances of his activity. On various occasions 

 he accompanied or represented his father, as 

 at the opening of the Vienna Exhibition in 

 1873 and the funeral of Victor Emmanuel at 

 Rome in 1878, and visited Sweden and Den- 

 mark in 1873, St. Petersburg in 1875, and Hol- 

 land and Belgium in 1876-'77. When the 

 Emperor was wounded by Nobling in 1878, 

 the prince was recalled from England to carry 

 on the Government. 



The conflict between Prussia and the Vati- 

 can was pending, and in a letter to the Pope 



the Crown-Prince thus emphatically expressed 

 himself : " To the suggestion in your holiness's 

 letter that the laws of Prussia should be so 

 modified as to accord with the statutes of the 

 Roman Church, no Prussian monarch could 

 listen for a moment. The independence of 

 the monarchy, which, as a patriot and my fa- 

 ther's heir, I am bound to maintain, would at 

 once be compromised if its freedom of legisla- 

 tion were subordinated to any external power." 

 During his temporary occupancy of the throne 

 he was called upon to sign the death-warrant 

 of the young Anarchist, Hoedel, who had made 

 an attempt upon the Emperor's life in May, 

 1878, and it is said that he went through days 

 of mental agony before he felt himself suffi- 

 ciently steeled to put his name to the warrant. 

 The Treaty of Berlin was ratified by the Crown- 

 Prince in his capacity as deputy Emperor. 



The Emperor Alexander II of Russia was 

 assassinated in 1881, and it devolved upon the 

 Crown-Prince to represent Prussia at the fu- 

 neral in St. Petersburg. Anxiety was felt in 

 Germany for his safety, in consequence of 

 the threats of the Nihilists, and the Emperor, 

 when pressed to prevent his son visiting Rus- 

 sia, replied, "Cest notre metier.' 1 '' 



After an extended tour through western 

 Europe, the Crown-Prince visited Rome in Jan- 

 uary, 1884, where, in an audience with the 

 Pope, the differences still existing between the 

 empire and the Vatican were amicably dis- 

 cussed. He was present at the Jubilee of 

 Queen Victoria's reign, in London, in June, 

 1887. 



The disease that eventually proved fatal to 

 the Crown-Prince was first noticed in January, 

 1887, as an inflammatory affection of the throat, 

 accompanied by a cough and slight hoarseness. 

 These symptoms refusing to yield to ordinary 

 treatment, and the appearance of a small growth 

 upon the left vocal chord, aroused in the minds 

 of the attending physicians the suspicion that 

 the disease was malignant. No change in his 

 condition resulted from a long sojourn at Ems, 

 and in May several German specialists, in con- 

 sultation, decided that the prince was suffering 

 from cancer of the larynx, and that an imme- 

 diate operation for its extirpation was impera- 

 tive. Before resorting to such extreme meas- 

 ures, it was thought advisable to get the opin- 

 ion of some other specialist, and Dr. Morell 

 Mackenzie was summoned from London for a 

 consultation with Profs. Gerhardt, Von Berg- 

 mann, and Tobold, and Drs. Von Lauer, Weg- 

 ner, and Schrader. As the result of his exami- 

 nation, Dr. Mackenzie claimed that, although 

 the growth might possibly be cancerous, the 

 symptoms did not warrant a positive diagno- 

 sis, and he consequently declined to give an 

 opinion as to the exact nature of the disease 

 until a portion of the growth had been sub- 

 mitted to microscopical examination. He ac- 

 cordingly removed, on May 21, a portion of 

 the diseased tissue, which was sent to Prof. 

 Virchow for examination. The result failed 



