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Napoleon invades German lands
Between 1806 and 1812, Napoleon made important territorail changes in German-speaking lands. He annexed lands along the Rhine RIver for France. THe Holy ROman empire was dissolved by forcing the emperor of Austria to become the king. -
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Congress of Vienna
The Congress of Vienna was an assembly of European leaders that met after the Napoleonic era to piece Europe back together. -
Otto Von Bismarck birth
Otto Eduard Leopold, Prince of Bismarck, Duke of Lauenburg is born on the 1st of April 1817 in Schönhausen, a wealthy family estate situated west of Berlin in the Prussian Province of Saxony. -
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Zollverein
A coalition of German states formed to manage tariffs and economic policies within their territories. Organised by the 1833 Zollverein Treaties, the Zollverein formally came into existence on 1 January 1834. However, its foundations had been in development from 1818 with the creation of a variety of custom unions among the German states. By 1866, the Zollverein included most of the German states. -
Fredrick William IV is offered the Throne
Fredick William IV was offered the crown on April 3, 1849. He refused the position saying that he would never accept "a crown from the gutter." -
Blood and Iron Speech
German unification had been one of the biggsst rpoblems during the revolution of 1848 and 1849. On the 30th of September 1862 Bismarck made a speech to the Budget Committee of the Prussian Chamber of Deputies. He included the emphasis on using "iron and blood" to achieve his goals. -
Bismarck becomes prime minister
In 1862, King William I made Otto Von Bismark prime minister of Prussia -
Bismarck declares war on Austria
n 1866, Bismarck invented an excuse to attack AAustria. The Austrian- Prussian war lasted just seven weeks and ended in a decisive Prussian victory. -
Bismarck declares war on Denmark
In 1864 Bismarck began a series of wars that would establish Prussian power in Europe. He attacked Denmark to gain the German-speaking territories of Schleswig-Holstein. -
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Franco Prussian War
The Franco-Prussian War or Franco-German War often referred to in France as the War of 1870 (19 July 1870 – 10 May 1871), was a significant conflict pitting the Second French Empire against the Kingdom of Prussia and its allies in the North German Confederation, as well as the South German states of Baden, Württemberg, Bavaria and Hesse-Darmstadt. -
Economic Development
In Germany economic growth started in 1871. The government helped promote economic development and they issued a single currency throughout Germany. During the depression of the late 1800s the government raised the tariffs to protect the home industries from foreign competition. -
House of Krupp
The House of Krupp was a large company which advanced after 1871.They priduced steel and weapons, which was provided all over the world. -
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Population growth
In !871 the population was 41 million then jumped to 67 million in 1914 -
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Campaigne against the Socialists
The socialists a threat by Bismark and he thought that these people would undermine the loyalty of the working class and a revolution would break out. He had laws passed against them and this backfired. He tried to pass laws that helped protected them after teh first laws failed. -
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Campaigne against the Church
Bismarck was a Lutheran and distrusted the Catholics and launched the Kulturekampf which means battle for civilization. The goal of this was to get the Catholics to put the state above the church. He had laws passed that supervised and regulated them. All of these went against him as these people went with the church and the Catholic Center party gained power in the Reichstag. Bismarck, being a realists recognized his error and tried to make peace with them. -
William I of Prussia becomes emperor
During the Franco-Prussian War, on 18 January 1871 in the Hall of Mirrors in Versailles Palace, William was proclaimed German Emperor. The title "German Emperor" was carefully chosen by Bismarck after discussion until (and after) the day of the proclamation. William accepted this title grudgingly as he would have preferred "Emperor of Germany" which, however, was unacceptable to the federated monarchs, and would also have signalled a claim to lands outside his realm. -
Bismarck becomes Chancellor
After a decade the new prime minister had become the highest ranked offical of a monarch. King William I had made Bismarck chancellor. -
Consitiution drafted by Bismarck
The constitution was effectively a treaty between its signatories, the North German Confederation and four southern German states, adding those states as members of the confederation and giving the enlarged entity a new identity as the Deutsches Reich. -
Second reich is created
The unified Germany which arose under Chancellor Otto von Bismarck in 1871 was the first entity that was officially called in German Deutsches Reich, also the Second Reich (Zweites Reich) succeeding the HRR. -
William II becomes Kaiser
William II was the last German Kaiser and King of Prussia, ruling the German Empire and the Kingdom of Prussia from 15 June 1888 to 9 November 1918. He was the eldest grandson of the British Queen Victoria and related to many monarchs and princes of Europe. -
Bismark resigns
Bismarck resigned at Wilhelm II's insistence on 18 March 1890, at age 75, to be succeeded as Chancellor of Germany and Minister-President of Prussia by Leo von Caprivi.
