Franz possessed a sense of national responsibility. To raise war funds for the Kingdom of Prussia, even he, the emperor, took the lead in donating one million florins, depositing it in the Austrian Royal Bank.
(1 florin ≈ 11.69 grams of silver)
Very quickly, nobles, merchants, students... across Austria all rushed to donate. However, these funds were not handed directly to the Prussian Government, but deposited into the Austrian Royal Bank.
That was right. This Austrian Royal Bank was something Franz had only just cobbled together. Its main business for the moment was collecting donations from the public while supervising the use of this money in the defense of the Duchies of Schleswig-Holstein.
Now that the Prussian army was rampaging across the Jutland Peninsula, it had already crossed that line and no longer met the conditions for releasing these donations.
Franz did not care what the Prussians thought. In any case, he was delighted. The Royal Bank, with registered capital of only one million florins, had taken in nearly thirty million florins in deposits in just one month—no, donations.
The bank had merely issued receipts to the donors. All donations would be used proportionally, and whatever remained unused would have to be returned afterward.
To demonstrate its patriotic integrity, the Royal Bank did not even charge the most basic handling fees. It was providing its services entirely free of charge.
Since they were donations, there naturally would be no interest. Before this enormous sum was put to use, Franz had gained another pool of liquid funds.
Leaving vast amounts of cash sitting idle in his hands was practically a crime, so Franz immediately issued himself a loan, using it to invest in the construction of a comprehensive food enterprise and, incidentally, purchase a large number of high-quality mines.
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