Recaps

Franz and Albrecht assessed the aristocratic officers’ progress and planned further training to prepare them for command. Franz intended to place them in units as deputies and test them during an armed training march, while concealing his larger aims.

• Albrecht assigned the officers a three-day exercise to plan Vienna’s defense or a counterattack, threatening to send failures back to physical training as ordinary brawlers.
• Franz asked Albrecht how well the trainees could command companies or platoons, and Albrecht estimated that most could bring out six or seven tenths of a unit’s fighting strength.
• Franz ordered another round of training and said the officers could serve as deputies before taking command during an armed training march.
• Albrecht agreed to cooperate, believing Franz planned to replace older aristocratic officers with younger relatives without disrupting the existing order.

Franz watched the February Revolution erupt in France amid economic hardship, mass unrest, and opposition to the July Monarchy. By February 23, King Louis-Philippe had dismissed the Guizot government and appointed Molé to form a cabinet, but the uprising continued.

• The January Revolution spread from Sicily into Italy, and the Vienna Government sent troops to protect Lombardy and Venice.
• Rising food prices, unemployment, strikes, and grain raids intensified social unrest in France, while opponents of the July Monarchy organized banquets and called for change.
• On February 22, 1848, Parisians protested the government’s ban on the Banquet Campaign, and the February Revolution began that night.
• Students, workers, townspeople, and some capitalists joined the uprising, while much of the National Guard refused to suppress it and some troops switched sides.
• On February 23, King Louis-Philippe dismissed the Guizot government and appointed Molé to form a cabinet in an effort to ease tensions.

Franz warned Albrecht that Austria was nearing revolution and urged him to bring the City Defense Force under control before unrest reached Vienna. Albrecht agreed to arrange field drills, while Franz used the Emperor’s authority to bypass the Regency Council.

• Franz told Albrecht to take the troops out for field drills and secure control of the army.
• Franz explained that unemployment, economic hardship, and worsening exploitation had made Austria a powder keg despite the workers and bourgeoisie not wanting to rebel.
• Albrecht asked whether Franz had warned Metternich, and Franz said the chancellor likely knew about the problems but might not have taken them seriously.
• Albrecht agreed to arrange the drills but warned that the Regency Council would not listen to him.
• Franz invoked an order from the Emperor to proceed, aiming to command the fourteen thousand City Defense Force soldiers if revolution broke out.

As Vienna's government rejected the protesters' demands and the Labor Protection Act remained shelved, bourgeois organizers pushed workers toward an uprising. Jack and the workers' representatives began planning a revolt while Franz and Albrecht kept the City Defense Force away on maneuvers.

• Franz and Albrecht camped the City Defense Force outside Vienna and discussed the weak state of the troops left behind.
• Vienna's government indefinitely shelved the Labor Protection Act, and rumors turned workers against the capitalists and government.
• After news of the February Revolution in France reached Vienna, citizens, workers, and students demonstrated and petitioned Ferdinand I for political changes.
• The Regency Council rejected the petition's demands, while most protesters still sought concessions rather than revolution.
• Jack met Cole and the workers' representatives in a slum hideout and urged them to launch an uprising while the City Defense Force was away.
• Jack promised that secretly acquired weapons would help the workers overcome the soldiers left in Vienna, and the workers accepted the plan.

Owen persuaded Austrian capitalists that a revolution could help them escape the economic crisis, and that they could control the new government by keeping workers divided. As unrest threatened Vienna, Metternich considered repression but proposed abolishing serfdom to restore confidence in the market.

• Owen told Mr. Love and the other capitalists that economic hardship was driving workers and business owners toward revolution.
• Owen explained that the capitalists could seize power after an uprising by preventing Vienna’s workers from uniting.
• Archduke Louis warned Metternich that the opposition was preparing a larger demonstration and urged him to arrest its leaders.
• Metternich considered ordering arrests but argued that repression would not solve the economic crisis.
• Metternich proposed abolishing serfdom throughout Austria to expand the market and restore confidence.

The Regency Council debated Metternich’s proposal to abolish serfdom, but fears of revolt and opposition from the nobles forced him to set it aside. The government ordered arrests of demonstration organizers, but Chief Inspector Winston’s men could not enter the University of Vienna.

• Archduke Louis warned Metternich that abolishing serfdom could prompt Hungary to declare independence and trigger revolts elsewhere.
• Kolowrat interrupted the council’s dispute and urged its members to address the immediate crisis, while Metternich recognized that he lacked support for his proposal.
• Metternich reluctantly agreed to begin making arrests, concluding that Austria could not risk a revolt over abolishing serfdom.
• The Vienna Government sent secret police to arrest demonstration organizers that night, but the main leaders had stayed out of sight.
• Chief Inspector Winston found that his men could not get through the University of Vienna’s gates to arrest student representatives, and he hesitated to storm the influential school.

A massive demonstration in Vienna escalated after the government arrested revolutionaries, prompting Metternich to call troops back to the city. As the protesters surrounded government buildings and demanded sweeping changes, the elderly prime minister was left pale and overwhelmed.

• Winston ordered his officers to contain the people inside the school rather than risk storming it.
• The government's arrests fueled a larger demonstration, and Metternich ordered the City Defense Force into Vienna to restore order.
• Albrecht received orders to return his troops to Vienna, while Franz remained confident that the royalist army would crush the uprising.
• Franz planned to dismiss Metternich's cabinet, abolish serfdom, enact labor protections, and punish only the uprising's ringleaders.
• Demonstrators surrounded government buildings, the palace, and parliament, making demands that included Metternich's resignation and the abolition of serfdom.
• Thousands of protesters chanted for Metternich to come out as the prime minister lost his composure.

Metternich ordered the City Defense Force to disperse demonstrators, but a clash and gunfire sparked an uprising in Vienna. As rebels and criminals spread chaos through the city, Metternich’s retainers forced him to flee while the imperial palace remained a refuge.

• Oppenheimer urged Metternich to disperse the demonstrators, and Metternich ordered the City Defense Force to act.
• Revolutionaries fired at soldiers, who returned fire, and the crowd fled amid reports that the army had killed people.
• Armed insurgents attacked a police station with help from the Vienna municipal government, while aristocrats and revolutionaries seized banks and burned promissory notes.
• Holder and Metternich’s guards bundled Metternich into an old carriage and smuggled him out of Vienna as other aristocrats fled.
• Revolutionary groups recruited prisoners and other recruits, and criminals exploited the disorder to prey on Vienna’s residents.

As Vienna’s uprising spread, the panicked archdukes failed to take decisive action, and Archduke Louis ordered the Palace Guard to hold until the City Defense Force returned. Franz learned of the revolt and prepared to march to Vienna with Albrecht, leaving the rebellion’s outcome uncertain.

• Ferdinand I suffered another seizure, and the archdukes avoided responsibility until Archduke Louis ordered the Guard to hold out for the City Defense Force.
• Franz learned that demonstrators and troops had clashed in Vienna on March 7 and that an uprising had followed that night.
• Albrecht urged Franz to hurry toward Vienna, fearing the rebels would grow stronger if the revolt dragged on.
• Franz refused to risk a night march and said Vienna’s police, City Defense Force, and Palace Guard could hold until their arrival.
• Franz reassured Albrecht that the rebels were divided and unlikely to unite quickly.

As Vienna’s revolution descended into violence between workers and capitalists, Owen’s bourgeois faction struggled to control the uprising and feared retaliation from the aristocracy. Owen argued that they should negotiate with the emperor while blaming the bloodshed on the workers, but the faction remained divided over whether that would save them.

• Workers retaliated against capitalists, killing overseers and looting grain shops, while the bourgeoisie formed its own revolutionary army and clashed with them.
• At an estate in Vienna, Owen’s allies reported that thirteen gentlemen had been killed and their property looted.
• Owen proposed negotiating with the emperor and preparing to suppress the rebels, noting that the regular army could return to restore the balance of power.
• Rams warned that the aristocrats would seek revenge for their executed members and questioned whether the emperor could protect them.
• Owen claimed the workers, not his faction, were responsible for the aristocrats’ deaths and urged the nobles who had supported their cause to designate the workers as rebels.

Franz returned to Vienna and put Albrecht in command of the forces suppressing the rebellion, while the disorderly rebels terrorized the city. At Hofburg Palace, Archduke Louis faced the capitalists’ sweeping negotiation demands as the nobles feared losing their land and political power.

• Franz handed command of the campaign to Albrecht, who ordered the Third Regiment to attack.
• The rebels’ lack of discipline let looting and violence spread through Vienna, including around the University of Vienna.
• Franz prepared to use the rebellion and future provincial uprisings to abolish serfdom and confiscate the estates of nobles and capitalists involved.
• Archduke Louis presented the capitalists’ demands for constitutional government, universal suffrage, abolition of serfdom, and redistribution of noble lands.
• The archdukes feared that accepting the demands would provoke the nobles to revolt, since they would lose their land and political rights.

Franz’s forces crushed the Vienna rebellion, and he worked to secure political credit while reassuring the city’s residents. As the rebels’ defeat became certain, Owen and other participants fled Vienna, leaving the government poised to punish those involved.

• The City Defense Force returned to Vienna, prompting the Hofburg negotiations to deadlock as Archduke Louis and the court refused to accept the bourgeoisie’s terms.
• Franz and Albrecht used military force and Franz’s promise not to punish coerced rebels to suppress the uprising with help from Vienna’s residents.
• Franz delayed returning to the palace until he had secured the city and its political credit, unaware that Metternich and Count Kolowrat had already fled.
• Owen and his son escaped their estate by carriage after the rebels were routed, fearing both government punishment and retaliation from rival capitalists.
• Capitalists, nobles, and politicians who had hoped to profit from the rebellion fled Vienna as the revolt collapsed.

After the Vienna uprising was suppressed, Franz considered how to handle the prisoners and assessed the heavy losses. At Hofburg Palace, the court dismissed Metternich’s cabinet, dissolved the Regency Council, and agreed that Franz Joseph would become regent.

• Franz learned that the troops had lost just over three hundred men, while rebel casualties in Vienna exceeded ten thousand dead and wounded.
• Franz returned to Hofburg Palace, where his father, Archduke Franz-Karl, praised his role in suppressing the revolt.
• The archdukes blamed the Regency Council for failing during the uprising and unanimously dismissed Prime Minister Metternich’s cabinet.
• Archduke Franz-Karl proposed dissolving the Regency Council, and the archdukes approved despite Archduke Louis’s objections.
• Archduke Louis proposed Franz Joseph as regent, and the archdukes agreed.

After accepting the regency, Franz warned Austria’s archdukes that revolutionary unrest threatened the Empire and proposed severe punishment for nobles involved in the Vienna rebellion. The archdukes balked at measures that could strip noble families of their titles and estates, but Franz insisted the dead and heirless families demanded justice.

• Franz accepted the regency from Archduke Louis and urged the archdukes to take decisive action against unrest across Austria.
• Franz described the Vienna rebellion as a broad movement involving many social classes and claimed that at least eighty-three nobles had participated.
• Archduke Louis and the other archdukes condemned the rebellious nobles, while Archduke Franz Karl asked what Franz intended to do.
• Franz proposed executing the ringleaders, punishing other rebels according to their crimes, revoking participating nobles’ titles, and confiscating their property.
• Archduke Louis asked Franz to let the nobles keep their titles, but Franz refused and cited the deaths and noble families left without heirs.

After the Vienna uprising, Franz formed a cautious cabinet and proposed a state-led wartime economic system to restart production and employ the city’s many unemployed. The ministers agreed to use piecework wages, while Franz insisted the idea be credited to experts rather than himself.

• Franz imposed martial law in Vienna, confiscated property, distributed relief grain, and blamed the capitalists for the uprising.
• News of the Lombardy uprising reached Vienna, and on March 18, 1848, Franz appointed Felix, Marquis of Schwarzenberg, as prime minister and named the rest of his cabinet.
• Franz asked the cabinet how to resettle nearly forty thousand prisoners and restart production as unemployment spread through Vienna.
• Felix proposed that the government take over ownerless factories and organize production under a wartime economic system.
• Finance Minister Karl warned that government-run production would raise labor costs, and Franz proposed using pre-uprising average wages and piecework pay.
• Karl endorsed piecework wages across industries, while Franz insisted experts had devised the policy and should explain it to the public.

Franz and the cabinet debated how to punish prisoners captured after the Vienna rebellion, while Franz tried to preserve their labor and keep confiscated wealth under state control. They settled on fining the workers and sending them to factories until their debts were paid, with harsher collective punishment for sabotage.

• Franz asked the cabinet how the rebellion’s prisoners should be sentenced after rebel leaders and revolutionary activists had already been executed.
• Archduke Louis demanded severe punishment for every prisoner after rebels killed his younger son and looted noble homes.
• Franz explained that many nobles had joined the rebellion to loot banks, and he planned to send confiscated valuables to the treasury rather than return them to their former owners.
• Franz proposed fining captured workers and making them work in factories until they had paid their fines, and Finance Minister Karl supported the plan.
• Finance Minister Karl proposed grouping prisoners so they would report on one another, with group members sent to the mines if they failed to expose sabotage.
• Franz declared the factory labor plan settled, with the prisoners facing collective punishment if they sabotaged their workplaces.

Franz pushed a military plan to prepare for uprisings across Austria and Hungary while securing control over the forces assigned to suppress them. He left Felix unable to block the preparations, and insisted that Hungary must integrate into Austria rather than become independent.

• Felix proposed doubling Vienna’s City Defense Force and raising two hundred thousand troops, while Franz used the plan to remove ineffective officers and place Lieutenant General Albrecht in command.
• Franz argued that Radetzky and Windisch-Grätz were needed to handle uprisings in Italy and Bohemia, then proposed sending fifty thousand troops to reinforce Italy.
• Franz proposed appointing Josip Jelačić governor of Croatia and commander of its City Defense Force, and Julius Jacob von Haynau governor of Slovakia and commander of its City Defense Force.
• Felix warned that preparations to suppress a Hungarian uprising could undermine ongoing negotiations, but Franz argued that Hungary’s leaders had repeatedly resisted concessions and threatened Austria’s unity.
• Franz declared that Hungary could pursue reform only by integrating into Austria, while Felix insisted that Hungary remain an indispensable part of the Empire.

Franz pushed for crushing a Hungarian rebellion and securing Russian support, while proposing the abolition of serfdom and a land reform plan. He left the cabinet facing a choice between surrendering land or employing former serfs, with rebels' property to be confiscated.

• Prime Minister Felix supported Franz's plan to resolve the Hungarian problem by force, while Foreign Minister Metternich warned that Austria could not bear the military pressure of a rebellion.
• Franz ordered the Foreign Ministry to seek Russian support and said he would rather compromise with France or Prussia than with domestic rebels.
• Finance Minister Karl raised the need for internal reform and the abolition of serfdom, and Franz said former serfs needed land to secure their livelihoods.
• Franz proposed confiscating the land of nobles who aided the rebellion and allowing farmers to lease or buy it in installments.
• Franz proposed buying land from loyal nobles without forcing them to sell, while requiring nobles who kept their land to employ former serfs, limit rents, and pay taxes.

Franz and the Austrian cabinet agreed on a compromise reform of serfdom and land ownership while preparing to strengthen central authority amid unrest across the Empire. The Vienna Government abolished serfdom and introduced a voluntary land-redemption program, leaving peasants free but making land ownership gradual.

• Franz rejected removing limits on land rental income, and Felix argued that nobles who resisted reform would bear the consequences of rebellion.
• The cabinet agreed to reform serfdom, and Franz planned a limited purge of corrupt or incompetent officials while weakening regional noble power.
• Franz assessed uprisings and political unrest in Lombardy, Venice, Galicia, Hungary, Croatia, Dalmatia, Slovenia, Transylvania, and Slovakia.
• On March 19, 1848, the Vienna Government issued the Abolition of Serfdom Act, granting peasants free status and banning forced labor except as punishment for criminals.
• On March 20, the Vienna Government issued the Land Redemption Act, allowing nobles to sell land to the government for lease and installment purchase by peasants over up to forty years.

Franz’s Vienna Government passed laws protecting tenants, released serfs, borrowers, and workers, easing public hostility toward the government in Vienna. As revolution spread to Prussia and unrest grew in Prague, the cabinet ordered arrests and prepared to suppress the Czech demonstrations.

• The Vienna Government introduced the Land Lease Act, Serf Settlement Security Act, Anti-Usury Act, and Minimum Wage Act to protect basic rights and livelihoods.
• Franz’s legislative campaign shifted public attention and weakened the revolution’s popular support in Vienna.
• The government welcomed news that the Berlin Revolution had broken out, leaving Prussia occupied with unrest.
• Demonstrators in the Czech region demanded a unified parliament, an independent National Guard, and equal status for Czech, while Franz rejected the demands.
• Felix said the Prague Government had been ordered to arrest the plotters and that Prince Windisch-Grätz would prepare to suppress the rebellion.

Franz and his ministers debated abolishing local tariffs with Hungary to win over capitalists, stabilize grain prices, and revive Austria’s economy, despite the measure’s likely harm to Hungarian nobles and Austrian estate owners. The government backed the proposal as it prepared for a costly war, though Hungary’s market offered little certainty while rebellion threatened transport and trade.

• Finance Minister Karl proposed abolishing the remaining local tariffs between Austria and Hungary to ease capitalist discontent and pressure Hungarian nobles.
• Franz supported the proposal, reasoning that it would weaken the great nobles without driving most Hungarians into rebellion.
• Archduke Louis objected that tariff abolition would hurt Austrian farmers and grain earnings.
• Prime Minister Felix argued that Hungarian grain would lower prices and that Austrian goods would gain better access to the Hungarian market.
• Foreign Minister Metternich supported the measure, citing Austria’s fiscal crisis, the cost of suppressing the rebellion, and the need to restart factories.
• Franz recognized that fighting could disrupt transport and make the hoped-for revival of trade with Hungary uncertain.

After Sardinia declared war on Austria and other Italian States joined under public pressure, Franz ordered Marshal Radetzky to hold his ground with the troops already sent while Austria dealt with unrest at home. The chapter left the Italian front in a cautious holding phase as Franz expected Radetzky to prevail.

• The Vienna Government abolished local customs duties, prompting Hungary's representative to walk out over the terms.
• News reached Vienna that Sardinia had declared war on Austria, and Franz asked whether the reinforcements sent to Marshal Radetzky had arrived.
• Felix reported that the fifty thousand reinforcements had reached the Venice region and begun suppressing the rebellion.
• Franz ordered Radetzky to fight as best he could, hold what ground he could, and wait another month for further reinforcements.
• Franz rejected Felix's suggestion to send more troops, explaining that Austria needed to preserve forces for the unstable situation at home.

Marshal Radetzky decided to abandon Milan and draw the Kingdom of Sardinia deeper into Lombardy, expecting to isolate it from other Italian states and exploit its logistical strain. Lieutenant General Edmond Leopold Friedri then proposed a plan to make Lombardy welcome Sardinian occupation even more warmly.

• Marshal Radetzky ordered the Austrian troops to prepare to abandon Milan on April 1, overruling Major General Victor’s objections.
• Marshal Radetzky explained that retreating would shorten Austria’s lines, keep other Italian states out of the war, and leave Sardinia overextended and without substantial British or French support.
• Marshal Radetzky considered how Sardinia’s occupation could draw Lombard nobles and capitalists to its side, allowing Austria to purge them and use their property to win over the people after reclaiming the territory.
• Lieutenant General Edmond Leopold Friedri suggested spreading word that would give Lombardy’s people an even better impression of the Kingdom of Sardinia.

Franz used the failed Dalmatian uprising to confiscate the rebel nobles’ estates and reward the capitalists and serfs who helped suppress it. Prime Minister Felix objected to granting land to the serfs but ultimately accepted Franz’s plan to strengthen imperial support among the peasants.

• A revolt led by Dalmatian noble officials was put down by local capitalists and serfs before Austrian troops arrived.
• Prime Minister Felix explained that the nobles had hoped to gain power and join forces with rebels in Trieste and the Italian regions, but the capitalists abandoned them to protect their interests.
• Franz ordered the rebel nobles’ estates confiscated, their opponents rewarded, and the emancipation law carried out, including grants of land to serfs who had helped suppress the uprising.
• Felix objected that the serfs should receive freedom but not land, while Franz argued that rewards were needed to unite forces against rebellions elsewhere in the empire.
• Felix backed down, and Franz began distributing land to serfs who had helped put down the rebellion.

Franz and his ministers debated how Austria should respond to the Frankfurt Assembly, which had excluded Austria and could help Prussia unify the German states. Franz decided Austria should sabotage the assembly or suppress its influence, while a proposed South German union remained only a possibility.

• Franz rejected Chancellor Felix’s suggestion to ignore the Frankfurt Assembly and warned it could promote a Lesser German Empire that excluded Austria.
• Metternich argued that the assembly’s popular influence and possible secret ties to Prussia threatened Austria, while Felix dismissed it as powerless.
• Franz stopped their quarrel and ordered his ministers to find ways to sabotage the assembly or limit its influence.
• Karl proposed forming a North-South German Empire, but Metternich argued that the plan would fail and cost Austria too much.