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Italian Unification Under Giuseppe Garibaldi

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Italian Unification Under Giuseppe Garibaldi

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In this video the revolutions of 1848 swept across Europe and Milan and Venice rose up against Austria. After the second war for Italian Independence against Austria, Giuseppe Garibaldi was able to recruit 1000 volunteers (Red Shirts) and they fought their way North. The Kingdom of Italy was proclaimed in 1861. Austria gave Italy Venice to keep them neutral, and they won Rome in 1870.

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German Unification Under Otto Von Bismarck

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German Unification Under Otto Von Bismarck

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He was sent to the new Prussian Parliament as a delegate. He was appointed the role of Prime Minister by Wilhelm the first. In 1864 he started a series of wars to capture the German speaking countries. He went up against the Catholic Church because he felt they had too much power.

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Otto von Bismarck (1815–1898) / German Unification

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Haitian Unification Under Toussaint L'Ouverture

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Haitian Unification Under Toussaint L'Ouverture

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The Declaration of Rights of Men gave hope to the slaves of Haiti and Toussaint L'Ouverture. In 1794 the French abolished slavery but people tried to bring slavery back which started another revolution. In 1804 independence was declared and the country was renamed Haiti.

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Italian unification was a political and social movement that brought together different states of the Italian peninsula into a single state in the 1800s. Giuseppe Garibaldi, Giuseppe Mazzini, Count Cavour and Victor Emannuel II are considered “the fathers of the fatherland”.

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Key Facts & Summary

Also known as Risorgimento, the Italian unification was a political and social movement that consolidated different states of the Italian peninsula into a single state of the Kingdom of Italy in the 19th century.

The process began in 1815, with the Congress of Vienna acting as a detonator, and was completed in 1871 when Rome became the capital. However, the last Italian territories under foreign rule did not join the Kingdom of Italy until 1918, after Italy finally defeated Austria-Hungary in World War I.

As other foreign powers were responsible for the situation of Italy, their very presence motivated Italians to strive for unification, however, Italy's successful unification, ironically, would not have come to pass without the help of other foreign powers.

The situation of Italy after unification can best be described after the statement of professor Serge Hughes: "Now that we have made Italy, we must make Italians."

Giuseppe Garibaldi, Giuseppe Mazzini, Count Cavour and Victor Emannuel II are considered to be "the fathers of the fatherland".

Prologue

Italy was first united by Rome in the third century B.C. It remained for over 700 years the de facto extension of the capital of the Roman Republic and Empire. It experienced a privileged status and evaded being converted into a province. Even with the fall of the Western Roman Empire, Italy remained united under the Ostrogothic Kingdom. However, this would later be disputed between the Kingdom of the Lombards and the Eastern Roman Empire.

Following the conquest of the Frankish Empire, the title of King of Italy merged with the office of Holy Roman Emperor. The emperors that followed had little concern for the governance of Italy as a state. This led Italy to gradually devolve into a system of city-states. Southern Italy was governed by the Kingdom of Sicily or Kingdom of Naples, initially established by the Normans. Central Italy was governed by the Pope as a temporal kingdom known as the Papal States.

It remained as such through the Renaissance but began to deteriorate with the rise of modern nation-states. Italy, including the Papal States, became the site of proxy wars between the major powers: The Holy Roman Empire including Austria, Spain, and France. Harbingers of national unity appeared as early as 1454, beginning with the Italic League treaty and in the 15th century, the foreign policy of Cosimo de Medici and Lorenzo de Medici helped to emphasize this.

This influenced and led Renaissance writers such as Dante, Petrarch, Machiavelli and Guicciardini to express opposition to foreign domination. The Peace of Westphalia in 1648 formally ended the rule of the Holy Roman Emperors in Italy but the Spanish branch of the Habsburg dynasty continued to rule most of Italy down to the War of the Spanish Succession in 1701-1714. After this war, Spain ceded Naples, Milan and Sardinia to the Austrian Empire and Sicily to Savoy.

Italian Unification

Italy was thus divided into many small principalities, and it would remain that way until the outbreak of the French Revolution in 1789.

Unification under Napoleon

During the French Revolution, Napoleon Bonaparte rose to power and proceeded to conquer the Italian states. This conquest was a success and it brought the small principalities under a single administrative unit. Through this process, Italy became part of the French Empire and thus imbibed the ideals of the French Revolution which promoted liberty, equality, fraternity and strengthened the people's participation in the political process. The empire established by Napoleon had served as a fuel for revolutionary ideas, as he even encouraged nationalism.

Napoleon thus implemented a wide array of liberal reforms in France and across Continental Europe, especially in Italy and Germany, as summarized by British historian Andrew Roberts:
"The ideas that underpin our modern world-meritocracy, equality before the law, property rights, religious toleration, modern secular education, sound finances, and so on-were championed, consolidated, codified and geographically extended by Napoleon.

As the Napoleonic Wars went on in Europe, Napoleon reign began to fail and other national monarchs he had installed tried to keep their thrones by feeding those nationalistic sentiments, setting the stage for the revolutions to come. Among these monarchs were the viceroy of Italy, Eugène de Beauharnais, who tried to get the Austrian Empire's approval for his succession to the Kingdom of Italy, and Joachim Murat, who called for Italian patriots' help for the unification of Italy under his rule.

Both men failed to consolidate their grip on Italy. Eugène fought in the Battle of Lützen in 1813 and was then ordered by Napoleon to go back to Italy and defend it from Austria. He was holding out at the Battle of Mincio until Napoleon abdicated in 1814. Murat fought in the Battle of Leipzig and despite France's defeat in Leipzig in 1813, Murat reached an agreement with the Austrian Empire in order to save his throne.

However, during the Hundred Days, the period in which Napoleon although defeated, returned from his exile and tried to consolidate power again, Murat realized that the European powers meeting at the Congress of Vienna, intended to remove him as well from power. Murat issued a proclamation to the Italian patriots in Rimini and moved north to fight against Austria in the Neapolitan War in order to strengthen his rule in Italy by military means. He was however defeated by the Austrian in the Battle of Tolentino in 1815.

Congress of Vienna - Italy is split again

The Congress of Vienna in 1815 aimed to restore Europe to its former position, reversing everything that happened since the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars, however, they couldn't undo everything. The desire for unification increased even more than before.

Although the Kingdom of Italy established by Napoleon crumbled, and the Italian peninsula remained fragmented through the mid-1800s, the concept of a united Italy began to take root.

Revolutions of 1848

It quickly became clear to many Italians that the Italy created by the Congress of Vienna was inefficient and ineffective. Hunger due to crop failures, lack of employment and other necessities were absent, the ruling class idle, unmoved and unwilling to make changes.

Secret societies formed to oppose the newly established conservative regimes. Several of these societies also promoted Italian nationalism and the idea of a unified Italian political state. One such society was the Carbonari, and it aimed to liberate Italy through armed uprisings. The Carbonari were inspired by the principles of the French Revolution.

Young Italy was formed in 1831 and aimed at the independence and unification of Italy and the subsequent establishment of a republic. This organization tried to encourage young men to join and support the cause of unification. Thus, the movement of Italian unification, a process referred to as the Risorgimento, proliferated by mid-century. Young Italy attracted the attention of Giuseppe Garibaldi, another iconic figure in the Italian unification. Garibaldi joined forces with Mazinni in 1833 and together they worked forward to accomplish their ideals. In February 1834 a failed Mazzinian insurrection in Piedmont forced Garibaldi to flee to South America.

Garibaldi returned amidst the turmoil of the revolutions in 1848 and offered his services to Charles Albert of Sardinia. He offered assistance to the provisional government of Milan which revolted against the Austrians. In the course of the following unsuccessful First Italian War of Independence, Garibaldi won minor victories.

However, the new pope soon proved to be of no use for the unification, he ordered his troops to retreat and the rest of the revolutionaries were vastly outnumbered. A crushing defeat at the battle of Novara in 1849, forced Garibaldi to move to Rome and support the recently proclaimed Roman Republic in the Papal States after the pope was forced to flee due to many Italians protesting against his previous decision.

However, Napoleon III of France sent an army to return the papacy to Rome, wishing to gain favour with the pope. Mazzini urged Garibaldi to take the defence of the city of Rome. Despite a great victory over France's superior numbers, it was clear that they couldn't hold the city for much longer. The Roman Assembly met and debated three options: surrender, fight or retreat to the Apennine mountains and continue the resistance, Garibaldi chose the third option and said: "Wherever we will go, that will be Rome." The two sides negotiated a truce and withdrew from Rome. Mazzini and Garibaldi parted on different paths, yet they would continue to fight for Italy's unification, their actions, although thwarted, managed to.

Second Italian War of Independence

Charles Albert was forced to abdicate during the revolutions, leaving the crown to his son Victor Emmanuel II, the third great figure of Italian unification.

The war had begun but not long after, France entered into secret negotiations with Austria fearing the possibility of Prussian involvement. An armistice was signed which granted Sardinia-Piedmont the state of Lombardy but Austria would retain control over the central states of Italy. Much to Emmanuel's dismay, this latter term was never enforced, however, and the French made no attempt to expel the Italian garrisons that then assumed control over the regions since the outbreak of the war.

In return for French backing, Cavour ceded Nice and Savoy to France. This decision enraged the Italians and the preeminent general during the conflict namely Giuseppe Garibaldi, who had returned to Italy since 1854. Garibaldi abandoned Mazzini's republican ideal of the liberation of Italy, assuming that only Emmanuel II could achieve it together with the help of Cavour and so they allied.

In order to stop Garibaldi, Cavour ordered Sardinian troops into the Papal States and the Kingdom of Naples. He organized a plebiscite to annex Naples to Sardinia. Garibaldi was thus outmanoeuvred by Cavour's realpolitik, a notion that states that politics should be conducted in terms of a realistic assessment of power and the self-interest of individual nation-states by any means.

Austro-Prussian War

Although most states of the Italian Peninsula were united and the Kingdom Of Italy was created, Venice and the much reduced Papal States were still far from their control. Garibaldi took up arms again in 1866, this time with the full support of the Italian government. The increasing discord between Austria and Prussia over the German Question turned into open war in 1866, granting an opportunity for Italy to try and capture Venice.

The German state of Prussia was aware of the tensions provoked by Austria's presence in Venice, and the Italian Government seeking an ally against Austria, so they decided to ally with Italy. On the 8th of April, 1866, Alfonso La Marmora, the President of the Council, entered into an agreement with Otto von Bismarck, the Prussian Prime Minister. Italy would now vow to support Prussia in the case of war against Austria. Austria soon realized the brewing threat and offered the transfer of Venice back to Italy as an olive branch.

Faced with a difficult choice, La Marmora tried to stall and decided not to support a war against either Prussia or Austria. Prussia, on the other hand, would not wait and on June 12th, cut all ties with Austria and invaded some of its territories four days later. Italy finally joined the battle on June 23rd starting the Third Italian War of Unification.

The Austrian Empire had no chance against these combined forces and after suffering numerous defats, mostly to Prussia, a peace treaty ensued. The cessation of hostilities was agreed to at the Armistice of Cormons signed on 12 August, followed by the Treaty of Vienna on 3 October 1866. The terms of the Peace of Prague included the giving of the Iron Crown of Lombardy to Victor Emmanuel II, the King of Italy. Venice was won by Italy after a plebiscite but Trentino, Rome, Friuli and Trieste remained to be captured.

End of the unification

By the end of the war, Italy's desire for unification had been emboldened, making the Third War for Independence another crucial step on the path to full national unity.
In 1871 Prussia attacks France starting the Franco-Prussian War. France, which had some troops in Rome, had to pull them back in order to fight the Prussians. Italy sees its chance and invades Rome successfully conquering it and making the Pope a prisoner in his own home.

This will turn the Pope against the Italian state for several decades. Officially, the capital was not moved from Florence to Rome until July 1871.

The unification of Italy was thus completed by the Capture of Rome and later by the annexation of Trentino, Friuli and Trieste at the end of World War I, also called in Italy the Fourth Italian War of Independence.

Aftermath

Dante Alighieri, Machiavelli, Cesare Borgia developed the national consciousness of Italy, however, their work and aspirations were developed and completed by Cavour, Mazzini, Garibaldi and Emmanuel II, men considered to be the fathers of Italy.

After the unification, Italy faced a number of problems. The middle class and aristocracy had never truly been won over by the revolutionary ideals that trickled down from France. The Pope was still against the state until Mussolini came to power.

In addition, the Italian parliament experienced gridlock as socialists and liberals failed to compromise on even the most basic pieces of legislation. Italians were still as disunited as ever, these issues plague Italy throughout the 19th century and some could say even today.

Bibliography:

[1.] Wawro, Geoffrey. "Austria versus the Risorgimento: A New Look at Austria's Italian strategy in the 1860s." European History Quarterly 26#1 (1996): 7-29.

[2.] Smith, Denis Mack. Victor Emanuel, Cavour, and the Risorgimento (Oxford University Press, 1971)

[3.] Riall, Lucy. The Italian Risorgimento: State, Society, and National Unification (Routledge, 1994)

[4.] Pearce, Robert, and Andrina Stiles. Access to History: The Unification of Italy 1789-1896 (4th rf., Hodder Education, 2015), textbook.

[5.] Ascoli, Albert Russell and Krystyna Von Henneberg, eds. Making and Remaking Italy: The Cultivation of National Identity around the Risorgimento (2001)

[6.] De Cesare, Raffaele (1909). The Last Days of Papal Rome. Archibald Constable & Co. p. 443

[7.] Maurizio Isabella, "Aristocratic Liberalism and Risorgimento: Cesare Balbo and Piedmontese Political Thought after 1848." History of European Ideas 39#6 (2013): 835-857.

[8.] Jasper Ridley, Garibaldi (2001)

[9.] Denis Mack Smith, Mazzini (1996).

[10.] Nelson Moe, "'This is not Italy!': Ruling and Representing the South, 1860-1861", in The View from the Vesuvius: Italian Culture and the Southern Question, 156-183 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002), 166.

Image source:

[1.] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/00/Italian-unification.gif
[2.] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/92/Episodio_delle_cinque_giornate_%28Baldassare_Verazzi%29.jpg
[3.] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e7/Code_Civil_1804.png
[4.] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concert_of_Europe#/media/File:Europe_1815_map_en.png
[5.] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b1/Museo_Torre_di_San_Martino_della_Battaglia_-_affresco_05.jpg
[6.] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giuseppe_Mazzini#/media/File:Giuseppe_Mazzini.jpg
[7.] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/98/First_meeting_between_Giuseppe_Garibaldi.jpg
[8.] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/17/Napol%C3%A9on_III_%C3%A0_la_bataille_de_Solf%C3%A9rino..jpg
[9.] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/85/Vittorio_Emanuele_II_ritratto.jpg
[10.] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/95/Camillo_benso_Conte_di_Cavour_iii.jpg
[11.] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/98/Cacciata_degli_austriaci_da_Bologna_%281848%29.jpg
[12.] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_unification#/media/File:Proclamation_of_the_Kingdom_of_Italy.jpg

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Italian Unification | Facts, Summary, Revolution, Historical Context

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Also known as Risorgimento, the Italian unification was a political and social movement that consolidated different states of the Italian peninsula into a single state of the Kingdom of Italy in the 19th century. The process began in 1815, with the Congress of Vienna acting as a detonator, and was completed in 1871 when Rome became the capital.

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Germany became a unified nation under the leadership of Otto von Bismarck who between 1862 and 1890 effectively ruled first Prussia and then all of Germany. A master strategist, Bismarck united 39 independent German states. He manipulated European rivalries to make Germany a world power.

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Table of Contents

1. Otto von Bismarck: Early Years

2. Otto von Bismarck: The Iron Chancellor

3. Otto von Bismarck: Kulturkampf, Welfare State, Empire

4. Otto von Bismarck: Final Years and Legacy

Germany became a modern, unified nation under the leadership of the "Iron Chancellor" Otto von Bismarck (1815-1898), who between 1862 and 1890 effectively ruled first Prussia and then all of Germany. A master strategist, Bismarck initiated decisive wars with Denmark, Austria and France to unite 39 independent German states under Prussian leadership. Although an arch-conservative, Bismarck introduced progressive reforms-including universal male suffrage and the establishment of the first welfare state-in order to achieve his goals. He manipulated European rivalries to make Germany a world power, but in doing so laid the groundwork for both World Wars.

Otto von Bismarck: Early Years

Otto Eduard Leopold von Bismarck was born April 1, 1815, at his family's estate in the Prussian heartland west of Berlin. His father was a fifth-generation Junker (a Prussian landowning noble), and his mother came from a family of successful academics and government ministers. Throughout his life Bismarck would emphasize his rural Junker roots, underplaying his considerable intellect and cosmopolitan outlook.

Did you know? Although German leader Otto von Bismarck wore a general's uniform in public for much of his later life (and successfully prosecuted three wars as chancellor), his only prior military service was a brief, unwilling stint in a reserve unit.

Bismarck was educated in Berlin and after university took a series of minor diplomatic posts before retiring, at age 24, to run his family's estate at Kneiphof. In 1847 he married and was sent to Berlin as a delegate to the new Prussian parliament, where he emerged as a reactionary voice against the liberal, anti-autocratic Revolutions of 1848.

From 1851 to 1862 Bismarck served a series of ambassadorships-at the German Confederation in Frankfurt, in St. Petersburg and in Paris-that gave him valuable insight into the vulnerabilities of Europe's great powers.

Otto von Bismarck: The Iron Chancellor

William I became Prussia's king in 1861 and a year later appointed Bismarck as his chief minister. Though technically deferring to William, in reality Bismarck was in charge, manipulating the king with his intellect and the occasional tantrum while using royal decrees to circumvent the power of elected officials.

In 1864 Bismarck began the series of wars that would establish Prussian power in Europe. He attacked Denmark to gain the German-speaking territories of Schleswig-Holstein and two years later provoked Emperor Franz-Josef I into starting the Austro-Prussian War (1866), which ended in a swift defeat for the aging Austrian empire. At the time, Bismarck wisely declined to levy a war indemnity against the Austrians.

Bismarck was less circumspect in his conduct of the Franco-Prussian War (1870-71). Seeing the opportunity to unify Germany's loose confederations against an outside enemy, Bismarck stirred political tensions between France and Prussia, famously editing a telegram from William I to make both countries feel insulted by the other. The French declared war, but the Prussians and their German allies won handily. Prussia levied an indemnity, annexed the French border provinces of Alsace and Lorraine and crowned William emperor of a unified Germany (the Second Reich) in the Hall of Mirrors at Versailles-a tremendous insult to the French.

Otto von Bismarck: Kulturkampf, Welfare State, Empire

With Germany unified, William I and Bismarck turned to entrenching their domestic power. For much of the 1870s Bismarck pursued a Kulturkampf (cultural struggle) against Catholics, who made up 36 percent of Germany's population, by placing parochial schools under state control and expelling the Jesuits. In 1878 Bismarck relented, allying with the Catholics against the growing socialist threat.

In the 1880s Bismarck set aside his conservative impulses to counter the socialists by creating Europe's first modern welfare state, establishing national healthcare (1883), accident insurance (1884) and old age pensions (1889). Bismarck also hosted the 1885 Berlin Conference that ended the "Scramble for Africa," dividing the continent between the European powers and establishing German colonies in Cameroon, Togoland and East and Southwest Africa.

Otto von Bismarck: Final Years and Legacy

William I died in 1888 and was succeeded by his son Frederick III and then his grandson William II, both of whom Bismarck found difficult to control. In 1890 the new king forced Bismarck out. William II was left in control of a flourishing unified state but was ill-equipped to maintain Bismarck's carefully manipulated balance of international rivalries. Respected and honored by the time of his death eight years later, Bismarck quickly became a quasi-mythic figure invoked by political leaders calling for strong German leadership-or for war.

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Otto von Bismarck - Biography, World Wars & Facts

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Otto von Bismarck (1815-1898)-also known as the "Iron Chancellor"-was Chancellor of the newly-united German Empire from 1862 to 1890. During his tenure he modernized the nation and helped set the stage for World War I.

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Toussaint, who had been freed from slavery and taught to read and write, soon became leader of the slave army in Haiti. For the next 12 years, he led the army in victorious battles against the French, Spanish and British armies. Then, in 1804 Haiti emerged as the first black republic.

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This fascinating, albeit short, collection of letters and other writings by Toussaint L'Ouverture reveals a surprising amount about the politics and character of the remarkable slave leader.

Toussaint joined a mass slave revolt in Saint Domingue, present-day Haiti, in 1791. The rebels, inspired by the 1789 French Revolution, rampaged through the country slaughtering slave owners and burning their properties.

Toussaint, who had been freed from slavery and taught to read and write, soon became leader of a rapidly expanding slave army. For the next 12 years, he led this army in victorious battles against the mighty French, Spanish and British armies. In 1804 "Haiti emerged as the first black republic" - described by Jean-Bertrand Aristide in an introduction that reveals as much about the politics of Haiti's first democratically elected and twice overthrown president as it does about Toussaint.

Toussaint apparently wrote up to 300 letters a day and it is inspiring to read words written in the heat of such battles. In his proclamation of 29 August 1793, for instance, in which he announced his adoption of the name L'Ouverture, Toussaint wrote: "Equality cannot exist without liberty. And for liberty to exist, we must have unity."

The letters show the military and political strategist at work, particularly in relation to people he was dealing with in France - itself going through dramatic revolutionary changes. They show he was a man of firm principles, but not the most radical of the rebels - a former slave who refused a joint British-US offer to make him king, but who passionately defended the sanctity of property, Catholicism and French law.

The letters also reveal Toussaint's ruthlessness and arrogance, perhaps qualities necessary for the tasks he faced. In 1800 he ordered enforced labour. The same year he executed his adopted nephew Moyse who opposed this policy and had supported workers demanding land reform. In May 1801 he announced a constitution that would make him all-powerful army chief and head of state for life.

None of this detracts from the enormous achievements of Toussaint - the reason his story is so little taught in our schools. We know much more about Spartacus because he lost.

Toussaint died in miserable conditions in a French jail in 1803. His abduction and imprisonment sparked a ferocious response in St Domingue by the slave army, which drove the French out for good. Toussaint's words after his abduction in 1802 were prophetic:

"In overthrowing me, you have cut in Saint Domingue only the trunk of the tree of liberty.

"It will spring up again by the roots for they are numerous and deep."

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Toussaint L'Ouverture: The Haitian Revolution

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This fascinating, albeit short, collection of letters and other writings by Toussaint L'Ouverture reveals a surprising amount about the politics and character of the remarkable slave leader. Toussaint joined a mass slave revolt in Saint Domingue, present-day Haiti, in 1791. The rebels, inspired by the 1789 French Revolution, rampaged through the country slaughtering slave owners and burning their properties.