Frederick William I (Prussia) (1688–1740; Ruled 1713–1740)

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FREDERICK WILLIAM I (PRUSSIA) (1688–1740; ruled 1713–1740)

FREDERICK WILLIAM I (PRUSSIA) (1688–1740; ruled 1713–1740), king of Prussia. On 25 February 1713, Frederick William succeeded his father Frederick I as king of Prussia. He arrived on the throne in the midst of both war and peace, as the War of the Spanish Succession (1701–1714) was drawing to a close, and the complex peace negotiations among all the European powers had begun while the fighting still continued. He ascended the throne at a difficult time, one filled with both danger and opportunity.

Frederick William I, who became known as the Soldatenkönig ('soldier king'), brought to the difficult task of rule the personality of a drill sergeant—including a bad temper combined with general vulgarity. A born autocrat, he enjoyed drilling his palace guard and playing crude practical jokes. His happiest hours were spent with military cronies in the Tabakskollegium, where the men talked shop, smoked and drank, and told bawdy jokes. But to this he added an immense capacity for work and an acute understanding for the real foundation of the scattered and impoverished territories of Prussia. That foundation was the army. He inherited an army of about 30,000 ill-equipped and badly trained troops, and he gradually built this up to a superbly equipped, housed, and trained army of over 80,000 men. It was, at his death, the best army in Europe and one of the largest. To pay for it Frederick William I cut expenses to the bone and managed the royal fisc, or treasury, carefully. By a tax collection machine that gradually became the most efficient in Europe, Frederick William doubled his income from 3.5 million thalers in 1715 to over 7 million in 1740. He managed expenses with such ruthless care that the royal domains moved from loss to gain, and even the postal system turned a profit. This increased income supported an everincreasing army. He had inherited a bankrupt state and a depleted military from his father, but he left his son Frederick the Great (ruled 1740–1786) a full treasury and a mighty army. Few European monarchs would ever receive so useful an inheritance.

Frederick William's main contributions to the growth of Prussian power involved the unglamorous and daily drudgery of administration. To bring all of the major functions of government under centralized supervision, Frederick William created in 1722 the General-Ober-Finanz-Kriegsund Domänendirektorium, known as the Generaldirektorium (General Directory). It functioned as an administrative board, all of whose decisions were examined by the king. The continuing royal policy, which the General Directory both administered and initiated, followed the standard model of eighteenth-century absolutism: centralization of administrative and policy decisions in the hands of the king and uniformity of application of law and administration across all classes and provinces. These were the goals of government everywhere during the eighteenth century, but nowhere in Europe were they so successfully and relentlessly pursued as in Prussia. By the time of his death in May 1740, Frederick William I had pulled together by sheer determination, persistence, and attention to the main elements of royal power the most efficient and best organized state in Europe.

In foreign policy, Frederick William I was equally tenacious in increasing the size and power of Prussia, but he tried to do this through diplomacy. His army constituted a constant potential threat to his neighbors, but Frederick William much preferred peace. He loved his army too much to see it damaged in a prolonged war. The goal of the diplomacy was always the same. Frederick William wished to annex as much of the Baltic possessions of a declining Sweden as possible, particularly the port of Stettin and the province of Pomerania. He allied himself with Russia, he deserted Russia, he made raids on Sweden, and he made peace with Sweden. He threatened Sweden and he finally, in 1720, bought Stettin and Pomerania from Sweden for two million thalers. He could afford it.

The policies that Frederick William I followed, although rigidly and often harshly applied, were nonetheless necessary for the welfare of both Prussia and the Prussians. Foremost among the state's needs was peace. In the decade before 1713 Prussia had been part of the Great Northern War, and suffered all the destruction that marauding armies and bands of deserters could inflict. Frederick brought nearly a quarter century of peace to a poor country, giving it a chance to recover. Beyond peace the king gradually made Prussian government the most honest and efficient in Europe. Nobles lost privileges, but many gained positions in the army or civil administration. Finally, Frederick William laid the foundations of the power of Prussia, which he built around the army, and which became the basis for the creation of a unified Germany in the next century.

See also Frederick II (Prussia) ; Germany, Idea of ; Hohenzollern Dynasty ; Northern Wars ; Prussia ; Spanish Succession, War of the (1701–1714) .