Hanover

HANOVER, formerly an independent kingdom of Germany, but since 1866 a province of Prussia, bounded on the north by the North Sea, Schleswig-Holstein, Hamburg and Mecklenburg Schwerin, east and south-east by Prussian Saxony, Brandenburg and Brunswick, south-west by Lippe and the Prussian provinces of Hesse-Nassau and Westphalia, and west by Holland. These boundaries include the republic of Oldenburg and the free state of Bremen, the former stretching southward from the North Sea nearly to the southern boundary of Hanover. A small part of the province in the south is separated from Hanover proper by the interposition of part of Brunswick. In 1873 the province was increased by the addition of the Jade territory (purchased by Prussia from Oldenburg), south-west of the Elbe, with the naval station and arsenal of Wilhelmshaven. The area of the province is 14,953 sq. miles.

The plain of Hanover is mainly sandhills, heath and moor. On the Elbe and near the North Sea, rich meadows are preserved from encroachment of the sea by dikes and ditches. The so-called Liineburger Heide in the north is an expanse of moor and fen, with oases of beech and oak woods, extending almost due north from the city of Hanover to the southern arm of the Elbe at Harburg. The south part of the province is hilly, rising to the forested Harz mountains. The east part of the northern plain is covered with fir forests. The Elbe forms the north-east boundary and receives the navigable Jeetze, Ilmenau, Lithe, Seve, Este, Schwinge and Medem; the Weser drains the centre, with its tributary the Aller (navigable from Celle downwards) ; and the Ems, the west, with its tributaries Aa and Leda. Numerous canals connect these river systems. A few small lakes are found here and there in the province.

The climate in the coastal lowlands is moist and foggy, in the plains mild, on the Harz mountains severe and variable. In spring the prevailing winds are easterly, in summer they blow from the south-west. In the town of Hanover the average monthly tem perature ranges from 32° F in January to 63° F in July, and the average annual rainfall is about 23.5 in. In the west the Herauch, a thick fog arising from the burning of the moors, is of frequent occurrence.

The population in was 3,360,827, giving a density of 225 to the sq.m. (English). The province is divided into the six Regierungsbezirke (or departments) of Hanover, Hildesheim, Luneburg, Stade, Osnabruck and Aurich, and these again into Kreise (circles, or local government districts)-82 in all. The chief towns are Hanover, Osnabruck, Hildesheim, Wesermunde, Wilhelmshaven, Harburg, Luneburg, Celle, Gottingen and Emden. Above 8o% of the population are Protestant. A court of appeal for the province sits at Celle.

The province has the university of Gottingen, a technical col lege in Hanover, an academy of forestry in Miinden, a mining college in Clausthal, and a veterinary college in Hanover.

The greater part of the soil is of inferior quality, and one-third of the province is uncultivated moor and heath; about half the remainder is arable and the rest pasture and forest. The best agriculture is to be found in the districts of Hildesheim, Calen berg, Gottingen and Grubenhagen, on the banks of the Weser and Elbe, and in East Friesland. Rye is widely grown for bread. Flax is extensively cultivated and exported, chiefly in the form of yarn. Potatoes, hemp, turnips, hops, tobacco and beets are also grown, the latter in connection with the sugar industry. Apples, pears, plums and cherries are the principal fruits cul tivated, while the wild red cranberries from the Harz and the black bilberries from the Luneburger Heide form an important article of export.

Hanover is renowned for its cattle and live stock. The Dine burger Heide yields excellent sheep, while horses are reared in Aurich and Stade, in Hildesheim, Hanover and in Celle. Bees are principally kept on the Luneburger Heide, and the yield of honey is considerable. Large flocks of geese are kept in the moist lowlands. The rivers yield trout, salmon (in the Weser) and crayfish. The sea fisheries are important and have their chief centre at Wesermunde.

The Harz mountains are rich in silver, lead, iron and copper; coal is found around Osnabruck, on the Deister, at Osterwald, etc., lignite in various places; salt-springs exist at Egestorfshall and Neuhall near Hanover, and at Luneburg; and petroleum is obtained south of Celle. In the cold regions of the northern low lands peat occurs.

Works for the manufacture of iron, copper, silver, lead, vitriol and sulphur are carried on. The iron works are important : smelt ing is carried on in the Harz and near Osnabruck; there are exten sive foundries and machine factories at Hanover, Linden, Osna bruck, Hameln, Wesermunde, Harburg, Osterode, etc., and manufactories of cutlery in the towns of the Harz and in the Soliinger Forest. Linen yarn and cloth are largely manufactured, and bleaching is engaged in extensively; woollen cloths are made in the south about Einbeck, Gottingen and Hameln; cotton spinning and weaving have their seats at Hanover and Linden. Glass houses, paper-mills, potteries, tile works and tobacco-pipe works are numerous. There are numerous tobacco factories, tan neries, breweries, vinegar works and brandy distilleries. Ship building is an important industry, especially at Wilhelmshaven, Papenburg, Leer, Stade and Harburg; and at Miinden river barges are built.

The carrying trade of Hanover is largely absorbed by Ham burg and Bremen, while the Weser forms the chief commercial artery of the province. The province has good roads connecting the chief towns and is intersected by trunk lines of railway ; notably the lines from Berlin to Cologne, from Hamburg to Frankfort-on-Main, from Hamburg to Bremen and Cologne, and from Berlin to Amsterdam.

The name Hanover (Hohenufer=high bank), originally con fined to the town which became the capital of the duchy of Luneburg-Calenberg, came gradually into use to designate, first, the duchy itself, and secondly, the electorate of Brunswick-Lune burg; and it was officially recognized as the name of the state when in 1814 the electorate was raised to the rank of a kingdom.

The early history of Hanover is merged in that of the duchy of Brunswick (q.v.), from which the duchy of Brunswick-Luneburg and its offshoots, the duchies of Liineburg-Celle and Liineburg Calenberg, have sprung. In 1692, in return for lavish promises of assistance to the empire and the Habsburgs, the emperor granted Duke Ernest Augustus of Calenberg the rank and title of elector of Brunswick-Liineburg with the office of standard bearer in the Holy Roman empire. Indignant protests followed, but in 1708 George Louis, the son and successor of Ernest Augustus, was rec ognized as an elector by the imperial diet. Through his mother, the elector George Louis became, by the terms of the Act of Settlement of 1701, king of Great Britain and Ireland in 1714.

Under British Sovereignty.

From this time until the death of William IV. in 1837, Luneburg or Hanover, was ruled by the same sovereign as Great Britain. Both George I. and George II. preferred Hanover to England as a place of residence, and it was a frequent and perhaps justifiable cause of complaint that the in terests of Great Britain were sacrificed to those of the smaller country. But George III. was more British than either his grand father or his great-grandfather, and owing to a variety of causes the foreign policies of the two countries began to diverge in the later years of his reign. During the Napoleonic wars Hanover was occupied by Prussia in 1805, but after the battle of Jena (1807) became part of the kingdom of Westphalia. The northern portion was added to France in 181o. The elector was granted the title of king by the Vienna Congress, which restored the independence of Hanover. On the conclusion of peace in 1814 the estates of the several provinces of the kingdom were fused into one body, con sisting of 85 members, but the chief power was exercised as be fore by the members of a few noble families. In 1819, however, this feudal relic was supplanted by a new constitution. Two cham bers were established, the one formed of nobles and the other of elected representatives ; but although they were authorized to con trol the finances, their power with regard to legislation was very circumscribed. This constitution was sanctioned by the prince regent, afterwards King George IV. ; but it was out of harmony with the new and liberal ideas which prevailed in Europe, and it hardly survived George's decease in 183o. The revolution of that year compelled George's brother and successor, William, to dis miss Count Munster, who had been the actual ruler of the coun try, and to name his own brother, Adolphus Frederick, duke of Cambridge, a viceroy of Hanover, one of the viceroy's earliest duties being to appoint a commission to draw up a new constitu tion. This was done, and after William had insisted upon certain alterations, it was accepted and promulgated in 1833. Representa tion was granted to the peasants ; the two chambers were em powered to initiate legislation ; ministers were made responsible for all acts of government ; a civil list was given to the king in return for the surrender of the Crown lands; and, in short, the new constitution was similar to that of Great Britain.

King Ernest Augustus.

By the law of Hanover a woman could not ascend the throne, and accordingly Ernest Augustus, duke of Cumberland, the fifth son of George III., and not Vic toria, succeeded William as sovereign in 1837, thus separating the crowns of Great Britain and Hanover after a union of 123 years. Ernest, a prince with very autocratic ideas, had disapproved of the constitution of 1833, and his first important act as king was to de clare it invalid. He appears to have been especially chagrined be cause the Crown lands were not his personal property, but the new arrangements were quite repugnant to him. Seven Got tingen professors who protested against this proceeding were de prived of their chairs; and some of them, including F. C. Dahl mann and Jakob Grimm, were banished from the country for pub lishing their protest. To save the constitution an appeal was made to the German Confederation, which Hanover had joined in 1815; but the federal diet declined to interfere, and in 184o Ernest al tered the constitution to suit his own illiberal views. Recovering the Crown lands, he abolished the principle of ministerial responsi bility, the legislative power of the two chambers, and other re forms, virtually restoring affairs to their condition before 1833. The inevitable crisis was delayed until the stormy year 1848, when the king probably saved his crown by hastily giving back the con stitution of 1833. Order, however, having been restored in 185o he dismissed the Liberal ministry and attempted to evade his con cessions; a bitter struggle had just broken out when Ernest Augustus died in Nov. 1851. During this reign the foreign policy of Hanover both within and without Germany had been coloured by jealousy of Prussia and by the king's autocratic ideas. Refus ing to join the Prussian Zollverein, Hanover had become a mem ber of the rival commercial union, the Steuerverein, three years before Ernest's accession; but as this union was not a great suc cess the Zollverein (q.v.) was joined in 1851. In 1849, after the failure of the German parliament at Frankfort, the king had joined with the sovereigns of Prussia and Saxony to form the "three kings' alliance"; but this union with Prussia was unreal, and with the king of Saxony he soon transferred his support to Austria and became a member of the "four kings' alliance." Annexation to Prussia.—George V., the new king of Han over, who was unfortunately blind, sharing his father's political ideas, at once appointed a ministry whose aim was to sweep away the constitution of 1848. This project, however, was resisted by the second chamber of the Landtag, or parliament ; and after sev eral changes of government a new ministry advised the king in 1855 to appeal to the diet of the German Confederation. This was done, and the diet declared the constitution of 1848 to be invalid. Acting on this verdict, not only was a ministry formed to restore the constitution of 184o, but after some trouble a body of members fully in sympathy with this object was returned to parliament in 1857. But these members were so far from repre senting the opinions of the people that popular resentment com pelled George to dismiss his advisers in 1862, and the more lib eral government which succeeded did not enjoy his complete con fidence. In 1865 a ministry was once more formed which was more in accord with his own ideas. This contest soon lost both interest and importance owing to the condition of affairs in Germany. Bismarck, the director of the policy of Prussia, was devising methods for the realization of his schemes, and it be came clear after the war over the duchies of Schleswig and Hol stein that the smaller German states would soon be obliged to decide definitely between Austria and Prussia. After a period of vacillation Hanover threw in her lot with Austria, the decisive step being taken when the question of the mobilization of the fed eral army was voted upon in the diet on June 14, 1866. At once Prussia requested Hanover to remain unarmed and neutral during the war, and with equal promptness King George refused to as sent to these demands. Prussian troops then crossed his frontier and took possession of his capital. The Hanoverians, however, were victorious at the battle of Langensalza on June 27, 1866, but the advance of fresh bodies of the enemy compelled them to capitulate two days later. By the terms of this surrender the king was not to reside in Hanover, his officers were to take no further part in the war, and his ammunition and stores became the prop erty of Prussia. The decree of Sept. 20, 1866, formally annexed Hanover to Prussia, when it became a province of that kingdom, while King George from his retreat at Hietzing appealed in vain to the powers of Europe. For some years many of the Hanover ians remained loyal to their sovereign, some of them serving in the Guelph Legion, which was maintained largely at his expense in France, where a paper, La Situation, was founded by Oskar Meding (182g-1903) and conducted In his interests.

BIBLIOGRAPHY. A. Hiine, Geschichte des Konigreichs Hannover and Bibliography. A. Hiine, Geschichte des Konigreichs Hannover and des Herzogtums Braunschweig (Hanover, 1824-3o) ; A. F. H. Schau mann, Handbuch der Geschichte der Lande Hannover and Braun schweig (Hanover, 1864) ; G. A. Grotefend, Geschichte der allgemeinen landstdndischen Verfassung des Konigreichs Hannover, (Han over, 1857) ; H. A. Oppermann, Zur. Geschichte des Konigreichs Hannover, 1832-186o (1868) ; E. von Meier, Hannoversche Verfassungs and Verwaltungsgeschichte (Leipzig, 1898-99) ; W. von Hassell, Das Kurfurstenturn Hannover yam Baseler Frieden bis zur preussischen Okkupation (Hanover, 1894) ; and Geschichte des Konigreichs Han nover (Leipzig, 1898-1901) ; H. von Treitschke, Der Herzog von Cum berland and das hannoversche Staatsgrundgesetz von 1833 (Leipzig, 1888) ; and the authorities given for the history of Brunswick.