WILLIAM I. (Ger. WILHELM) (1797-1SSS). King of Prussia and German Emperor. He was the second son of Frederick William III. of Prussia and Queen Luise, and was born March 22, 1797. He took part in tile campaigns of 1814 and 1815 against Napoleon. On the acces sion of his elder brother. Frederick William IV. (fl.v.), to the Prussian throne in 1840. William received the title of Prince of Prussia and Governor of Pomerania. His Absolutist attitude provoked such popular enmity that on the out break of the revolution of 1848 he had to tlee to England. He returned some months later, and was elected to the Prussian National Assembly, where in a brief address he placed himself on record as favoring a constitution. but took no further part in the discussion. In 1S-19 he com manded the Prussian forces sent to put down the revolutionists in the Palatinate and Baden. In October, 1857, the King having become mentally incapacitated. William assumed charge of the government temporarily. and in October, 1858, became Regent. He was a soldier by talent and inclination. and while Regent contended steadily. against the opposition of the Diet, for the reor ganization of the Prussian Army. On the death of his brother, January 2. 1861, William became King of Prussia, and at his coronation, at Kii nigsberg, October 18th. he declared that he "ruled by the favor of God, and of no one else." The result of the elections to the Prussian Diet being in favm• of the Liberal Party, William de clared in his address at the openi.ng of the cham bers that he "never could permit the progressive development of our inner, political life to ques. tion or to endanger the rights of the Crown and the power of Prussia." This principle he main tained and the contest over the aruu• continued. At last, in 1862, he found Bismarck a Minister who was able to govern without a Parliamentary majority. The struggle between the King and the Liberal majority in the chambers was thrown into the background at the close of IS(13, by the strategy of Bismarek, who made Prussia champion the cause of Schleswig-Holstein against Denmark —an intervention in which Austria was forced to participate—and, contriving to make the Sehles wig-Holstein question one of 'German' intere,4, silenced. for the time being. the Liberal opposi
tion in Prussia. In 1866 (lime the war between Prussia and Austria. in which the King took the field as commander-in-chief of the Prussian forces, William became the head of the North German Confederation in 1867. At Ems, in .luly, 1870, took place the memorable interviews between William and the French ambassador, Benedetti, which precipitated the outbreak of the war of 1870-71. William was at the head of the united German armt•, and commanded nutted perstmally at the decisive battles of Gravelotte and of Sedan. On January IS, 1871, he was proclaimed German Emperor in the palace of the Frenell kings at Versailles. On March 21st he opened in Berlin the first Reichstag of the new German Empire. (For the events of his reign as German Em peror, see GERMANY, SISMARCK. K ULTURKA PIo. SOCIALISM, and POLITICAL PARTIES, section on Germany.) In 1878 two attempts were made on the life of the Emperor. The second time he was seriously wounded. These attempts were at tributed, directly or indirectly, to socialist in fluence. lle died in Berlin March 9, MS. William married, dune I I, 1829. the Princess Au gusta of Saxe-Weimar, by whom he had two chil dren. The son. Frederick William, succeeded his father as Frederick 111. (q.v.). Consult: Mareks, Kaiser Wilhelm I. ( Leipzig, 1 S991, the best biog raphy; thicken. Das Zeitalter des Kaisers t2 vols.. Berlin, 1590-92) ; Lavisse, Trois empercurs d'illemagne: Guillaume L. Frederic M., Guillaume II. (Paris. 18881: Forbes, Life of Emperor William (London, 1889).