Augustus, Grand Duke of Oldenburg

Augustus (13 July 1783 – 27 February 1853) was the reigning Grand Duke of Oldenburg from 1829 to 1853.

Augustus
Grand Duke of Oldenburg
Reign21 May 1829 – 27 February 1853
PredecessorPeter I
SuccessorPeter II
Born(1783-07-13)July 13, 1783
Rastede
DiedFebruary 27, 1853(1853-02-27) (aged 69)
Oldenburg
Burial
Ducal Mausoleum, Gertrudenfriedhof, Oldenburg
Spouse
        ​
        (
        m. 1831; died 1844)
        Issue
        Full name
        German: Paul Friedrich August
        HouseHolstein-Gottorp
        FatherPeter I
        MotherFrederica of Württemberg
        ReligionLutheranism

        Birth and family

        Augustus was born on 13 July 1783 at Schloss Rastede near Oldenburg, to the then Prince Peter Frederick Louis of Holstein-Gottorp and his wife Duchess Frederica of Württemberg, a daughter of Frederick II Eugene, Duke of Württemberg.

        Augustus had one younger brother, Duke George of Oldenburg, who was a year younger than him. In 1785, his mother died in childbirth at the age of twenty. His father never remarried.

        Early life
        Augustus with his brother George in the 1790s

        In 1785, when Augustus was two years old, his father became Prince-Bishop of Lübeck and was furthermore appointed regent of the Duchy of Oldenburg for his incapacitated cousin William, Duke of Oldenburg.

        From 1788 to 1803, the two princes were educated at home under the supervision of their father. Together with his brother, he studied at the University of Leipzig from 1803 to 1805. From 1805 to 1807 he and his brother travelled extensively in England and Scotland.[1]

        In 1808, he accompanied his father to the Congress of Erfurt, the meeting between Emperor Napoléon I of France and Tsar Alexander I of Russia. Between 1810 and 1814, Oldenburg was occupied by Napoleonic France.

        In December 1810, the Duchy of Oldenburg was annexed by the French Empire and Augustus and his father traveled to Russia to stay in exile with their relatives, the Russian imperial family.[2] This annexation was one of the causes for the diplomatic rift between former allies France and Russia, a dispute that would lead to war in 1812 and eventually to Napoleon's downfall.

        From 1811 to 1816 he was Governor of Estonia where he led the work to prepare the abolition of serfdom. He participated in the Napoleonic Wars from 1812 to 1814.[3] After the end of the Napoleonic Wars, he returned to Russia to finish his work as governor of Estonia. He returned to Oldenburg in 1816.[4]

        First marriage
        Princess Adelheid of Anhalt-Bernburg-Schaumburg-Hoym

        On 24 July 1817, at the age of 34, Augustus married Princess Adelheid of Anhalt-Bernburg-Schaumburg-Hoym. She was a daughter of Victor II, Prince of Anhalt-Bernburg-Schaumburg-Hoym, and his wife, Princess Amalie Charlotte of Nassau-Weilburg.

        Augustus and Adelheid had two daughters; Amalia, who was born in 1818 an later married Prince Otto of Bavaria, the elected King of Greece, and thus became Queen consort of Greece; and Frederica, who was born in 1820 and later married Baron Maximilian Emanuel von Washington (1829–1903) a son of Baron Jakob von Washington, a distant relative of the first President of the United States George Washington. However, Princess Adelheid died suddenly in 1820.

        Hereditary Prince

        In 1823, his father succeeded as Duke of Oldenburg after the death of his cousin William, Duke of Oldenburg and Augustus became Heir apparent.

        Although Oldenburg, like many other German duchies, had been elevated from a mere duchy to a grand duchy in 1815 at the Congress of Vienna, his father chose to continue the use of the lesser title of Duke, making Augustus the Hereditary Prince rather than the Hereditary Grand Duke of Oldenburg.[5]

        As Hereditary Prince, he participated extensively in the government of the duchy.[6]

        Second marriage
        Princess Ida of Anhalt-Bernburg-Schaumburg-Hoym

        On 24 June 1825, after five years as a widower, Augustus married secondly Princess Ida of Anhalt-Bernburg-Schaumburg-Hoym, a younger sister of his first wife.

        Augustus and Ida had one son, Peter, who was born in 1827 and would later succeed Augustus as Grand Duke. Just like her sister, however, Princess Ida died after three years of marriage, in 1828.

        Reign
        Grand Duke Augustus on a Thaler coin from 1846

        Augustus succeeded his father, Grand Duke Peter I, to the throne of Oldenburg, and the Principality of Birkenfeld on 21 May 1829. Unlike his father, Augustus assumed the title of Grand Duke, and Augustus was thus the first to use the title Grand Duke of Oldenburg.

        As Grand Duke, Augustus was employed in reforming the administration of his small state and showed himself a patriarchal ruler who cared for agriculture, transport, social welfare, art and science. Trade flourished along the lower Weser and Jade, and the city of Oldenburg developed into one of Northwestern Germany's cultural centres.[7]

        The Grand Duke however was reluctant to follow popular demands to introduce a constitution for the Grand Duchy. Although article 13 of the constitution of the German Confederation obliged Oldenburg to have a constitution, following the advice of his Russian relatives, the Grand Duke again and again postponed the promise of a constitution given in 1830.

        Only as a consequence of the Revolutions of 1848 did the Grand Duke reluctantly give in under pressure from his advisers. On 18 February 1849, he signed the Oldenburg constitution which had already been revised by 1852.[8]

        Third marriage
        Princess Cecilia of Sweden

        On 5 May 1831, Augustus married thirdly his second cousin once removed Princess Cecilia of Sweden, a daughter of the deposed King Gustav IV Adolf of Sweden. He had become Grand Duke two years earlier, making her the first Grand Duchess of Oldenburg.

        Augustus and Cecilia had three sons, of which just one, Elimar, survived to adulthood.

        Grand Duchess Cecilia died on 27 January 1844 in Oldenburg.

        Death and succession

        Grand Duke Augustus died on 27 February 1853 in Oldenburg. He was buried in the Ducal Mausoleum in the Churchyard of Saint Gertrude in Oldenburg. Augustus was succeeded as Grand Duke by his eldest son, Peter.

        Legacy

        The settlement Augustfehn in Ammerland in Lower Saxony, Germany is named after Grand Duke Augustus.

        Titles and styles
        • 13 July 1783 – 2 July 1823: His Highness Duke Augustus of Oldenburg
        • 2 July 1823 – 17 January 1829: His Royal Highness The Hereditary Prince of Oldenburg
        • 17 January 1829 – 27 February 1853: His Royal Highness The Grand Duke of Oldenburg

        Honours

        Ancestry and descent

        Ancestry

        Issue
        NameBirthDeathNotes
        Duchess Amalia21 December 181820 May 1875married Otto of Bavaria, the elected King of Greece, and thus became Queen consort of Greece.
        Duchess Frederica8 June 182020 March 1891married Baron Maximilian Emanuel von Washington, a distant relative of the first President of the United States George Washington.
        Duke Peter8 July 182713 June 1900succeeded his father as Grand Duke of Oldenburg; married Princess Elisabeth of Saxe-Altenburg; had issue
        Duke Alexander16 June 18346 June 1835
        Duke August15 February 183630 April 1837
        Duke Elimar23 January 184417 October 1895married morganatically Baroness Natalie Vogel von Friesenhof
        gollark: ```c#include <stdint.h>#include <stddef.h>static uintptr_t MEMPOS = 1;void* malloc(size_t size) { uintptr_t bees = MEMPOS; MEMPOS += size; return (void*)bees;}void free(void* ptr) { *(char**)ptr = "hello please do not use this address";}```
        gollark: I prefer my malloc implementation.
        gollark: discord.bash when?
        gollark: I only run autoupdating untrusted shellscripts.
        gollark: I'm not running some autoupdating untrusted Electron blob which does stuff like scan processes *already* on an osmarks.tk critical server!

        References
        1. ADB, p. 667-68.
        2. ADB, p. 668
        3. ADB, p. 668.
        4. ADB, p. 668
        5. Oakes, p. 57.
        6. NDB, p. 447.
        7. NDB, p. 447
        8. NDB, p. 447
        9. Le livre d'or de l'ordre de Léopold et de la croix de fer, Volume 1 /Ferdinand Veldekens

        Sources
        • Oakes, Augustus Henry (1921). The Great European Treaties of the Nineteenth Century. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
        • Hermann Lübbing (1953), "August I.", Neue Deutsche Biographie (NDB) (in German), 1, Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, pp. 446–447
        • Theodor Merzdorf (1875), "Paul Friedrich August (Großherzog von Oldenburg)", Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB) (in German), 1, Leipzig: Duncker & Humblot, pp. 667–669
        Augustus, Grand Duke of Oldenburg
        House of Holstein-Gottorp
        Cadet branch of the House of Oldenburg
        Born: 13 July 1783 Died: 27 February 1853
        Regnal titles
        Preceded by
        Peter I        		 Grand Duke of Oldenburg
        1829-1853        		 Succeeded by
        Peter II
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