Chapter 500 Eat It All

Franz naturally knew what was happening in Silesia, but there was not much he could do. It can be said that the reasons for Silesia's poverty include but are not limited to the result of the combined effects of backward production methods and systems, traditional concepts, technology, national policies, and natural and man-made disasters.

First of all, the tax farmer system that has continued from the time of Frederick the Great to the present day. Secondly, it is inevitable that the family handicraft industry will be impacted by modern industry. Technological innovation and the invention of machinery have exacerbated the current predicament.

At the same time, Berlin demanded too much from Silesia, but the subsidies were too little, and even deliberately restricted its development.

This is not only because this land was taken from Austria, but also because a large number of Poles lived on it.

According to estimates at the time, in the first fifty years of the 19th century, the Prussian government took at least more than 1 billion francs in money and materials from Silesia alone.

This number is very scary, equivalent to this small province paying half of Hungary's taxes every year.

Then there were natural disasters that caused poor harvests in some parts of Prussia, but only Silesia had the highest number of people starving to death. Among them, there were 2,000 people in 1841, 3,000 people in 1842, 6,000 people in 1843, and another poor harvest in 1844.

The Prussian government and local nobles have always played the role of villains; the masters concealed the actual situation in the local area, and the inspectors sent by the Berlin high-level officials neglected their duties and hastily submitted reports to the higher authorities without investigation.

The relief work was also very ridiculous. After 1838, the famine in Silesia could no longer be covered up. The government allocated money to local nobles, who directly used it to grow feed, causing food prices to rise further.

Afterwards, seeds, clothes and paper were sent to the affected people. You must know that the weavers at that time had almost no culture, and they had no pens in their hands, and paper could only be used to wipe their butts, and they were also disliked for being too hard.

By the way, toilet paper in the true modern sense only became popular in 1857. At this time, Europe had all kinds of strange tools for going to the toilet, and the most outrageous one should be the goose neck.

Yes, those kings would use the swan's neck to wipe their buttocks, and it is said that this would make the buttocks feel an extraordinary pleasure.

"Using it as toilet paper has both the softness of fluff and the warmth of the goose. This warmth will pass through the large and small intestines and reach the brain and heart directly." - John Harrington, a powerful official during the reign of Elizabeth I.

Since Franz learned this story, he could no longer look directly at the word swan neck.

Back to the topic, in 1843, tens of thousands of weavers were affected by the disaster, but the local government only sent 146 kilograms of frozen rotten potatoes, causing thousands of people to starve to death.

One thing that was better about Silesia at this time than in history was that Austria was in the German Customs Union, and Franz vigorously promoted immigration policies, so more than half of the people who should have starved to death went to Austria.

Compared with the future crown prince, there are others who pay more attention to the development of the Prussian textile industry center at this time, namely British Prime Minister Robert Peel and the current leader of the Polish Restoration Army, Landry Promi.

The reason why the former pays attention to this is very simple, that is, to avenge the miners' strike.

After all, Europe is still in a "peaceful period" at this time, and before everyone has a falling out, they can only make small moves behind the scenes.

However, since they have the experience of dealing with the French, dealing with the Prussians is already a piece of cake; coupled with the ambiguous attitude of Hanover, this makes the British actions more effective, and soon a large amount of weapons and ammunition flow into the Silesia region.

At the same time, the spies they sent began to incite the weavers to riot, but soon found that those on the verge of bankruptcy did not even need a spark.

The weavers who could not afford to eat and survive had long been a volcano waiting to erupt at any time, and the local government of Prussia obviously did not prepare a response.

But there is only one small problem, that is, the number of weavers is too small and is on a downward trend. At this time, there are only more than 30,000 people. Even if they can be organized, they may not have much impact on the Kingdom of Prussia.

Moreover, most of these people are children, women, and the elderly, and two-thirds of them have different degrees of physical deformities; almost all of them have lung diseases, and their combat effectiveness and destructive power are very limited.

At the same time, because they belong to many lords and are far away from each other, it is difficult to organize.

The Polish Restoration Army will focus on Silesia, which is naturally due to London. Although the Anglo-French alliance has not been formed, Poland has successfully connected with the British line.

From the perspective of Great Britain, the more chaotic Europe is, the happier it is, and Poland is undoubtedly the most suitable troublemaker at this time.

However, in the eyes of Landry Promie, the value of Silesia's weavers is limited. They cannot donate money and materials to the Polish Restoration Army, and they also lack a lofty ideal-reviving Poland.

Moreover, Poland's national restoration movement was at a low ebb at that time, and it was obviously not a wise choice to offend Prussia. As for the promises made by Britain and France, he did not see any sincerity.

So Landry Prome did not intend to wade into the muddy water of the weavers' uprising. He spent more energy on supporting local pro-Polish forces.

At this time, the Berlin court was unaware of what was brewing in Silesia, and William IV was still waiting for the news of his finance minister Friedrich List's triumphant return.

After all, monopolizing the distribution rights of British goods is a good way to save the country in a roundabout way. At that time, the German region had a mysterious worship of English goods, while French goods were synonymous with luxury.

Austrian goods were cheap industrial products, and local goods were synonymous with counterfeit and shoddy products. Historically, German industry started with imitation, but soon formed its own characteristics.

But this process is obviously much slower, because the market is full of Austrian industrial products.

Austrian goods are good and cheap, so the profit of counterfeiting is not high, and the difficulty of imitation is also very great. What is more worrying is that this country has the ability to enforce laws across borders.

However, it is a good thing for the nobles and the people. After all, who doesn’t want to buy the best goods with the least cost?

But from the perspective of a country, it is not a good thing; because it means that they have to rely on Austria’s production capacity.

If there is a conflict between the two countries, they will be in a very unfavorable position.

However, the game and competition in trade have little impact on small countries. After all, they are inherently deficient and have long been accustomed to this kind of life of looking at people’s faces.

But for powerful states like Prussia and Bavaria, it was very painful and dangerous.

However, most of the princes in the German region did not have much objection to Austria's possible control of the German Customs Union or even the entire German Confederation. After all, it was only about fifty years away from the end of the Holy Roman Empire.

But Prussia was different. It was too big, and its historical grievances with Austria forced it to find ways to balance its southern neighbor.

At this time, Friedrich List was coldly received in London, which made him puzzled. Because the alliance between Britain and Prussia was more favorable to the former no matter how you looked at it.