Evening star., 1934-08-04
Hindenburg Gets First Taste
Of Var IN austrian Conflict
Young Lieutenant Then Sees German
Empire Founded in Hall of Mir
rors After Defeat of French.

burg sat up, rejoiced, received deco
ration, and, to the day of his death
had the stricken helmet on his walls
as evidence of his first bout with his
tory.
A little later, at Prague, the boy met
his father, now a knight Of honor OF
the Order of st. John, the boy smelling
of blood and powder, the father seek
ing the wounded.
Three years of peace and the Franco
Prussian War broke Hindenburg
took the field as adjutant of the lst
Battalion of the Guards. Circum-
stances threw him into the battle of
st. Privat, where his detachment met
very heavy fire. II do not myself un-
derstand," he wrote to his family, "how
could have remained so cold
blooded yet we had to try and
execute the movement which had
begun" ="
A cloud of dustI Paul Won Hinden-
burg, lieutenant and regimental adju-
tant, gazed curiously and sceptically
after it. Napoleon III. IncredibleI
Yet, over there, in one direction, was
Inundated Sedan; and. over there,
in another direction, was the dry high
way to Imprisonment. So that was
France! Hindenburg gazed atten-
lively at the whirling dust-cloud of
victory: IF I had reached that road
few minutes earlier would have
been an eye witness of the historic
spectacle" What matter? He was
to inherit the consequences. Mean
while. Germany no longer was name;
1t had become fact.
Felt Like a Crusader.
Thence to Paris. over fields to be-
come memorable to Hindenburg 46
years later d.. with the All-Highest
as his companion And, when, at
last, the troops glimpsed, on a per-
feet Autumn day, the gilded domes
OF the Invalides, Hindenburg re-
fected that so must the crusaders
have felt when first they looked down
on Jerusalem.
Paul Hindenburg, with a sergeant,
was to represent his regiment at the
ceremony which was to make a sulky
King William the first German En-
peror-a title no abhorred. Due to
various exigencieS Hindenburg and
his sergeant made the trip on a
transport wagon and in a dog cart,
in turn. The wagon. if slow, was
safe: but the dog cart lost a wheel
and pitched the future President of
Germany into a ditch.
The proclamation of the empire
on January Is, 1871. conceded with
the 10th anniversary of the creation
of the Kingdom of Prussia. 1t took
place in the historic Hall of Mirrors
in the royal city where Louis XIV
had held his brilliant court In this
awed assembly, bending ear to the
reSounding words, none was more
eager than Lieut.. Paul Won Hinden-
burg He noticed, then as later, that
the South Germans were the more
vociferous, the Prussians the more
reserved, for" he proudly remarked.
we have learned to know our own
value at a time when Germany was
but geographical expression" Many
years later he added sadly, that
cannot be said in the future!"
He witnessed attentively the strug-
gle between the French government
and the Commune; disdained the
telescopes set up by commercially
minded" persons. and leaned out of
the hotel window or rode carelessly
about and saw what was to be seen.
He saw the end Of it from his win
dow, in the glow of fiery French
reaction.
Thus informed. he turned his back
on Paris. Austria, France had been
beaten, The empire had been erected
on their common disasters, and the
| future was to be glory. Nor did he
perceive, any more than the great
Bismarck, that the empires birth
was not the climax OF one historic
phase, but the origin Of the next.
For history is thus logical.
| tCopyright 1884. by the North American
Newspaper Alliance. 1ne9