page_title: Georg Forster
section_title: Foundation of the Mainz Republic
hierarchical_section_title: Georg Forster / Life as a revolutionary / Foundation of the Mainz Republic
context_page_description: Johann Georg Adam Forster was a German naturalist, ethnologist, travel writer, journalist, and revolutionary. At an early age, he accompanied his father, Johann Reinhold Forster, on several scientific expeditions, including James Cook's second voyage to the Pacific. His report of that journey, A Voyage Round the World, contributed significantly to the ethnology of the people of Polynesia and remains a respected work. As a result of the report, Forster was admitted to the Royal Society at the early age of twenty-two and came to be considered one of the founders of modern scientific travel literature.
  After returning to continental Europe, Forster turned toward academia. He taught natural history at the Collegium Carolinum in the Ottoneum, Kassel, and later at the Academy of Vilna. In 1788, he became head librarian at the University of Mainz. Most of his scientific work during this time consisted of essays on botany and ethnology, but he also prefaced and translated many books about travel and exploration, including a German translation of Cook's diaries.
context_section_description: The French revolutionary army under General Custine gained control over Mainz on October 21, 1792. Two days later, Forster joined others in establishing a Jacobin Club called "Freunde der Freiheit und Gleichheit" ("Friends of Freedom and Equality") in the Electoral Palace. From early 1793 he was actively involved in organizing the Mainz Republic. This first republic located on German soil was constituted on the principles of democracy, and encompassed areas on the left bank of the Rhine between Landau and Bingen. Forster became vice-president of the republic's temporary administration and a candidate in the elections to the local parliament, the Rheinisch-Deutscher Nationalkonvent (Rhenish-German National Convention). From January to March 1793, he was an editor of Die neue Mainzer Zeitung oder Der Volksfreund (The new Mainz newspaper or The People's Friend), a name chosen in reference to Marat's L'Ami du peuple. In his first article he wrote:
  Die Pressefreiheit herrscht endlich innerhalb dieser Mauern, wo die Buchdruckerpresse erfunden ward.
  The freedom of the press finally reigns within these walls where the printing press was invented.
  This freedom did not last long, though. The Mainz Republic existed only until the retreat of the French troops in July 1793 after the Siege of Mainz.
  Forster was not present in Mainz during the siege. As representatives of the Mainz National Convention, he and Adam Lux had been sent to Paris to apply for Mainz – which was unable to exist as an independent state – to become a part of the French Republic. The application was accepted, but had no effect, since Mainz was conquered by Prussian and Austrian troops, and the old order was restored. Forster lost his library and collections and decided to remain in Paris.
caption: A liberty pole, a symbol of revolutionary France as used in the Republic of Mainz. Watercolor by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.
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