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Encyclopedia Britannica - Main :: BEC-BER |
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BERNSTORFF, CHRISTIAN GUNTHER, COUNT VON (1769-1835) , Danish and Prussian statesman and diplomatist, son of Count Andreas Peter von Bernstorff, was born at Copenhagen on the 3rd of April 1769. Educated for the diplomatic service under his father's direction, he began his career in 1787, as attache to the representative of Denmark at the opening of the Swedish diet. In 1789 he went as secretary of legation to Berlin, where his maternal uncle, Count Leopold Friedrich zu Stolberg, was Danish ambassador . His uncle's influence, as well as his own social qualities, obtained him rapid promotion; he was soon charge d'affaires, and in 1791 minister plenipotentiary. In 1794 he exchanged this post for the important one of ambassador at Stockholm, where he remained until May 1797, when he was summoned to Copenhagen to act as substitute for his father during his illness. On the death of the latter (21st June), he succeeded him as secretary of state for foreign affairs and privy councillor. In ',goo he became head of the ministry. He remained responsible for the foreign policy of Denmark until May 181o, a fateful period which saw the battle of Copenhagen (2nd of April 18o1), the bombardment of Copenhagen and capture of the Danish fleet
Napoleon
Joachim
bear bitter fruit later in the Schleswig-Holstein question (q.v.). He again accompanied the allied sovereigns to Paris in 1815, returning to Copenhagen the same year. In 1817 he was appointed Danish ambassador at Berlin, his brother Joachim
It was, therefore, as a Prussian diplomat that Bernstorff attended the congress of Aix-la-Chapelle (October 1818), at the close of which he returned to Berlin as minister of state and head of the department for foreign affairs. Bernstorff's management of Prussian policy during the many years that he remained in office has been variously judged. He was by training and temperament opposed to the Revolution, and he was initiated into his new duties as a Prussian minister by the reactionary Ancillon. He is accused of having subordinated the particular interests of Prussia to the European policy of Metternich and the " Holy Alliance." Whether any other policy would in the long run have served Prussia better is a matter for speculation. It is true that Bernstorff supported the Carlsbad decrees, and the Vienna Final Act; Ile was also the faithful henchman of Metternich at the congresses of Laibach
From 1824 onward Bernstorff had been a constant sufferer from hereditary gout, intensified and complicated by the results of overwork. In the spring of 1832 the state of his health compelled him to resign the ministry of foreign affairs to Ancillon, who had already acted as his deputy for a year. He died on the 18th of March 1835.See J. Caro in Allgem. Deutsch. Biog. s. v.; also H. von Treitschke, Deutsche Geschichte (Leipzig
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