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May 5, 1888 – Werner Siemens is ennobled
Werner von Siemens, about 1888
For his outstanding scientific achievements, Werner Siemens had already been honored in 1860 with an honorary doctorate from Berlin University. He was very pleased to receive such awards primarily because – as he wrote in his Recollections – he considered them an acknowledgement of his scientific accomplishments. But Werner Siemens reacted somewhat differently to distinctions of a personal nature. This was apparent for the first time ten years later when King Wilhelm of Prussia awarded him the title “Counselor of Commerce.”
Referring to the award in a letter to his brother Carl at the beginning of February 1870, he wrote: “This morning, Police Commissioner Wurmb came and brought me my commission as Counselor of Commerce. He noticed the shock on my face, and I told him openly that I would be ten times more grateful if the King would agree to rescind this sign of his favor. He replied that this was out of the question since the King would consider it a personal insult. So, I went to the court ball to which I had been invited and decked myself out in all my medals with the firm intention of asking the Crown Prince to help me. However, Wurmb approached me at once and said he’d told the King of my reluctance and that the title “Counselor of Commerce” was inappropriate for a First Lieutenant and honorary doctor. The King laughed and instructed him to go at once to Itzenplitz and have the announcement of my appointment cancelled. […] So now I am truly a ‘Privy’ Counselor of Commerce! […] Now, I’ll probably end up being made a Captain or even a Major! Funny world…”
But the new Privy Counselor of Commerce did not remain “privy” for long, and Werner Siemens’ rejection of his appointment became a scandal in Berlin society. However, the damage to his position was not lasting. In the 1870s, after his invention of the electric dynamo, Siemens companies found more and more new applications for electricity – in the area of lighting, for example, and for the first electric railway in 1879. The success was so great that in 1888 Werner Siemens was awarded one of the highest honors of his day: elevation to the hereditary Prussian aristocracy.
Patent of nobility of Werner von Siemens dated 5th of May, 1888; Source: GStA PK, I. HA Rep. 176 Heroldsamt, Nr. 8583, Bl. 8-9 RS
At that time, an increasingly wealthy and powerful middle class had grown up alongside the aristocracy, which, however, continued to maintain its traditionally strong position in Prussian society. Some members of the middle class were eager for elevation to its ranks, while others, like Alfred Krupp, August Thyssen and Hugo Stinnes, officially declined the distinction in order to demonstrate their loyalty to their middle class roots and to underscore that their success was the result of their own personal efforts. Werner Siemens also harbored reservations about the aristocracy all his life. For example, in the winter of 1891, shortly before his death, he clashed with a member of the old Russian aristocracy. As he wrote to his brother Carl while on holiday: “Prince G. is a hostile fellow. He’s filled, it seems, with a vast amount of aristocratic arrogance! Our friendship is over. I suppose I’m the one that ruined things by telling him I thought it more honorable to achieve distinction through one’s own efforts than to inherit it […].”
Werner Siemens was all the more surprised therefore when, in 1888, he read in the newspaper that he had been elevated to the hereditary aristocracy: “If you don’t have an umbrella, you get wet when it rains! And that’s what’s happened to me now that the Emperor (or Empress) has published the ennoblement list. I’ve been included without even being asked! […] This has never happened in Prussia before. You were always asked beforehand, so you could refuse if you wanted […]. A refusal now would require a direct petition to the Emperor with a request to be restored to the commons – a step that would anger the sick old man and produce an unpleasant éclat. That’s the kind of bind I’m in.”
Werner Siemens was apparently intent on contesting his ennoblement. However, his brothers Friedrich and Carl advised him strongly against it. Carl wrote: “You’re going to have to be extremely careful in this matter since, if you or one of your sons lets fall some idle remark here or there and it reaches the ears of the Emperor or Crown Prince at some point, it could again give immediate rise to feelings of ill will of the kind that you (and all of us with you) have already had enough of during King and Emperor Wilhelm’s reign. […] It is, after all, an honor and from the giver’s perspective a very high one, and you must be grateful to him for it. […] Also vis-à-vis the general public, it’s better if you keep very quiet or people will say, ‘He’s just trying to make himself important and attract attention.’ No one will believe your true feelings. […] Emperor Friedrich did it this way because he wished to act tactfully. An award loses all its value if the recipient has to be asked first if he wants it.”
Werner – now “von” – Siemens accepted his brother’s advice and answered: “With regard to your observations about this tiresome title business, I’m completely of your opinion. […] The whole thing has stirred up a lot of dust and I think I’ll duck out of sight for a couple of weeks” – which he also did: his next letters were posted from London.
May 2011 – Dr. Florian Kiuntke