Part 2
Combat path of 653 and 654 battalions of self-propelled guns "Ferdinand"
The battle on the Kursk Bulge ended and the German troops, “leveling” the front line, began a slow retreat towards Ukraine, where on the Dnieper River the Germans had already begun the construction of a new line of defense, the “Eastern Wall”.
As for the personnel of the 653rd and 654th self-propelled gun battalions, “Ferdinand military fate prepared a dangerous military fate for the soldiers and officers.
They will still fight well in Ukraine, Italy, Ukraine and will fight to the end in the same way in Berlin, besieged by the Red Army, and at the end of the war, the majority will die on the battlefields.
And returning to our story about the “combat path” of the above-mentioned battalions, we must immediately note that starting in mid-1943, the situation with the operational reserves of armored vehicles in the Wehrmacht was such that both of the above-mentioned battalions became either another “lifesaver” or “firefighter” team" for the German high command, since they, as the "last line of defense" for the retreating German troops, were constantly thrown from one breakthrough to another.
After the battles on the Kursk Bulge in the second half of August 1943, the withdrawal of the 656th heavy tank destroyer regiment to the rear began. And the information enshrined in the documents shows us how much the high German command and Hitler personally valued the Ferdinands as the strongest striking force..
On August 13, 1943, G. Guderian wrote:
“The Fuhrer decided to immediately withdraw the 654th battalion armed with Ferdinands and the 216th battalion of assault tanks and transfer them to Dnepropetrovsk in order to restore them again there, near the tank factories with their workshop companies, to the full combat readiness of the existing tanks.
And transfer the 653rd Ferdinand battalion as a personal (separate - editor's note) unit to Orleans to retrain it there for heavy anti-tank "Panthers"; Subordinate the battalion to the 58th Reserve Tank Corps."
Two weeks later, the decision changed to the exact opposite: the remaining 50 Ferdinands in service and 19 self-propelled guns of the 654th battalion, which had suffered heavy losses, were transferred to the 653rd.
But its personnel were sent to Orleans for retraining for new types of Jagdpanther tank destroyers.
The repair companies of the two Ferdinand battalions were also combined. Oberleutnant of the 654th Battalion Wolfgang Römer and military official Rudolf Szafranek shared responsibility for the work.
Meanwhile, transporting the battalion from Bryansk caused many difficulties. It was not easy to prepare a suitable place for repairs in Dnepropetrovsk, but nevertheless, already on August 22, the first Ferdinand self-propelled guns had already unloaded in Dnepropetrovsk, and on September 1, 1943, Wolfgang Roemer sent the following report on command:
50 Ferdinands survived the Battle of Kursk, but each of them required repairs.
1. Since the battalion was in battle for three weeks without the possibility of maintenance and repair, most of the vehicles needed major repairs (in order to prevent this, it is worth taking the vehicles for maintenance every 5-6 days).
2. All machines need better design. Appendix I contains detailed information regarding this issue. The most important is:
a) Improvement of engine protective grilles.
b) Fuel line protection.
c) Installation of a flexible branch on the water supply pipe.
d) Modification of the alternator.
III. How many vehicles can be quickly prepared for battle without major repairs?
I) A week after arriving in Dnepropetrovsk, ten “Ferdinands” were already of limited combat capability.
2) Urgent repairs of the remaining Ferdinands were impossible, since all repair work requiring removal of the wheelhouse takes a long time.
3) The battalion commander spoke out against partial repairs, adding that after such repairs he could not guarantee the reliability of the vehicles in battle.
4) An immediate decision must be made - either an accelerated repair of these 10 Ferdinands, or a major overhaul of all of them, since each of these decisions will require different actions to implement it.
I. Repairs and maintenance will be carried out:
1. In the Ferdinand battalion:
a) Company maintenance of the 653rd heavy tank destroyer battalion.
b) Maintenance company of the 654th heavy tank destroyer battalion.
At the cost of considerable effort, the repairmen managed to bring 15 Ferdinands and 25 assault guns into combat readiness within seven days. The design of the vehicles was not improved, but for most of them the tracks and engines were replaced.
Despite the continuation of repairs, the Ferdinand self-propelled guns were again required in battle and on September 11, 1943, 12 Ferdinands and 13 assault tanks) under the command of Hauptmann Baumunk were sent to Sinelnikovo and Pavlograd, located in the direction of the Soviet advance into the northern sector of Army Group South "
Here are military newsreels showing us self-propelled guns "Ferdinand" and other German tanks in a real battle in 1943 in Ukraine. This is unique footage telling the truth about the war!!! I strongly recommend it to everyone who has high-speed Internet to watch it!
https://yandex.ua/video/search?filmId=IRUKe0W2UXI&text=
The battle group was ordered to hold the Sinelnikovo-Pavlograd railway and the Pavlograd-Dmitrievka road.
In mid-September 1943, due to the situation at the front, the overhaul of Ferdinands and assault tanks in Dnepropetrovsk had to be interrupted.
The entire maintenance battalion, other repair services and the logistics service relocated to continue urgent repairs in Nikopol.
On September 19, 1943, the 656th Heavy Tank Destroyer Regiment received an order from the High Command to send all combat-ready vehicles to the Zaporozhye bridgehead.
This bridgehead on the eastern bank of the Dnieper had to be held at all costs. It covered the largest hydroelectric power station in Europe, the Dnieper Hydroelectric Station, with a dam 760 meters long, whose turbines generated electricity for the entire industrial zone of Ukraine.
However, even here, the Ferdinands, in unfavorable terrain for battle, provided support with their enormous firepower in many battles throughout the bridgehead.
The battle for the city of Novo-Alexandrovka in the southern part of the bridgehead turned out to be especially fierce. It was there that Ferdinands and assault tanks repelled an attack by Soviet armored vehicles on October 10, 1943. The regiment reported 48 destroyed Soviet tanks.
Early in the morning of October 13, the Ferdinands were recalled from the bridgehead. Huge military vehicles slowly crossed the dam to the western bank of the Dnieper, and soon after, on October 15, the dam was blown up.
On the same days, the bridgehead near Zaporozhye was evacuated.
October 23, 1943 Oberleutnant Connack took command of the company.
A very turbulent period began for the 656th Heavy Tank Destroyer Regiment. The regiment was divided between three army corps.
Fourteen Ferdinands went to the LVII Army Corps near Krivoy Rog, of which 6 self-propelled guns were attached to the 11th Panzer Division, which had fortified itself in the area to prevent the city from being recaptured by Soviet troops.
Four more combat vehicles were attached to the XXX Army Corps, and three more to the XVII Army Corps.
The first defensive battle began on November 20, 1943.
The battles for the villages of Mareevka (November 20, 1943) and Katerynivka (November 23, 1943) were very important for holding the German defensive line. The Ferdinands proved themselves to be especially successful in the battle near Meeropol.
Their crews declared the destruction of 54 Russian tanks, 21 of them by the crew of Lieutenant Franz Kretschmer (gunner non-commissioned officer Alois Moosdil; driver non-commissioned officer Heinrich Appel; radio operator Ober-Corporal Peter Scheid; first loading gunner Otto Isen; second loading gunner Paul Schmidt). For this battle, Lieutenant Franz Kretschmer was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross on December 17, 1943.
By the end of November, the situation with self-propelled guns of the 653rd battalion looked like this: 4 - ready for battle; 8 - in short-term repair; 30 - in major repairs; 4 - lost forever.
Moreover, the latter were not even destroyed in battle, but burned out on the march due to spontaneous combustion after an average mileage of 2000 km.
This difficult situation with combat vehicles forced G. Guderian to report to A. Hitler:
“The condition of the 656th Anti-Tank Regiment, even if this full-fledged formation should only remain for months, requires immediate withdrawal. Thanks to replenishment and own repairs in the rear or in the General Government, combat readiness can be restored again within a replenishment time of about 8 weeks.”
As a result, a decision was made to withdraw the regiment from the front.
It was supposed to be sent for major repairs to St. Pölten and St. Valentin.
On December 10, 1943, the 656th Heavy Tank Destroyer Regiment received the following order:
“The 656th heavy tank destroyer regiment is withdrawn from the sector of Army Group South (Krivoy Rog / Nikopol area), and together with the 653rd heavy tank destroyer battalion and the 216th assault gun battalion is sent to St. Pölten for repair work "
In the period from December 16, 1943 to January 10, 1944, the entire regiment on 21 transport trains was returned to Germany.
In Germany, modernization had to be preceded by major repairs and modernization.
The prerequisite for it was the conclusions drawn based on the results of the debut of self-propelled guns on the Kursk Bulge by the Porsche representative in the 653rd battalion of heavy tank destroyers, Heinz Groschl, and included in the company’s report dated July 26, 1943:
“Our vehicles spent three weeks in combat, and, taking into account the path before, they covered an average of 500 kilometers each. I have collected enough information to present you with the positive and negative aspects of our cars.
I am inclined to agree with most of the gentlemen from the battalion that they turned out to be successful weapons, and everyone regrets that so few of them were produced. Considering that for each vehicle there is an average of 15 tanks destroyed, we can truly speak of success.
First of all, I should note that this figure could be much higher, but, unfortunately, the majority of cars are constantly under repair. Moreover, every day the situation is getting worse and worse - the stock of spare parts, already small, has finally been depleted along with the increased wear and tear of all machine parts.
And there was practically no replenishment of this stock, with rare exceptions. Of the original composition of 44 vehicles, the battalion lost 17. Seven of them, by order of the regimental command, were transferred to other battalions. Another 10 are lost forever. .....
The annex to the report dated September 1, 1943 stated:
“To improve the combat effectiveness and reliability of the Ferdinand tank destroyers, it is considered necessary to make the following changes:
A. Fire precautions.
1. Change the protective grilles for better protection against splinters.
2. Protect the fuel line from exhaust gases.
3. Improve the connections of the exhaust pipe.
4. Oil leak shield on the fan housing.
5. Protection against clogging of exhaust pipes with leaves and other debris.
6. Simplification of access to the engine compartment from the crew compartment.
7. Installation of a fire protection system consisting of two carbon dioxide fire extinguishers with a capacity of 5 liters each.
B. Reducing damage from min.
1. Elastic battery suspension.
2. Remove the rigidly fixed legs from the generator body.
3. Improved alternator mounting.
C. Eliminate sources of faults in the low-voltage electrical system.
1. Installation of alternators with new anchors designed by Bosch.
2. Supply of 12 volts to generators (instead of 24) to improve communication quality.
3. Reduced interference caused by the deckhouse and hull.
4. Protect the ammeter from damage.
B. Motor system.
1. Replacing the floating clutch with a rigidly mounted one.
2. Installation of larger diameter gear wheels in the motor system.
3. Delivery of new tracks.
4. Replacement of rubber pads on tracks.
E. High voltage electrical system.
1. Adjustment of resistance K 58.8 (protection against voltage surges).
2. Replacement of high-resistance resistance with grounding.
3. Complete cleaning of all electrical equipment and switches.
4. Remove the generator housing from under the sealed partition.
F. Chopping.
1. Installation of gutters on its front part.
2. Sealing the driver and radio operator hatches in the front part.
3. Sealing the seam between the hull and the deckhouse.
4. Covering the grates with mesh.
5. Strengthening the spring tension of the driver and loader hatches.
6. Installation of handrails on the hull before the cabin.
7. Securing spare tracks, tools and equipment boxes at the rear of the cabin.
8. Installation of sun and rain visors over viewing slots.
9. Installation of a sealed partition in the rear part of the housing.
10. Improved welding on the access hatch to the engine compartment.
G. Other Changes.
1. Changing the shape and inclination angles of the gun mantlet.
2. Protection from fragments behind the gun mask.
3. Strengthening armor or strengthening the front flat part of the cabin. (Recommendation: weld the loading hatch, but only if step 4 is completed.)
4. Emergency exit through the maintenance hatch at the rear of the cabin.
5. Turret with observation devices for the commander.
6. It is recommended to equip vehicles with a coaxial machine gun.
7. Equip the vehicles with directional machine guns in the driver’s place.
8. Viewing device for the radio operator.
9. Installation of an engine telegraph for communication between the commander and the driver.
10. The best rubber gaskets for peepholes.
11. Improvement of cooling and ventilation systems.
12. Improve the neck caps for collecting water so that they close more tightly; attach the lids to the necks with chains.
13. Improve the attachment of rear additional armor.
14. Changing the nuts on the “fingers” of the tracks (tightening with a hexagonal wrench).
15. Changes in the exhaust gas removal system (exhaust gases must be removed from the tracks).”
Modernization was carried out taking into account the combat experience acquired in the USSR. It ran from January to early April 1944.
. By order of May 1, 1944, the modernized Ferdinands received the official name “Elephant”.
"Elephant" differed from "Ferdinand" only in details, but these were very important details.
The Ferdinands were equipped with Otto and Maybach HL-120 TRM engines, that is, the power plants were unified. A ball machine gun mount with a KwMG-34 was placed in the frontal armor plate of the hull to the right of the main caliber gun.
The self-propelled gun received a weapon of self-defense and destruction of light targets - the lesson of the Battle of Kursk was learned. The machine gun mount was covered with an applied armor plate, as a result of which the thickness of the armor in this place was increased to 300 mm: 100 mm of the original armor of the Tiger hull, 100 mm of the Ferdinand applied armor and 100 mm of the new armor plate. An armor plate 30 mm thick was welded onto the bottom in the area of the driver's seat to increase protection in the event of a mine explosion.
A commander's cupola was installed on the roof of the cabin, replacing the rectangular commander's hatch of the Ferdinand. Now the commander of the vehicle could observe the battlefield without the risk of getting a bullet in the forehead.
To simplify the change of gun mantlet and barrel, the shield on the barrel was now officially mounted with the ribs outward. The hoods over the engine compartment blinds were strengthened.
The internal electronic intercom is complemented by a mechanical signaling system between the commander and the driver (“engine telegraph”), and the driver’s periscopes are equipped with sun visors. Two 5-liter fire extinguishers are installed remotely in the engine compartment.
Instead of 600 mm Kgs-62/600/130 tracks, the tracks are made of 640 mm Kgs-64/640/130 tracks. The cannon's ammunition capacity has been increased to 55 rounds. All tools and spare tracks are moved to the stern. The vertical surfaces of the hull and the lower part of the cabin were covered with zimmerit - a special coating used to protect armored vehicles from magnetic mines and cumulative action grenades, as well as fire mixtures.
While the self-propelled guns were being modernized, the 656th regiment had a change of command. Baron von Jungenfeld was promoted to colonel and transferred to staff work.
The position of regiment commander was taken by Colonel Richard Schmittgen. Jungenfeld did not remain at the headquarters for long; he ended the war as a holder of the Knight's Cross as commander of a battle group.
After the 1st company of the 653rd battalion and the 216th battalion were sent to Italy, the regiment was never again assembled into a single whole.
Fighting in Italy
In January 1944, the first company of the 653rd battalion, consisting of 11 “Elephants” (modernized “Ferdinands”), one repair and recovery vehicle also based on the Tiger (P) tank chassis and two ammunition transporters, was transferred to Italy to counter the British offensive. American troops. Heavy self-propelled guns took part in the battles of Nettuno, Anzio, and Rome.
Despite the dominance of Allied aviation and the difficult terrain, the company proved itself to be the best, so, according to German data, only on March 30-31, on the outskirts of Rome, two self-propelled guns destroyed up to 50 American tanks, armored personnel carriers and cars and were blown up by the crews after running out of fuel and ammunition.
On June 26, 1944, the company, which still had two combat-ready Elefants, was withdrawn from the front and transferred first to Austria and then to Poland to join the 653rd battalion.
American troops managed to capture one self-propelled gun "Ferdinad" and, as a unique military trophy, it was sent to the United States for study. There, today this car has been completely restored.
Here is a video film about the second surviving self-propelled gun "Ferdinand" in the world, kept near Moscow in a tank museum.
Last battles in Western Ukraine
The two remaining self-propelled gun companies were transferred to the Eastern Front, to the Ternopil area in April 1944.
In addition to 31 "Elephant", the companies included two repair and recovery vehicles based on the chassis of the Tiger (P) tank and one based on the Panther tank, as well as three ammunition transporters.
In heavy battles at the end of April, the companies suffered losses - 14 vehicles were disabled; however, 11 of them were quickly restored, and the number of combat-ready vehicles even increased due to the arrival of repaired vehicles from the 1st company from the factories. In addition, by June, the companies were replenished with two unique types of armored vehicles - the Tiger (P) tank with frontal armor reinforced to 200 mm and the Panther tank with a PzKpfw IV tank turret, which were used as command vehicles.
In July, a large-scale Soviet offensive began, and both Elephant companies were drawn into heavy fighting.
On July 18, they were thrown without reconnaissance or preparation to the aid of the SS division Hohenstaufen and suffered heavy losses from Soviet anti-tank and self-propelled artillery fire.
The battalion lost more than half of the vehicles, and a significant part of them was subject to restoration, however, since the battlefield remained with the Soviet troops, the damaged self-propelled guns were destroyed by their own crews.
On August 3, the remnants of the battalion (12 vehicles) were transferred to Krakow. Where the German command is trying to restore the combat effectiveness of the crews of the self-propelled gun "Ferdinand" they began to collect everything as in the proverb "everything from the world to a naked shirt"
The remnants of the battalion, the 2nd, 3rd and headquarters companies, have now been strengthened to six tank destroyers (three were previously, three returned from Italy).
The battalion was commanded by Hauptmann Rudolf Grillenberger, the 2nd company was commanded by Lieutenant Werner Salomon, and the 3rd company by Lieutenant Bernhard Connack.
On April 6, the battalion began to arrive in Berezhany, where it was then assigned to the XXXIV Panzer Corps and became operationally subordinate to the headquarters of the 9th SS Panzer Division Hohenstaufen. She had to recapture Tarnopol from the Red Army. At the end of the second week of April, the Ferdinands moved to the front line, where in the Zolotnikov area they took part in fierce battles with units of the Soviet 10th Guards Tank Corps.
By April 9, only four combat-ready Ferdinands remained in the battalion.
These vehicles were included in the Salomon battle group, which defended Zlotniki, while the 3rd company blocked the Red Army’s path to the town of Malovody.
It was not possible to defend Malovody, after which the company crossed the Styr River with great difficulty. The German operation in the Tarnopol area failed. Soviet counterattacks carried out over the next few days forced the Germans to completely evacuate the bridgehead in the area of the town of Osovtsy.
After a short period of rain, the weather improved and fighting resumed. Now the Elephants supported the actions of the 100th Jaeger Division,
Be that as it may, hard times came for German tank units, regardless of the location of the front, and the 653rd battalion was no exception.
Tanks and self-propelled guns got stuck in the mud, broke down, and were blown up by mines. One “Elephant” scooped up dirt with its cannon barrel, and when it tried to fire, the shell exploded in the barrel. The loader was killed and the commander was seriously injured.
The battalion was withdrawn from the front for a short rest near Březany.
The respite ended on June 22, 1944 with the start of the largest offensive of the Red Army.
During it, the 653rd battalion took part in defensive battles near Pomeranians and Rohatyn, and then, together with the 1st Tank Army, retreated to Lemberg (Lvov).
In just two weeks at the end of July, the battalion lost at least 22 armored vehicles (19 Ferdinands, one Porsche Tiger and two Berge Elephant), two-thirds of its fleet.
After crossing the San River, the 653rd battalion retreated further to the West through Przemysl and Tarnow to Rabka, where it was temporarily assigned to Army Group Northern Ukraine.
By August 1, only 12 “Elephants”, collected in the 2nd company of Lieutenant Werner Salomon, survived in the battalion.
The personnel of the 3rd company were evacuated to Vienna and Dollersheim, where it was planned to equip the company with heavy Jagdtiger tank destroyers.
While the 2nd company was stationed in Krakow, two self-propelled guns, repaired in Vienna after the Italian odyssey, arrived here.
On September 19, the 2nd company of the 653rd battalion was transferred to the 17th Army of Army Group A (former Army Group Northern Ukraine) and assigned to the reserve, moving the company to the Tarnow area. On November 24, Lieutenant (soon promoted to Hauptmann) Bernhard Connack took command of the company.
At the same time, the 653rd battalion was transferred to the Jagdtigers, and a new 2nd company on the Jagdtigers was formed.
Soon the original 2nd company was renamed the 614th separate tank destroyer company. On December 22, 1944, the 614th company was assigned to the 4th Tank Army and redeployed to the outskirts of Kielce.
On January 14 and 15, the company happened to find itself at the forefront of the next Soviet offensive, which started on January 12 from the Sandomierz bridgehead. In heavy fighting east and south of Kielce, the company lost most of its Elephants.
Hauptmann Ritter, the new company commander, on January 30, 1945, reported to the Inspector General of Tank Forces about the four combat-ready Elephants and one Bergepanther ARV remaining in the company.
Then the company retreated through Oppeln, Breslau, Sorau, Sprötau to Frankfurt an der Oder.
Here the remnants of the company were withdrawn to reserve, to the Wünsdorf area.
There were also plans to increase the number of Elephants to ten vehicles, strengthen the company with Jagdtigers, and form new crews from the ranks of the Reserve Army...
But all this was no longer possible - no new self-propelled guns of this type were built.
All four remaining cars needed serious repairs. There was even a shortage of spare parts, which had to be delivered from Linz.
Fighting in Berlin and its surroundings
Until February 1945, this company, consisting of 13 self-propelled guns, was in reserve. On February 25, 1945, the company was transferred to Wünsdorf to strengthen the anti-tank defense of German units.
On April 20, 1945, Ritter's battle group began to form (who led this formation on April 22), consisting of the headquarters of the 2nd tank battalion of the 36th tank regiment, the 4th company of the 11th tank regiment, a company of armored vehicles and the 614th battery tank destroyers.
The last unit contained four Elephant self-propelled guns, two of which were abandoned due to malfunctions in the Frankfurt-on-Oder area. The remaining vehicles fought in the suburbs of Berlin in the area of the testing ground in the city of Zossen.
Additionally, the company included a captured Soviet T-35 tank, which was soon knocked out. . Many years later he recalled:
“We took advantage of the last Ferdinand that remained in the vicinity of Berlin.
We acted separately, without the “Royal Tiger” or “Jagdtiger” and received only a tank with five turrets. During the last battles at the Zossen test site, the crews abandoned their vehicles.
Mine was hit, I was captured along with Hauptmann Ritter and returned home only on November 2, 1949...”
In the encircled city, the last two Elephant self-propelled guns fought as part of the Berlin garrison - on Karl-August Square and near the Church of the Holy Trinity.
(end of part 2)
Ferdinand III (13.VII.1608 - 2.IV.1657) - Emperor since 1637, Austrian Archduke. Son of Ferdinand II. King of part of the Kingdom of Hungary and the Kingdom of Bohemia. After Wallenstein's death (1634) and before ascending the imperial throne, he was commander-in-chief of the imperial troops. It ended with him Thirty Years' War 1618-1648 .
Soviet historical encyclopedia. In 16 volumes. - M.: Soviet Encyclopedia. 1973-1982. Volume 15. FELLAHI - ZHALAYNOR. 1974.
Ferdinand III (1608–1657), Holy Roman Emperor. The eldest son of Emperor Ferdinand II and Maria Anna, daughter of the Duke of Bavaria, Ferdinand was born on July 13, 1608 in Graz, and was raised by the Jesuits. In 1625 he was crowned king of Hungary, and in 1627 - of the Czech Republic. Ferdinand wanted to lead the imperial army that fought in the Thirty Years' War, but Wallenstein, who was then the commander-in-chief of the imperial forces, did not allow this. When Wallenstein was killed in 1634, Ferdinand captured Regensburg and Donauwerth, and was also nominally considered the victor of the Swedes at Nordlingen (where Matthias Gallas actually commanded). In 1636 he was elected King of Rome, and after the death of his father in February 1637 he became Holy Roman Emperor. Ferdinand sought to end the Thirty Years' War, but was unwilling to grant religious freedom to Protestants. At the conclusion of the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, he refused to ensure the rights of Protestants in his lands. In 1656, Ferdinand sent an army to Italy, acting in alliance with the Spaniards against the French, and in 1657 he signed an agreement with Poland on joint actions against the King of Sweden Carla X. Ferdinand died in Vienna on April 2, 1657.
Materials from the encyclopedia "The World Around Us" were used.
Ferdinand III (1608-1657). From the Habsburg dynasty. King of Hungary in 1625-1655. King of the Czech Republic in 1627-1656. German king in 1636-1657. Emperor "Holy Roman Empire" in 1637-1657 Son Ferdinand II and Maria Anna of Bavaria.
2) from July 2, 1648 Maria Leopoldina, daughter of Archduke Leopold V of Tyrol (b. 1632 + 1649);
3) from April 30 1651 Eleanor, daughter of Charles II, Duke of Mantua (b. 1630 + 1686).
Ferdinand succeeded his father at the height of the Thirty Years' War, when the Catholic party achieved a decisive advantage over its enemies and only the help of France saved the Protestant princes from complete defeat. The new emperor did not have much statesmanship, was rather indifferent to matters of government and was not carried away by the broad political plans of his father. He, it is true, was a sincere Catholic, but he did not have at all the fanaticism that distinguished the disseminators of Catholic teaching.
Ferdinand did not like the Jesuits, he sincerely pitied his subjects, who experienced terrible hardships during the war, and, perhaps, was ready to grant religious freedom to the Protestants, but it was difficult for him to change his father’s system of government and free himself from the heavy influence of his ministers. Ferdinand II Meanwhile, from the first years of Ferdinand's reign, military actions began to take an increasingly less favorable turn for Catholics. A huge French army entered the war on the Protestant side in 1637, the Swedes still occupied northern Germany, and the Protestant leader, Duke Bernhard of Weimar, won important victories on the Rhine. In February 1638 he defeated the imperial army at Rheinfeld, took Breisach in December, but died soon after. After this, the French took possession of Alsace, which they had conquered. The following year they took Arras and captured Argua. The Swedes invaded Silesia in 1642, defeated the imperial army, penetrated Moravia and began to threaten Vienna itself. Ferdinand, who had spent all his strength on the war and did not know where to recruit a new army, began to seek peace. Negotiations, which began in 1643, dragged on slowly, while the war continued to rage. In subsequent years, the imperial army was defeated by the Swedes at Leipzig (in 1642) and Jankov (in 1645), and by the French at the battles of Rocroi (1643) and Freiburg (1644). In 1648, the Swedes were already besieging Prague, and only the conclusion of the Peace of Westphalia saved this city from fall. Peace conditions were very difficult for the empire. France received Austrian-owned Alsace, Sundgau and important fortresses: Breisach and Philippsburg. Stetin, the island of Rügen, Wismar, the bishopric of Bremen and Verden went to Sweden. Their Protestant allies also received an increase in their territories. It was decided that the Protestants would retain all lands acquired before 1624. On the hated restoration edict of the emperor finally lost all meaning: the Peace of Westphalia legitimized the independence of the princes, giving them the right to wage war and enter into alliances both among themselves and with foreign sovereigns.
All the monarchs of the world. Western Europe. Konstantin Ryzhov. Moscow, 1999.
He is one of the architects of the future "World Empire" of his grandson Charles V.
| arag. Ferrando II d'Aragon | ||||||
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| Predecessor | Juan II Faithless | |||||
| Successor | Juan I Mad | |||||
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| Predecessor | Juan II Faithless | |||||
| Successor | Juan I Mad | |||||
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| Predecessor | Juan II Faithless | |||||
| Successor | Charles II of Habsburg | |||||
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| Predecessor | Juan II Faithless | |||||
| Successor | Charles IV of Habsburg | |||||
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| Predecessor | Isabella I | |||||
| Successor | Juan I Mad | |||||
| Birth |
10th of March(1452-03-10
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Sos, Spain |
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| Death |
January 23(1516-01-23
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(63 years old) Madrigalejo, Spain |
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| Burial place | Royal Chapel in Granada, Spain | |||||
| Genus | Trastamara | |||||
| Father | Juan II of Aragon | |||||
| Mother | Juana Enriquez | |||||
| Spouse |
1. Isabella I of Castile 2. Germaine de Foix |
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| Children |
1. Isabella of Asturias 2. John of Asturias 3. Juana the Mad 4. Mary of Aragon 5. Catherine of Aragon |
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| Religion | Catholicism | |||||
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| Ferdinand II at Wikimedia Commons | ||||||
Marriage to Isabella of Castile and dynastic union of Castile and Aragon
After the death of King Enrique and the imminent proclamation of Isabel as Queen of Castile, a civil war began in Castile between supporters of Isabel and supporters of the king's daughter Juana, which escalated into a war with Portugal. Ferdinand, who was in Aragon at the time of Enrique's death, was proclaimed in Castile simply the queen's husband, but not the king.
After difficult negotiations between Ferdinand and his wife and the Castilian nobility, the Treaty of Segovia was concluded in 1475, giving him the title of King of Castile ( Fernando V) and extensive rights, but the treasury and army of Castile and Leon still remained at the exclusive disposal of Isabella.
Fernando took an active part in the war with Portugal, leading the army and leading it in the Battle of Toro, as well as in clashes with rebellious feudal lords. The struggle ended in 1479 with the decisive defeat of Juana and the signing of the Peace of Alcacovas with Portugal. In the same year, Fernando succeeded his father Juan II, becoming the sovereign king of Aragon.
Creation of the Holy Hermandade
In an age of almost complete absence of professional police in most European states, Ferdinand managed to organize an entire police force that dealt excellently with all sorts of separatist and heretical movements.
This was the so-called “Saint Hermandada” (Spanish. Santa Hermandad), which arose back in the 13th century, mainly in Castilian cities. The “Brotherhood” then called itself holy on the grounds that the townspeople who composed it and filled its ranks with mercenaries set themselves the goal of fighting bandits and robber knights. To achieve this goal there was a special tax. Trustworthy (that is, non-robber) knights were often invited to serve in the hermandads of the city, as people accustomed to military enterprises. Ferdinand very skillfully used this institution to form a special police militia, subordinate exclusively to the king. First (in 1476) he made the hermandada mandatory even where it did not exist; From Castile, the “brotherhood” soon spread to Aragon. Ferdinand used Ermandada to fight the feudal lords, who for a long time did not want to recognize the royal city police, but eventually submitted. From 1498 Ferdinand finally expelled from the hermandada all traces of the former elected city offices and brought it directly under the central government; the tax that ensured the existence of the “brotherhood” remained in full force. Roads became safer, which immediately affected trade relations. Subsequently, the Hermandada contributed to the fall of the Cortes, who withered under Ferdinand and died in the 16th century.
Conquest of Granada
Ferdinand and Isabella managed to complete the task, which their predecessors had already unsuccessfully begun several times. The papal treasury and private individuals willingly donated money when they learned that Ferdinand was going to go against the Moors, who still held the kingdom of Granada in the south of the peninsula. New taxes created specifically for this purpose further strengthened the royal treasury, and in 1482 it became possible to start a war, facilitated by dynastic feuds between the heirs of the emirate. This war lasted ten years and made Ferdinand extremely popular even in those parts of Castile where he might be looked upon as a tyrant and usurper. In 1492 Granada surrendered.
This success gave the Spaniards additional economic resources in the form of lands with developed agriculture, allowed the Spanish troops to gain combat experience, which they later showed in Italy, and Ferdinand and Isabella received the title of Catholic kings from Pope Innocent VIII, confirmed in 1496 by the next pope, Alexander VI.
Inquisition and persecution of non-Christians
The exact number of people executed by the Spanish Inquisition has been a matter of debate. One of the first historians of the Inquisition, Juan Llorente, suggested at the beginning of the 19th century that in the first 15 years of its work, about 8,800 people were burned, also about 6,500 were executed by strangulation, and in total there were about 30 thousand executed over several centuries of the history of this organization. Modern experts call much lower figures, for example, G. Kamen believes that the total number of those executed during the almost 20-year reign of Torquemada (the bloodiest period in the history of the organization) is about one and a half thousand people (and approximately the same over the next 300 years), Prof. . T. Madden writes about two thousand executed during the years of Torquemada's work. By 1500, mass hysteria about Jewish converts secretly returning to Judaism had subsided. The new Inquisitor General, Cardinal Jiménez de Cisneros, reformed the Inquisition by assigning lay officials to each tribunal.
Ferdinand widely used the confiscation of the property of heretics for his own purposes - he received a third of the fines and confiscated property by law and usually almost the same amount by the right of the strong, for the three inquisitors appointed by him did not dare to protest against the violation of the privileges of the Papal Throne and the Inquisition, which according to the law was to receive the remaining two-thirds.
Discovery of America
Catholic kings sent the expedition of Christopher Columbus to search for a route to India. In 1493, two months after the return of Columbus, Castile and Portugal received a bull from Alexander VI Inter caetera, according to which the lands west and south of a line running one hundred leagues west and south of any of the islands of the Azores or Cape Verde belonged to Castile. A new agreement between the countries was reached in 1494 (Treaty of Tordesillas), according to which Portugal “received” all the lands east of a line running 270 leagues west of the Cape Verde Islands, while the Spaniards received all the lands to the west (as it later turned out, they included the entire western part of the American continent and the Pacific Islands).
It is characteristic that Ferdinand looked at the discovery of America as a fact of less importance than the almost simultaneous annexation of Roussillon to Aragon. When the Portuguese Vasco da Gama discovered the sea route to India in 1499, Spain treated the Portuguese with envy; Moreover, Columbus never reached India, the reserves of gold in the first Spanish possessions on the Caribbean islands turned out to be scanty, and in general at the beginning of the 16th century. possessions in the New World did not yet provide much income. However, Ferdinand's heirs could already ascertain the enormity of the material resources that the discovery of Christopher Columbus endowed Spain with.
Fight with France
Soon after the fall of Granada, Ferdinand succeeded in the Treaty of Barcelona (Spanish) Russian return Roussillon to the Aragonese crown and other northern border regions that were in the hands of Charles VIII, King of France. Two years after the Treaty of Tours-Barcelona, the condition of which was Ferdinand's non-interference in Charles's war of conquest in Italy, the treaty was violated by both parties and Ferdinand sent troops to Italy, declaring war on Charles who had invaded there. Thus, all of Charles’s initial successes on the Apennine Peninsula were lost.
Having deceived Henry VIII, his father-in-law called on English troops not to the north of France, as England’s benefits demanded, but to the south, to Gascony, which Ferdinand needed. As a result, the entire burden of the war fell on Henry, and all the benefits both in Italy and on the Pyrenean border remained with Ferdinand.
Simultaneously with these successes in Europe, Ferdinand completed the conquest of the North African Barbary possessions, which had begun in the last decade of the 15th century, which had been under the leadership of Jimenez since 1505.
Second marriage and political intrigues of recent years
In 1506, Ferdinand benefited politically from his widowhood: he married the young Germaine de Foix, niece of King Louis XII. Having become close to Louis, Ferdinand began intrigues against his son-in-law Philip, the husband of Juana the Mad, to whom her mother Isabella bequeathed Castile so that Ferdinand would remain regent of the country in the event of her incapacity. Juana was mentally unstable even during Isabella’s life, and Ferdinand, taking advantage of his daughter’s emotional instability, tried in every possible way to remove Philip, her husband, from power. To succeed in this enterprise, he needed the support of Louis of France. After a series of unsuccessful intrigues, the Treaty of Villafafil was concluded in 1506 between Ferdinand and his son-in-law, according to which Philip was officially recognized as the king of Castile, and Juana the Mad was actually removed from power. But after the sudden death of Philip, the regency on behalf of his daughter passed to Ferdinand.
In 1515, the king became seriously ill and died early next year. King Ferdinand was buried in the Royal Chapel in Granada.
Result of the reign
By the end of Ferdinand's life, his power was firmly consolidated within Spain, in the newly conquered possessions in southern Italy, America, Africa; all his enemies were defeated, some by cunning, some by force. Ferdinand himself quite openly joked about the fact that his opponents were “drunk and stupid” and he deceived them much more often than they deceived him. He prepared for his heir and grandson
From 1590 he studied at the University of Ingolstadt, where the Jesuits taught. Here the future emperor was instilled with the strictest rules of faith and the most sublime concepts about his future destiny. From his early years until his death, Ferdinand considered himself a warrior of the Catholic Church, destined by God to restore its ancient teaching. In 1595 he returned to Graz, the following year he was declared of age and took possession of his Duchy of Central Austria, which included Styria, Carinthia and Carniola.
By nature, Ferdinand was a pleasant socialite: kind to those close to him and merciful to his servants, he easily got along with people, was generous, passionately loved music and was passionate about hunting. At the same time, he was an active and businesslike sovereign who never neglected his duties. But the main feature of his nature was a fanatical commitment to the Catholic Church, which he was ready to serve with both word and sword. The Jesuits had a huge influence on him. Two of them were always in his hallway and had the right to enter him at any time, even at night, for advice and edification.
As soon as he assumed power, the young duke began to relentlessly persecute the Protestants. Ferdinand ordered everyone who did not want to change their religion to leave the country. Like his uncle, Ferdinand loved to repeat the words: “Better a desert than a country inhabited by heretics.” A few years later, in the Austrian possessions, where previously half the population consisted of Lutherans and Calvinists, not a single Protestant church remained.
Since Ferdinand's older cousins, and, did not have legitimate sons, from the beginning of the 17th century he began to be considered as their potential heir. Every year Ferdinand had more and more influence on imperial affairs. In 1617, Ferdinand was elected king of the Czech Republic, and the following year he ascended the Hungarian throne. Following this, complex negotiations began with the imperial princes about the election of Ferdinand as emperor. At this point, in May 1618, a national uprising broke out in Prague, which served as a prologue to the devastating Thirty Years' War.
It all started when, back in December 1617, the Archbishop of Prague ordered the destruction of the Protestant church in Klostergrab. This incident caused a lot of noise in the Czech Republic and throughout the empire. Czech Protestants gathered in Prague and, after heated debates, decided that such lawlessness could not be left without consequences. On May 23, 1618, several hundred nobles went to the ancient castle of Hradcany, where ten governors who ruled the Czech Republic in the absence of a conference were conferring, seized two of them, especially hated by everyone, and threw them out the window (the so-called “Second Prague Defenestration”).
Obviously, after this the war was supposed to begin. However, neither the emperor nor his minister wanted her. Klesl made an attempt to resolve the conflict peacefully. Then Ferdinand took the cardinal into custody in July and imprisoned him in the castle of Ambras. Having lost his long-term adviser, Matvey was at a loss, placed all the levers of power in the hands of Ferdinand and could only watch powerlessly as events dragged Germany into a destructive religious war.
Meanwhile, the uprising in the Czech Republic was supported by Protestants in Austria itself. The Czechs, led by Count Thurn, moved towards Vienna and in June 1619 took possession of its outskirts. At the same time, Austrian rebels seized the imperial palace and demanded that Ferdinand proclaim religious freedom. One of the brave opposition leaders, Tonradel, even grabbed a button of the imperial jacket and pushed Ferdinand several times. Fortunately, at that moment a cavalry detachment had just entered the city, and the rebels were frightened by the loud sound of trumpets.
In August 1619, after his death, Ferdinand was elected emperor. He ascended the throne under the most difficult circumstances. The Czechs had already openly broken away from the Habsburgs, declared Ferdinand deposed and handed over the crown to the Elector of the Palatinate. The Hungarians soon followed their example: on August 25, 1620, a Transylvanian prince was elected king of Hungary at the Diet in Bestercebanye. With joint efforts, the Czech-Moravian-Hungarian army even besieged Vienna, but was forced to retreat after attacks from enemies in the rear.
Soon, Count Tilly, who commanded the Bavarian army, easily suppressed the disturbances in Upper and Lower Austria, entered the Czech Republic and quickly pushed the rebels back to the walls of Prague. The Czechs occupied a hill to the west of their capital, which was called the White Mountain. On November 8, Tilly attacked their positions and won a decisive victory. This put an end to the Czech uprising. Prague opened its gates to the victorious imperial army, Moravia and Silesia also expressed their submission. The “Royal Rescript” and other acts that gave the Czechs national and religious freedom were destroyed, and the rights of the Sejm were curtailed so much that the Czech Republic found itself in the position of an Austrian province. But in order to completely eradicate the spirit of freedom in the kingdom, laws alone were not enough. Severe repression fell upon the participants in the uprising: 24 nobles were beheaded in Prague, many nobles and ordinary citizens were punished with whips, imprisoned or expelled from the country. Then the confiscation of estates began, which assumed colossal proportions. Three quarters of all lands were taken from the national nobility and given to monasteries and German Catholics. Since the nobility from time immemorial was considered the main force of the national movement, this action broke the freedom-loving spirit of the Czech people. At the same time, Catholicism was being planted. All Czech books of suspicious content were burned. Anyone who did not want to renounce the Protestant faith was ordered to leave the country. About 40 thousand families then went into exile.
On December 31, 1621, the emperor signed a peace treaty with Nikolsburg. The Transylvanian prince renounced his claims to the Hungarian crown, receiving in return part of Slovakia, Subcarpathian Ruthenia, part of North-Eastern Hungary and the principalities of Opole and Raciborz in Silesia.
Since he did not want to give up the title of Czech king given to him by the rebels, he became the next victim of the Catholics - by 1623 the Bavarians took possession of the entire Palatinate. Then the Danish king entered the war on the side of the Protestants, who received significant subsidies from England for the recruitment of troops. Seeing that the Protestants were increasing their forces, the leaders of the Catholic League began to demand help from the emperor. Ferdinand himself understood that it was impossible to place all the hardships of the war on one Bavarian army, but he had absolutely no means to recruit his own troops. In these difficult circumstances, the Friedland Duke Wallenstein undertook to deliver an army to the emperor at his own expense. Two years later, he gathered more than 50 thousand adventurers from all over Europe under the banner, organized them and created a completely combat-ready army. Wallenstein's main idea was that the army should supply itself, collecting indemnities from the population. Soon he managed to arrange things in such a way that it cost the emperor almost nothing to maintain his army. True, we had to turn a blind eye to the fact that wherever Wallenstein’s soldiers appeared, widespread robberies, murders and cruel torture of civilians began. But since these brave warriors knew how not only to loot, but also to fight and actually won glorious victories, Ferdinand for a long time did not pay attention to their atrocities.
In April 1626, Wallenstein inflicted a decisive defeat on the Protestants at the Dessau Bridge on the Elbe. He then marched to Hungary and forced the rebels there to submit. Meanwhile, Tilly, next to Lutter, fled. All of northern Germany hastened to submit to the emperor. Wallenstein and Tilly, pursuing the Danes, took possession of all of Holstein, Schleswig and Jutland. In 1629, Ferdinand made peace. The Danish king received back all his possessions, but had to refuse to interfere in German affairs. In March of the same year, the emperor promulgated the edict of restitution (restoration), according to which the Protestants were to return to the Catholics all the lands they had seized after the Peace of Augsburg. This law took away from the Protestants two archbishoprics, twelve bishoprics, many monasteries, priories and other possessions. By carrying it out, the Protestant party would be completely broken. However, the Swedish king stood in the way of Ferdinand's ambitious plans. In the summer of 1630, he declared war on the emperor and quickly captured Pomerania and Mecklenburg.
The war resumed with the same ferocity. In the same year, Tilly took Magdeburg and left it to terrible ruin. The city burned to the ground, about 20 thousand people died from sword, fire and horror. Tilly then invaded Saxony and occupied Leipzig. The indignant Saxons, who had previously observed neutrality, went over to the side. On September 17, 1631, a big battle took place near the village of Breitenfeld, and Tilly was defeated in it. After this important victory, he took possession of Würzburg and invaded the Rhine Palatinate. In 1632 he moved against Bavaria. In April, in the battle of Lech, Tilly was defeated for the second time and received a mortal wound. But when, after this, the Swedish king attacked Wallenstein’s camp near Nuremberg, he met strong resistance and retreated with heavy losses. Wallenstein followed him into Saxony. On November 16, a decisive battle took place at Lucenna. Under the pressure of the Swedes, Wallenstein's regiments were scattered and driven back. But the winner fell in this battle, and this negated all the success of his army. The Protestant coalition collapsed. The Swedes avoided decisive action and no longer seemed so dangerous. But another threat appeared. By the beginning of the 1630s, Wallenstein's power had become so great that it began to inspire fear in the emperor himself. In 1634, senior army officers plotted in favor of their commander. Having learned about this, Ferdinand ordered the loyal troops to suppress the rebellion with all possible firmness, at the same time he gave a secret order to the Eger governor Gordon to deal with Wallenstein. On February 25, the famous commander was suddenly surprised by assassins in his castle and killed the minute he came out of the bathroom.
The new chief of the imperial army, Gallas, took Regensburg, and in September defeated the Swedes at Nordlingen. The Saxon elector had to retreat from his allies and in the spring of 1635 he made peace with the emperor in Prague. This treaty left to the Protestants those lands that they owned in 1552, and the right to use the possessions appropriated between 1552 and 1555 for 40 years. Other Protestant princes were indignant at the betrayal of the Saxons, but were forced, one after another, to join the concluded peace. This could have been the end of the war if not for the intervention of France. In October 1635, Cardinal Richelieu attracted Duke Bernhard of Saxe-Weimar to his side. With French gold, he recruited a large army and led successful actions against the imperial commanders. The war began to flare up with renewed vigor. Ferdinand never lived to see its end - he died two years after the Prague Peace.
Emperor Charles the Fifth had a younger brother, Ferdinand. He was the fourth child of Archduke Philip the Fair of the Habsburg family and the unlucky Queen Juana of Castile - “Juana the Mad”.
On his mother’s side, he was the grandson of the unifiers of Spain - Queen Isabella of Castile and her husband King Ferdinand of Aragon, nicknamed “Catholic kings” for their steel-like commitment to Catholicism. The Inquisition began to punish even minimal deviations from the tenets of the Faith, starting with the “Catholic king and queen.”
On his father’s side, Ferdinand is the grandson of Emperor Maximilian, the same one who, having married Maria, the only daughter of the last Duke of independent Burgundy, Charles the Bold, acquired a huge, but incredibly troubled “Burgundian inheritance”, the brightest diamond of which was the “Lower Lands”, otherwise called the Netherlands.
The future emperor received his name in honor of his grandfather Ferdinand the Catholic, King of Aragon, who, in fact, built “an empire on which the sun never sets. From his youth, Ferdinand was in the shadow of his ambitious brother Charles. His brother was once jealous of the fact that the younger Ferdinand, raised in Spain, was loved by the Castilians - his, Charles's, subjects - and sent him in the spring of 1518 to the Netherlands. Ferdinand never returned to his beloved Castile; the fate of him and his descendants now belonged undividedly to Germany and Austria.
When Charles became emperor in 1519, Ferdinand received the rights of his governor in Germany, divided into a huge number of independent principalities.
Ferdinand witnessed how, at a Church Council in the German city of Worms, monk Martin Luther presented his ideas about the need to correct abuses in the Roman Church. Despite the fact that the majority reacted very calmly to the speeches of the learned monk, Karl attacked him with severe criticism, accusing him of schismatic activities in relation to the united Christian world. With his imperial power, he insisted on a ban on Luther's public speeches and sermons. Ferdinand could not understand why his brother went into such a frenzy, because there was so much truth in Luther’s words!
Ferdinand was then 16 years old, and Karl was 19.
In 1521, Ferdinand married Anna Jagiellonka, her father Wladyslaw II (from the line of Polish kings) was simultaneously the king of Bohemia (Czech Republic) and Hungary. These countries “rolled away” from under the scepter of the Habsburgs, and Ferdinand’s marriage had the goal of gradually bringing them back. At the same time, he received from his elder brother their main ancestral lands - Upper and Lower Austria, Carinthia and Styria, as well as Krajna (as Slovenia was previously called), and a little later - Tyrol. They were owned for several centuries by their ancestors, the Archdukes of the Austrian House of Habsburg.
In 1536, her marriage to Anna began to pay dividends - her childless brother Louis (Lajos in Hungarian), king of Bohemia, Hungary and Croatia, died in the battle with the Turks at Mohács. Ferdinand laid his rightful claim to these orphaned crowns. But the Hungarians and Czechs did not recognize the heredity of royal dignity in their countries. In October 1526, the Bohemian Diet elected Ferdinand as king, setting some conditions for him, while the Diets of Moravia and Silesia recognized both Anna and Ferdinand as sovereigns by right of inheritance. In 1531 Ferdinand was also crowned King of Rome.
Then Ferdinand had to fight for a long time for Hungary with the Turks; in that era, the Great Ottoman Empire waged wars of conquest in Europe, and the task of stopping the Turkish invasion of Christian Europe quickly became the work of his life for Ferdinand.
Ferdinand, the fight against the Turks for Hungary
Ferdinand was opposed by the ruler of Transylvania, Janos Zapolyai, who in 1526, dissatisfied with the foreign ruler, was proclaimed king by the Hungarian nobles at Tokaj Castle. In 1527–1528, Ferdinand's army invaded Hungary, defeated Zápolya's troops and expelled him from the country to Poland. Janos Zapolyai turned to the Ottoman Empire for help in 1528.
In 1529, the invasion of Hungary by Suleiman the Magnificent began. Ottoman forces drove the Habsburg forces out of the country and restored János's power in the larger (eastern) part of Hungary. In July 1529, János Zápolyai took a vassal oath to the Turkish Sultan and was recognized by him as the King of Hungary.
But the most dramatic moment in Ferdinand’s life was the appearance of the army of Suleiman the Magnificent at the walls of Vienna in the spring of 1529! The siege of the capital of Austria is considered by some historians as a test of strength for a large-scale Turkish invasion of Germany, and by others as simply a desire to unite Hungary under Turkish rule. The Turks near Vienna suffered enormous hardships, the number of deserters increased, and after an unsuccessful assault, Suleiman the Magnificent ordered a retreat. Ferdinand, with the help of the troops of his elder brother Emperor Charles V, kept western Hungary under his rule.
Ferdinand - Arbiter of the German lands
Charles V “spent his whole life in the saddle,” moving from one battle to another, while his younger brother Ferdinand really ruled and solved the most difficult problems every day. Ferdinand acquired invaluable many years of experience in resolving the most difficult disputes between Catholic princes and nobles and electors, princes, dukes and landgraves who had gone over to the Protestant camp. When the older brother did not achieve complete victory by force of arms, the younger brother, who had the ability to reach an agreement in almost hopeless cases, stepped in.
Ferdinand's main achievement as a ruler was the interreligious peace concluded in the City of Augsburg in 1555. He formulated the principle “Whose power, his faith.” For a long time, his elder brother did not want to recognize the right of Protestant princes to determine the dominant religion in their state. He correctly suspected that this would mean his personal defeat, the impossibility of preserving a unified Christian Empire and the final split of Germany along religious lines.
But the day came when even the emperor’s Catholic allies said that it was impossible to fight endlessly, we had to come to an agreement! Thus came the personal triumph of Ferdinand Habsburg!
And for his descendants, this meant that the Habsburg power remained in that part of Germany that defended its Protestant religion by force of arms. The Peace of Augsburg lasted for more than six decades.
In 1558, Charles the Fifth abdicated the crown of the Holy Roman Empire, and it was his brother Ferdinand, and not his son Philip, who became his successor-emperor. This marked the split in Habsburg history into Spanish and Austrian parts.