118 North
Bohemia, Saxony, and Lausitz opened up a continuous supply of textiles,
which in the eighteenth century were traded primarily in the American colo-
nies, namely the Caribbean, by way of England. At the same time, Hamburg
profited from the intensification of the French plantation economy in the West
Indian islands, which delivered sugar, coffee, and cocoa to Hamburg by way of
France. In Hamburg, the raw products were processed and further distributed
in the North and Baltic Sea regions. In comparison to Hamburg, Bremen and
Lübeck were at a disadvantage because the Weser network offered Bremen
only a small hinterland. Lübeck, by virtue of its position on the Baltic Sea,
was cut off from the intermediary trade with the North Sea and the Atlantic
because all goods had to be transported either through the strait or overland by
way of Hamburg. Contemporary assessments from the second half of the eigh-
teenth century allow speculation that the disadvantages in the French trade
in particular, which were noticeable for Lübeck as well as for Bremen, resulted
in a low turnover in trade in comparison with Hamburg. Thereafter, the trade
with Lübeck would amount to only a tenth of Hamburg’s total trading volume;
Bremen approached nearly one half of Hamburg’s sales.31
In the 1770’s and 1780’s, trade with France had contributed to the upswing of
Hamburg’s commerce; and even after the outbreak of the revolution, this rela-
tionship was not initially diminished. On the contrary, Hamburg’s merchants
could purchase cheap luxury wares in France, and the French aristocratic
emigration also brought cheap cultural assets to the Elbe. Northern Germany
profited from the French-inspired foundation of the Batavian Republic in
the Netherlands in 1795, especially Hamburg, which profited above all from
an extension of commerce. Besides this, Hamburg took over a portion of the
financial center functions from Amsterdam. The Hanseatic cities were made
acutely aware of the vulnerability of international commerce by the short term
occupation of Bremen as well as Ritzebüttel, a post belonging to Hamburg, by
Hanoverian and British troops. This would repeat itself many times in the early
years of the eighteenth century.
In light of the mounting dangers, the representatives at Hamburg, Bremen
and Lübeck gathered again in May of 1795 for the first time since the Hanseatic
Diet of 1669, and in the period following, began work on the “Hanseatic desid-
erata” for a collective declaration of neutrality. It was argued that unrestricted
of Greifswald, 2013). Michael North, “Hamburg: The Continent’s Most English City,” in
idem, From the North Sea to the Baltic: Essays in Commercial, Monetary and Agricultural
History, 1500–1800 (Aldershot, 1996), 1–13.
31 Pierre Jeannin, “Die Hansestädte im europäischen Handel des 18. Jahrhunderts,” Hansische
Geschichsblätter 89 (1971), 41–73, here 58–60; Michael North, “Hamburg” 2–4.