The Hanseatic League in the Early Modern Period 119
Hanseatic commerce lay in the interest of all peoples and it swore to, as it says
in the memorandum of the same name by Johann Georg Büsch, “the politi-
cal importance of the freedom of Hamburg and her sister cities, Lübeck and
Bremen, to the commerce of all Europe.” Accordingly, it was believed for a long
time that France would not be closed to these arguments.
The Peace of Amiens, in the year 1802, appeared to provide such hopes and
also new energy. First of all, it briefly ended the disagreements between France
and Great Britain and led to a new upswing phase for commerce.32 The acts
of war, including hijackings, ended and international trade and ship traffic
came to life again and the high wartime assurance premiums fell away. France
and Great Britain negotiated concerning the trade agreement of 1786, now in
force again. At the same time, military armament at sea continued, and on
May 16, 1803, Great Britain declared war on France after previously declaring
an embargo on Dutch and French ships. The French army occupied Hanover
and then Cuxhaven on the left bank of the Elbe, whereupon (the left bank)
Great Britain imposed a blockade of the Elbe’s mouth. Through this blockade,
Hamburg, which until now—on grounds of its neutrality—had been only
somewhat adversely affected by English-French conflicts, was cut off from
international commerce and shipping. The commerce of the Elbe dwindled,
against which backdrop Bremen (until the impending Weser blockade),
Stettin, Lübeck, Copenhagen, and above all Emden profited. English mer-
chants dispatched a portion of their wares to Copenhagen, Stettin and espe-
cially Lübeck, whose trade strongly increased. Emden in particular profited
from the blockade of Hamburg because English, French, and American trade-
houses set up shop on the Jade. English wares were shipped to France under
the Prussian flag by way of Emden. Even English trade with Amsterdam went
through Emden because the direct exchange was still forbidden. Otherwise,
the city of Papenburg and the leadership of Kniphausen (which was overseen
by the French) offered protection from hijacking with their neutral sea passes.
The trade in English wares proceeded from Emden into the hinterland as
far as the Frankfurt trade fairs (Frankfurter Messen). However the merchants
of Hamburg were also resourceful, in that besides Lübeck and Kiel, they used
Tönning at the mouth of the Eider as a port, in which merchants, brokers,
shippers, and assurance agents set up shop. Although half of the wares had
to be transported over land, a great portion of the English wares journeyed
32 For the following see Michael North, “Die Auswirkungen der Kontinentalsperre auf das
nördliche Deutschland und den Ostseeraum,” in Andreas Klinger, Hans-Werner Hahn,
and Georg Schmidt, eds., Das Jahr 1806 im europäischen Kontext. Balance, Hegemonie
und politische Kulturen (Cologne/Weimar/Vienna 2008), 101–122.