My Life — Volume 1

Bakunin told me the planned retreat to the Erzgebirge had been called off: reinforcements had poured in overnight, and the fighters were so eager to fight they had held off the Prussians so far. But the Prussians had brought in more troops, and had switched tactics, breaking through house walls instead of attacking barricades head-on, so the defense of Dresden was doomed. He had proposed blowing up the Town Hall’s powder stores when the Prussians broke through, but the town council had hidden the powder, and Heubner had sided with them, so the retreat was set for the next morning. I told them I had seen thousands of reinforcements on the road to Freiberg, including four hundred exhausted reservists who couldn’t go further for lack of transport. Heubner begged me to go back and tell the reservist leaders to requisition horses and carts from the local villages to speed the retreat, and Marschall von Bieberstein, the former college friend who had been a fiery leader of the citizen guard, offered to come with me. He was hoarse and exhausted, barely able to speak, but agreed. We left that night, got to Freiberg at dawn, told the reservist leaders to take whatever transport they needed, and set off back to Dresden. Marschall left me at the edge of town to go rally more forces, and I fell asleep on the coach. I woke to shouting, and opened my eyes to see a column of armed revolutionaries marching away from Dresden. “What’s happened?” I called. “It’s all over,” one replied. “The provisional government is in the carriage behind us.”

I jumped out of the coach and ran up the hill, and found Heubner, Bakunin, and Martin, the revolutionary post-office clerk, in a slow-moving hired carriage, the driver sobbing because his springs were about to break under the weight of the men and the National Guards crammed in behind. Bakunin laughed at his tears, calling them nectar for the gods, but agreed to let Heubner and me get out to make room. Heubner walked down the line of retreating troops, telling them to fall back to Freiberg and wait for orders. A German Catholic priest named Menzdorff, who had been arrested by the Chemnitz guard for agitating them to join the uprising, fell in with us, and we learned the Chemnitz guard had invited the provisional government to their city only to arrest them, and were already on their way back to Chemnitz to set up the trap.

We reached Freiberg to find locals begging Heubner not to turn their town into a battlefield. He took Bakunin and me to his house to consult, and after breakfast he asked Bakunin straight out if he was fighting for a Red Republic. Bakunin said he had no interest in any political system, only fought because he respected Heubner’s courage; his own dream of total destruction had nothing to do with the Dresden uprising. Satisfied, Heubner said he would call for a Saxon representative assembly in Chemnitz, and hold the city as the provisional government’s headquarters. Then the young compositor Stephan Born arrived, saying he had marched the revolutionary bands to Freiberg safely, but refused to defend the city, saying he was no soldier. Heubner agreed they would fall back to Chemnitz. I decided to go ahead to Chemnitz to prepare, but the coach was delayed by the marching troops; I watched the Vogtland regiment march out, their drummer’s odd, rattling beat reminding me of the skeleton dance in Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique. I went back to find Heubner and Bakunin had already left, and finally caught a coach to Chemnitz late that night. I checked into an inn, and at dawn the next morning walked to my brother-in-law’s house. I asked a town guard sentry if the provisional government had arrived, and he shrugged. “That’s all over with,” he said. My brother-in-law arrived home that afternoon, and told me Heubner, Bakunin, and Martin had reached Chemnitz before me, collapsed from exhaustion, and were arrested by the police as soon as they arrived. The Chemnitz guard had lured them there deliberately, and had already warned the guard to watch for me too. My brother-in-law drove me to Altenburg that night, and I continued on to Weimar, where I had planned to spend my holiday, hiding under the name Professor Werder from Berlin.

My mind was still reeling when I met Liszt again, and we talked first of Tannhäuser—I could barely bring myself to tell him I hadn’t left Dresden as a royal conductor on holiday, but as a fugitive. I still had no idea if I had broken any laws, or what would happen to me. Then alarming news came from Dresden: Röckel had been arrested for arson, charged with burning the Opera House. Liszt soon realized I was connected to the uprising, though I never admitted to being a combatant. We talked art at Princess Caroline of Wittgenstein’s house, and I even pitched my Jesus of Nazareth idea, though I could barely summon enthusiasm for it, still shaken by what I’d lived through. A rehearsal of Tannhäuser stirred me briefly, moved by Liszt’s deep understanding of my work, but that night Liszt had a violent outburst of rage against the aristocracy that left him shaken with nerves. The next morning he left for Karlsruhe, and I was invited to meet the Grand Duchess of Saxe-Weimar, the Tsar’s sister, at Eisenach Castle; I went, still half-convinced I was dreaming. When I returned to Weimar, I found a letter from Minna: the police had searched our house in Dresden, and she had been warned I had a warrant out for my arrest, and would be seized if I returned. Liszt and his friends urged me to flee Germany immediately, but I begged to say goodbye to Minna first. They arranged for me to hide at a steward’s estate in Magdala, three hours away, where I stayed for three days, listening to a assembly of defeated revolutionary soldiers give rambling, bitter speeches. On the second day my host’s wife came back from Weimar with news that the composer whose arrest warrant had arrived that day was Röckel. My host laughed, and said he’d be stupid enough to get caught. I said nothing, the memory of my narrow escape from death in student duels flashing in my mind, already planning my next move out of Germany.