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Law and order in Habsburg Venetia 1814–1835*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

David Laven
David Laven
Affiliation:
University of Reading
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Abstract

Much recent historiography has adopted a revisionist approach to Habsburg policy in restoration Italy, jettisoning the ‘black legend’ which long surrounded Austrian rule of Lombardy-Venetia. Nevertheless the Habsburg police still tend to be portrayed as essentially repressive, constantly preoccupied with the threat of revolution. This case study of the police in the Venetian provinces during the reign of Francis I challenges such a view. It looks first at the problem of establishing forces of law and order in the aftermath of Napoleonic rule, demonstrating how under-funding conservatism and a desire for uniformity with the rest of the empire meant that the Venetian constabulary was often ill-suitedfor the prevention of crime. Then follows an examination of the part played by the police in the administrative machine. This emphasises a number of roles performed by higher-ranking police officials and the secret police, and suggests their major concerns were not merely with the threat of revolution, but with gathering information essential for efficient government, and with maintaining a watchful eye over other branches of the bureaucracy. These in turn contributed considerably to the efficiency of Habsburg rule and the remarkable political passivity of the Venetian provinces in this era.

Type
Articles
Information
The Historical Journal , Volume 39 , Issue 2 , June 1996 , pp. 383 - 403
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1996

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References

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14 Steven, Hughes, ‘Fear and loathing in Bologna and Rome. The Papal police in perspective’, Journal of Social History, 21 (1987), pp. 96–116Google Scholar. Michael Broers has recently pointed out in an unpublished paper entitled ‘Policing Piedmont 1789–1820: from absolutism to reaction’ that the only institution that the extremely reactionary Savoyard regime of restoration Piedmont chose to retain from the Napoleonic period was the gendarmerie, so successful had it proved in combating formerly endemic banditry and so popular had it proved among the bulk of the Piedmontese population.

15 Helfert, , Zur Geschichte, pp. 47–8Google Scholar; Sandonà, , Il Regno Lombardo-Veneto, pp. 172–3.Google Scholar

16 See, for example, Onigo to Presidio di Governo, Treviso, 5 December 1821; Ansaldi to Presidio di Governo, Rovigo, 24 November 1821; and Torresani to Presidio di Governo, Udine, 7 November 1821. A. S. V., P. di G., 1820–23, I 14/14.

17 Helfert, , Zur Geschichte, p. 45Google Scholar and Kaiser Franz, pp. 23–7; Sandonà, , Il Regno Lombardo-Veneto, p. 172.Google Scholar

18 Known as the C. O. H.C and empowered to deal with Illyria as well, it sat until the autumn of 1817. On its activities see Meriggi, Amministrazione, passim and Arthur G., Haas, Metternich, reorganization and nationality 1813–1818. A story of foresight and frustration in the rebuilding of the Austrian Empire (Wiesbaden, 1963)Google Scholar. On Lazansky's opposition to the gendarmerie see Sandonà, , Il Regno Lombardo-Veneto, pp. 172–3Google Scholar. The C. O. H. C. vote on the issue was taken on 8 March 1817.

19 For Lazansky's rôle on the C. O. H. C. and his ideological outlook see Meriggi, , Amministrazione, pp. 29–90 passim.Google Scholar

20 Lazansky, Vienna, 30 October 1817. A. S. V., I. R. G., 1817, XVIII 8.

21 Haas, , Metternich, reorganization and nationality, p. 188.Google Scholar

22 Meriggi, Amministrazione, passim.

23 The gendarmerie was only introduced into the Hereditary Lands in 1849. Macartney, C. A., The Habsburg Empire 1790–1918 (London, 1968), p. 471Google Scholar. See also Franz, Neubauer, Die Gendarmerie in Österreich (Vienna, 1925).Google Scholar

24 Goëss, Vienna, 25 August 1819. Archivio di Stato, Milano (henceforth A. S. M.), Cancelleria Austriaca, Geheime Section (henceforth C. A. G. S.), 12–15. Goëss, Reuss-Plauen's successor as Governor of Venetia was citing the imperial decree of 19 August 1819. For the entire text of the decree issued on 26 September 1819 as a Risoluzione sovrana see Collezioni di leggi e regolamenti pubblicati dall'imp. regio governo delle Provincie Venete, Vol. VI, Part II (Venice, 1819), pp. 409–10.Google Scholar

25 Ibid.

26 Helfert, , Zur Geschichte, p. 45Google Scholar and Kaiser Franz, pp. 23–7; Sandonà, , Il Regno Lombardo-Veneto, p. 172.Google Scholar

27 Sedlnitzky to Spaur, 31 January 1828. A. S. M., C. A. G. S., 19–21.

28 Amberg, Venice, 21 February 1829, A. S. V., I. R. G., 1825–29, CXXIX 10/1.

29 Spaur to Ranieri, Viceroy of Lombardy-Venetia, Venice, 29 April 1831. A. S. M., C. A. G. S., 22–24.

30 Antonio, Lorenzoni, Istituzioni del diritto pubblico interno pel Regno Lombardo-Veneto (4 vols., 1835–1839), I, Pt 2, p. 287.Google Scholar

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32 The notion of ‘preventative policing’ in nineteenth-century Italy is rather different from that in twentieth-century Britain or America. In the former the term implies the identification of likely offenders and their subsequent observation, rather than any form of broader deterrence. The policy of deterrent policing, which would now generally be known as preventative, was in the nineteenth century, rather confusingly, referred to as ‘repressive policing’. I am grateful to Steven Hughes for making this distinction clear to me.

33 Istruzione, A. S. M., C. A. G. S., 16–18 and Lorenzoni, , Istituzioni, I, Pt 2, pp. 227–93Google Scholar, passim, but see especially, p. 288.

34 Clearly deprivation was likely to increase crime, however strong the police. It is no coincidence that crime rates peaked in the years of bad harvests, such as 1816, 1817 and 1829. For the years 1816–29 see Alfredo, Grandi (ed.), Processi politici del senate lombardo-veneto, 1815–1851 (Roma, 1976), p. 282.Google Scholar

35 Hughes, ‘Fear and loathing’, passim.

36 The most comprehensive study of the conspiratorial activities of the so-called settarj in Venetia is in Angela, Mariutti, Organismo ed azione delle società segrete del Veneto durank la seconda dominazione austriaca (1814–1847) (Padova, 1930)Google Scholar. Also useful is Rath, , The provisional Austrian regime, pp. 143–315Google Scholar, passim, and the same author's articles, ‘The Carbonari: their origins, initiation rites and aims’, The American Historical Review, LXIX (1964), 352–70Google Scholar and ‘La costituzione guelfa e i servizi segreti austriaci’, Rassegna Storica del Risorgimento, L (1963), 346–76Google Scholar. Emerson, , Metternich and the political police, pp. 57–99Google Scholar, gives an insight into the political activity of the Austrian police, although he is keen to portray them in the worst possible light. For a detailed and scholarly, although unquestionably partisan, view of the trials that followed the insurrections of 1820–21, see Augusto, Sandonà, Contributo alla storia deiprocessi del ventuno e dello Spielberg (Milano-Torino–Roma, 1911)Google Scholar. Useful for the later period is Franco Delia, Peruta, Mazzini e i rivoluzionari italiani: Il ‘partito d'azione’, 1830–45 (Milano, 1974)Google Scholar. For the early years see Helfert, Kaiser Franz and Zur Geschichte, passim.

37 Lodges had flourished throughout the Napoleonic Kingdom of Italy and Eugène Beauharnais himself had been grand-master. One of Francis I's earliest actions on retaking the region had been to outlaw any mason from government service (although, in fact, many former masons continued in office). See Rath, , The provisional Austrian regime, p. 43Google Scholar and Helfert, , Kaiser Franz, p. 128Google Scholar, and Zur Geschkhte, p. 1.

38 Alan, Sked, ‘Metternich's enemies or the threat from below’, in Sked, A (ed.), Europe's balance of power 1815–1848 (London, 1979), pp. 164–5.Google Scholar

39 Istruzione risguardante il servizio segreto della polizia riservata pel solo Direttore Generale, A. S. M., C. A. G. S., 16–18.

40 Meriggi, , Il Regno Lombardo-Veneto, pp. 310–18.Google Scholar

41 The only conspiracy to take place in the early 1830s was a half-hearted affair centred on a student at Padua called Brocchi, who was acquitted for lack of evidence. For accounts of this case see Delia, Peruta, Mazzini e i rivoluzionari, pp. 54–5Google Scholar; Mariutti, , Organismo ed azione, p. 63Google Scholar, and Laven, , ‘Liberals or libertines? Staff, students, and government policy at the University of Padua, 1814–1835’, History of Universities, II (1992), 144–5.Google Scholar

42 Delia, Peruta, Mazzini e i rivoluzionari, pp. 54–5 and p. 233Google Scholar, and A. Mariutti, Organismo ed azione, passim.

43 Conflict between civilians and soldiers was by no means rare in the cities of the Venetian mainland, prompting at least one special investigation. However, the authorities concluded that troops were not resented for political reasons. For reports from delegati and police chiefs on the frequency of clashes between soldiers and civilians see fascicolo A. S. V., P. di G., 1830–34, XIV 2/6.

44 See the busta entitled Sekten undgeheime Gesellschaften, A. S. V., P. di G., Geheim, 1830–34, 29.

45 Rath, , The provisional Austrian regime, pp. 274–315.Google Scholar

46 Meriggi, , Il Regno Lombardo-Veneto, pp. 315–7.Google Scholar

47 Francis I to Plenciz, Vienna, 29 October 1821 in Grandi, (ed.), Processi politici, pp. 677–8.Google Scholar

48 Enrico, Misley, L'ltalie sous la domination autrichienne (Paris, 1832).Google Scholar

49 Giorgio, Candeloro, Storia d'Italia modernaGoogle Scholar; Vol. II: Dalla restaurazione alia rivoluzione nazionale, 1815–1846, p. 125Google Scholar. For a vivid description of Romagnosi's trial see Kent Roberts, Greenfield, Economics and liberalism in the Risorgimento. A study of nationalism in Lombardy, 1814–1848 (Revised edn, Baltimore, 1965), p. 163.Google Scholar

50 Douglas, Hay, ‘Property, authority and the criminal law’Google Scholar in Douglas, Hay, Peter, Linebaugh, John C., Rule, Thompson, E. P. and Cal, Winslow, Albion's fatal tree. Crime and society in eighteenth-century England (London, 1975), p. 33.Google Scholar

51 Paride, Zajotti, Semplice verità opposta alle menzogne di Enrico Misley (Milano, 1835)Google Scholar. The title page carries the false date and place of publication as Paris, 1834. This is not the only instance where Zajotti is economical with the truth, although he never indulges in the ridiculous and blatant lying that characterises almost every line of Misley.

52 Macartney, , The Habsburg Empire, p. 206.Google Scholar

53 Douglas, Hay, ‘Poaching and game laws on Cannock Chase’Google Scholar, in Hay, et al. , Albion'sfatal tree, pp. 249–50.Google Scholar

54 On the subject of censorship see Giampietro, Berti, Censura e circolazione delle idee net Veneto della restaurazione (Venezia, 1989).Google Scholar

55 The files of the Presidio di Governo are full of evidence of the constant police interest in foreign travellers. See, for example, A. S. V., P. di G., 1830–34, I 1/4 for Turkish subjects visiting Venice; I 1/23 for esteri (almost all Italians) banned from entering the Venetian provinces; I 1/28 for foreigners en route for Hungary. Legion fascicoli address passports, right of entry, travellers to be kept under particular surveillance and so on. There are numerous contemporary British accounts of the ‘petty vexations’ caused by the Habsburg authorities to travellers in Lombardy-Venetia. See, for example, Sinclair, J. D., An autumn in Italy (Edinburgh, 1827), p. 53Google Scholar; Rose, W. S., Letters from the North of Italy (2 vols; London, 1819)Google Scholar; and Baring, T, A tour through Italy, Sicily, Istria, Camiola, the Tyrol, and Austria in 1814 (2nd edition, London, 1817), pp. 113–4.Google Scholar

56 Istruzione risguardante il servizio segreto della polizia, A. S. M., C. A. G. S., 16–18.

57 See for example the fascicoli from A. S. V., P. di G., 1820–23, I 10/1–10/98 which consist mostly of reports from Sedlnitzky in Vienna on whether individuals should be permitted into Lombardy-Venetia. While a few of those listed were simply common criminals or other undesirables such as bankrupts, the majority were banned for political motives, ranging from past insurrectionary activity elsewhere in Italy to seeking to enrol as mercenaries in the Greek struggle against Turkish domination. Those listed include Italians, Germans, French, Irish, Spaniards and Greeks.

58 On the prohibition of study abroad see Collezione di leggi e regolamenti (Venezia, 1817), vol. IV/2, pp. 110–11.Google Scholar

59 Sinclair, , An autumn in Italy, pp. 59–60.Google Scholar

60 For an example of the alarm caused by the Greek insurrection see Inzaghj's letters to direzione generate di polizia and the delegati provinciali, A. S. V., P. di G., 1820–23, I 1/9. Meriggi's remark that the 1831 rising in the Papal Legations was greeted with only a few pre–emptive arrests, tends to underestimate the disquiet caused among the Austrian authorities. Il Regno Lombardo-Veneto, p. 318.

61 Spaur to Metternich, Venice, 7 Feb. 1831, H. H. S. W., Staatskanzlei, Provinzen, Lombardo-Venezien (henceforth St.k, Prov., L.-V.), 15. See also Baron Frimont's correspondence regarding revolutionary sentiments in the Italian states outside direct Austrian control in H. H. S. W., St. k. Prov. L.-V., 24. Frimont was the Austrian commander-in-chief at Verona.

62 Spaur to Rainer, Venice, 29 Apr. 1831, A. S. M., C. A. G.S, 22–24.

63 For reports on the political calm in Rovigo and the surrounding area see Ansidei to Spaur, Rovigo, 10 Feb., 1 Mar., 10 Mar., and 18 Mar. 1831, A. S. V., P. di G., 1830–34, Geheim, 14.

64 Ansidei to Spaur, Rovigo, 4 Feb. 1832, A. S. V., P. di G., 1830–34, Geheim, 14. For the renewed outbreak of rebellion and the Austrian response, see Reinerman, A. J., Austria and the Papacy in the age of Mettemich (2 vols.; Washington, D. C., 1979–1989), II, pp. 81–133.Google Scholar

65 Stratico, Udine, 21 Feb. 1831, A. S. V., P. di G., 1830–34, Geheim, 14.

66 Spaur to Rainer, Venice, 29 Apr. 1831, A. S. M., C. A. G. S., 22–24 and Spaur to Metternich, Venice, 7 Feb. 1831, H. H. S. W., St.K. Prov. L.-V., 15.

67 Laven, , ‘Liberals or libertines?’, pp. 144–5.Google Scholar

68 Spaur to Metternich, Venice, 23 Feb. 1831, H. H. S. W., St.K. Prov. L.-V., 15.

69 Goëss cited in Carlo, Tivaroni, L'Italia durante il dominio austriaco (1815–1849): l'Italia settentrionale (Torino-Roma, 1892), p. 493.Google Scholar

70 Istruzione risguardante il servizio segreto, A. S. M., C. A. G. S., Section, 16–18.

71 Ibid. There are legion police reports on prospective public employees in the Presidio di Governo files of the Archivio di Stato in Venice. One set which gives a good indication of the general procedure is the list of possible censors in A. S. V., P. di G., 1815–19, VII 1/1.

72 In 1851–2 three volumes were published by the Tipografia Elvetica at Capolago entitled Carte segrete ed atti ufficiali della polizia austriaca in Italia dal 4 giugno 1814 al 2 marzo 1848. Consisting of documents drawn from the Austrian police files, they were produced under the auspices of Daniele Manin. The aim was to provide straight-forward anti-Austrian propaganda by showing the extent of Austrian police activity. In fact the material is for the most part anodyne or reveals the Austrians in rather a good light, however much the shrill commentary provided by the editors tries to distort the original text. The original documents may still be consulted in the Museo Correr in Venice.

73 See, for example, Porcia, Treviso, 8 May 1815, A. S. V., P. di G., 1815–19, II 10/1 and the correspondence of Mulazzani in Carte segrete., I, 21–8.

74 See, for example, the rapporti politici-amministrativi sent by the police chiefs Raab and Vogel in A. S. V., P. di G., 1815–19, II 10/8 and VIII 3/5, or the correspondence of Grôller in A. S. V., I. R. G., 1830–34, XXIV 1/9, and De Pauli and Humbracht in A. S. V., P. di G., 1831–35 Geheim, 33. For a similar case of sympathy for the lower orders amongst Papal carabinieri in the 1830s see John A., Davis, Conflict and control. Law and order in nineteenth-century Italy (London, 1988), p. 140.Google Scholar

75 For these reports see the files of the H. H. S. W., Minister Kolowrat Akten (henceforth M. K. A.).

76 For examples of complaints about the slow progress of the land register and the high rates of land tax in Venetia, see Lancetti, Venice, 29 August 1832, H. H. S. W., M. K. A. 73 (1832) 2066; Spaur, Venice, 10 February, 1832, H. H. S. W., M. K. A. 65 (1832) 431; Cattanei, Venice, 11 May 1834, H. H. S. W., M. K. A. 98 (1834) 1090.

77 See Regina, Schulte, ‘Poachers in Upper Bavaria in 1848: Crime or conflict?’, in Richard J., Evans (ed.), The German underworld. Deviants and outcasts in German history (London, 1988), pp. 141–58Google Scholar, for a comparable example of how an early nineteenth-century German magistrate came to defend the lower orders from central authority from a mixture of fear of the local community, sympathy for their plight, and a desire to avoid an escalation of disorder.

78 Cited in Cesare, Cantù, ‘Il Conciliatore. Episodio del liberalismo lombardo’, Archivio Storico Italiano, 1876, p. 295.Google Scholar

79 See, for example, the work of the Bohemian bureaucrat, Carl Czoernig, who believed the Venetians essentially frugal because too idle to work, and unlikely to be moved to action because of a prevailing spirit of dolce far niente. Über den Freijhafen in Venedig (Wien, 1831), p. 12Google Scholar. Similarly see Goëss's list of Venetian national characteristics which emphasise a fear of hard work and the absence of patriotic feeling. Goëss, Venice, 31 January 1819, H. H. S. W., K. F. A., 71.