Revolutionary years in Europe [1848-1849]

The revolutionary year of 1848 did not go unanswered in the Sokolov region either.

On May 15, 1773, Klemens Lothar Wenzel's son was born to the Governor General of the Rhineland, Metternich. If we used today's national criteria, the future foreign minister and Austrian chancellor were German, but the Rhineland was administered by the Habsburgs, so the family belonged to high-ranking Austrian officials and young Klemens spoke better (and rather) French than German. He was one of the rationalist children of the Enlightenment, sympathetic to both Voltaire and Kant, and delighted in the moral lessons and honed epigrams with which he trampled on adversaries. In 1824 he wrote to Wellington - for a long time Europe has belonged to me, so today he would undoubtedly be one of the zealous followers of a uniting Europe.

The revolutionary movement that swept Europe in 1848-1849 was a manifestation of the culminating crisis of the existing political and social system, a milestone in the transition from feudalism to capitalism, a profound intervention in the process of bourgeois transformation of most states on the European continent. In the revolutions of this period, unresolved issues of a national nature, the pursuit of national equality, originality, state independence and a freer national life in all its spheres played a major role in many countries, including Hungary. The nation became one of the most important attributes of the time, and the masses tried to enforce their own demands by using revolutionary, especially armed, means. A new era was expected to begin. In this sense, the revolution of 1848-1849 was a real " spring of nations ."

The events that Hurban expressed as follows at the Slavic Congress were fulfilled: " If the Hungarians give us what belongs, it is not possible ... to stand against them with a sword. When they allow the Serbs what they want, they also do not draw their sword. For they would be put to shame in front of the whole world. If the Hungarians do not give, then, of course, the fight. "

Slovak society entered the revolutionary events in a largely undeveloped form. At a time when the Slovak nobility was being nationalized, the Slovak intelligentsia became the main representative of the national movement. March's revolutionary events also had a strong impact in Slovakia, and Slovaks welcomed the " spring of nations " full of hopes and expectations. The culmination of their efforts and demands became the St. Nicholas Requests of the Slovak Nation, to which, however, the Pest government responded by persecuting the authors of the St. Nicholas Assembly and issuing an arrest warrant for J.M. Hurban, M.M. Hodža and Ľ. Štúr. The alternative of a possible agreement with the Hungarian government has reached a dead end.