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| The route from Andrews Caserne to the Standesamt in Zehlendorf |
The Treaty of Finckenstein (sometimes spelled “Finkenstein”
without the “c”) was signed on May 4, 1807 between France and Persia, two years
after France lost the Battle of Trafalgar, and France turned its attention to
the East. Napoleon I of France would guarantee
Fath Ali Shah of Persia a bunch of goodies, specifically Georgia and parts of
Transcaucasia, as well as guns and ammunition, officers and workmen. All the shah had to do in return was declare
war on Britain, expel all Britons from Persia and clear the way for France to
claim British possessions in the Middle East.
Not the first time Britain and France were at odds over goings on in the
Middle East, nor the last. The treaty
didn’t hold. Two years later it was Britain that signed a treaty with Persia, forcing the French this time to buzz off.
The treaty was named after the castle in which it was
signed. Finckenstein Castle, what’s left
of it after the Russians burned it down in 1945, is located in what was once
West Prussia and today is Poland. Napoleon I (yes, that one, born Napoleone di
Buonaparte in 1769) actually lived here with his mistress, Maria Walewska, who
abandoned husband and child for the honor.
Josephine had pissed him off when she took up with Hippolyte Charles, and Maria was only one of
his many mistresses.
Finckenstein Castle was owned by a man named Finck. Finck von Finckenstein. Actually, Count Albrecht Konrad Reinhold
Finck von Finckenstein. The Finck von
Finckenstein family lost it eventually to the Schlobittens – the
Dohna-Schlobittens, to be more precise, who lived in it till the Russians
burned it down. Before they did, Greta
Garbo and Charles Boyer made a movie in it, the 1937 film titled Conquest.
During the 1960s I lived along with several friends who
would become friends for life in a military barracks in Finckensteinallee in
the Southwestern Berlin suburb of Lichterfelde.
I can’t be sure the street was named after the castle, but how many
Finckensteins are there running around, I ask you? These friends included Craig Buchanan, Jerry
Rodgers and Merrill Van de Graaff, all three now passed on, and Bob Grous and
Ed Schanda and me, still very much alive and well. The barracks was known by its snootier French
name, “caserne.” Andrews Kaserne, in
German; Andrews Caserne in English.
Andrews Kaserne had been built originally in 1873-74 as the Imperial
"Hauptkadettenanstalt" - the main military academy of the newly
formed German Empire under Bismarck. Just before the Americans took possession in
1945 it had been the home of Adolph Hitler’s personal guard, a fact that lent
an air of some discomfort at times when sleep was slow to come.
From Andrews Caserne in Finckenstein Allee to the Standesamt
– the official records office where weddings are performed – next to the city hall
in Zehlendorf – is a 40-minute walk.
Seven minutes by car, I am informed by Google Maps.
That’s where Ed Schanda married his childhood sweetheart
Bonnie, from Southeast Missouri, on this day, fifty-one years ago. Bob Grous and I were the witnesses.
Finckenstein Castle had nothing to do with it.
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