3-046-946 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Imperial Festivities at Berlin: crowd at the illuminations, Serenade by Prussian Guards, 1872. Celebrations 'at Berlin upon the occasion of the visit of the Emperor of Russia and the Emperor of Austria to the Emperor of Germany...1200 bandsmen of Prussian Guards, under the palace windows, [played] not only the Austrian National Hymn and the Radetzky March, but the national tunes of Russia and Prussia, ending with the tremendous Zapfenstreich, or Retreat...The electric light on the roof of the palace, mingling with the red and green Bengal lights, and the yellow glare of torches carried by a procession in the square, had a bewildering effect. In the chief streets of the city, Unter den Linden and the Wilhelm-Strasse, the illuminations brought together a vast crowd of spectators, and there was a crush in one place by which several persons were killed'. From "Illustrated London News", 1872.