William, Count of Nassau-Siegen (13 August 1592 – 17 July 1642), , official titles: Graf zu Nassau, Katzenelnbogen, Vianden und Diez, Herr zu Beilstein, was Count of Nassau-Siegen, a part of the County of Nassau from 1624 to 1642. A member of the House of Nassau-Siegen, a cadet branch of the Ottonian Line of the House of Nassau, he was a professional soldier who served in the armies of the Hanseatic League and the Republic of Venice, then with the Dutch States Army during the Eighty Years War. Promoted field marshal in 1633, he was successively governor of Emmerich, Heusden and Sluis.
Personal details William was born in Dillenburg on 13 August 1592,Huberty, et al. (1981), p. 234. the fifth son of Count John VII 'the Middle' of Nassau-Siegen and his first wife, Countess Magdalene of Waldeck-Wildungen.Dek (1970), p. 87.Dek (1968), p. 249.Vorsterman van Oyen (1882), p. 116. He studied in HeidelbergLück (1981), p. 100.Blok (1911), p. 1572. and then went – along with the later 'Winter King' Frederick of the PalatinateFrederick of the Palatinate was the eldest son of Countess Louise Juliane of Nassau, the eldest daughter of Prince William I 'the Silent' of Orange and Duchess Charlotte of Bourbon-Montpensier. – to the court of Henri de La Tour d'Auvergne,Henri de La Tour d'Auvergne had been married since 1595 to Countess Elisabeth of Nassau, the second daughter of Prince William I 'the Silent' of Orange and Duchess Charlotte of Bourbon-Montpensier. the Duke of Bouillon, in Sedan. With Landgrave Otto of Hesse-KasselOtto was the eldest son of Landgrave Maurice of Hesse-Kassel from his first marriage to Agnes of Solms-Laubach. Maurice remarried in 1603 to William's sister Juliane. William visited England.
Career William began his military career in 1610 in his father's army in the Upper Palatinate. In 1615 he was captain in the Army of the Hanseatic League to end the siege of Brunswick. In 1617 he joined his eldest brother John Ernest, who was a general for the Republic of Venice in the Uskok War.
After the end of the Twelve Years' Truce in 1621, William recruited troops for the Dutch Republic in the County of Nassau and entered the Dutch States Army in that same year. He was appointed colonel of the infantry on 24 July 1622, but lived in Siegen until 1625.Huberty, et al. (1981), p. 288. In 1625 he became governor of Emmerich, then of Heusden from 1626 to 1637. The States of Holland refused on 25 November 1626 to make an exception for William to the rule that no military charges could be accumulated, and the Gecommitteerde Raden of Holland decided on 12 December 1626 not to oppose a proposed increase in William's salary in the States General but to allow it to fade away. At the baptism of his daughter Hollandine in March 1628, the States of Holland were prepared to sponsor, complete with a baptismal giftPoelhekke (1978), p. 146. (which meant they were willing to spend money on an annuity for life).
During the Siege of 's-Hertogenbosch in 1629, William had his headquarters in ,Poelhekke (1978), p. 264. from where 's-Hertogenbosch was first shelled on 15 May.Poelhekke (1978), p. 275. Accompanied by 24 companies of infantry and some cavalry, William was sent to the Bommelerwaard by Prince Frederick Henry of Orange to prevent an invasion by Hendrik Graaf van den Bergh, then commander of the Army of Flanders.Poelhekke (1978), p. 272. In the year 1629, William's salary was £400, equivalent to in , per month.
In the winter of 1629–1630, William was sent with his troops east of the Rhine to Cleves, Mark, Jülich and Berg, but without providing sufficient funds. In January 1630, Hendrik van der Capellen, gecommiteerde ter velde (representative of the States General of the Dutch Republic at the Dutch State Army), complained in a letter to Prince Frederick Henry that if the Dutch garrisons of Duisburg and Essen did not receive one month's pay immediately, () and cause the citizens to leave those cities. The prince argued in response that it were () to worry about this, because after all (). In Soest Walraven van Gendt also complained but the presence of these soldiers forced the Spanish troops to withdraw from Unna, Hamm and Lippstadt, leaving them to the Dutch. In fact, William's troops returned in 1630 after some unrest over their overdue pay, albeit in a rather desolate state.Poelhekke (1978), p. 340–341.
In 1631 William purchased the heerlijkheid of Poederoijen on the River Meuse. During the in 1632, William and his troops initially kept an eye on the situation near the front in Zeeland until he was summoned by Prince Frederick Henry of Orange to the Siege of Maastricht in late July.Poelhekke (1978), p. 381. William captured the Kruisschans on the Scheldt and and other sconces near Antwerp, later Orsoy, in the following year the Sterreschans and those of Philippine in . In 1632 William was appointed ritmeester of the cuirassiers and in April 1633 succeeded his uncle Count Ernest Casimir of Nassau-Diez as Field marshal.Koenhein & Heniger (1999), p. 23.
In 1636, the strongly defended Schenkenschanz was captured from the Spanish by William and his brother John Maurice.Lück (1981), p. 104. In 1637, William became governor of Sluis and took part in the Siege of Breda; being paid £7000, equivalent to in , for his service. In support of his planned attack on Antwerp, in 1638 Prince Frederick Henry entrusted William with an important undertaking, the occupation of the levee at Calloo. Having taken the sconces of Stabroek and Calloo and chased off their Spanish defenders, William stopped and awaited reinforcements instead of continuing his march. Receiving false intelligence that a larger Spanish force was approaching, he hastily retreated but was caught and defeated at the Battle of Kallo on 17 June. He lost over 2,000 men, including his son Maurice Frederick,Muller (1898), p. 133.Van der Aa (1877), p. 270. which meant Frederick Henry's entire enterprise failed. During the in 1641, William received a musket shot in the abdomen, from which he later succumbed.
Count of Nassau-Siegen
Settlement of the succession by Count John VII 'the Middle'
Because the county of Nassau-Siegen was so small (it had about 9,000 inhabitants and yielded an annual revenue of about 13,000 guilders) William's father John VII 'the Middle' decided that the county should not be divided again. He made a will and testament in 1607, which stated that only the eldest son would rule and the other children should be compensated with money or offices. As one of the most convinced advocates of Protestantism, it was particularly painful for John that his second son, John 'the Younger', converted to the Catholic Church in 1613. In a codicil of 8 October 1613 he explicitly stipulated that his heirs had to keep the land in the Reformed confession. At first, the conversion of John 'the Younger' did not change this house law established by the will, because John Ernest was the eldest son.Lück (1981), p. 99.
To the surprise of his relatives, John 'the Younger' joined the Spaniards in 1617, the opponents of the House of Nassau and the Dutch Republic. In the same year, his older brother John Ernest died in the service of the Republic of Venice. John 'the Middle' had to decide whether an enemy of Nassau and the Netherlands could remain his heir.Lück (1981), p. 123. On 15 November 1617, John declared his will of 8 April 1607 to be null and void.Lück (1981), p. 124. Abolition of the primogeniture would have meant a division of the small country and John opposed all proposals in that direction. In an amicable agreement, he had his son sign a declaration on 31 December 1617, in which the latter declared that, although he remained a Catholic, he would not force his subjects to any other than the existing religious confession. On 22 December 1618 John drew up a second will, which promulgated the promises of his son as a condition and still held on to the primogeniture. He imposed the penalty of disinheritance on the introduction of 'papism'.
Why John 'the Middle' still distrusted his son, in spite of the latter's confirmations, cannot be fully elucidated. Maybe it was because John 'the Younger' loudly proclaimed that no power in the world could prevent him from succeeding in Nassau-Siegen, because the power of the Emperor and the King of Spain was behind him. Perhaps John 'the Middle' also knew the influence of the de Ligne family and the Catholic clergy on his son. It is certain that such rumours were conveyed to him from all sides and that his relatives and other Protestant estates of the realm warned him again and again about his son. Only when John 'the Middle' was convinced that his son was under the influence of the Jesuits and that the possibility of a Catholic area within the Nassau lands was a danger to the Protestant inhabitants, was he persuaded to make a new will. On 3 July 1621 John 'the Middle' drew up a third will, in which he laid down that the small county of Nassau-Siegen, which was barely able to support one lord, was to be split into three parts. His three eldest sons, John 'the Younger', William and John Maurice, were to receive one third each. The administration of the city of Siegen would remain in joint ownership.Huberty, et al. (1981), p. 247.
For John 'the Younger', only one third of the county was provided for in the third will. On 6 August 1621, he was informed of this, with a statement of the reasons that had led his father to take this step. On 9 May 1623, i.e. not until two years later, John 'the Younger' protested against this with a letter from Frankfurt to the councillors of Siegen. He had not been idle and had not hesitated to denounce his father to the Emperor. At the time of his letter of protest he was certainly already aware of the , which Emperor Ferdinand II officially issued some time later, on 27 June 1623, informing John 'the Middle' that at the time of making his third will as a fellow combatant of the outlawed Winter King he was not entitled to make a will. He had to revoke it and answer to an imperial court within two months. It seems that John 'the Younger' then shrank from having the imperial decree delivered to his seriously ill father. John 'the Middle' died at on 27 September 1623. None of the three sons mentioned in the will were present at the death of their father. On 13 October William and John Maurice arrived in Siegen, and on 26 October John 'the Younger'.Lück (1981), p. 126.
Succession dispute Everyone knew that there would be a dispute at the reading of the will on 11 December 1623. John 'the Younger' had the imperial decree read out and when his brothers demurred, he said as he stood up '' ('The Emperor will part us!'). He had taken the precaution of obtaining a further imperial decree on 20 November 1623 against Countess Dowager Margaret and her sons, in which the Emperor strictly forbade impeding John's assumption of government, his taking possession of the land and his inauguration. On 12 January 1624, John 'the Younger' was able to accept the homage from the town of Siegen but only because he had secretly let a squadron of selected horsemen into the town through the castle gate (that is, not through a city gate) in a heavy snowstorm, so that they could not be seen or heard by the town guards.