Ernest I

▪ duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha

born Jan. 2, 1784, Coburg, Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld [Germany]

died Jan. 29, 1844, Gotha, Saxe-Coburg-Gotha

      duke of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld (as Ernest III) from 1806 and then, from 1826, duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. He was the uncle of Queen Victoria and the father of her husband, Prince Albert.

      When Ernest succeeded to the Duchy of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld on the death of his father (Francis) in 1806, the duchy was occupied by Napoleon, and Ernest did not recover it until the peace of Tilsit (July 1807). He commanded the Saxon V army corps in 1813–14 and reduced Mainz by blockade; he also took part in the campaign of 1815. At the Congress of Vienna he received the principality of Lichtenberg, which he sold to Prussia in 1834.

      In 1826, after the death of his brother-in-law Frederick, the last duke of Saxe-Gotha (1825), Ernest gave up Saalfeld and received Gotha, becoming Ernest I of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. In 1821 he had given a constitution to Coburg, but he did not change the traditional system of estates in Gotha. He married twice: (1) in 1817, Louise of Saxe-Gotha, whom he divorced in 1826; (2) in 1832, Mary of Württemberg. Of his sons, Ernest (b. 1818) succeeded him, and Albert (b. 1819) married Queen Victoria of Great Britain. His brother Leopold (1790–1865) became king of the Belgians and his sister Victoria (1786–1861) was Queen Victoria's mother.

▪ duke of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg

byname  Ernest The Pious,  German  Ernst Der Fromme 

born Dec. 25, 1601, Altenburg, Saxony [Germany]

died March 26, 1675, Gotha, Saxe-Gotha

      duke of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg, who, after the ravages of the Thirty Years' War, sought to rebuild and reform his country.

      An ardent Lutheran, Ernest allied himself with the Swedes from 1631, fighting in the battles of Lech, Nürnberg, Lützen, and Nördlingen. In 1635 he signed the Peace of Prague and turned to the governing of his duchy, making it eventually one of the most prosperous areas of Germany.

      Ernest's educational reforms—made with the help of Veit Ludwig von Seckendorf and Andreas Reyher (a disciple of John Amos Comenius)—were so fundamental that he might be called the real founder of the modern common school system in Germany. A set of school regulations entitled Schulmethodus (“School Method”; 1642; revised 1648, 1658, 1662, 1672), compiled under his direction, instituted such ideas as compulsory education, grading, and an enlarged curriculum to embrace sciences, civics, and other “useful” subjects. He also established the ducal library of Gotha and generally, through his patronage, set the stage for the German Enlightenment.

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