Christian Gunther Bernstorff

Born Apr. 3,1769, in Copenhagen; died Mar. 28, 1835, in Berlin. Danish and Prussian statesman and diplomat. Son of A. P. Bernstorff.

From 1797 to 1810, Bernstorff was Danish minister of foreign affairs. In 1800 he was instrumental in bringing Denmark into the second league of countries neutral to Napoleonic France, the alliance that had been created by the Russian emperor Pavel I. Bernstorff tried to conduct a policy of neutrality, but after the outbreak of the Anglo-Danish War of 1807–14, he concluded a military alliance with France. In 1814–15 he took part in the Congress of Vienna. In 1818, Bernstorff entered the Prussian service and served as the Prussian minister of foreign affairs until 1832. In 1818 he took part in the Aix-la-Chapelle Congress of the Holy Alliance.