Max Schneckenburger

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Max Schneckenburger (* 18 July 1819 in Talheim near Tuttlingen, Southern Germany; † 3 May 1849 in Burgdorf near Berne, Switzerland) is famous for writing a poem in 1840 that later became the patriotic hymn "Die Wacht am Rhein".

The younger brother of Matthias Schneckenburger was a co-owner or iron blast furnace company, and his business sent him across the Rhine River to Switzerland. Due to this connection, a first version of his poem was set to music and performed there in 1840 by local musicians. This Berne version is now largely forgotten.

The well-known music to his poem was composed by Karl Wilhelm in 1854, five years after his death. After the use of the song in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870/1871 made him (and the composer) famous, his widow and two sons were granted an annual pension of 3000 Mark by Bismarck's Reichskanzleramt. Also, his "Deutsche Lieder" (German songs) could now be published, 1870 in Stuttgart.

On 18 July 1886, his remains were returned to his native town Talheim near Tuttlingen in Germany.

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In a political essay of Schneckenburger in 1840, he calls for a re-arrangement of the "patch work" European borders to on national areas, according to languages spoken, similar to Ernst Moritz Arndt.

Bei der ersten neuen Regulierung Europas muß die Schuhflickerorganisation des Wiener Congresses durch die einzig vernünftige und fürderhin einzig zulässige Eintheilung nach nationalen Grundlagen ersetzt werden. Und einer solchen Eintheilung ist es vorbehalten, Deutschland alle seine nach und nach entfremdeten Provinzen wiederzugeben, wobei Arndts Soweit die deutsche Zunge klingt als das richtige Schema für die Gründung eines neuen Deutschland angenommen wird.