Wvs satz final indd

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open for operation in September 1875. Over the following months, 

the cable was broken three times by competitors’ sabotage. The 

attacks ceased only when the results of an independent investiga-

tion were released, confi rming the existence of sabotage, and the 

Faraday was permanently stationed in Halifax to make repairs at 

any time. Nevertheless, Pender was still able to shut out his new 

competitor by making a tender offer to the shareholders of Direct 

United States Cable Co. Ltd.; in 1877 he absorbed the line into his 

own ring of cables. Yet Siemens Brothers remained in the busi-

ness. The company got contracts from France and the 

USA

 to lay 

additional transatlantic cables, and by 1884, Pender’s monopoly 

was fi nally broken.

Keeping employees for the long term 

The international cable projects sharply raised both revenues 

and profi ts at Siemens & Halske. These years made Werner von 

Siemens a wealthy man. In today’s terms, his annual income from 

the Berlin business alone came to about 

EUR

 880,000.

35

 Upper 

management also benefi ted from the rising profi ts – they re-

ceived smaller percentages. In the early 1870s, Germany enjoyed 

an economic boom, and wages rose accordingly. At the same time, 

staff turnover rose with the size of the company’s workforce. In its 

early years, Siemens & Halske’s workers came mainly from the 

crafts environment, and developed a strong loyalty to the company. 

As the number of orders rose in the early 1870s, it now became im-

portant to hire large numbers of employees, many of them even 

untrained; as a rule they developed no long-term ties with a com-

pany and changed employers often. Amid this situation, and under 

the infl uence of the social-reform debates of the day, Werner von 

Siemens began for the fi rst time to consider providing social in-

surance benefi ts through the company. Until then, he had given 

little thought to such issues. In a spirit of “liberal patriarchalism”, 

he expected both good performance and obedience from his em-

ployees.

36

 Despite his benevolent intentions, he seldom became 

involved in his employees’ affairs.

Now he realized that social-insurance benefi ts for the staff 

would also benefi t the company. On the occasion of the company’s 

A view from the bridge of the Fara-

day across the deck, undated photo

1876  

British scientists Sir William Thomson and Sir Frederick Joseph 

Bramwell issue a public report confi rming that competitors had sabotaged 

the transatlantic cable laid by Siemens Brothers. 

1874  

The Faraday is the fi rst ship built specifi cally to lay cable. It is named in 

honor of the discover of electromagnetic induction, Michael Faraday.

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48

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25th anniversary in October 1872, he announced that he had 

founded a Pension, Widows’ and Orphans’ fund for all employees 

in Berlin, London and St. Petersburg.

37

 The three shareholders 

donated 50,000 talers for the purpose; Halske added another 

10,000 talers. The employees were now entitled to a pension – 

a benefi t that few companies offered at the time. Since the amount 

of the pension entitlement depended on how long the person had 

been with the company, employees now had a strong incentive to 

stay at Siemens & Halske. Moreover, the company’s benefi ts were 

intended to make it easier to enforce piecework and to counteract 

the infl uence of the rising socialist workers’ movement on the 

staff. 

Legal document establishing the Pension, 

Widows’ and Orphans’ fund, 1872

1880s  

Chancellor Otto von Bismarck introduces health insurance () and 

accident insurance (). In , the Reichstag approves a retirement and 

disability insurance program. 

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50

51

New family happiness, a change of lifestyle

After his wife Mathilde’s death, Werner von Siemens had fi rmly de-

cided never to marry again. He had no wish to place a stepmother 

over his four children; instead they would grow up with their fa-

miliar caretakers. But when he met Antonie Siemens, a 28-year-old 

distant relative from Hohenheim near Stuttgart, he changed his 

mind. Her father Karl von Siemens, who taught as Professor of Ag-

ricultural Technology at the Land- und Forstwirtschaftliche Hoch-

schule Hohenheim (Hohenheim Technical University for Agricul-

ture and Forestry), was a cousin of Werner’s in the third degree. 

The two men thought highly of one another, but had little contact. 

At the invitation of her uncle Adolf, her father’s  younger brother, 

who was lieutenant colonel in the Prussian Artillery, Antonie 

came to Berlin in March 1869, stayed in the city for some time, and 

was hosted more and more often at Werner’s house. He found the 

tall, young Swabian maiden likeable, and initially considered her 

as a suitable wife for his youngest brother Otto – until he himself 

fell deeply in love with her. Antonie moved into his house, and in 

May the wedding announcements were sent out. Werner wrote at 

the time to the wife of his cousin Johann Georg: “I must tell you 

that I’ve been taken in by a clever Swabian trick. Our tall Swabian 

lady has turned me aside from my intent not to marry.”

38

 The 

wedding was held in Hohenheim on July 13, 1869. It was the busi-

nessman’s second marriage to a relative, and in this case as well, 

family trust and the congruity of many personal values may have 

played a role in his decision.

Werner von Siemens and his second wife, 

Antonie, with their children Hertha and 

Carl Friedrich, ca. 1878

1838  

Karl von Siemens is appointed instructor in agricultural 

technology and head of the chemical technical workshop at the Land- 

und Forstwirtschaftliche Hochschule Hohenheim. 

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