The New International Encyclopædia/Busch, Moritz

BUSCH, bụsh, Moritz (1821-99). A German publicist. He was born in Dresden, studied theology and philosophy in Leipzig, and began literary life as a translator of Dickens, Thackeray, and other English authors. In 1851 he visited the United States, and on his return published Wanderungen zwischen Hudson und Mississippi (1853) and Die Mormonen (1857). He then engaged in newspaper work, and attracted Bismarck's attention by his articles in the Grenzboten. On April 1, 1870, he received an appointment in the German Foreign Office, but his real function was that of a reporter for the press to Prince Bismarck. From that time and for many years he was the inseparable companion and confidant of the Chancellor, taking daily notes of his sayings and doings, and earning for himself the title of ‘Bismarck's Boswell.’ In 1878 he published a part of his diary, kept during the Franco-Prussian War, under the title of Graf Bismarck und seine Leute während des Kriegs mit Frankreich; this was published also in English in 1879. In 1884 he published the life of his hero, which was soon issued in an English translation under the title Our Chancellor. Two months after the death of Bismarck Dr. Busch published a large work, which was immediately translated into English under the title Bismarck: Some Secret Pages of His History (1898).