Frederick William II

Frederick William II. (1744-97), nephew and successor of Frederick the Great, inherited none of his qualities. He dissipated the treasure left him by his unole in a war undertaken in favour of his brother-in-law, the Stadtholder of Holland. and alienated his subjects by heavy taxation and by interference, with freedom of thought and religion. He gained territory, including the long-coveted Dantzic and Thorn by the second and third partitions of Poland (1793-95), but he was unsuccessful in obtaining any from France as he had hoped to do by attacking the revolutionary government.