The Rise of Prussia 1795–1815

After the final annexation of Poland between Prussia, Russia and Austria in 1795, Prussia became part of a coalition that opposed the French in the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. The War of the First Coalition (1792–97) consisted of Austria, Prussia, the Netherlands, Spain, Portugal, the Holy Roman Empire, Naples and Tuscany in opposition to the French First Republic, which was founded after the 1789 French Revolution. By 1795, the French brokered peace with Prussia. This peace ended in 1807 when the French military leader, Napoleon Bonaparte, defeated Prussia and its ally, Russia. Under the Tilsit treaty, Prussia ceded one third of her territories to France. Prussia contributed to the victory over Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815, and was rewarded with the recovery of lost territories and part of western Germany. She also became a member of the German Confederation.