ABSTRACT
Ralf Roth Introduction This anthology concerns significant financial transactions that have taken place across national borders. In this context, the present article will focus on a major investor, the German ‘railway king’ Bethel Henry Strousberg. Strousberg first established railway shares not only as an act of national unification but also to create an extensive Europe-wide network in the 1860s. He worked together with British investors on the construction of some of the German railway lines and later invested a great deal of his own capital in foreign countries like Russia, Hungary, and Romania. In this contribution, the role of this German financier will be discussed within the framework of the following questions: 1. When and why were railway investments coming from foreign investors of great importance to the construction of the German railway network? 2. How difficult was it for foreign investors to realise their interests in light of German railway law and Prussian government policy? 3. What were the economic and political consequences of railway investments across the borders?
