QUEEN KRUPP.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXVIII, Issue 7965, 16 February 1906, Page 3

QUEEN KRUPP.

•■ Bertha Krapp, the daughter of the great gunmaker, ht»B reoeived a new title, "Queen Krapp," by which she is known all round Essen. Her income goea on increasing; so does her state and power. The reserve of the Essen works, according to a balancesheet jnst published, amounts now to nearly £20,000,000, aod the young woman's net income for the year .ending November 30th from the Esßen works alone was £6d0.000. If we add that from mines, shipbuilding and other concerns, the total amount will be close to one million. Bertha Krnpp is absolute owner of her kingdom; in Essen aloue she has 40 000 workers toiling for her, who with their families make a total "of more than 200,000 persons dependent on her nod. If other concerns be added we have a total of '300,000 dependents. Thousands of engines, tens of thousands of men, are daily ooiniug gold for her. She owns gasworks, railways, telegraphs, telephones, her own bakeries, Blaughter-houaes and general storeß. ■Her subjects are under her sceptre as under no other ruler's throughout the empire. She has even her own army, regularly drilled, with stern rules of discipline; it is called a fire brigade, but is as much a body of picked troops a 9 any in Germany. Her army numbers more than nine hundred men, all well armed. Sentinels march up and down the terrace of her castle, and there are pickets throughout the grounds. To got at "the queen'' you must first pass hor incorruptible guards. She has also police and a secret service. Finally, she has ambassadors in every Court in Europe. They rcay not bjo known in the regular diplomatic) world as eucb, but they are there all the same, and are a power to be reckoned with.