De facto, however, most Princes on German soil were not willing to give up sovereignty and resisted it, so it did not succeed on land, with the German Confederation being restored a year later. On the other hand, this first and democratic German Empire, with its small Reichsflotte (Imperial Fleet) founded a year earlier, fought the First War of Schleswig at sea with the Battle of Heligoland. The fleet's black-red-gold war ensign was one of the first instances of the official use of the modern republican Flag of Germany.