During this period he issued Lieder der Gegenwart (“Songs of the present,” 1842) and Zensurflüchtlinge (“Refugees from censoring,” 1843) - the poetical fruits of his political enthusiasm.

He met with immediate success, and beginning as a dramaturge in Königsberg with Der Blinde von Alcala (1846) and Lord Byron in Italien (1847), he went on to Hamburg where he occupied a similar position.

Gottschall was raised, in 1877, by the king of Prussia to the hereditary nobility with the prefix "von," having been previously made a Geheimer Hofrat by the Grand Duke of Weimar.

The Deutschen Schachbund (DSB) was founded in Leipzig on 18 July 1877 by athletes and intellectuals such as Adolf Anderssen, Rudolf Gottschall, Hermann Zwanziger, Max Lange and Carl Göring.

Pitt und Fox (1854) was never surpassed by his other lighter dramas, among which may be mentioned Die Welt des Schwindels and Der Spion von Rheinsberg.

The tragedies, Mazeppa, Catharine Howard, Amy Robsart and Der Gotze von Venedig, were very successful; and the historical novels, Im Banne des schwarzen Adlers (1875; 4th ed., 1884), Die Erbschaft des Blutes (1881), Die Tochter Rübezahls (1889), and Verkümmerte Existenzen (1892), enjoyed a high degree of popularity.