cahn

In our last installment, our heroes found that Henri de Catt's memoirs, a major source for current biographers of Frederick the Great, are not to be trusted!!

rheinsberg

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From:

mildred_of_midgard

Yes, the copying job on this was terrible, and disappointing once I realized 80% of it was blank pages and that last page. But still really good to have!

He‘s informed by „two captains“ who also tell him they‘re ordered to force him to watch and will have to drag him to the window if he can‘t go on his own.

That's interesting, because it meas this story was floating around without coming from Fritz, and any memoirist who reports it isn't necessarily getting it from Fritz, or even from someone who was inside the room. *However*, Fritz fainting seems to be real, since he reports it to Mitchell. Since the fainting is in the pamphlet, that means word got out from inside that room pretty quickly. Seeing as how Fritz fainting isn't something an eyewitness of the execution could tell from outside. Since Wilhelmine says doctors were immediately sent for, that makes sense. That was probably known throughout the town by evening November 6.

Katte keeps eye contact with him right until death.

On the one hand, this is obviously something anyone in the history of ever would supply to spice up the narrative, but, on the other, if we trust the sources that say that Fritz couldn't see over the ones that say he could, it's possible that what really happened was that Katte kept looking in the direction of the Schloss where Fritz was. Which is what I always imagined, because I think he's clinging to every anchor he can grab in order to keep his calm exterior, and Fritz is going to be a major focal point. I think Katte's got a voice in the back--or front--of his mind chanting, "This is for Fritz, do it for Fritz, it's okay, it's worth it, Fritz is worth it."

Also, I agree the pamphlet is based largely off an eyewitness report, and if you consider that there were 150 eyewitnesses from the garrison, plus a handful of others, the source is most likely one or more of them. And as I said in another comment, since all contemporaries agree that Fritz could see the execution from where he was, it must not have been at all obvious to them that he couldn't. If nothing else, even if they can tell that Fritz's room isn't visible, they can't be certain that Fritz hasn't been moved to a room with a better view. So if Katte was staring at the Schloss or Weisskopf until the end, everyone outside is going to assume that Fritz is looking back.

And thus FW gets a report that Fritz *totally* watched, and fainted afterwards (I figured that's what Münchow/Schack/Lepel told him, and it's nice to see a contemporary account that says exactly that!).

Pamphlet says Hand-Fuß, not „Hand-Kuß“, but I think that‘s simply a letter misprint, because a foot instead of a kiss makes no sense here.

OOOHHH. Duh. I was wondering what that hand-foot gesture was, knew there were stories about final kiss-blowing, but was wondering if hand-foot was some kind of crazy German idiom like English "raining cats and dogs," and completely forgot the German word for kiss. Thanks!

The divergences - the hour of execution, Fritz watching and fainting after, not before, Katte keeping eye contact - can be simply yellow press need for even more drama.

Yes, and also inaccuracies that inevitably creep into any story through the course of transmission. If something happened at 7:45 am, I wouldn't necessarily expect everyone to remember it didn't happen at 10 am and for that number to be preserved two months later hundreds of miles away. Especially since the date is also wrong (Nov 9 instead of Nov 6), and I'm not entirely sure Nov 9 fits a yellow press need. Unless you can think of something.

And as for the story that Fritz watched and fainted afterward, as noted, that's not only the yellow press need, that's the "I, Münchow and Lepel, don't want my own head chopped off by FW for not making Fritz watch" need. Plus, any given eyewitness was either inside or outside, and the outside eyewitnesses couldn't see what happened inside and vice versa. And let's be real, even if the execution had taken place directly under Fritz's window, one, it's hard for people outside a building to see inside a room through the window anyway, and two, when Katte's head rolls directly in front of you, are you really staring at Fritz's window and timing the moment at which you don't see him any more vis-a-vis the moment the head falls? You're watching either the executioner or Katte. And then when you look up and see Fritz isn't there any more, you conclude that he fainted afterward. No conscious invention necessary.

And since everyone who was in the room is repeating that version of the story loudly, where FW can hear them...actually, much to my surprise, I'm backing myself into a corner where the only account according to which Fritz fainted *before* has to come from Fritz. First to Wilhelmine, presumably, who passes it on to Pöllnitz.

And the only other source that explicitly has Fritz fainting before, not after...is Catt. Who has Fritz saying that he avoided seeing the execution only by dint of fainting first.

Which, as I've pointed out, makes sense if Fritz hadn't been told he wasn't going to have to see the head fall, if afterward everyone is proclaiming to his father that he did, and if when he woke up, he wasn't surprised at not seeing the body because he assumed it was taken away (whereas outside perspectives know it was left until 2 pm), and if his accounts don't report a sand heap because he never saw one, because it was out of sight. Which is why the accounts that might come at least partly from him, Wilhelmine and Voltaire, supply scaffolds.

And you know, if the dominant narrative is that Fritz saw it, if very few people know he didn't, if Catt didn't have access to Wilhelmine (okay, darn, he had access to Pöllnitz, but their accounts are so radically different that I don't see a link), if the *obvious* and *sensationalist* account is that Fritz saw the execution and fainted afterwards, and two people independently making up something less obvious and less exciting would be very strange...

I think the Catt account is real, as in, comes from Fritz. I think the conversation happened after the diary ends in 1760, not remotely on the date that it's reported in the memoirs, where we've seen that Catt clumsily stitches together a bunch of disparate anecdotes and leaves his seams showing, but

1) We know Fritz talked about the execution with Mitchell.

2) We know Fritz talked about Küstrin with Catt.

When I started writing this post, I was 50/50 on Catt getting his Katte account from Fritz vs. fleshing out Voltaire with what he'd heard from other sources. Well, I still think he was reading Voltaire based on that one sentence I pasted earlier, but I'm now like 80/20 on Catt getting his account from Fritz. Which means I suspect Voltaire did too.

Thiébault, though, I think is getting his account from Pöllnitz (probably written rather than orally, or at least not solely orally), possibly Voltaire, and whatever else was floating around by 1804. T's account doesn't have any of the hallmarks of a Fritz account, and even his actual memoirs have more in common with Pöllnitz and Wilhelmine than with Catt, Voltaire, and Mitchell. No, one exception: T has Fritz calling simply "mon ami," and nothing from Katte, and doesn't report any of the variants of Fritz begging Katte's pardon and Katte's last words telling Fritz there's nothing to forgive. The absence of that dialogue is one element I think was probably a feature of Fritz's account, where I can easily imagine Fritz absolutely did not want to recount his last exchange with Katte with people he wasn't really that close to. I.e. I think Wilhelmine got a much more detailed and emotional account from him.

Well, leaving T aside, the important thing is I now think Catt's account is very likely to be real, based on Mitchell + the fainting taking place before rather than after.

Btw, Münchow, Jr. has Fritz *about* to faint, and, since he's the sole 18th century source so far who doesn't believe Fritz could see the execution site from his room, he obviously believes it was triggered by that last exchange with Katte and not by the sight of the execution itself. Which tells me that maybe after FW was dead, Münchow, Sr. started talking, at least with his family, about how Fritz didn't see the execution after all.

One more detail that varies: who informed Fritz of the upcoming execution? According to the pamphlet, two captains. According to Wilhelmine, Lepel and Münchow. According to Münchow fils, Lepel and Münchow. But according to Catt and Voltaire, "an old officer and four/several grenadiers."

So either Voltaire is making it up and Catt is copying him, which I now think is unlikely, or else there's this possible reconciliation: Münchow and Lepel as the two men of rank that are worth mentioning, plus several officers there to wrangle the reluctant boy to the window if necessary. Lepel, 73 years old, is the one who breaks the news to Fritz. Münchow is present, but Fritz is too busy freaking out at the time to remember all the details three decades later, or possibly just doesn't consider the presence of another officer important enough to be worth reporting, when there are much bigger deals going on, like the part where his boyfriend is about to die.

Though there is one alternate explanation, if the whole thing (the pamphlet) is intended as a moral lesson for disobedient sons to lead a more Christian life.

That did occur to me as well, but if you say there's nothing else to reinforce it...I, as a sensational gossip-monger who would have paid for this pamphlet (but thankfully didn't have to :P), am going with "Shame on FW!"

That Fritz post fainting „isn‘t seen or heard of“ anymore is one of those details that make me believe someone did get an eyewitness account and then proceeded to juice it up.

Now that sounds like yellow press to me! Wilhelmine's version has Fritz on the verge of death for three days, but I believe Müller's report to FW has him and Fritz chatting about predestination the next day, so I think Wilhelmine is juicing that part up herself, out of sympathy for Fritz, and general sensationalism.

Thanks so much for this write-up. It turned out to be surprisingly helpful in developing my thoughts about the reliability of the Catt account.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Okay, my write-up is posted, and well over 6,000 words. To spare you reading all of them, here are my conclusions, without presenting the evidence and the cases for and against:

FW definitely orders Lepel to make Fritz watch.

Presumably for reasons of compassion, Lepel and Münchow agree to stop just short of holding the execution where Fritz can see. In order to achieve plausible deniability for themselves, they do everything they can short of holding the execution in his line of view.

1) They position the execution site very close to his window.
2) They tell Fritz he's going to have to watch.
3) They have him dragged to the window when it's time.
4) They have Katte marched by his window.

Combining all those points, it wouldn't have been difficult to write a report afterward that conveyed to FW the impression that Fritz watched the execution, nor to convince everyone who was present that he had been watching.

Having made these plans, they come to Fritz's room, crying. He believes that this means he's going to die. Lepel breaks the news to him about Katte, and they have the accompanying grenadiers drag Fritz to the window.

While Fritz is being held there, Katte is marched past. Fritz begs for his forgiveness, and Katte replies there's nothing to forgive. Fritz thrusts his arm out the window (possibly to blow a kiss).

Fritz faints. Katte is marched to the execution site, out of Fritz's view. He stands in a circle of 150 men while the sentence is read. He may gaze the whole time in the direction of the building where Fritz is being held. He refuses a blindfold, takes off his wig, pulls a cap over his eyes, kneels in the sand. His head is removed with one stroke.

None of the 150 men can tell that Fritz can't see Katte from where he is.

Katte's body is covered with a black cloth, then left there until 2 pm, when the townspeople come to bury him, per FW's orders.

Meanwhile, Fritz is unconscious. Word spreads at Küstrin that he has fainted. Perhaps this happens when a doctor is sent for. When Fritz wakes, he can't see a body or any signs of an execution site, and he assumes it's all been removed. He spends the rest of his life believing that the only reason he didn't watch was that he fainted.

The official report from Lepel and co. to FW goes out stating that Fritz watched and was so impressed that he fainted afterwards. Eyewitnesses also report that he watched.

The pamphlet, from the perspective of someone watching the execution, believes that Fritz watched, and that he fainted after seeing the head roll.

Fritz somehow, perhaps through a smuggled letter, conveys to Wilhelmine that he thought he was going to be executed, that he was dragged to the window, that he saw Katte go by, and that he fainted before he could see the execution. He mentions nothing about the execution site or any body, because he never saw either.

Wilhelmine writes her memoirs on the basis of a long-since destroyed letter, a memory of a conversation many years ago, or both. She is not on speaking terms with Fritz at the time she's writing, she doesn't have access to the archives, and she can't let on that she's producing her memoirs. She compiles as many accounts of the November 6 events as she can and tries to make a coherent and exciting narrative out of them. Her perspective on what was happening outside the room is very inaccurate, and it informs her thinking on what was happening inside the room.

Pöllnitz, whom we know was in Bayreuth in 1744, when she was writing her memoirs, sits down and talks to her about what happened. They agree on an account and both render it in their respective memoirs, with something like 90% agreement on detail and overlap in wording, but not so much that I have reason to believe one was reading the draft of the other. She doesn't let on to him that she's writing memoirs (otherwise it would have become public knowledge, thanks to the notoriously talkative Pöllnitz).

In the 1750s, Fritz gives Voltaire a probably abbreviated account of what he told Wilhelmine. He also gives Mitchell an account in 1757. It's unclear how much Mitchell is summarizing or reporting everything he was told, but he writes down what he knows in 1757. Voltaire's memoirs aren't published until 1784, posthumously.

At some point after Catt's diary ends, Fritz also tells this story to Catt. It's unknown when Catt composed his memoirs or how late in the century he was still editing it, but at some point, he hears about Katte. In his memoirs, he assigns that anecdote to April 1758, in a conversation that also contains a lot of other stories that he's heard at various times from various people, including but not limited to Fritz.

Fritz may or may not tell this story to Thiébault during the 1760s or 70s. Thiébault almost certainly refers to Pöllnitz, published 1791, when writing his memoirs to be published in 1804, and quite likely to Voltaire, published in 1784.

At some point in the 1740s, Münchow the father tells his family about the Katte execution, with reference to the fact that Fritz did *not* have to watch. He also says that he and Lepel were in the room at the time, and they made Fritz sit down and drink something before he fainted.

In the 1790s, the son of Münchow writes the first account that we know of that states that Fritz was not in a position to watch. Until now, everyone has either said that he did watch it, or that he fainted just in time to avoid seeing it. Münchow was a child at the time, an eyewitness, and represents the outsider perspective, with a secondhand knowledge of the insider perspective through his father. He does not know about FW's order to make Fritz watch and concludes that there was none, because he can't imagine Lepel would engage in civil disobedience like that. He is probably our most reliable source on what the layout of Küstrin was like in the 1730s, since he lived there.

In 1804, Thiébault's memoirs are published.

In 1810, Wilhelmine's memoirs are published.

In 1860, Thiébault's memoirs are condensed and rewritten by someone else after his death, massively plagiarizing the Katte execution scene from Wilhelmine's memoirs.

In the 1860s, Theodor Hoffbauer publishes an investigation of two questions: Where was Katte executed? Did Fritz really watch? He concludes that Fritz couldn't see the execution site, and positions the execution site accordingly.

From:

cahn

Thank you for this -- this all sounds very plausible and appears to explain all the evidence we have. (Amazing how much more we know than when you originally formulated the documentary hypothesis!)

(And I did read your rheinsberg post! :) )