cahn | Frederick the Great discussion post 12

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Every time I am amazed and enchanted that this is still going on! Truly DW is the Earthly Paradise!

All the good stuff continues to be archived at

rheinsberg :)

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From:

mildred_of_midgard

Letter to Amalie: I've only seen the mention by German wiki, providing this citation:

Christopher Frey: Friedrich von der Trencks Beziehung zu Prinzessin Amalie von Preußen sowie ein bisher unbekannter Brief Trencks. In: Mitteilungen des Instituts für Österreichische Geschichtsforschung, 116. Band, Heft 1–2 (2008), S. 146–158.

Check the library!

From:

selenak

Check the revised Rheinsberg write-up!

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Ooh, nice! For one, that's a really neat detail about Amalie not being able to move her arms, as a corroboration to Trenck's "She didn't let go of my hand for half an hour." I don't think you had told us that?

And since he got arrested at the end of June, and Soor wasn‘t until the end of September, he can‘t have told them that Eichel and the war chest would be around, either...

True, and also my impression is that the plundering of the Prussian camp and train was not an organized effort carried out under orders from superiors, but the officers losing control of the hussars, which happened more than once during Fritz's wars. Loot was seen as one of the major perks of being a soldier, and the hussars were "irregulars" anyway.

It might also be worth adding to

rheinsberg what we found in that Seven Years' War book, that most deserters who requested a pardon were granted one (though usually on condition they rejoined; telling Trenck that he's *not* allowed to rejoin is interesting)?

From:

selenak

Not just interesting but it means the example of deserters getting pardoned in the 7 Years War is useless, since there the motivation is clearly to have more canon fodder. Understandable in a situation where Prussia is rapidly running out not just of soldiers in general but also of officers with any kind of experience or training, the longer the war takes. (Krockow was very good on this, including the reminder than more Prussian officers died in the 7 Years War than at any point of subsequent history until WWII.) Whereas Trenck gets offered his pardon not only in peace time, after the Silesian Wars, when Prussia is doing just fine, but under the explicit condition that he never tries to join the Prussian army again. Ergo: pears and oranges. Can‘t compare.

Amalie‘s physical state: no, I only mentioned near blindness before the end, not the difficulties of moving after what appears to have been a stroke or a series of short ones.

Frey also has some other interesting stuff, including that Thièbault, who is the one having worked for Fritz memoirist who subscribes to the Trenck/Amalie sotry, hadn‘t just read Trenck‘s memoirs, as I had guessed from even the rewritten into two volumes version of Thiebault‘s book, but had met Trenck himself, in 1789 in Paris, and talked to him about this. Unfortunately, this makes the entire thing not more or less plausible, since again, Trenck is Thièbault‘s only source, but it‘s possibly worth noting that Thièbault, who knew Fritz for 20 years, is willing to buy the story.

Then again, Trenck must have been enormously convincing. I mean, he got FW2 to actually order that Trenck was to be paid a pension as an officer of the Prussian army. With retroactive payment covering the Magdeburg years. (Might have been because of FW2‘s general „think about what Uncle Fritz would do, then do the opposite“ mantra, of course.)

Oh, and this happened, since Trenck also got an Austrian pension. Bear in mind he was in Paris twice, once when the Revolution started and once in the middle of the Terreur, when he got himself beheaded.

Trenck: *returns in 1790 from Paris*: Vive la Revolution! A bas les aristocrats! Wow, events in Paris are just awesome. I‘m totally going to publish about this.

Leopold: Who do you think you are, Prinz Heinrich? I might not be willing to commit troops to saving my sister Marie Antoinette, but that kind of thing is not okay. Say farewell to your Austrian pension, Trenck.

Trenck: Habsburg bastard! Fine! I‘m going back to the wonderful land of liberty. While still boasting of my royal connections.

The. Dumbest. Gryffindor.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Not just interesting but it means the example of deserters getting pardoned in the 7 Years War is useless, since there the motivation is clearly to have more canon fodder

I agree it's pears and oranges, but I disagree that makes it completely useless. Because imagine if we didn't have that example. Imagine if desertion were SUCH an unforgivable crime that you had to execute people for it even when you had a good reason for keeping them around as cannon fodder. Then we'd really only have Peter and Trenck as the exceptions, and the Trenck exception of forgiveness for desertion + initial crime would be mind-blowing.

As it is, there's an abundance of precedent for pardoning of desertion, possibly even during peacetime, and it's plausible that if Fritz can find a reason for letting someone come back, he will. And no, Trenck isn't joining the army again (because of his initial crime that predated the desertion), but he's bringing some money with him, which might not be a lot, but in peacetime might be the equivalent of "one more piece of fodder for cannon." Especially if they are allowing pardons and rejoins in peacetime as well, which means "one more potential piece of fodder in the event we go to war again (which I don't think we are) and you're still here."

The. Dumbest. Gryffindor.

No contest!

From:

selenak

True, the fact that desertion & pardons were a (common) thing under specific circumstances for people other than Peter and Trenck should be mentioned, and I‘ll do it when I‘m back home. (Am in a train now.) But I haver something else for you, which I waited to post until Cahn put up a new post, she says mysteriously.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Have already seen it, read it, and started preparing a reply. Thank you SO MUCH!

It had two magic K words, what can I say? :D I dropped everything.

ETA: Also, I should add that you did already mention in

rheinsberg that pardons were common during wartime, but 1) we have a much more reliable source now than Duffy + Asprey, and 2) that source seems to imply that it was a peacetime practice as well, although I'm not sure. If we *really* care how exceptional Trenck was during peacetime, you could have a gander at that Disziplin und Desertion volume, although limited time is limited, so up to you.

Edited Date: 2020-03-07 03:59 pm (UTC)