MacDonogh gives the escape attempt in some detail, so while I couldn't have given you all the Spaen detail off the top of my head, I did remember him and Ingersleben.
On Spaen:
In the course of the hearing, [Fritz] carelessly implicated Robert [sic!] Keith, Katte and Lieutenant von Spaen. The last two were arrested as a result.
The prince’s friends the subalterns Spaen and Ingersleben were rounded up and thrown into prison. So too was poor Doris Ritter.
[The court martial's] job was to try Frederick, Katte, Ingersleben, Spaen and Lieutenant Keith. The different members of the court martial delivered their verdicts according to rank on 27 and 28 October. Ingersleben’s offence of running between Frederick and Doris Ritter was considered minor. Suggestions for Ingersleben’s punishment ranged from six weeks’ confinement to quarters (major-generals) to six months’ fortress detention (majors and colonels). Spaen was privy to certain secrets. He merited a stiffer sentence: to be dismissed from his regiment and incarcerated for anything up to six years.
Peter Keith had well and truly deserted. Here the verdicts were consistent with Prussian law. In his garrison the drum should be beaten three times. If Keith did not appear, he should be declared ‘unspeakable’, his sword broken, and his image hanged in effigy.
On 1 November the king wrote from Wusterhausen to confirm the court’s sentences on Spaen and Keith, and pardoned Ingersleben. Others who had simply been close to Frederick were banished: the prince’s librarian Jacques, and the brother and sister von Bülow, who had been friends of Frederick. Duhan de Jandun was exiled to Memel. The Freiherr von Montolieu, who had lent Frederick money, wisely fled before he was asked.
Selena wonders:
So, Spaen - did he exaggarate the degree of his involvement and/or friendship with pre-escape Fritz? I mean, if he got one year of Spandau anyway, he could have dealt with it better by reshaping his relatonship with the Crown Prince to one where he was an intimate friend on the same level as Katte and Keith, he just chose not to come along.
Well, if he said or implied he was on the same level as Keith, I'm going to guess he was exaggerating, based partly on the fact that Wilhelmine didn't see him as a threat! And based partly on the fact that he doesn't seem to have been nearly as involved in the escape as Katte and Keith.
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timeasmymeasure
Re: The Escape Attempt (Nicolai Version)
Date: 2021-03-04 02:38 pm (UTC)On Spaen:
In the course of the hearing, [Fritz] carelessly implicated Robert [sic!] Keith, Katte and Lieutenant von Spaen. The last two were arrested as a result.
The prince’s friends the subalterns Spaen and Ingersleben were rounded up and thrown into prison. So too was poor Doris Ritter.
[The court martial's] job was to try Frederick, Katte, Ingersleben, Spaen and Lieutenant Keith. The different members of the court martial delivered their verdicts according to rank on 27 and 28 October. Ingersleben’s offence of running between Frederick and Doris Ritter was considered minor. Suggestions for Ingersleben’s punishment ranged from six weeks’ confinement to quarters (major-generals) to six months’ fortress detention (majors and colonels). Spaen was privy to certain secrets. He merited a stiffer sentence: to be dismissed from his regiment and incarcerated for anything up to six years.
Peter Keith had well and truly deserted. Here the verdicts were consistent with Prussian law. In his garrison the drum should be beaten three times. If Keith did not appear, he should be declared ‘unspeakable’, his sword broken, and his image hanged in effigy.
On 1 November the king wrote from Wusterhausen to confirm the court’s sentences on Spaen and Keith, and pardoned Ingersleben. Others who had simply been close to Frederick were banished: the prince’s librarian Jacques, and the brother and sister von Bülow, who had been friends of Frederick. Duhan de Jandun was exiled to Memel. The Freiherr von Montolieu, who had lent Frederick money, wisely fled before he was asked.
Selena wonders:
So, Spaen - did he exaggarate the degree of his involvement and/or friendship with pre-escape Fritz? I mean, if he got one year of Spandau anyway, he could have dealt with it better by reshaping his relatonship with the Crown Prince to one where he was an intimate friend on the same level as Katte and Keith, he just chose not to come along.
Well, if he said or implied he was on the same level as Keith, I'm going to guess he was exaggerating, based partly on the fact that Wilhelmine didn't see him as a threat! And based partly on the fact that he doesn't seem to have been nearly as involved in the escape as Katte and Keith.