Loool, well, I see Wilhelmine isn't the only one who can be savage about her relatives!
No kidding. I do wonder whether he's speaking out of the general assumption any daughter of FW is probably as mad as FW, or whether Wilhelmine was in right in her memoirs that her old governess Leti told Lady Darlington/Gräfin Kielmannsegg all kind of negative things about her, of which the story of her having uneven shoulders (a la grandpa F1) was but one. (But the one which she had to undress in front of Hannover ladies for when Mom wanted to prove she had a straight back.)
Well, those are very different things! I do remember wondering what evidence there was about the plan to sneak off and marry Wilhelmine, it seemed very unlikely. Seems like maybe it was too good to be true? Or maybe the second version was the cover-up story. :P
Since Dennison is a good biographer who does footnotes and source references, I can tell you he has both stories from: Vivian, Frances: A life of Frederick, Prince of Wales, 1707 - 1751: A Connoiseur of the Arts. The Edwin Mellen Press, Lewiston, 2006. He does not mention who Vivian's primary sources were.
ETA: in the AU where Fritz of Wales shows up in Berlin to marry Wilhelmine and asks for asylum from mean Dad and Mom while he's at it, I've already asked how you think FW would respond; now I'm asking how Wilhelmine and Fritz would?
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Re: The First Iron Lady: A life of Caroline of Ansbach- III: Gloriana
Date: 2021-08-01 10:57 am (UTC)No kidding. I do wonder whether he's speaking out of the general assumption any daughter of FW is probably as mad as FW, or whether Wilhelmine was in right in her memoirs that her old governess Leti told Lady Darlington/Gräfin Kielmannsegg all kind of negative things about her, of which the story of her having uneven shoulders (a la grandpa F1) was but one. (But the one which she had to undress in front of Hannover ladies for when Mom wanted to prove she had a straight back.)
Well, those are very different things! I do remember wondering what evidence there was about the plan to sneak off and marry Wilhelmine, it seemed very unlikely. Seems like maybe it was too good to be true? Or maybe the second version was the cover-up story. :P
Since Dennison is a good biographer who does footnotes and source references, I can tell you he has both stories from: Vivian, Frances: A life of Frederick, Prince of Wales, 1707 - 1751: A Connoiseur of the Arts. The Edwin Mellen Press, Lewiston, 2006. He does not mention who Vivian's primary sources were.
ETA: in the AU where Fritz of Wales shows up in Berlin to marry Wilhelmine and asks for asylum from mean Dad and Mom while he's at it, I've already asked how you think FW would respond; now I'm asking how Wilhelmine and Fritz would?