Historical Characters, Including Frederick the Great, Discussion Post 44

[cahn]

Not only are these posts still going, there is now (more) original research going on in them deciphering and translating letters in archives that apparently no one has bothered to look at before?? (Which has now conclusively exonerated Fritz's valet/chamberlain Fredersdorf from the charge that he was dismissed because of financial irregularities and died shortly thereafter "ashamed of his lost honor," as Wikipedia would have it. I'M JUST SAYING.)

Comments

Re: Catherine, Poniatowski, Hanbury-Williams

[mildred_of_midgard]

But still, as I said when reading the two books on him: he should never have become a diplomat, and how he got a couple of really important assignments is a mystery to me.

The Count de Broglie has an entertaining opinion on that too!

Sir Charles Hanbury Williams appears to have been one of those dissipated diplomatists who are not unfrequently met with in the English legations; whither they are banished by British scruples, which, holding them unworthy to fulfil the serious duties of parliamentary life, consider them fit for the looser ways of the Continent.

In other words, if you have an STD, you get to piss of Fritz and MT??

Anyway, this book is suuuuper entertaining, both the content (Louis XV is telling his diplomats to do the opposite of what the minister of foreign affairs is telling them to do!) and the author's commentary, and I'm going to have to do a write-up on the hilarity so far. :D

Viserys has zero charisma and doesn't manage anything like the 45 though?

Indeed, but specifically the post-45 part, where he's wandering around deluded about his prospects and about how much people back "home" are really invested in getting his family back, and the foreign powers he meets are like, "Look, it's not necessarily that I don't want to invade your country, it's that...nothing about meeting you is inspiring confidence that you would be a great partner in this endeavor." Wikipedia tells me that Charles was reportedly too drunk to talk coherently in the 1771 meeting, so further discussions were canceled. (Not that Viserys was an alcoholic, but BPC's charisma levels dropped way off after 1746.)

(Is George Keith still the Prussian envoy in Versailles at this point?)

No, in 1759, France and Prussia are at war, so no diplomatic representation, and in 1771, Wikipedia tells me the envoy is Wilhelm Bernhard von der Goltz. George Keith's years as envoy were apparently 1751-1754.

Ah, German Wikipedia tells me this Goltz is the same Goltz who was Fritz's ambassador to Peter III. I knew I recognized that name!

Also I think Suhm would not have infected his wife with syphilis.

I mean, it's clear which envoy *I* prefer. :D