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: Letter from Fritz...to Peter?

[mildred_of_midgard]

That sounds like a good idea but alas I really don't have the time right now.

Oh, I had meant me! Cross-checking is a favorite activity for detectives who can read small amounts of Fraktur at a time but not 6 volumes of Nicolai in one week. :P I had already had a quick skim and found much of what Felis did, and made a note to come back to it later.

But I see Felis is not only on it, but has gone above and beyond with remembering the Old Dessauer letters too!

I'm with you there. 1729 isn't impossible, but 1728 is more likely. I mean, Fritz had a bad time in Dear Old Wusterhausen in 1727, 1728, 1729, so that criteria doesn#t give much away by itself, but....

Yeah, 1727 is when he writes from Wusterhausen to Borcke about his melancholy, and 1728 is the infamous forced drunkenness episode.

Now it's possible he hit the breaking point in 1729, this letter reflects that, and when he came back to Potsdam he was like, "Peter, we gotta get out of here now!" But it doesn't sound like someone who's already planning to run away and has an escape route planned with the person he's writing to.