cahn | Historical Characters, Including Frederick the Great, Discussion Post 45

Unfortunately, there was then at Berlin a King who pursued one policy only, who deceived his enemies, but not his servants, and who lied without scruple, but never without necessity.

(from The King's Secret - by Duke de Broglie, grand-nephew of the subject of the book, Comte de Broglie, and grandfather of the physicist) )

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From:

mildred_of_midgard

Duchhardt's doctoral thesis is a readable and not too dry overview

Based on the excerpt I read, I agree, and thus it is a pity that when I went to obtain a copy of his Balance of Power und Pentatarchie: 1700-1785, none of the $50 copies would ship to me, and the cheapest I can find is $100. Which I have declined to pay at this time. Meh!

But I have added it to my list of things to keep an eye out for a bargain on.

but also various foreign monarchs, including Danish Kings like Christian II (Danish Kings were a serious possibility because in their capacity as Dukes of Holstein and rulers of Schleswig, they were already ruling a sort of German principality, see also Schleswig-Holstein question

So I knew about the overlap between Denmark and the Holy Roman Empire, and that the Danes were *extremely* interested in hanging onto territory that would give them a say in the affairs of the Empire, but I don't think I knew they were considered a possibility for Protestant emperor!

and they were of course staunchly Protestant other than Christina)

Just to clarify for

cahn, Christina (daughter of ultra-Protestant conquering hero Gustavus Adolphus) was of course Swedish, but the same situation obtained in the 17th century: Sweden had conquered territories in Germany that gave them a voice in the empire, and they were very interested in hanging onto that in the 18th century, for the same reason as Denmark.

Envoy Suhm in Paris in 1711

This is our Suhm's dad, Burchard von Suhm. He will die in 1720 and be succeeded by Hoym, whom we've learned about (Cahn, he's the one who gets locked up for conspiring with Fritz, gets a trumped-up charge of impregnating his niece, and commits suicide in prison).

Buchhardt says Wilhelmine's memoirs say that child!Fritz is hailed by a captive Swedish Officer (this would have been during the Great Northern War then?) as the future Emperor. (I don't recall that, but I probably skipped it, I don't think he made that up.)

Yep, Great Northern War:

There were at that time several Swedish officers at Berlin, who had been taken prisoners at the siege of Stralsund. One of these officers, of the name of Cron, had acquired some notoriety for his knowledge in judicial astrology. The queen had the curiosity to send for him. He foretold her that she would be delivered of a princess. To my brother he said, that he would become one of the greatest princes that ever reigned: that he would make considerable acquisitions, and die an emperor.

It's the same guy who foretells that Wilhelmine's life will be a tissue of fatalities, and that she would have her hand in marriage asked by 4 monarchs, namely those of Sweden, England, Russia, and Poland. Now, she says this comes true, and I don't remember the details, but I do remember us discussing it and deciding she was fudging a bit to make it work out.

And then there's the 1744 Wilhelmine & Imperial Envoy exchange. Now Renate Zedinger made it sound as if Duchhardt thinks Fritz seriously considered it in her footnoting this book, but the actual passage reads more like the opposite:

Yeah, that's the impression I got just from the Google snippet view, and then reading the whole Fritz section shows that it agrees with us that Fritz was overall really not into becoming emperor (once he escapes Dear Old Dad, anyway).

Speaking of escaping! I'm reading that bio of August III, and the author doesn't believe in citing sources except when the whim takes him once per chapter, but he claims twice that Fritz flirted with the idea of becoming King of Poland in 1733, when August the Strong died and the War of the Polish Succession kicked off, as a way to get away from FW.

Now, on the one hand, I'm willing to believe he wanted to get away from FW, but on the other...he's out of Küstrin.

selenak, do you have any memory of Fritz putting this idea of becoming King of Poland in writing, or alternately, a third party like Other Seckendorff or Manteuffel reporting it about him?

his passage is footnoted and sourced to "Droysen, Preuß. Plitik, V/2, S.194",

Okay, wow, this is interesting. And hilarious.

1. Droysen:

No less did other agents of the Queen* work, specifically Count Cobenzl at the Bayreuth court, to whom the Margravine confided the most astonishing statements about the ambitious plans of her royal brother: his next plan was aimed at the conquest of Hamburg; he was willing, if the Emperor** died, to assume the imperial dignity, and completely ready to change religion for this purpose.

* I.e. the Queen of Hungary.

** Note "emperor", this will become relevant later.

Citation: Cobenzel to MT, Erlangen 2. Nov. 1744, in Arneth, II, p. 530.

2. Arneth, p. 307:

Frederick's own sister, the Margravine Wilhelmine of Bayreuth, whose earlier friendly relationship with her brother now admittedly had rather loosened, claimed to know with certainty that Frederick intended it [his military preparations] for Hamburg. Then she was again set into consternation by the news that Prussia's arming was aimed at conquering Nuremberg. Indeed, she assured Count Cobenzl, her brother would, if Karl VII died, seek the imperial dignity, and he was ready to convert to Catholicism as the price.

Arneth's context here is: get rid of the idea that 1743 was a peaceful year for Fritz; he was massively increasing his military might, beyond anything needed for defense, and all of Europe was gossiping about the target of all these preparations.

3. Cobenzl, cited in Arneth p. 530, endnotes to p. 307 cited above:

Count Cobenzl to Maria Theresia. Erlangen, 2. Nov. 1743. Cipher. "The Lady Margravine has spoken to me entirely confidentially various times about the King of Prussia, and described his way of thinking, which is anyway known to Your Royal Majesty. Yesterday she assured me, as you certainly know, that the whole Prussian army has orders to be ready to march next January, and all generals must enter Berlin at this date. She has reason to believe that these war preparations are directed neither for nor against Your Royal Majesty, I thus could really believe this, whether her brother gave the strongest assurances or not*, his intention is aimed at Hamburg, and although she** can't be anything but happy at the aggrandizement of her house***, yet she complained/regretted that the whole Empire, and especially the imperial princes, are oppressed and will find no protection, as long as the imperial dignity does not return to the Most Illustrious Arch-House****."

* The syntax (or maybe just the lack of punctuation) feels a little unfamiliar here, Selena, check me? "Ich köndte dieses also richtig glauben ihr Bruder mogte dargegen die kräfftigste versicherungen geben oder nicht."

** I.e., Wilhelmine.

*** I.e. of Hohenzollern, if Fritz starts conquering new territory.

**** I.e. the Habsburgs.

4. Cobenzl's next report, cited in Arneth p. 530, endnotes to p. 307 cited above:

Cobenzl to Maria Theresia. Erlangen. 17 Dec. 1743. St. A.*

"Apart from that, the Lady Margravine assures me in confidence that the King of Prussia, in case the Elector of Bavaria** dies, will think on the imperial dignity, and she claims to know for certain that he is even completely ready to change religion for this purpose."

* State archives?

** I.e. Karl Albrecht, Karl VII, the Wittelsbach guy.

Reminder to Cahn who these people are: Droysen is a 19th century fanboy of Fritz and major proponent of the "great men of history" school of thought in German historiography.

Arneth is the 19th century director of the Austrian state archives, the man who knew the contents of those archives about as well as Koser knows his Prussian sources, so if he says something happened, he's probably got a primary source to back it up. He's the one who disproved the idea that MT wrote to Pompadour calling her "cousin" or "sister", not that anyone listens to him. He's also a bit tired of pro-Prussian historiographical bias.

HILARIOUSLY--and predictably!--pro-Prussian Droysen called MT the "Queen" (i.e. of Hungary, what Fritzian supporters called her), while Austrian envoy Cobenzl called Karl Albrecht the "Elector of Bavaria" (i.e. because MT never recognized his election as emperor as legitimate). Less predictably, apparently Arneth the Austrian recognized Karl VII.

Two other things I notice: Arneth dates both these reports to 1743, and Droysen typos or misremembers them as 1744. Arneth also points out that Fritz and Wilhelmine are already not super close at this date. Arneth doesn't spell it out, but she clearly didn't have good data on Hamburg. Either that, or she was straight up trolling Cobenzl, but either way, this is not a reliable source, Zedinger!

Also, I notice Duchhardt did *not* go tracing down the source to the reports in Arneth, or he would have noticed it was 1743, not 1744. I don't think that's a typo in Arneth, since it's in an entire long paragraph about 1743, the allegedly peaceful year, and 1743 is given as the date twice, once for each report, not just once.

The Erlangen Journalist stuff had already happened

Looks like this started to play out in mid-1744, so after the actual Cobenzl reports, though you were right about it happening before the autumn of 1744.

I think the marriage of Female Marwitz with an Austrian Count also had done

October 1743, so just before the Cobenzl reports.

Here's what's interesting to me about the chronology: Wilhelmine works on her memoirs when she's unhappy. In 1739, because her husband is cheating on her. Circa 1744, because of the falling out with Fritz.

We suspect that her reports of long-ago prophesying are influenced partly by what she thinks, or wants to believe, not solely what was actually prophesied or actually happened.

Now, I'm willing to believe someone prophesied young Fritz would be emperor, based on what Duchhardt tells us about Fritz's dead older brother. But it's Wilhelmine who decides to include it in her memoirs, right after another prophesy she says came true (and arguably did not). Can you put this together with her claim to Cobenzl in late 1743 to conclude she might actually have thought Fritz would go for HRE after Karl VII died? The timing is interesting, not for what it tells us about what *Fritz* thought, but for what it tells us about what *Wilhelmine* thought. The part where she says her life is a "tissue of fatalities" is certainly consistent with her writing it when she was unhappy!

Not for the first time, I wish we had a source that would tell us which parts of the memoirs date to 1739 and which parts date to the mid-1740s. I would like to know if she wrote this already before Fritz became king, or in hindsight after he had already acquired "considerable acquisitions." I'm guessing the latter, but I can't be sure.

Also, Wilhelmine's belief he would go for Hamburg is interesting. Back when you proposed a body switch with Frederik V,

selenak, I started thinking, what would Fritz do with the Danish army and navy? And the first thing that came to mind, besides the inevitable Schleswig-Holstein question, was "conquer Hamburg and piss off all his neighbors."

I swear I read Hamburg was blockaded circa 1740, but I can't remember by who (Denmark? England?) or where I read it. I also remember I had no luck googling it when I first ran across it and wanted to know more, and I'm not having any more luck now.

Anyway, I think this idea has more credibility now that Wilhelmine has mentioned it and Cobenzl has considered it at least worth passing on.

Edited Date: 2023-09-18 03:51 am (UTC)

From:

selenak

So I knew about the overlap between Denmark and the Holy Roman Empire, and that the Danes were *extremely* interested in hanging onto territory that would give them a say in the affairs of the Empire, but I don't think I knew they were considered a possibility for Protestant emperor!

As mentioned in the earlier comment: most foreign candidates discussed never declared themselves, but Christian II seems to have made it clear he was actually interested. Mind you, as D himself points out, while there was never anything legal blocking a Protestant candidate from getting elected, it's highly questionable that this would ever have worked out as opposed to starting the Thirty Years War somewhat earlier, because in the pre Thirty Years War century with all the religious wars and conflicts, I just don't see the Catholic princes accepting a Protestant Emperor. And post Thirty Years War, the Protestant Princes had more realistic and more tempting prospects to aggrandize themselves. I mean, if F1, aka a Prince who really really REALLY loves his splendour and titles, isn't interested in the job and would rather start a new kingdom instead, that's telling you something how the position of Emperor is regarded by ambitious Protestant royalty post Thirty Years War.

(As an aside, I'm reminded here of the aggrieved F1 biographer who is indignant about one of Fritz' many grandpa disses declaring F1 totally would have sold out and converted if he'd gotten a splendid Catholic coronation with high ranking clergy crowning him out of it, and refutes this by saying he could have, but he didn't.)

That pamphleteers and the likes repeatedly wrote about Protestant candidates for Emperor, otoh, until the very end of the HRE I can well believe, and also that once the Great Elector put Brandenburg/Prussia on the map as important (again) post Thirty Years War and defeated himself some Swedes, and once the Saxons took themeslves out of the Protestant picture by August the Strong's conversion and Team Hannover had that prospect of the English throne, it pretty much had to be a Hohenzollern.

It's the same guy who foretells that Wilhelmine's life will be a tissue of fatalities, and that she would have her hand in marriage asked by 4 monarchs, namely those of Sweden, England, Russia, and Poland. Now, she says this comes true, and I don't remember the details, but I do remember us discussing it and deciding she was fudging a bit to make it work out.

Yes, not least because when she wrote this, Fritz of Wales was still alive and she had every reason to believe he'd become Fritz the First of England eventually, only he never did, since he died before G2, with the succession going straight to G3. Poland means August the Strong, and I know there's considerable scepticism about Wilhelmine's claim this was a match discussed for a while before the famous Fritz and FW visit to Dresden, but that one I actually believe because Fritz' earliest preserved letter to Wilhelmine, from Dresden, does provide her with a "August: Hot or not?" description. But Russia and Sweden? All this said, it's totally the type of thing I can see SD telling little Wilhelmine and Wilhelmine then clinging to, especially when depressed (and in a marital crisis complete with favourite lady-in-waiting lording it over her as maitresse en titre of her husband).

Anyway, I remember that prophecy but I clean had forgotten the part about Fritz as future conqueror and Emperor.

Now, I'm willing to believe someone prophesied young Fritz would be emperor, based on what Duchhardt tells us about Fritz's dead older brother. But it's Wilhelmine who decides to include it in her memoirs, right after another prophesy she says came true (and arguably did not).

Yes, and that very much speaks for this particular passage having been written in 1743 or 1744. Like I said, by the early 18th century, if there was ever going to be a Protestant Emperor it was clear it pretty much have to be a Hohenzollern, so such a prediction is believable, as is Wilhelmine embellishing it in her memory by adding the land aquisitions that Fritz at the time of writing already got. But it does factor into the "was she trolling Cobenzl or did she really believe Fritz would go for HRE?" question. While I wouldn't completely exclude trolling, I'm currently favouring the "in 1743, she does think Fritz could and would" explanation. Not least because: Silesia 1 had been a resounding success for Fritz. Yes, MT had proved herself to be of sterner stuff than anyone thought pre 1740, but on the outs with Fritz or not, I think Wilhelmine saw him at this point as going the Prussian Alexander the Great road, and that if he wanted to be ~~King of Kings~~ Emperor, he would be Emperor. (Clearly the Wittelsbach guy wasn't up to snuff, what with his hometurf of Bavaria occupied by MT's troops, and she probably guessed correctly his son would either not run for Imperial office or would not get elected if he did under these circumstances, and that Fritz would never support a neigbouring Saxon for HRE. Which pretty much leaves himself as the only viable candidate in 1743, unless you assume what actually happens, i.e. Fritz going back to supporting FS for Emperor as part of his second peace treaty with MT.

Thank you so much for tracking down the original quote via Droysen to Arneth to the actual report! I was hoping you would, being the Awesomest Detective, and lo, you did!

I think the marriage of Female Marwitz with an Austrian Count also had done

October 1743, so just before the Cobenzl reports.

This makes so much sense! No matter what she later claimed, Wilhelmine must have been very aware Fritz would not be happy with her "letting" Female Marwitz marry an Austrian noble, but otoh she was not yet willing to confess to her marital situation as the deeper cause as to why she needed that marriage to happen. (One of her biographers argued that this was because Wilhelmine made "at least my husband loves me, so there, Mom!" as her defense against SD's constant "how dare you disappoint me by marrying that provincial nothing!" through the 1730s, and in addition to being personally hurtful, her husband's infidelity with her (now former) friend also was humiliating. So she is emotionally on edge, but she also needs to keep the Austrians sweet, not just because of the general Bayreuth situation but also because she wants Female Marwitz TO LEAVE ALREADY in the direction of Vienna, the chances for which are probably easier if she makes nice with the Austrian envoy and maybe Female Marwitz' new husband gets offered a good job by MT. (In the end, Female Marwitz would not leave until Fritz, after Wilhelmine had finally told him about the whole marital disaster, was ready to hand over her inheritance post Silesia 2.)

(BTW, let's not forget that Manteuffel had asked her whether Fritz would go for HRE in the weeks immediately after MT's Dad's death in 1740, which could have reinforced this idea as a possibility in her mind.)

Also, Wilhelmine's belief he would go for Hamburg is interesting. Back when you proposed a body switch with Frederik V, selenak, I started thinking, what would Fritz do with the Danish army and navy? And the first thing that came to mind, besides the inevitable Schleswig-Holstein question, was "conquer Hamburg and piss off all his neighbors."

LOL, well, while Hamburg isn't a smighty as in the Middle Ages anymore, it's still a great trading city to have and control in the mid 18th century - if you could get it. But good lord, would everyone else have been pissed off at Fritz. Mind you, bring this up could also simply have been something to say that sounded useful to the Austrian envoy she wants to keep sweet because of Marwitz, but which also doesn't betray Fritz to his arch nemesis (as saying "yup, my brother is totally getting ready for round 2 with THE QUEEN OF HUNGARY" would have been. Not that she'd know for sure in either case, since she and Fritz are hurdling from argument to passive aggressive argument at this point.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Thank you so much for tracking down the original quote via Droysen to Arneth to the actual report! I was hoping you would, being the Awesomest Detective, and lo, you did!

I was hoping you'd provide me with the exact citation so I could track it down, and lo, you did! We continue to make a first-rate team.

Speaking of which, one of my questions you didn't answer: do you have any memory at all of Fritz expressing or being said to express an interest in the Polish crown in the early 1730s?

But good lord, would everyone else have been pissed off at Fritz.

To the point where I think it would have been difficult for him to find an ally!

So she is emotionally on edge, but she also needs to keep the Austrians sweet, not just because of the general Bayreuth situation but also because she wants Female Marwitz TO LEAVE ALREADY in the direction of Vienna, the chances for which are probably easier if she makes nice with the Austrian envoy and maybe Female Marwitz' new husband gets offered a good job by MT.

Very plausible!

Mind you, bring this up could also simply have been something to say that sounded useful to the Austrian envoy she wants to keep sweet because of Marwitz, but which also doesn't betray Fritz to his arch nemesis (as saying "yup, my brother is totally getting ready for round 2 with THE QUEEN OF HUNGARY" would have been.

True. These Cobenzl reports are very interesting in terms of "trolling or best guess?"

From:

selenak

Speaking of which, one of my questions you didn't answer: do you have any memory at all of Fritz expressing or being said to express an interest in the Polish crown in the early 1730s?

None, though my memory is hardly infallible. All that comes to my mind, though, is him complaining how boring the Rhine campaign was. And he may or may not have included in one of the complaining letters something along lines of "if I was in Stanislas/August's place" , but I really don't remember.

(Unfortunately, being bitchy and racist about Poles and Jews and Polish Jews in some later era letters, though, has clung to my mind more.)

Incidentally: I really think the timing is all wrong. As you said, he's already out of Küstrin and starting to build his not-with-FW life, first in Ruppin, then in Rheinsberg. Yes, he'd like to be not married, but he's made that deal, and also, if he becomes King of Poland divorce won't be in the cards, either. And then there are those powerful Polish noble families and the Sejim. Very much not what a budding autocrat used to the Prussian nobility as tamed by FW would want having to deal with. AAAAAND then there's the "you and what army?" question, because as opposed to 1740 onwards, he doesn't have those troops and the treasure at his personal disposal, he'd have to beg FW for both.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

And he may or may not have included in one of the complaining letters something along lines of "if I was in Stanislas/August's place" , but I really don't remember.

Oh, that's ringing a faint bell, now that you mention it. Although I seem to recall Fritz wargaming what he would do in FW's shoes. *scratches head*

Okay, AvB, our Hungarian post-WWI Habsburg royalist gives us Fritz siding with Stanislaus:

Openly, Berlin sided with the protegé of France (Stanislaus Lescinsky, father-in-law of Louis XV) in Danzig, and Friedrich Wilhelm openly toasted Stanislaus at his table round. But just as hostile, only even more openly hurtful, was the attitude of Crown Prince Friedrich. Often he bet with the Saxon envoy Manteuffel that the Elector would not remain King of Poland. In a converastion with Manteuffel, he prophecied the defeat of August, as French and Swedish troops as support counting up to 10 - 21 000 men would be on their way in order to push the election of Stanislaus through by force, who because of Prussia's neutrality would be able to land on Prussian soil. Manteuffell, a practised diplomat, replied that such a solution would be more than welcome to Saxony and Russia, since this way the arena of war would be shifted to much more suitable terrain and one would at last meet troops one could fight as enemies. At the first sign of a landing the united Saxon and Russian army would be able to march against the French, since because of Prussia's neutrality Prussia could not possibly object to letting the Saxons march through Prussian territory. Friedrich was struck by this very logical reply, and returned indiginant that Prussia was no playground for foreign armies. At last, he stated that as opposed to his original plan of war, the French and the Swedes should land in Stralsund which belonged to the Swedes.

And also:

Manteuffel managed to find out that Friedrich planned on immediately after his accession to the throne supporting the Polish anti King Stanislaus Lescynski with a corps of his troops, which amounted to an open attack.

Which we questioned, but it may be what you were thinking of.

But neither of those is Fritz saying *he* wants to be King of Poland.

Incidentally: I really think the timing is all wrong.

Same, for all the same reasons you do. That's why I'm extremely questioning this claim and asking if anyone else has any reason to believe it happened.