Historical Characters, Including Frederick the Great, Discussion Post 46

[cahn]

Background: The kids' school has a topic for "Unit" every trimester that a lot of their work (reading, writing, some math) revolves around. These topics range from time/geographic periods ('Colonial America') to geography ('Asia') to science ('Space') to social science ('Business and Economics'). (I have some issues with this way of doing things, but that's a whole separate post.) Anyway, for Reasons, they have had to come up with a new topic this year, and E's 7/8 class is doing "World Fairs" as their new topic.

Me: I know E's teacher is all about World Fairs and I know she is great and will do a good job. But I feel like if we had a different teacher who wasn't so into World Fairs, they wouldn't do such a good job and another topic would be better.
Me: Like... the Enlightenment!
D: Heh, you could teach that! But you'd have to restrain yourself from making everything about Frederick the Great.
Me: But that's the thing! Everyone does relate to each other in this time period! Voltaire -- and his partner Émilie du Châtelet, who was heavily involved in the discourse of conservation of energy and momentum -- well, I've told you Voltaire had a thing with Fritz -- and then there's Empress Maria Theresa, who went to war with him a few times -- and Catherine the Great --
D, meditatively: You know --
Me: *am innocently not warned even though this is the same tone of voice that is often followed by, say, a bad pun*
D: -- it's impressive how everyone from this 'the Great' family is so famous!
Me: *splutters*
D, thoughtfully: But of course there's probably selection bias, as the ones who aren't famous don't get mentioned. You never see 'Bob the Great' in the history books...
Me: *splutters more*

Comments

Re: Stuarts and Scotland

[selenak]

The dislike because of the trashing (and all the other humiliating conditions) came surely before the marriage idea was voiced, but that wasn't the reason why young Charles refused to marry her as diplomatically as he could at the time. Remember, it's a plot point in The King's Touch when it comes to the debate as to whether or not he married Jemmy's mother: being single is one of the few cards young, penniless and exiled Charles had to play. Gaining a bride who came with a huge dowry, rich and royal connections and preferably even some soldiers was therefore instrumental. (In his late conversation with Jemmy where he at last spells it out to him in no ambiguous terms, he says that if he'd married Lucy at that time, he'd have conceded that he would never become King. And that he was tempted in his more nihilistic "to hell with everything" moments back then when basically everything went wrong, but that his survival instinct was just too strong. Now that's Jude Morgan the novelist's interpretation, of course, and note that Jemmy still doesn't want to believe it at that point because he's invested so much in this idea his parents were married, but it's all plausible enough.)

Now of course Miss Campbell the Marquess of Argyll's daughter did come with advantages, but Charles due to having agreed to all the other humiliating conditions first knew he'd get the Scottish army anyway at this point. I mean, Argyll was the unofficial regent of Scotland, but he knew that if after they'd gotten Charles to promise basically everything everyone else had wanted, including making the entire island and Ireland adhere to the Scottish Kirk, he'd have refused support just because Charles didn't want to marry his daughter, all the other Scots nobles would have been after his blood. Also, again, Cromwell and his army were already in Scotland and mightily pissed off their former Covenant allies were now on Team Stuart, and Cromwell had come straight from Ireland where he'd infamously committed massacres to subject the Irish. If there was ever a chance to solve the Civil War militarily left, they needed to invade England now; the idea was to leave Cromwell and his New Model Army, who'd beaten the Scots at Dunbar, tied up there and invade England where people would flock to the new young King's banner so that by the time Cromwell had caught up with them, their armies would be at equal size, swelled by popular support. Except popular support didn't come, Cromwell moved fast, and was one of the great generals of the era.

(Life lesson learned by young Charles II: if the Restoration will happen, it won't happen via foreign armies, which was how the Scots were perceived by even the royalist English. Even if you remove Oliver Cromwell and his personal competence from the equation, and indeed when Oliver C. died, the transition to his son happened smoothly - it was then, when Richard C. took power, that it became evident the Protectorate was too unstable to survive without one specific guy at the helm. But even then, Charles remained on the continent and waited until the Protectorate had crashed and burned and a free Parliament had been elected while negotiating with General Monck, and then still waited until said Parliament explicitly called him back, instead of trying to push things by showing up in person and backed up by exiles and foreign soldiers the way he had done twelve years earlier.)

Anyway, it does say something about how intensely Charles II resented Argyll that he refused his offer of service and instead had him executed after the Restoration, though, because he wasn't vendetta minded as a rule. Yes, anyone still alive who had personally signed Charles I. death warrant was excempted from the general Civil War amnesty Charles II, Monck and Parliament had agreed upon, but that was a given. Getting Cromwell's body out of his grave, beheading him and putting his head on a pike was symbolic; by contrast, and much to the indignation of many a royalist exile, Cromwell's surviving sons, Henry and Richard, were allowed to keep all of their (considerable) possessions and lived out their lives comfortably and in obscurity. Thomas Fairfax, who had been just as important as Oliver Cromwell, if not more so (because he was the top Commander of the New Model Army and Cromwell his right hand man until Fairfax resigned in the wake of Charles I's execution), for the victory of Parliament over Charles I, was treated with respect and even took part in Charles II's entry into London. (Okay, Fairfax had famously only attended the first day of Charles I.'s trial and then excused himself because he did not think this was a just court, his wife, who remained, had openly protested what was going on during the trial, and Fairfax had refused to sign Charles I's death warrant and resigned his army command over this. It would have looked badly if he'd been treated as a rebel. But still, Henrietta Maria, Charles' mother, certainly still resented him for having defeated her husband in the first place, and didn't understand why Charles was treating him as an honorable veteran.

Anyway, my point being: Charles II in general wasn't acting vengeful during the Restoration, the thirty something people directly involved in Charles I's execution excepted, and one could make a case that subjects executing their King had set such a dangerous precedent that he pretty much had to go after them. Otherwise, reconciliation was the word of the day. But not with Argyll, who hadn't been involved in Charles I's execution. Yes, he had very much contributed to Charles I' ending up defeated and in Parliament's hands in the first place, but then so had Thomas Fairfax. Both had explicitly been against the execution. But Fairfax hadn't put a young and grieving Charles through the extortion and humiliation wringer, and I think that was a difference. (That, and Argyll's position in Scotland wasn't one a truly sovereign King of Scotland could have allowed to continue, there was that as well.)

Re: Stuarts and Scotland

[cahn]

but Charles due to having agreed to all the other humiliating conditions first knew he'd get the Scottish army anyway at this point.

Ah, got it! -- why give up his trump card until he absolutely has to?

But even then, Charles remained on the continent and waited until the Protectorate had crashed and burned and a free Parliament had been elected while negotiating with General Monck, and then still waited until said Parliament explicitly called him back, instead of trying to push things by showing up in person and backed up by exiles and foreign soldiers the way he had done twelve years earlier.

Charles is really the Picard of the Stuarts, isn't he! (Well, at least in regards to the politics, if not the reputation with women.)

by contrast, and much to the indignation of many a royalist exile, Cromwell's surviving sons, Henry and Richard, were allowed to keep all of their (considerable) possessions and lived out their lives comfortably and in obscurity.

Huh, that's great.

Okay, Fairfax had famously only attended the first day of Charles I.'s trial and then excused himself because he did not think this was a just court, his wife, who remained, had openly protested what was going on during the trial, and Fairfax had refused to sign Charles I's death warrant and resigned his army command over this.

Ohhhh, that's awesome. Go Fairfax.

But still, Henrietta Maria, Charles' mother, certainly still resented him for having defeated her husband in the first place, and didn't understand why Charles was treating him as an honorable veteran.

Lol Henrietta Maria. I mean, I have got the impression there are a lot of things she didn't see the same way...