Continuing with the theme of finding out more about Peter and his family through the power of decipherment...
Remember when Du Moulin and Meinerzhagen were hunting Peter in the Netherlands, and they forged a letter from Fritz to Peter, hoping to lure Peter out? With my newly improved decipherment skills, I can read (most of) FW's handwriting, and I just discovered it was his idea!
My dear Colonel du Moulin. I order you to go to London, or even to Strasbourg if necessary. There you should find out whether the deserted Lieutenant Kait is there.
If you find him, you should have handed over to him these letters from my son, in which he is ordered to come to Speyer. If you lure him out into the [open], you should arrest him immediately.
(Honestly, it's shocking I can read as much of FW's handwriting as I can. December was time well spent!)
In other news: Keith family drama! At least one person wasn't surprised when Karl needed to be recalled from Turin for fighting a duel. Back when he was very first assigned to Turin, someone who I think is one of his Knyphausen uncles (or possibly cousins) wrote to another of his Knyphausen uncles or cousins:
I do not know whether I should congratulate Madame de Keith on her son's mission to Turin. With what you tell me, he will have to support himself in this post. He will be very constrained there, and moreover, I do not believe him very suitable for the character of a negotiator, especially in the most refined and most refined court in Europe.
I wasn't aware Turin was the most refined court in Europe, but okay!
I never wanted to speak to you about the subjects of complaint that I have against him, fearing that it would harm him in your mind and would afflict my sisters, but because you are informed in part, I will tell you that what displeased me in him from the beginning of our acquaintance is the lack of cordiality and frankness. He took pains in Paris to hide this approach from me. His investment in life annuities and other foolish things were immediately known. I pretended to be ignorant of all of it so as not to have any trouble which would upset my sisters, but when he left, I sent him the letters he asked me for Berlin, in all of which I praised him for the reason I have just said.
He took it into his head to open the letter I wrote to my brother and to send it back to me, asking me to change a few things in it. You will agree, Sir and very dear brother, that such a procedure could only be excused by an extreme simplicity and ignorance of behavior, and you know as well as I do that one could not accuse him of either; to what then can one attribute such a grievous offense?
Wow. So on the one hand, this is hilarious; on the other hand, why do we mostly only have correspondence from the 1760s, 1770s, and 1820s?? Where is all the 1740s and 1750s gossip, when Peter was alive???
No kidding. It's like Lehndorff with his refusal to deliver Katte family gossip despite having an in with the clan via Frau von Katte!
Congratulation to your deciphering. Wasn't a letter by FW the very first thing you deciphered because it's on the website where they teach you to decipher 18th century Süderin as an example? Anyway, him having the idea to forge a Fritz letter in order to entrap Peter makes me wonder whether he remembered Clement and all his forged letters....
Wasn't a letter by FW the very first thing you deciphered because it's on the website where they teach you to decipher 18th century Süderin as an example?
Yes, but the letter was by FW, I'm pretty sure the handwriting was not! It's noticeably worse in mine, and I assume the example the Prussian archive website gives was dictated. I mean, maybe mine was dictated too, but if so, it was dictated to someone with bad handwriting!
Anyway, mine was sent from Wesel in a hurry ("Catch Peter now!!"), and the website's was sent from Wusterhausen at more leisure ("Plz talk Wretched Son out of predestination"), so I assume FW had more options for people with good handwriting to dictate the Wusterhausen one to.
ETA: Yes, I went and looked at the website, and it says "Cabinet order. Handwritten copy." Copies are almost always "clean copies," i.e. in better handwriting than the original.
Anyway, him having the idea to forge a Fritz letter in order to entrap Peter makes me wonder whether he remembered Clement and all his forged letters....
Ooh, I hadn't thought of that!
What's interesting is FW says "diese Briefe," which I take to mean he wanted the actual letters he enclosed sent; whereas Du Moulin and Meinerzhagen decide to forge a letter based on an actual letter. Maybe so they could make changes? Maybe so they'd have his original handwriting in case they needed to forge mutiple letters (no carbon paper in those days)?
Anyway, maybe FW *didn't* have forgery on the brain, that was an embellishment by his agents. But maybe!
Maybe so they could make changes? Maybe so they'd have his original handwriting in case they needed to forge mutiple letters (no carbon paper in those days)?
Okay, I get it. I'm going back over Du Moulin trying to puzzle out more of the handwriting, and it's clear the reason they copied it rather than sending the original was to change the date and place so the date was more recent and the place was Utrecht. They obviously want it to look like Fritz has escaped and is in the Netherlands *now*, as opposed to sending an old letter from when he's in Germany, which isn't going to make Peter very confident about coming out of hiding.
Also, I guess Fritz still had a letter on him when he was arrested, meaning he had been traveling with it and hadn't destroyed it, when he was arrested. It looks like he was still hoping to make a break for it, until the very end.
Unless he had mailed it already, and it had been confiscated and given to FW. I suppose that's possible.
ETA: And they changed the place Peter was supposed to go to, as well: Amsterdam instead of Speyer. Yeah, Peter's not leaving the relative safety of Chesterfield's house to go *back* into Germany, and deep into Germany at that.
(I'm telling you, this plan changed daily. There was no "the plan"; there was only everyone winging it.)
So I think FW said "Send this authentic letter!" and his agents went, "That's not going to be very effective. What we can do instead is forge a letter that tells him to go somewhere he might actually go, in a way that makes it look like Fritz has escaped and is actually going to meet him there."
So no, I don't think FW had Clement on the brain; that was his agents displaying some initiative to make the plan more effective.
Ha, so having read through Du Moulin more carefully, I remembered that he was sending people to different cities looking for Peter, and it dawned on me that that must be what some of these other protocols I haven't read/deciphered yet are. (I was mostly ignoring them because I didn't recognize who they were by, and a quick skim didn't reveal anything exciting.)
And indeed!
At least one is the Lt. Cordier that he sent to Amsterdam. Cordier had the same experience Du Moulin and Meinerzhagen did: he reported a deserter, was told that deserters had asylum in this city, clarified that it wasn't just desertion but matters of state that this guy was guilty of, and was told that he'd have to wait until the official meeting of the authorities qualified to decide that.
Dutch: Screw you, FW.
This letter (beautiful handwriting, thank you, Cordier--didn't have to transcribe at all, could read at sight) also confirmed my educated guess that the "Waapen van Embden" was an inn in Amsterdam. You may remember that that's where the forged letter told Peter to go to meet Fritz. So my guess is that Du Moulin and Meinerzhagen picked that inn after receiving notification from Cordier that he was staying there. Since Cordier's letter is dated the 18th, and they sent the forged letter on the 20th, and Amsterdam to The Hague is 60 km, I assume the mail could get there in time for that to be the sequence of events.
Stay tuned for exciting Knyphausen drama not involving Peter but worth reporting anyway!
At least one is the Lt. Cordier that he sent to Amsterdam. Cordier had the same experience Du Moulin and Meinerzhagen did: he reported a deserter, was told that deserters had asylum in this city, clarified that it wasn't just desertion but matters of state that this guy was guilty of, and was told that he'd have to wait until the official meeting of the authorities qualified to decide that.
I do not know whether I should congratulate Madame de Keith on her son's mission to Turin. With what you tell me, he will have to support himself in this post. He will be very constrained there
Karl has just arrived in Turin, and what is the first thing he does when he gets there? *drumroll* He complains about the high cost of living! #envoylife
He has nothing to negotiate; Fritz just wanted to respond to the King of Sardinia's request for a reciprocal envoy. Fritz tells Podewils not to bother forwarding Keith's reports, just give him the executive summary.
Ah, here we go, Hertzberg is responding to the other person's complaints about Karl! He must have been the recipient of that other letter.
I am sorry M. de Keith has displeased you with his proceedings. It is true that he is characterized by phlegm of a [??] and a coldness which goes too far, and by which he sometimes falls short of what one would expect/demand of him.
Okay, so I think I can identify the guy who was complaining about Karl, it's Oriane's youngest brother, Friedrich Ernst. Hertzberg has started talking to him about his other brother, Dodo Heinrich (the one who got to be envoy to London during the Seven Years' War). He doesn't name him, but it's January 1775, and he's very upset about some guy named Görne. Wikipedia tells me Dodo Heinrich "demanded his resignation in December 1774 because he deeply distrusted Görne. He also turned down the offer of an appointment as secret budget and directing minister of the General Directorate. He was therefore dismissed on January 11, 1775."
So Friedrich Ernst does not like his nephew Karl. Hertzberg seems to, in that he's always supporting the guy and ends up trying to salvage his career when he fucks up with the duel.
This is good, it means I have a point of handwriting comparison for Friedrich Ernst! (These people don't like signing their first names, even when they sign at all, which they often don't! It makes a historian's job harder, and calls for a lot of detective work.)
ETA: Duh, the bit about Karl not having to negotiate anything is in response to Uncle Friedrich Ernst saying he didn't think nephew Karl was cut out for negotation. Hertzberg's saying it doesn't matter, there's nothing to negotiate. It helps when you know what a letter is replying to!
Also, I've been wondering for years and years what on earth Prussia and Sardinia were negotiating in 1774; now I know why I couldn't find anything.
ETA: Duh, the bit about Karl not having to negotiate anything is in response to Uncle Friedrich Ernst saying he didn't think nephew Karl was cut out for negotation. Hertzberg's saying it doesn't matter, there's nothing to negotiate. It helps when you know what a letter is replying to!
Also, I've been wondering for years and years what on earth Prussia and Sardinia were negotiating in 1774; now I know why I couldn't find anything.
One anonymous (or at least, I haven't found a name yet) family friend writes very chatty letters in the 1770s, catching one of the Knyphausen sisters up on family news.
We get daily life tidbits from her. For example, remember when we found in the Berlin address book that Karl and his mother had moved house in the early 1770s? We have a description of their new place!
Google-translated for speed and only touched up slightly.
I hope, my dear friend, that you have less rain than we have here, because besides walking, one of the great pleasures of the countryside, the harvest, an even more essential object, could suffer from this abundance of humidity, even rain, is a daily occurrence here and 20 times a day, an ordinary occurrence, one is too happy when one can catch a little walk in the park in the intervals.
Yesterday I met Mr. de Keith under the trees of the new town, who had made his decision, and counted the rain for nothing. It is true that it was not heavy--so he would not accelerate his pace--always rather slow, as you notice. He continues to do well, the hubbub of the move has passed and I saw Madam your sister all arranged in her apartment.
I will tell you naturally how I find it. Quite convenient for the place, and the layout. The view of the water pretty and smiling. What overlooks the courtyard is sad, the staircase neither better nor worse than that of the English. And all in all, the greatest fault in our regard is the distance, for I find the house further away than I imagined, and it is only the idea that Madame de Keith could have come to lodge at the end of the town that makes me want to call her a neighbor. I must not forget to tell you that the bedroom is one of those that I esteem the most. The small alcove is very good, but that is only good by means of the free door that opens into the vestibule, and that you wanted to close. It is much better that it remains open; without this clearance, the room would not be any less long, and would not be as convenient to live in. You will approve of this arrangement.
Btw, I see I referred to the letter writer as "her". I don't actually have data on this, but the letter-writer seems to socialize more with women than with men, and I get a slightly "female gender role" vibe from the letters. But I haven't read them closely, so take that with a grain of salt.
so he would not accelerate his pace--always rather slow, as you notice.
I'm reminded of the description of him by someone else as "rather phlegmatic." I bet Tido wasn't a slow walker!
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timeasmymeasure
Minor Peter and Karl Keith findings
Date: 2025-01-06 12:30 pm (UTC)Remember when Du Moulin and Meinerzhagen were hunting Peter in the Netherlands, and they forged a letter from Fritz to Peter, hoping to lure Peter out? With my newly improved decipherment skills, I can read (most of) FW's handwriting, and I just discovered it was his idea!
My dear Colonel du Moulin. I order you to go to London, or even to Strasbourg if necessary. There you should find out whether the deserted Lieutenant Kait is there.
If you find him, you should have handed over to him these letters from my son, in which he is ordered to come to Speyer. If you lure him out into the [open], you should arrest him immediately.
(Honestly, it's shocking I can read as much of FW's handwriting as I can. December was time well spent!)
In other news: Keith family drama! At least one person wasn't surprised when Karl needed to be recalled from Turin for fighting a duel. Back when he was very first assigned to Turin, someone who I think is one of his Knyphausen uncles (or possibly cousins) wrote to another of his Knyphausen uncles or cousins:
I do not know whether I should congratulate Madame de Keith on her son's mission to Turin. With what you tell me, he will have to support himself in this post. He will be very constrained there, and moreover, I do not believe him very suitable for the character of a negotiator, especially in the most refined and most refined court in Europe.
I wasn't aware Turin was the most refined court in Europe, but okay!
I never wanted to speak to you about the subjects of complaint that I have against him, fearing that it would harm him in your mind and would afflict my sisters, but because you are informed in part, I will tell you that what displeased me in him from the beginning of our acquaintance is the lack of cordiality and frankness. He took pains in Paris to hide this approach from me. His investment in life annuities and other foolish things were immediately known. I pretended to be ignorant of all of it so as not to have any trouble which would upset my sisters, but when he left, I sent him the letters he asked me for Berlin, in all of which I praised him for the reason I have just said.
He took it into his head to open the letter I wrote to my brother and to send it back to me, asking me to change a few things in it. You will agree, Sir and very dear brother, that such a procedure could only be excused by an extreme simplicity and ignorance of behavior, and you know as well as I do that one could not accuse him of either; to what then can one attribute such a grievous offense?
Wow. So on the one hand, this is hilarious; on the other hand, why do we mostly only have correspondence from the 1760s, 1770s, and 1820s?? Where is all the 1740s and 1750s gossip, when Peter was alive???
Re: Minor Peter and Karl Keith findings
Date: 2025-01-06 04:32 pm (UTC)Congratulation to your deciphering. Wasn't a letter by FW the very first thing you deciphered because it's on the website where they teach you to decipher 18th century Süderin as an example? Anyway, him having the idea to forge a Fritz letter in order to entrap Peter makes me wonder whether he remembered Clement and all his forged letters....
Re: Minor Peter and Karl Keith findings
Date: 2025-01-06 04:52 pm (UTC)Yes, but the letter was by FW, I'm pretty sure the handwriting was not! It's noticeably worse in mine, and I assume the example the Prussian archive website gives was dictated. I mean, maybe mine was dictated too, but if so, it was dictated to someone with bad handwriting!
Anyway, mine was sent from Wesel in a hurry ("Catch Peter now!!"), and the website's was sent from Wusterhausen at more leisure ("Plz talk Wretched Son out of predestination"), so I assume FW had more options for people with good handwriting to dictate the Wusterhausen one to.
ETA: Yes, I went and looked at the website, and it says "Cabinet order. Handwritten copy." Copies are almost always "clean copies," i.e. in better handwriting than the original.
Anyway, him having the idea to forge a Fritz letter in order to entrap Peter makes me wonder whether he remembered Clement and all his forged letters....
Ooh, I hadn't thought of that!
What's interesting is FW says "diese Briefe," which I take to mean he wanted the actual letters he enclosed sent; whereas Du Moulin and Meinerzhagen decide to forge a letter based on an actual letter. Maybe so they could make changes? Maybe so they'd have his original handwriting in case they needed to forge mutiple letters (no carbon paper in those days)?
Anyway, maybe FW *didn't* have forgery on the brain, that was an embellishment by his agents. But maybe!
Re: Minor Peter and Karl Keith findings
Date: 2025-01-09 03:57 am (UTC)and the website's was sent from Wusterhausen at more leisure ("Plz talk Wretched Son out of predestination")
I laughed :P
Re: Minor Peter and Karl Keith findings
Date: 2025-01-11 10:27 pm (UTC)Okay, I get it. I'm going back over Du Moulin trying to puzzle out more of the handwriting, and it's clear the reason they copied it rather than sending the original was to change the date and place so the date was more recent and the place was Utrecht. They obviously want it to look like Fritz has escaped and is in the Netherlands *now*, as opposed to sending an old letter from when he's in Germany, which isn't going to make Peter very confident about coming out of hiding.
Also, I guess Fritz still had a letter on him when he was arrested, meaning he had been traveling with it and hadn't destroyed it, when he was arrested. It looks like he was still hoping to make a break for it, until the very end.
Unless he had mailed it already, and it had been confiscated and given to FW. I suppose that's possible.
ETA: And they changed the place Peter was supposed to go to, as well: Amsterdam instead of Speyer. Yeah, Peter's not leaving the relative safety of Chesterfield's house to go *back* into Germany, and deep into Germany at that.
(I'm telling you, this plan changed daily. There was no "the plan"; there was only everyone winging it.)
So I think FW said "Send this authentic letter!" and his agents went, "That's not going to be very effective. What we can do instead is forge a letter that tells him to go somewhere he might actually go, in a way that makes it look like Fritz has escaped and is actually going to meet him there."
So no, I don't think FW had Clement on the brain; that was his agents displaying some initiative to make the plan more effective.
Re: Minor Peter and Karl Keith findings
Date: 2025-01-12 01:05 am (UTC)Re: Minor Peter and Karl Keith findings
Date: 2025-01-12 01:35 am (UTC)Re: Minor Peter and Karl Keith findings
Date: 2025-01-12 06:29 pm (UTC)And indeed!
At least one is the Lt. Cordier that he sent to Amsterdam. Cordier had the same experience Du Moulin and Meinerzhagen did: he reported a deserter, was told that deserters had asylum in this city, clarified that it wasn't just desertion but matters of state that this guy was guilty of, and was told that he'd have to wait until the official meeting of the authorities qualified to decide that.
Dutch: Screw you, FW.
This letter (beautiful handwriting, thank you, Cordier--didn't have to transcribe at all, could read at sight) also confirmed my educated guess that the "Waapen van Embden" was an inn in Amsterdam. You may remember that that's where the forged letter told Peter to go to meet Fritz. So my guess is that Du Moulin and Meinerzhagen picked that inn after receiving notification from Cordier that he was staying there. Since Cordier's letter is dated the 18th, and they sent the forged letter on the 20th, and Amsterdam to The Hague is 60 km, I assume the mail could get there in time for that to be the sequence of events.
Stay tuned for exciting Knyphausen drama not involving Peter but worth reporting anyway!
ETA: Tangentially involving Peter!
Re: Minor Peter and Karl Keith findings
Date: 2025-01-15 05:23 am (UTC)Dutch: Screw you, FW.
:)
Re: Minor Peter and Karl Keith findings
Date: 2025-01-15 03:36 pm (UTC)Karl has just arrived in Turin, and what is the first thing he does when he gets there? *drumroll* He complains about the high cost of living! #envoylife
He has nothing to negotiate; Fritz just wanted to respond to the King of Sardinia's request for a reciprocal envoy. Fritz tells Podewils not to bother forwarding Keith's reports, just give him the executive summary.
Ah, here we go, Hertzberg is responding to the other person's complaints about Karl! He must have been the recipient of that other letter.
I am sorry M. de Keith has displeased you with his proceedings. It is true that he is characterized by phlegm of a [??] and a coldness which goes too far, and by which he sometimes falls short of what one would expect/demand of him.
Okay, so I think I can identify the guy who was complaining about Karl, it's Oriane's youngest brother, Friedrich Ernst. Hertzberg has started talking to him about his other brother, Dodo Heinrich (the one who got to be envoy to London during the Seven Years' War). He doesn't name him, but it's January 1775, and he's very upset about some guy named Görne. Wikipedia tells me Dodo Heinrich "demanded his resignation in December 1774 because he deeply distrusted Görne. He also turned down the offer of an appointment as secret budget and directing minister of the General Directorate. He was therefore dismissed on January 11, 1775."
So Friedrich Ernst does not like his nephew Karl. Hertzberg seems to, in that he's always supporting the guy and ends up trying to salvage his career when he fucks up with the duel.
This is good, it means I have a point of handwriting comparison for Friedrich Ernst! (These people don't like signing their first names, even when they sign at all, which they often don't! It makes a historian's job harder, and calls for a lot of detective work.)
ETA: Duh, the bit about Karl not having to negotiate anything is in response to Uncle Friedrich Ernst saying he didn't think nephew Karl was cut out for negotation. Hertzberg's saying it doesn't matter, there's nothing to negotiate. It helps when you know what a letter is replying to!
Also, I've been wondering for years and years what on earth Prussia and Sardinia were negotiating in 1774; now I know why I couldn't find anything.
Re: Minor Peter and Karl Keith findings
Date: 2025-01-20 05:33 am (UTC)Also, I've been wondering for years and years what on earth Prussia and Sardinia were negotiating in 1774; now I know why I couldn't find anything.
omg, lol!
Re: Minor Peter and Karl Keith findings
Date: 2025-01-16 02:44 pm (UTC)We get daily life tidbits from her. For example, remember when we found in the Berlin address book that Karl and his mother had moved house in the early 1770s? We have a description of their new place!
Google-translated for speed and only touched up slightly.
I hope, my dear friend, that you have less rain than we have here, because besides walking, one of the great pleasures of the countryside, the harvest, an even more essential object, could suffer from this abundance of humidity, even rain, is a daily occurrence here and 20 times a day, an ordinary occurrence, one is too happy when one can catch a little walk in the park in the intervals.
Yesterday I met Mr. de Keith under the trees of the new town, who had made his decision, and counted the rain for nothing. It is true that it was not heavy--so he would not accelerate his pace--always rather slow, as you notice. He continues to do well, the hubbub of the move has passed and I saw Madam your sister all arranged in her apartment.
I will tell you naturally how I find it. Quite convenient for the place, and the layout. The view of the water pretty and smiling. What overlooks the courtyard is sad, the staircase neither better nor worse than that of the English. And all in all, the greatest fault in our regard is the distance, for I find the house further away than I imagined, and it is only the idea that Madame de Keith could have come to lodge at the end of the town that makes me want to call her a neighbor. I must not forget to tell you that the bedroom is one of those that I esteem the most. The small alcove is very good, but that is only good by means of the free door that opens into the vestibule, and that you wanted to close. It is much better that it remains open; without this clearance, the room would not be any less long, and would not be as convenient to live in. You will approve of this arrangement.
Re: Minor Peter and Karl Keith findings
Date: 2025-01-20 05:36 am (UTC)Re: Minor Peter and Karl Keith findings
Date: 2025-01-20 05:18 pm (UTC)so he would not accelerate his pace--always rather slow, as you notice.
I'm reminded of the description of him by someone else as "rather phlegmatic." I bet Tido wasn't a slow walker!