The rumor of these things naturally fills all minds, and occupies all
human tongues, in Berlin and Prussia, though an Edict threatens, That
the tongues shall be cut out which speak of them in any way, [Dickens,
of 7th November, 1730.] and sounds far and wide into foreign Courts and
Countries, where there is no such Edict. Friedrich Wilhelm's conduct,
looked at from without, appears that of a hideous royal ogre, or blind
anthropophagous Polyphemus fallen mad. Looked at from within, where the
Polyphemus has his reasons, and a kind of inner rushlight to enlighten
his path; and is not bent on man-eating, but on discipline in spite
of difficulties,--it is a wild enough piece of humanity, not so much
ludicrous as tragical. Never was a royal bear so led about before by a
pair of conjuring pipers in the market, or brought to such a pass in his
dancing for them!
"General Ginkel, the Dutch Ambassador here," writes Dickens, "told me
of an interview he had with the King;" being ordered by their High
Mightinesses to solicit his Majesty in this matter. King "harbors 'most
monstrous wicked designs, not fit to be spoken of in words,' reports
Ginkel. 'It is certain,' added he, 'if the King of Prussia continue in
the mind he is in at present, we shall see scenes here as wicked and
bloody as any that were ever heard of since the creation of the
world.' 'Will sacrifice his whole family,' not the Crown-Prince alone;
'everybody except Grumkow being, as he fancies, in conspiracy against
him.' Poor enchanted King!--'And all these things he said with such
imprecations and disordered looks, foaming at the mouth all the while,
as it was terrible either to see or hear.'" That is Ginkel's report, as
Dickens conveys it. [Despatch, 7th September, 1730.] Another time, on
new order, a month later, when Ginkel went again to speak a word for the
poor Prisoner, he found his Majesty clothed not in delirious thunder,
but in sorrowful thick fog; Ginkel "was the less able to judge what the
King of Prussia meant to do with his Son, as it was evident the King
himself did not know." [Ib. 10th October.]
Poor Friedrich Wilhelm, through these months, wanders about, shifting
from room to room, in the night-time, like a man possessed by evil
fiends; "orders his carriage for Wusterhausen at two in the morning,"
but finds he is no better there, and returns; drinks a great deal, "has
not gone to bed sober for a month past." [Ib. 19th December, 1730.] One
night he comes gliding like a perturbed ghost, about midnight, with his
candle in his hand, into the Queen's apartment; says, wildly staring,
"He thinks there is something haunting him:"--O Feekin, erring
disobedient Wife, wilt not thou protect me, after all? Whither can I
fly when haunted, except to thee? Feekin, like a prudent woman, makes
no criticism; orders that his Majesty's bed be made up in her apartment
till these phenomena cease. [Ib. 27th February, 1731.] A much-agitated
royal Father.
The question what is to be done with this unhappy Crown-Prince, a
Deserter from the army, a rebel against the paternal Majesty, and a
believer in the doctrine of Election by Free Grace, or that a man's good
or ill conduct is foredoomed upon him by decree of God,--becomes more
intricate the longer one thinks of it. Seckendorf and Grumkow, alarmed
at being too victorious, are set against violent high methods; and
suggest this and that consideration: "Who is it that can legally try,
condemn, or summon to his bar, a Crown-Prince? He is Prince of the
Empire, as well as your Majesty's Son!"--"Well, he is Heir of the
Sovereign Majesty in Prussia, too; and Colonel in the Potsdam Guards!"
answers Friedrich Wilhelm.
At length, after six or seven weeks of abstruse meditation, it is
settled in Tobacco-Parliament and the royal breast, That Katte and the
Crown-Prince, as Deserters from the Prussian Army, can and shall be
tried by Court-Martial; to that no power, on the earth or out of it, can
have any objection worth attending to. Let a fair Court-Martial of our
highest military characters be selected and got ready. Let that, as a
voice of Rhadamanthus, speak upon the two culprits; and tell us what is
to be done. By the middle of October, things on Friedrich Wilhelm's side
have got so far.
CROWN-PRINCE IN CUSTRIN.
Poor Friedrich meanwhile has had a grim time of it, these two months
back; left alone, in coarse brown prison-dress, within his four bare
walls at Custrin; in uninterrupted, unfathomable colloquy with the
Destinies and the Necessities there. The King's stern orders must be
fulfilled to the letter; the Crown-Prince is immured in that manner. At
Berlin, there are the wildest rumors as to the state he has fallen into;
"covered with rags and vermin, unshaven, no comb allowed him, lights
his own fire," says one testimony, which Captain Dickens thinks worth
reporting. For the truth is, no unofficial eye can see the Crown-Prince,
or know what state he is in. And we find, in spite of the Edict,
"tongues," not "cut out," kept wagging at a high rate. "People of all
ranks are unspeakably indignant" at certain heights of the business:
"Margravine Albert said publicly, 'A tyrant as bad as Nero!'" [Dickens,
7th November, 2d December, 1730.]
How long the Crown-Prince's defiant humor held out, we are not told. By
the middle of October there comes proposal of "entire confession" from
the Prince; and though, when Papa sends deputies accordingly, there
is next to nothing new confessed, and Papa's anger blazes out again,
probably we may take this as the turning-point on his Son's part. With
him, of course, that mood of mind could not last. There is no wildest
lion but, finding his bars are made of iron, ceases to bite them. The
Crown-Prince there, in his horror, indignation and despair, had a lucid
human judgment in him, too; loyal to facts, and well knowing their
inexorable nature, Just sentiments are in this young man, not capable of
permanent distortion into spasm by any form of injustice laid on
them. It is not long till he begins to discern, athwart this terrible,
quasi-infernal element, that so the facts are; and that nothing but
destruction, and no honor that were not dishonor, will be got by not
conforming to the facts. My Father may be a tyrant, and driven mad
against me: well, well, let not me at least go mad!
Grumkow is busy on the mild side of the business; of course Grumkow and
all official men. Grumkow cannot but ask himself this question among
others: How if the King should suddenly die upon us! Grumkow is out
at Custrin, and again out; explaining to the Prince, what the enormous
situation is; how inflexible, inexorable, and of peril and horror
incalculable to Mother and Sister and self and royal House; and that
there is one possibility of good issue, and only one: that of loyally
yielding, where one cannot resist. By degrees, some lurid troublous
but perceptible light-gleam breaks athwart the black whirlwind of
our indignation and despair; and saner thoughts begin to insinuate
themselves. "Obey, thou art not the strongest, there are stronger than
thou! All men, the highest among them, are called to learn obedience."
Moreover, the first sweep of royal fury being past, his Majesty's stern
regulations at Custrin began to relax in fulfilment; to be obeyed only
by those immediately responsible, and in letter rather than in spirit
even by those. President von Munchow who is head of the Domain-Kammer,
chief representative of Government at Custrin, and resides in the
Fortress there, ventures after a little, the Prince's doors being closed
as we saw, to have an orifice bored through the floor above, and thereby
to communicate with the Prince, and sympathetically ask, What he can
do for him? Many things, books among others, are, under cunning
contrivance, smuggled in by the judicious Munchow, willing to risk
himself in such a service. For example, Munchow has a son, a clever
boy of seven years old; who, to the wonder of neighbors, goes into
child's-petticoats again; and testifies the liveliest desire to be
admitted to the Prince, and bear him company a little! Surely the law
of No-company does not extend to that of an innocent child? The innocent
child has a row of pockets all round the inside of his long gown; and
goes laden, miscellaneously, like a ship of the desert, or cockboat not
forbidden to cross the line. Then there are stools, one stool at least
indispensable to human nature; and the inside of this, once you open it,
is a chest-of-drawers, containing paper, ink, new literature and
much else. No end to Munchow'a good-will, and his ingenuity is great.
[Preuss, i. 46.]
A Captain Fouquet also, furthered I think by the Old Dessauer, whose man
he is, comes to Custrin Garrison, on duty or as volunteer, by and by. He
is an old friend of the Prince's;--ran off, being the Dessauer's little
page, to the Siege of Stralsund, long ago, to be the Dessauer's little
soldier there:--a ready-witted, hot-tempered, highly estimable man; and
his real duty here is to do the Prince what service may be possible. He
is often with the Prince; their light is extinguished precisely at seven
o'clock: "Very well, Lieutenant," he would say, "you have done your
orders to the Crown-Prince's light. But his Majesty has no concern with
Captain Fouquet's candles!" and thereupon would light a pair. Nay, I
have heard of Lieutenants who punctually blew out the Prince's light, as
a matter of duty and command; and then kindled it again, as a civility
left free to human nature. In short, his Majesty's orders can only be
fulfilled to the letter; Commandant Lepel and all Officers are willing
not to see where they can help seeing. Even in the letter his Majesty's
orders are severe enough.
SENTENCE OF COURT-MARTIAL.
Meanwhile the Court-Martial, selected with intense study, installs
itself at Copenick; and on the 25th of October commences work. This
Deserter Crown-Prince and his accomplices, especially Katte his chief
accomplice, what is to be done with them? Copenick lies on the road to
Custrin, within a morning's drive of Berlin; there is an ancient Palace
here, and room for a Court-Martial. "QUE FAIRE? ILS ONT DES CANONS!"
said the old Prussian Raths, wandering about in these woods, when
Gustavus and his Swedes were at the door. "QUE FAIRE?" may the new
military gentlemen think to themselves, here again, while the brown
leaves rustle down upon them, after a hundred years!
The Court consists of a President, Lieutenant-General Schulenburg,
an elderly Malplaquet gentleman of good experience; one of the many
Schulenburgs conspicuous for soldiering, and otherwise, in those times.
He is nephew of George I.'s lean mistress; who also was a Schulenburg
originally, and conspicuous not for soldiering. Lean mistress we say;
not the Fat one, or cataract of tallow, with eyebrows like a cart-wheel,
and dim coaly disks for eyes, who was George I.'s half-sister, probably
not his mistress at all; and who now, as Countess of Darlington so
called, sits at Isleworth with good fat pensions, and a tame raven
come-of-will,--probably the SOUL of George I. in some form. [See
Walpole, _Reminiscences._] Not this one, we say:--but the thread-paper
Duchess of Kendal, actual Ex-mistress; who tore her hair on the
road when apoplexy overtook poor George, and who now attends chapel
diligently, poor old anatomy or lean human nail-rod. For the sake of
the English reader searching into what is called "History," I, with
indignation, endeavor to discriminate these two beings once again; that
each may be each, till both are happily forgotten to all eternity.
It was the latter, lean may-pole or nail-rod one, that was Aunt of
Schulenburg, the elderly Malplaquet gentleman who now presides
at Copenick. And let the reader remember him; for he will turn up
repeatedly again.
The Court consisted farther of three Major-Generals, among whom I name
only Grumkow (Major-General by rank though more of a diplomatist
and black-artist than a soldier), and Schwerin, Kurt von Schwerin of
Mecklenburg (whom Madam Knyphausen regrets, in her now exile to
the Country); three Colonels, Derschau one of them; three
Lieutenant-Colonels, three Majors and three Captains, all of whom
shall be nameless here. Lastly come three of the "Auditor" or the
Judge-Advocate sort: Mylius, the Compiler of sad Prussian Quartos, known
to some; Gerber, whose red cloak has frightened us once already; and
the Auditor of Katte's regiment. A complete Court-Martial, and of
symmetrical structure, by the rule of three;--of whose proceedings we
know mainly the result, nor seek much to know more. This Court met on
Wednesday, 25th October, 1730, in the little Town of Copenick; and in
six days had ended, signed, sealed and despatched to his Majesty; and
got back to Berlin on the Tuesday next. His Majesty, who is now at
Wusterhausen, in hunting time, finds conclusions to the following
effect:--
Accomplices of the Crown-Prince are two: FIRST, Lieutenant Keith, actual
deserter (who cannot be caught): To be hanged in effigy, cut in four
quarters, and nailed to the gallows at Wesel:--GOOD, says his Majesty.
SECONDLY, Lieutenant Katte of the Gens-d'Armes, intended deserter, not
actually deserting, and much tempted thereto: All things considered,
Perpetual Fortress Arrest to Lieutenant Katte:--NOT GOOD this; BAD this,
thinks Majesty; this provokes from his Majesty an angry rebuke to the
too lax Court-Martial. Rebuke which can still be read, in growling,
unlucid phraseology; but with a rhadamanthine idea clear enough in it,
and with a practical purport only too clear: That Katte was a sworn
soldier, of the Gens-d'Armes even, or Body-guard of the Prussian
Majesty; and did nevertheless, in the teeth of his oath, "worship the
Rising Sun" when minded to desert; did plot and colleague with foreign
Courts in aid of said Rising Sun, and of an intended high crime against
the Prussian Majesty itself on Rising Sun's part; far from at once
revealing the same, as duty ordered Lieutenant Katte to do. That Katte's
crime amounts to high-treason (CRIMEN LOESOE MAJESTATIS); that the rule
is, FIAT JUSTITIA, ET PEREAT MUNDUS;--and that, in brief, Katte's doom
is, and is hereby declared to be, Death. Death by the gallows and hot
pincers is the usual doom of Traitors; but his Majesty will say in this
case, Death by the sword and headsman simply; certain circumstances
moving the royal clemency to go so far, no farther. And the
Court-Martial has straightway to apprise Katte of this same: and so
doing, "shall say, That his Majesty is sorry for Katte: but that it is
better he die than that justice depart out of the world." [Preuss, i.
44.]
This is the iron doom of Katte; which no prayer or influence of mortal
will avail to alter,--lest justice depart out of the world. Katte's
Father is a General of rank, Commandant of Konigsberg at this moment;
Katte's Grandfather by the Mother's side, old Fieldmarshal Wartensleben,
is a man in good favor with Friedrich Wilhelm, and of high esteem and
mark in his country for half a century past. But all this can effect
nothing. Old Wartensleben thinks of the Daughter he lost; for happily
Katte's Mother is dead long since. Old Wartensleben writes to Friedrich
Wilhelm; his mournful Letter, and Friedrich Wilhelm's mournful but
inexorable answer, can be read in the Histories; but show only what we
already know.
Katte's Mother, Fieldmarshal Wartensleben's Daughter, died in 1706;
leaving Katte only two years old. He is now twenty-six; very young for
such grave issues; and his fate is certainly very hard. Poor young
soul, he did not resist farther, or quarrel with the inevitable and
inexorable. He listened to Chaplain Muller of the Gens-d'Armes; admitted
profoundly, after his fashion, that the great God was just, and the poor
Katte sinful, foolish, only to be saved by miracle of mercy; and piously
prepared himself to die on these terms. There are three Letters of his
to his Grandfather, which can still be read, one of them in Wilhelmina's
Book, [Wilhelmina, i. 302.] the sound of it like that of dirges borne on
the wind, Wilhelmina evidently pities Katte very tenderly; in her heart
she has a fine royal-maiden kind of feeling to the poor youth. He did
heartily repent and submit; left with Chaplain Muller a Paper of pious
considerations, admonishing the Prince to submit. These are Katte's last
employments in his prison at Berlin, after sentence had gone forth.
KATTE'S END, 6th NOVEMBER, 1780.
On Sunday evening, 6th November, it is intimated to him, unexpectedly at
the moment, that he has to go to Custrin, and there die;--carriage now
waiting at the gate. Katte masters the sudden flurry; signifies that all
is ready, then; and so, under charge of his old Major and two brother
Officers, who, and Chaplain Muller, are in the carriage with him,
a troop of his own old Cavalry Regiment escorting, he leaves Berlin
(rather on sudden summons); drives all night, towards Custrin and
immediate death. Words of sympathy were not wanting, to which Katte
answered cheerily; grim faces wore a cloud of sorrow for the poor youth
that night. Chaplain Muller's exhortations were fervent and continual;
and, from time to time, there were heard, hoarsely melodious through the
damp darkness and the noise of wheels, snatches of "devotional singing,"
led by Muller.
It was in the gray of the winter morning, 6th November, 1730, that Katte
arrived in Custrin garrison. He took kind leave of Major and men: Adieu,
my brothers; good be with you evermore!--And, about nine o'clock he is
on the road towards the Rampart of the Castle, where a scaffold stands.
Katte wore, by order, a brown dress exactly like the Prince's; the
Prince is already brought down into a lower room to see Katte as he
passes (to "see Katte die," had been the royal order; but they smuggled
that into abeyance); and Katte knows he shall see him. Faithful Muller
was in the death-car along with Katte: and he had adjoined to himself
one Besserer, the Chaplain of the Garrison, in this sad function, since
arriving. Here is a glimpse from Besserer, which we may take as better
than nothing:--
"His (Katte's) eyes were mostly directed to God; and we (Muller and I),
on our part, strove to hold his heart up heavenwards, by presenting the
examples of those who had died in the Lord,--as of God's Son himself,
and Stephen, and the Thief on the Cross,--till, under such discoursing,
we approached the Castle. Here, after long wistful looking about, he did
get sight of his beloved Jonathan," Royal Highness the Crown-Prince, "at
a window in the Castle; from whom he, with the politest and most tender
expression, spoken in French, took leave, with no little emotion of
sorrow." [Letter to Katte's Father (Extract, in Preuss, _Friedrich mit
Freunden und Verwandten,_ p. 7).]
President Munchow and the Commandant were with the Prince; whose
emotions one may fancy; but not describe. Seldom did any Prince or man
stand in such a predicament. Vain to say, and again say: "In the name of
God, I ask you, stop the execution till I write to the King!" Impossible
that; as easily stop the course of the stars. And so here Katte
comes; cheerful loyalty still beaming on his face, death now nigh.
"PARDONNEZ-MOI, MON CHER KATTE!" cried Priedrich in a tone: Pardon me,
dear Katte; oh, that this should be what I have done for you!--"Death is
sweet for a Prince I love so well," said Katte, "LA MORT EST DOUCE POUR
UN SI AIMABLE PRINCE;" [Wilhelmina, i. 307; Preuss, i. 45.] and fared
on,--round some angle of the Fortress, it appears; not in sight of
Friedrich; who sank into a faint, and had seen his last glimpse of Katte
in this world.
The body lay all day upon the scaffold, by royal order; and was buried
at night obscurely in the common churchyard; friends, in silence, took
mark of the place against better times,--and Katte's dust now lies
elsewhere, among that of his own kindred.
"Never was such a transaction before or since, in Modern History,"
cries the angry reader: "cruel, like the grinding of human hearts under
millstones, like--" Or indeed like the doings of the gods, which are
cruel, though not that alone? This is what, after much sorting and
sifting, I could get to know about the definite facts of it. Commentary,
not likely to be very final at this epoch, the reader himself shall
supply at discretion.
END OF BOOK 7