Royal Murder Read online

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  There has been much speculation as to how he met his fate, but first let us look at the known facts. Because of his irregular habits his servants felt no anxiety for two days, but when he did not come home on the third his secretary, Hildebrande, became uneasy and visited Marshal Podevils who advised him to wait a couple more days before taking action. After twelve hours the faithful secretary could wait no more and he sent a message to the authorities in Dresden informing them of their new major general’s disappearance. On the following day, Friday, he wrote to Aurora in Hamburg stating that he did not now think he would ever find his master alive and that he was in “the liveliest anxiety that a mortal can be in”, being convinced of the death of “him whom all my life I shall mourn with hot tears”.

  Rudiger, the count’s chamberlain, also wrote to Aurora, describing how he had seen Konigsmark leave his house in some sort of disguise, being dressed in poor grey clothes with a brown coat over his shoulders.

  On Friday, July 7, an adjutant visited the Konigsmark household with a rumour that the count was still alive but was being held prisoner in La Platen’s house. The same rumour reached Konigsmark’s brother-in-law General Lowenhaupt who was stationed on the Rhine, but this was followed by other tidings that the count had been assassinated.

  From Zell James Cresset wrote: “Konigsmark’s commerce with our electoral princess is all come out and the count is murdered . . . Konigsmark’s papers have all been seized and the princess and her letters discovered. She is undone and her mother and father will hardly outlive the disgrace. I am in their confidence and comfort them all I can you may be sure, for better princes or people there cannot be on earth.”

  Aurora did the most to try and establish the fate of her brother. First she travelled with her sister Amalie, Countess Lowenhaupt, to Zell, and gaining no information there she set out to Hanover to demand her brother. When she was met with outright discourtesy and negative statements she hurried on to Saxony to enlist the help of Konigsmark’s old friend the Elector Frederick Augustus. She remained there “beseeching for her brother as if he was still alive”, while the elector called for an explanation from Hanover as to the disappearance of his officer. A brief reply came that Konigsmark was technically in the Hanoverian service since he had not resigned his commission or presented his accounts, therefore if he was found the Elector of Hanover would be at liberty to deal with him as a deserter.

  It was not only the Elector of Saxony who was interested in the fate of Konigsmark. Hanover was bombarded with letters of inquiry and indignation from courts all over the Continent and it was feared the affair would endanger the Grand Alliance. Threats from Saxony became so extreme that Ernest Augustus prepared for hostilities, and it took the intervention of the Emperor and William III of England to allay the fury of “that madman at Dresden”. One result of Frederick Augustus’ interest in the case was that Aurora became his mistress and bore him a son who became the celebrated Marshal Saxe.

  Meanwhile in Hanover the name of Sophia Dorothea was deleted from the state prayers, and in the palace every token of her presence removed after she was sent to the Castle of Ahlden where she was to remain a prisoner for thirty-two years until her death there. Her children were never allowed to visit her, but her son did manage to secrete a portrait of her which he kept hidden during his father’s lifetime. As a young man he tried to plan her escape: this came to nothing but his resentment of his father’s treatment of his mother never abated.

  Ernest Augustus instituted proceedings on behalf of his heir, the case going before an ecclesiastical court which, on December 28, 1694, granted the divorce and gave the innocent party permission to marry again if he wished. It was granted on the grounds of desertion by the princess; throughout the case no mention of Konigsmark or adultery was raised as this would have reflected on the honour of the House of Hanvover.

  At the time of the scandal the Viscomte de Beaucaire wrote of the princess: “Whether she was guilty or not mattered little. They wanted no more of her. They had to be bribed to take her; she had given children to assure a succession; they had got her money and they had made certain of her inheritance, and that was enough.”

  Elenora von dem Knesebeck was imprisoned without a trial in the ancient fortress of Scharzfels perched on a crag in the Harz Mountains. For three years she remained shut up in one room until she was dramatically rescued by a loyal servant of the family she had served who, disguised as a tiler, lowered her on a rope down the eighty-foot castle wall. She managed to reach Vienna where she lived quietly until her beloved mistress’ daughter Sophia married the Crown Prince of Prussia and Brandenburg whereupon she entered her services in Berlin.

  In 1698 Geoege Lewis became the new elector and Sophia Dorothea wrote to him that she hoped that the “depth and sincerity” of her repentance might soften his heart so that he might “permit me to see and embrace our beloved children. My gratitude for this . . . will be infinite since I desire nothing else to enable me to die content.”

  He made no reply, nor did he relent in 1714 when prior to his departure to claim the English crown his family tried to induce him to relax the harshness of his ex-wife’s imprisonment. It is thought that had he done so it might have lessened his unpopularity in Britain where his treatment of Sophia Dorothea, contrasted with his fondness for his two German mistresses known descriptively as the Elephant and Castle by the irreverent English public, were the subject of endless pamphlets, lampoons and ballads.

  When Sophia Dorothea died in November 1726, there was no recognition of the event in Hanover, but in England the London Gazette did announce the demise of “the Duchess-Dowager of Hanover.”

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  There have been several accounts of what actually happened to Konigsmark, at least one of which is said to be based on a confession by one of the guards involved in the assassination. Apart from minor details, the main difference between the versions is the amount of guilt apportioned to the Elector Ernest Augustus, his mistress Countess von Platen and his son George Lewis.

  A representative description of the crime was given by Wilkins who wrote: “On Sunday, July 1 1694, Konigsmark received a note from the princess written in a feigned hand asking him to come to her that night without fail and appointing the hour and mentioning the signal. In obedience to this summons long expected the same night between ten and eleven he stole out of his house ‘. . . Arriving at the Liene Schloss Konigsmark went round to the wing where the princess’s apartments were situated and gave the signal, whistling a few bars of a well known air. The signal was probably answered by a light at the window and a minute later he was admitted through the postern by Knesebeck and conducted to the princess’s chamber. Here she withdrew and the lovers were left alone. They had not seen one another for more than three months and now met under the shadow of great peril.

  “Both were ready to take the fatal plunge and brave the consequences. There could hardly be a more favourable time than the present, so it seemed to them: the electoral prince was in Berlin, the electress at Herrenhausen; there was no one of all the royal Hanoverian family in Hanover but the old elector, weak and ailing, in a far off wing of the palace; time and circumstances alike were favourable for flight.”

  Wilkins claimed that through one of her spies the Countess von Platen, still enraged by Konigsmark’s drunken gossip about her in Dresden, learned of the meeting and hurried to the elector’s apartment where she told him with much agitation and many gestures that Konigsmark was even now in the chamber of the electoral princess and besought him to take immediate steps to punish the offenders ... If His Highness would leave the matter to her she would find a way to arrest Konigsmark quickly and then the elector might punish the delinquents at his leisure.

  On obtaining his agreement La Platen hurried to the guardroom where she swore four halberdiers to secrecy and then posted them close to Sophia Dorothea’s apartments. When the count left the outer door of these he stole down a long corridor leading to
a magnificent hall known as the Rittersaal.

  Wilkins continued: “A door had purposely been left unbarred for his exit and it was now locked ... he turned to retrace his step. At that moment the four desperados sprang from their hiding place and rushed upon him with their weapons. The unfortunate man realised he was caught in a trap but though taken by surprise he defended himself. For a few minutes there was fierce conflict during which two of his adversaries were wounded and although Konigsmark was fighting in the dark against four armed men the results seemed uncertain until his sword broke. This placed him at the mercy of his assailants and he fell severely wounded in the hip by a cut from a battleaxe and run through the body by a sword. As he fell his cry was ‘Spare the princess. Spare the innocent princess.’“

  Other authors lay the blame squarely on the elector and his son George Lewis, declaring that the motive had not been inspired by La Platen’s desire for revenge but because proof had come to light that the couple intended to elope. Certainly it would seem that the removal of a noble as famous as Konigsmark, who was an excellent swordsman, in the midst of the royal palace could only have been done with the knowledge and discretion of the elector and his son. They must have certainly watched the progress of the affair, allowing the couple every chance to incriminate themselves, until a point was reached where, for the honour of the royal family, it was decided to remove the count.

  In her book The Life and Times of George, Joyce Marlow wrote: “One set of the proliferating rumours stated that Ernest Augustus had ordered the assassination with the agreement of his son. Another set had Ernest Augustus actually present in Sophia Dorothea’s apartment during the gruesome murder, though it was agreed that George Lewis was not in Hanover when it took place . . . The saddest set of rumours said that Sophia Dorothea and Konigsmark had finally realised that their love was star-crossed and could not continue. He had come to the palace to bid the final ‘adieu’ to his beloved mistress, only to be cruelly butchered, either at the instigation of Ernest Augustus with the connivance of George Lewis, or by the hirelings of the Countess von Platen.”

  Though nothing definite about the count’s murder came to light during the lifetime of George I, his body was discovered beneath the floor of Sophia Dorothea’s apartment when alterations were being made to the palace during the reign of George II.

  “The discovery was hushed up,” wrote Horace Walpole. “George II entrusted the secret to his wife, Queen Caroline, who told it to my father; but the king was too tender of the honour of his mother to utter it to his mistress ...”

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