Виктория Холт - The Third George

It was hardly likely that Juliana Maria would stand by and do nothing. She had her own son Frederick to consider. Some time before she had gone to Fredensborg from where she watched events at Court with great concentration. She was surrounded by supporters; and there she had plotted.

In the Christiansberg Palace a masked ball was being held. Caroline Matilda and Struensee were dancing together when the conspirators entered. Conspirators! They would call themselves the patriots. Their schemes had matured in the apartments of Juliana Maria; and the people were with them. Struensee was arrested. She saw him carried off under her eyes; but she had not believed that they would dare touch her.

She had cried: "I am the Queen. Take your hands from me.”

But they took no heed of her orders and struggling she was carried away and no one in the great hall attempted to prevent this outrage. Her first thoughts were for her children. She begged not to be parted from them. They had become more important to her than anything else. The guards considered and at length her little daughter was brought to her. Her son Frederick was not allowed to see her; he was the Crown Prince and belonged to the state. But at least she had Louisa. And so they had brought her to the prison on the Sound and the days of captivity had begun.

What was happening in Copenhagen, in Frederiksberg, in London? she wondered; and her thoughts dwelt on London. George would hear what was happening to her and he would never allow these people to treat a sister of his in this way.

She had wanted to scream at them: "Do you realize that I am the sister of the King of England?”

But she had remained silent. She would get messages to him; and he would never desert her.

People might laugh at George, say he was simple, respectably bourgeois, but he was kind and he would never desert his sister.

What frightening days she endured in prison when she had heard news of Struensee's trial; when they tortured him and under torture he confessed to his intrigue with her all the details, the private intimate details; and she knew that they did not wish to incriminate him only, but her. They wanted to take her out of this prison to her execution. They wanted to humiliate her, to kill her.

And they had brought to her her lover's confession. Is this true? they demanded. And she regarded them silently. It was true. She had loved this man; there had been a time when nothing in the world had been important to her but him; and now they had him under restraint; the penalty for his sins was horrible death.

She had cried: "The fault is mine. I take the blame." And that had pleased them; that was what they had wanted her to say. So they had brought their case against her; she was to be divorced from the King; her lover was to die ... barbarously. And herself? What of herself?

She had waited for news of her lover's death. There was no news; and one April day she was overcome by a terrible melancholy; and she said to herself : "This is the day.”

Later she heard that she was right. She shuddered to think of the torturing of that once handsome body; she could not shut out of her mind the thought of his corpse. And herself. What of herself?

Her only hope lay with George.

**** George paced up and down his mother's apartment.

"What do you think they will do to her, eh, what? Are they planning to execute her as they did Struensee?”

"We cannot allow it," said the Princess Dowager.

"No, we will not allow it. Caroline Matilda." George's eyes grew soft. His little sister who was so bright and pretty. Something must be done to save her.

"I will speak to North," he said. "We must delay no longer. Who knows what these Danes will do next. We must prove to them the might of England, eh?”

"How I wish this marriage had never taken place.”

"And I" agreed George. "But what can we do? Can we leave our women unmarried ... spinsters, eh? What? Not a good prospect for them. And so few Protestant sovereigns in Europe.”

"None could be worse than this Christian. A lunatic, George. Nothing more. My poor, poor daughter.”

The Princess Dowager had become a little more sentimental since she felt so ill. Now she was thinking of Caroline Matilda, her youngest, the posthumous child of the Prince of Wales. She remembered so well those months when she had awaited the child's birth and dear Lord Bute had been waiting too. When Caroline Matilda had come into the world, the Princess Dowager had ceased to mourn for her husband; then she had turned happily to Lord Bute. This had happened all those years ago; and now this daughter of hers was in great trouble; and she felt too ill to listen, to care as she should have done.

"I will speak to North," George was saying. "We cannot allow these people to forget that their queen is our sister. She must be treated with the respect due to the Crown.”

The Princess Dowager nodded, and George noticed her listlessness for the first time. She was different; in the spring light her face looked sallow and ravaged.

"You are ill," he said suddenly.

"No ... no ... no," she protested.

"This has upset you, I fear.”

"Yes," she answered. Let it go at that. She was not going to admit to George how ill she was. She was going on fighting to the end.

The news from Denmark was bad. There were strong opinions there that the Queen deserved the same fate as Struensee, so why should she not suffer it?

The Danish ambassador faced the King and his ministers. He should not forget, they reminded him, that the Queen of Denmark was an English princess.

"My government would never tolerate the execution of an English princess," said the King.

The answer came from the Danish Court that they would settle their own affairs without help from England; and as a result a squadron was ordered to sail for Denmark.

Now the Danes were alarmed and just as diplomatic relations between the two countries were about to be broken off, they expressed a change of attitude. The Queen should be divorced; they would not take her life, but she should be exiled from Denmark.

The squadron was not sent to Denmark; but the position demanded some action; therefore two frigates and a sloop were ordered to Elsinore to make sure that the Queen was allowed to leave Denmark in safety.

George had discussed the affair at great length with his mother. Caroline Matilda had been guilty of adultery; they must remember that. They could not blame the Danish Government entirely for its treatment of her. She had admitted that Struensee had been her lover; he had paid the price; they must not demand a free pardon for Caroline Matilda merely because she was an English princess. But they would remember that she was the King's sister; therefore the Navy must make this gesture to the Danes that they might not forget the exalted rank of the English princess.

The Danes had no wish for trouble with England. All they wanted was to be rid of Caroline Matilda. It was enough that she was divorced and exiled although the British ambassador did succeed in getting her a pension of about 5000 pounds a year. So it was goodbye to Denmark.

Caroline Matilda was weeping bitterly. Not that she cared to leave this land in which she had known such tempestuous years. She despised her husband; she had been disappointed in her lover; and all that was left to her was her children. And this was her punishment; she was to be parted from them. Frederick! Louisa! They were no longer hers. They belonged to the state of Denmark.

And she was to be exiled by a freak of fortune in the castle of Celle.

It was at Celle that her great-grandmother, Sophia Dorothea the tragic Queen of George I, had lived her happy childhood; and poor Sophia Dorothea's life had run on similar lines to that of Caroline Matilda, for married to the coarse and inconsiderate George I, she had taken a lover, been discovered, her lover had been brutally murdered, her children taken from her, and she exiled to spend the rest of her life in solitude. She remained in exile for more than twenty years, I believe, thought Caroline Matilda. I pray it will not be so long for me.

And so ended Caroline Matilda's life in Denmark, as, her children taken from her, her lover lost to her for ever, she made her journey towards Celle.

The family troubles were not over. It was hardly likely that Cumberland would learn his lesson; no sooner had the Grosvenor scandal died down than he came to his brother in a mood of something between contrition and truculence and told him that he had something of importance to tell him.

"You will hear of it sooner or later," he told George, 'and I would rather you heard it first from my own lips.”

George's spirits sank. He could see from his brother's expression that it would be something which would not please him.

"You'd better tell, eh?”

"I... I am married.”

"Married," spluttered George. "But ... but it's impossible. How ... can that be?”

"Your Majesty should know. You take your oath before the priest and ...”

Cumberland was looking sly, reminding George of that ceremony he had undergone with Hannah Lightfoot. George said: "You had better tell me the worst.”

"She's beautiful. I would have made her my mistress but she would have none of that. Marriage or nothing ... so it was marriage.”

"Who is she?" asked George.

"Mrs. Horton. You've heard of her. There's been plenty of scandal about us. Widow of a Derbyshire squire. Lord Irnham's daughter.”