A QUEEN OF TEARS
BY THE SAME AUTHOR.
THE LOVE OFAN UNCROWNED QUEEN:
SOPHIE DOROTHEA, CONSORT OF GEORGE I.,AND HER CORRESPONDENCE WITH PHILIPCHRISTOPHER, COUNT KONIGSMARCK.
New and Revised Edition.
With 24 Portraits and Illustrations.
8vo, 12s. 6d. net.
LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO.,
LONDON, NEW YORK AND BOMBAY.
A QUEEN OF TEARS
CAROLINE MATILDA, QUEEN OFDENMARK AND NORWAY ANDPRINCESS OF GREAT BRITAINAND IRELAND
BY
W. H. WILKINS
M.A., F.S.A.
Author of “The Love of an Uncrowned Queen,” and “Caroline the Illustrious,Queen Consort of George II.”
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS
IN TWO VOLUMES
Vol. I.
LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO.
39 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON
NEW YORK AND BOMBAY
1904
PREFACE
Some years ago, when visiting Celle in connectionwith a book I was writing on Sophie Dorothea,The Love of an Uncrowned Queen, I found, inan unfrequented garden outside the town, a greymarble monument of unusual beauty. Around thebase ran an inscription to the effect that it waserected in loving memory of Caroline Matilda, Queenof Denmark and Norway, Princess of Great Britainand Ireland, who died at Celle in 1775, at the ageof twenty-three years. To this may be traced theorigin of this book, for until I saw the monumentI had not heard of this English Princess—a sisterof George III. The only excuse to be offered forthis ignorance is that it is shared by the greatmajority of Englishmen. For though the romanticstory of Caroline Matilda is known to every Dane—sheis the Mary Stuart of Danish history—hername is almost forgotten in the land of her birth,and this despite the fact that little more than acentury ago her imprisonment nearly led to a warbetween England and Denmark.
Inquiry soon revealed the full measure of myignorance. The dramatic tale of Queen Caroline[Pg vi]Matilda and her unhappy love for Struensee, herPrime Minister, has been told in Danish, German,French and English in a variety of ways. Apartfrom history and biography, it has formed the themeof novels and plays, and even of an opera. Themost trustworthy works on the Queen and Struenseeare written in Danish, a language not widely read.In English nothing of importance has been writtenabout her for half a century,[1] and, owing to the factthat many documents, then inaccessible, have sincebecome available, the books a