Tag Archives: Seven Years’ War

Sweden’s Age of Liberty, Part Two

09 Friday Nov 2018

Posted by in democracy, Despotism, Sweden

≈ 8 Comments

Tags

, , , , , , , , , , ,

Gustav III, King of Sweden by Alexander Roslin, 1777

Sweden’s Age of Liberty

  • Charles XII’s death (1719)
  • Peter the Great’s victory (1721)

Between 1611 and 1721, Sweden was an Empire and between 1796 and 1718, it was ruled by absolutist King Charles XII (b. 17 June 1682 – 30 November 1718 [aged 36]). Charles XII was killed during the Siege of Fredriksten, in 1718. In 1731, Voltaire wrote a History of Charles XII (Histoire de Charles XII), the last ruler of the Swedish Empire. After his death, Sweden and its allies lost the Swedish Empire to the Tsardom of Russia, henceforth a Tsardom and an Empire. As we have seen in an earlier post, Peter the Great wanted access to seas, which, to the west, was the Baltic Sea and, by extension, the Baltic provinces and the Baltic states. Peter I was successful in his quest, but he ended Sweden’s age of “greatness.”

However, and ironically, Charles XII’s death and Sweden’s defeat provided a window of opportunity for the development of a rudimentary parliament in Europe. Sweden had lost its “greatness,” but it had entered its Age of Liberty, or Age of Freedom. Sweden’s Age of Liberty is:

a half-century-long period of parliamentary governance and increasing civil rights, beginning with Charles XII‘s death in 1718 and ending with Gustav III‘s self-coup in 1772.

(See Age of Liberty, Wiki2.org.)

In 1719, Count Arvid Horn (6 April 1664 – 17 April 1742), President of the Privy Council Chancellery of Sweden, transferred power from an absolute monarchy to a parliament, Sweden’s Riksdag of the Estates, a name used by the Estates when they assembled.

Charles XII was childless. He was succeeded by Ulrika Eleonora, his sister, who abdicated because power was in the hands of the Riksdag of the Estates. Her husband Landgrave Frederick I of Hesse-Kassel, a prince consort, would serve as King Frederick I of Sweden until 5 April 1751.

The Treaty of Nystad (10 September 1721)

Frederick I of Sweden signed the Treaty of Nystad (1721) which ended the Great Northern War (1700 – 1721). Sweden surrendered Swedish Estonia, Swedish Livonia  (which had capitulated in 1710) and Southeast Finland (Kexholmslän and Karelia), in exchange for two million silver thaler.

{{{image_alt}}}

Treaty effects: pre-war Sweden in yellow, Russia in green, Russian gains indicated. (Wiki2.org.)

The Riksdag of the Estates

  • the Riksdag of the Estates vs Britain’s Parliament
  • the Hats and the Caps (Nightcaps)
  • Arvid Horn

The Riksdag of the Estates differs from Britain’s Parliament. It may consist of two parties opposing one another. During the Age of Liberty, the Riksdag opposed the Hats (les Chapeaux) and the Caps (les Bonnets). I noted the role played by the Hats and the Caps in the short version of this post. But I should add that the “Horn Period” was a better Age of Liberty than the period during which the Hats ruled.

His strong hand kept the inevitable strife of the parliamentary factions within due limits, and it was entirely owing to his provident care that Sweden so rapidly recovered from the wretched condition in which the wars of Charles XII had plunged her.

(See Arvid Horn, Wiki2.org.)

Frederick I Martin van Meytens
Adolph Frederick by Gustaf Lundberg

The Two Kings

  • Frederick I and Adolph Frederick
  • The Hats: Wars and Greatness

As for the relationship between the Riksdag of the Estates and the kings who reigned during the Age of Liberty, it reflects to a large extent, the rule of the Hats and the Caps. I have mentioned the Russo-Swedish war of 1741-1743. Sweden, the former Swedish Empire, was defeated and, under the terms of the Treaty of Åbo, it had to cede territory east of the Kymi river to Russia. Elizabeth of Russia demanded that pro-absolutist Adolph Frederick from the House of Holstein-Gottorp be the future king of Sweden. As a result, members of the house of King Frederick I of Sweden, the Landgraviate of Hesse-Kassel were eliminated from the line of succession.

Under pro-absolutist Adolp Frederick of the House of Holstein-Gottorp, the Riksdag of the Estates was attacked twice: the Coup of 1756 and the very serious December Crisis of 1768. (See Sweden’s Age of Liberty, 8 November 2018.)

The Hats also involved Sweden in the Pomeranian Theatre of the Seven Years’ War. Sweden lost 40,000 men in a war France did not win. Sweden suffered immense losses seeking the “greatness” it had lost.

The End of the Age of Liberty

According to the Encyclopædia Britannica, the reason for the transfer from absolutism to its Age of Freedom was “the complete failure of the policy of ‘greatness’ connected with the Carolingian [Charles XII] absolutism.” In 1772, Gustav III‘s self-coup re-introduced absolutism. Gustav III is described as a popular king. He was when he modelled his absolutism on his uncle, Frederick the Great of Prussia’s enlightened despotism. But what of the people’s will?

They [enlightened desposts] typically instituted administrative reform, religious toleration, and economic development but did not propose reforms that would undermine their sovereignty or disrupt the social order.

(See Enlightened Despotism, Britannica.)

They felt, as did Empress Catherine the Great of Russia, that aristocracy was their “profession.” Elizabeth of Russia used the Treaty of Åbo as a coup. She became an Empress of Russia and named her successor: Peter III of the House of Holstein-Gottorp. In Sweden, kings and queens were elected! When Gustav IV lost Finland, he was deposed by officers of his army and various notables. He had to abdicate and go into exile, never to return. A democracy is a “government of the people, by the people, for the people.” (See Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburgh Address, Wiki2.org.)

The Age of Liberty‘s early Riksdag of the Estates took all powers away from monarchs. This would change as Swedish democracy developed, a process usually marked by trials and errors. The Age of Liberty can be viewed as an experiment in democracy. Matters  change. Arvid Horn’s grew increasingly neutral, and his neutrality was opposed. Ulrika Eleonora, Charles XII’s sister, abdicated because she refused to be a figurehead. But, although King Charles XIII was prematurely senile, he was involved in the drafting of the Instrument of Government of 1809, Sweden’s constitution. It was not developed unilaterally and it remained unchanged until 1974.

In fact, to what extent was Charles XII an absolute monarch? Voltaire preferred Charles XII to Peter the Great.

The form of government instituted in Sweden under King Charles XI and passed on to his son, Charles XII is commonly referred to as absolute monarchy; however, the Swedish monarch was never absolute in the sense that he wielded arbitrary power.

(See Absolute Monarchy, Wiki2.org.)

It remains that, as an absolute monarch, Gustav III tried to abolish the Privy Council of Sweden and propably did so out of fear. Gustav III’s Union and Security Act of 1789, “swept away most of the powers exercised by the Swedish Riksdag.” He “severely curtailed” the Freedom of the Press Act of 1766. (See Gustav III, Wiki2.org.)

Yet, Sweden defeated Russia at the Battle of Svensksund, Gustav III demonstrating leadership and “greatness.” But such “greatness,” Sweden had probably outgrown in its Age of Liberty.

im524-640px-Desprez-Swedish_war_preparations_1788

Swedish warships fitted out in Stockholm in 1788; watercolor by Louis Jean Desprez

Love to everyone 💕

RELATED ARTICLES

Sources and Resources

Johan Agrell – Violin Concerto in D major

Charles XIV John of Sweden, Wiki2.org.)

©Micheline Walker
9 November 2018
WordPress

Le Chevalier de Saint-George: the Black Mozart

12 Wednesday Sep 2012

Posted by in Mulatto, Music

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

, , , , , , ,

La Gavotte

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-George (1745–1799)
 

Joseph Bologne was born in Guadeloupe, in 1745, and was educated both in Guadeloupe and in France.  In Saint-Domingue, Joseph had studied music with the black violinist Joseph Platon.  But after his family emigrated to France, in 1752, he was enrolled in a private academy and is believed to have been a pupil of Antonio Lolli, one of the finest Italian violinists of the eighteen century.  As for composition, it would appear that his mentor was Francois Joseph Gossec, a fine composer remembered for writing a lovely gavotte, a piece of music often incorporated in a suite or a partita, but rooted in a French folk dance.[i]

Joseph Bologne at Versailles

As we know already, in France, his musical talent opened the best possible doors.  Joseph Bologne was Marie-Antoinette’s music teacher and became the maestro of the Concert des Amateurs,[ii] “a title of extreme respect given to a master musician” (Wikipedia).  He was then appointed director of the Concert de la Loge Olympique, the largest orchestra of his time (65-70 musicians).

Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-George

The World Première of Haydn’s Paris Symphonies, but the divas…

It is in his capacity as director of the Concert de la Loge Olympique, that he directed the world première of Haydn’s six “Paris Symphonies”  which had been commissioned by the Concert de la Loge Olympique.  So, as a denizen of Versailles, Joseph Bologne met Haydn and he also met the white Mozart.  He is one individual whose talent helped override ethnicity, but not altogether.  When Saint-George was appointed director of the Royal Opera of Louis XVI, three divas opposed Saint-George‘s appointment because he was a mulatto.

The Mulatto

Being a mulatto had already been a threat in Joseph’s life.  Before Joseph’s father emigrated to France, he had to flee Guadeloupe where he was suspected of murder.  He sought refuge in France to prevent Nanon and Joseph from being sold as slaves.  Moreover, on 5 April 1762, King Louis XV decreed that people of color, nègres and mulattos, had to register with the clerk of the Admiralty.  Both Nanon and Joseph were registered.  Nanon was registered as being 34 years old.  As for Joseph, he was mistakenly registered as Joseph Boulogne by La Boëssière, his master of arms.  It could be that, by then, Georges, Joseph’s father, had returned to Guadeloupe.  After the Seven Years’ War, France had chosen to keep Guadeloupe rather than New France.

Joseph as Swordsman and Equestrian

His career as a musician may have suffered because of the divas’s refusal to be seen next to a mulatto, but Joseph has other talents.  La Boëssière had a fine student.  Joseph became one of the finest swordsmen in Europe, if not the finest, as well as an extraordinary equestrian.  His talents and reputation as an athlete served him well when divas rejected him.  He excelled as an athlete and it brought him recognition.

Joseph as Soldier

But Joseph de Bolo(u)gne is remembered not as an athlete but as a prolific composer of the classical era (Haydn, Mozart and early Beethoven).  His compositions are listed in his Wikipedia entry.  Joseph served in the army of the Revolution against France’s foreign enemies, but he is not known to have participated in the misfortune of his student, Marie-Antoinette, and her husband.  On the contrary, his father having been ennobled in 1757, Joseph was an aristocrat at a time in history when aristocrats were almost systematically executed.

False Accusations

Technically speaking, Joseph de Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-George survived the French Revolution, but barely.  In 1793, he was accused of using “public funds for personal gain.”  (Wikipedia).  He was acquitted, but in the meantime he had spent 18 months in jail and upon his release, he no longer had patrons.  Most had been guillotined.  Joseph did direct orchestras on a few occasions, but too few.  He died a poor man, in 1799 at the age of 54.

I have not paid much attention to Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-George’s role in the military.  Moreover I do not know why Napoléon ordered that the Chevalier’s works be destroyed.  I need to read the books that are now being published on Joseph Bologne.  These and CDs of his music are available from Amazon.com.  Moreover, there are  biographical videos on YouTube.  I will insert them in a separate post.

Conclusion

In the history of music, Joseph de Bologne is considered an important figure not only because of the music he composed, but also because he was one of the earliest black musicians to compose what we call “classical music.”  In fact, he composed during the “classical era” (1730-1820).  But his story is nevertheless rather sad.  His rise to success was extremely rapid, but he was a mulatto, the ‘black Mozart.’  Moreover, he was jailed for a crime he had not committed.

Related Blogs: 
“C’est mon ami,” composed by Marie-Antoinette (lyrics by Florian)
“Plaisir d’amour,” sung by Kathleen Battle (lyrics by Florian)
The News & the Music of Frederick the Great
The Duc de Joyeuse: Louis XIII as a Composer
Terminology, the Music of Louis XIII & the News (eras in the history of music)
 
© Micheline Walker
September 12, 2012
WordPress 
_________________________
[i] Many folk dances found their way into suites and variations, but some were also solo pieces.  For instance, although a polonaise may be found in a suite, Chopin used it as a solo piece. The same is true of his mazurkas, not to mention the gavotte and the folía, folies d’Espagne, found in Baroque music (1600–1760).  What seems particularly important here is the link between dance and music.     
 
[ii] In eighteenth-century France, an “amateur de musique” was a lover of music. Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven were “amateurs de musique.”  French is changing. The word may now be used to differentiate professional musicians from musicians who are not professionals. 
 

The Aftermath (cont’d): Aubert de Gaspé’s Anciens Canadiens

30 Friday Mar 2012

Posted by in Canada, Literature

≈ 12 Comments

Tags

, , , , , , ,

The Ice Bridge at Longue-Pointe, by Cornelius Krieghoof, 1847-1848

I did not write a conclusion to my last blog because Cornelius Krieghoof’s paintings were my conclusion.  In Krieghoof’s paintings, Quebec was mythified.  And it was also mythified in Philippe Aubert de Gaspé‘s (October 30, 1786 – Habyart 29, 1871) Les Anciens Canadiens (1863).  Les Anciens Canadiens, a novel, was first serialized in Les Soirées canadiennes, a magazine founded in 1861 by H. R. Casgrain, A. Gérin-Lajoie, the author of Un Canadien errant (the words only),  F. A. H. La Rue and J. C. Taché.

Aubert de Gaspé’s family manoir, 1900

A Literary Homeland Novel & an historical novel

Aubert de Gaspé wrote his Anciens Canadiens, Quebec (1863) when he was in his mid-seventies and did so in response to the Report of John George Lambton, 1st Earl of Durham GCB, PC (12 April 1792 – 28 July 1840), in which Durham stated that the Canadiens did not have a history or a literature.  Les Anciens Canadiens therefore constitutes a Patrie Littéraire achievement.  Charles G. D. Roberts‘s KCMG, FRSC (January 10, 1860 – November 26, 1943) 1890 translation of Gaspé’s novel entitled The Canadians of Old, remains a favourite, but there is at least one other translation.

Given that it was written one hundred years after the Treaty of Paris (1763), one may think this novel has little to do with the aftermath, except that it is a historical novel in which events take place as the Province of Québec replaces Nouvelle-France, which Aubert de Gaspé memorialized and idealized.

Its main protagonists are Jules d’Haberville, the son of a seigneur, and Archibald Cameron of Locheill, an exiled Highlander, both of whom are students at the Jesuit seminary in Quebec City and both of whom are fated to fight on opposite sides during  the Seven Years’ War or French and Indian War.

Moreover, while visiting Jules’s father manoir, Archibald meets Blanche, Jules’s sister, and the two fall in love, which almost takes us back to Krieghoof’s two major themes: the habitant and the Amerindian.  Krieghoof was fond of genre themes and, among these themes, a “typical scene” was one where “a British soldier flirts with a young francophone woman, the intimate moment interrupted by her husband or a parent.”[i]

Archibald, renamed Arché, is not “a British soldier flirting with a young francophone woman.”[ii]  However, like a “parent,” the parents of a French-Canadian girl, Blanche herself does not think she should marry Arché.  She is the daughter of a seigneur and she rejects Arché who is not just “un bon Anglais,” but Scottish and extremely handsome.  Blanche is simply too pure.  It is at times possible to correct the accidents of history.

Un Ancien Canadien

Dumais’s gratitude & the habitant as voyageur

However, being Scottish does save Archibald’s life.  The novel contains two perilous and related events.  Early in the novel, Dumais, an habitant, crosses the Rivière-du-Sud when the ice is too thin and breaks.  The Canadiens made ice bridges, as depicted in Krieghoff’s painting above.  In fact, Dumais is the victim of a genuine débâcle.  He breaks a leg and is hanging from a tree hoping to be rescued. Archibald turns into a formidable athlete and saves Dumais’s life.

Later in the novel, Dumais will save Archibald’s life.  The British have attacked New France and Archibald is ordered to burn properties, including the d’Haberville’s manoir, which he doesn’t want to do.  However, as he is destroying properties, Archibald is captured by Amerindians and is about to be tortured and burned when Dumais surfaces, looking like an Amerindian, and tells the Amerindians that their captive is not an Englishman, but Scottish and that  “les Écossais sont les sauvages des Anglais[,]”[iii] or “the Scots are the Englishmen’s savages [Amerindians].”  Dumais then goes on to tell that Archie is the young man who saved his life on the day the ice broke.

Dumais even reveals that is not altogether the Amerindian he appears to be, but a sort of “voyageur,” the often métissé French-Canadian who manned the birch-bark canoes, first for fur-traders and later for Scottish explorers who crossed the continent, the voyageur who spoke the Amerindian languages and married Amerindians.

Reference to Cooper and Chateaubriand 

Interestingly, Les Anciens Canadiens, contains a reference to James Fenimore Cooper and, indeed, written by a Cooper the tragic events at the Rivière-du-Sud may have been better told.  “Only a Cooper or a Chateaubriand could have done justice to a depiction of the tragic events taking place on the shore of the Rivière-du-Sud.” « La plume d’un Cooper, d’un Chateaubriand, pourrait seule peindre dignement le spectacle qui frappe leurs regards sur la berge de la Rivière-du-Sud. »[iv]  Given Chateaubriand’s masterful style and Cooper’s quickly penned realism, this comparison is not altogether felicitous or convincing.

A Flaw, but not too tragic

Yes, there is the flaw.  Like Cooper’s Last of the Mohicans, Aubert de Gaspé’s Anciens Canadiens is a page-turner, but Aubert de Gaspé so idealizes New France that a comparison with Cooper is again rather inappropriate.  The seigneur is too cordial and life at the manoir, too perfect:  the meal, the May Fest, the Saint-Jean-Baptiste, the spontaneous singing, the good gentleman who has been imprisoned because others spent his fortune, the priest (le curé), the gentle treatment of the seigneur’s black slave, the friendship between Jules and Arché: frères (brothers), the much too “noble” Blanche.  In fact, even Archibald’s heroism is also a little too heroic.

__________________

[i] Arlene Gehmacher, “Cornelius Krieghoof,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/articles/cornelius-david-krieghoff

[ii] Ibid.

[iii] Philippe Aubert de Gaspé, Les Anciens Canadiens (Éditions Fides, collection Bibliothèque québécoise, 1988[1864]), p. 239.

[iv] Les Anciens Canadiens, p. 79.

[v] Arlene Gehmacher, “Cornelius Krieghoof,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/articles/cornelius-david-krieghoff

[vi] Theodore C. Blegen, Songs of the Voyageurs (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society, 1998 [1966]), p. 46.

Nouvelle-France’s Last and Lost Battle: the Battle of the Plains of Abraham

24 Saturday Mar 2012

Posted by in Canada, History, New France

≈ 64 Comments

Tags

, , , , , ,

Louis-Joseph de Montcalm-Gozon,
Marquis de Saint-Veran                      
C. W. Jefferys, 1869 – 1951
 

France in the Eighteenth Century

During the eighteenth century, France was not as vigilant as it could or should have been regarding the management of its North-American colonies. The motherland had considerable problems of its own that culminated in the French Revolution (1789 – 1794).

The Battle of the Plains of Abraham

Yes, there were battles, the most significant being the Battle of the Plains of Abraham, in Quebec City. It took place on 13 September 1759. The British won, but the battle claimed the life of Major-General James P. Wolfe (2 January 1727 – 13 September 1759). As for Louis-Joseph de Montcalm-Gozon, Marquis de Saint-Veran (28 February 1712 [O.S. 17 February 1712] – 14 September 1759), he was mortally wounded. There were sufficient men on both sides, but “many of the French were ill-trained militia,” not “regulars.” In other words, the French were not in a position to fight Major-General  Wolfe’s professional soldiers.[i] 

C. W. Jefferys (1869 – 1951)

The Death of General Montcalm depicts the Marquis de Montcalm mortally wounded in 1759. He died on 14 September 1759.

The Treaty of Paris, 10 February 1763

Signed on 10 February 1763, the Treaty of Paris brought to a close both a European conflict, not to say the first world war, the Seven Years’ War, and the North-American French and Indian War. Nouvelle-France was ceded to Great Britain on 10 February 1763.

Under the terms of the Treaty of Paris, the King of Great Britain

  • granted “the liberty of the Catholick [sic] religion to the inhabitants of Canada,”
  • agreed that the French inhabitants of Canada might withdraw from Canada without hindrance, and
  • gave to French fishermen “the liberty of fishing in the gulph [sic] of St. Lawrence” and “the liberty of fishing and drying on a part of the coasts of the island of Newfoundland”, as well as
  • the ownership of the islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon, “to serve as a shelter to the French fishermen.”[ii]

The Canadiens

For the Canadiens (French-speaking Canadians), the loss of New France was a devastating blow. The Canadien felt he had aband oned by the motherland, in which he was mostly correct. The shores of the St Lawrence had become his country. He could not return to France. According to the Treaty of Paris, the Canadiens would be free to practice their religion and farmers did not lose their farms, nor did city dwellers lose their home. However, aristocrats working in Nouvelle-France returned to France. This was also a stipulation of the Treaty of Paris. 

The Voyageurs

However, as I wrote in an arlier post the voyageurs may not have learned they had become British subjects immediately. But they learned. Certain fur-trading posts were no longer French, but British or American. Under the terms of the Treaty of Ghent, signed on 24 December 1814, ending the War of 1812 between the United States of America and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, a border would have to be drawn between British and American territories in the Northern limits of the continental United States of America.

For one thing, many voyageurs would work for John Jacob Astor (17 July 1763 – 29 March 1848), the owner of the American Fur Trade Company, established in 1808.  Ramsay Crooks urged John Jacob Astor to hire Canadiens as boatmen. Americans, who had first been hired, lacked the ability to work as a team and could not respect Amerindians.

In theory, Joan Jacob Astor’s American Fur Trade Company could not hire Canadiens who were British subjects. However, during the Presidency of Thomas Jefferson, an exception was made to the Embargo Act of 1897. Here is a link to a narrative of these events: https://michelinewalker.com/2012/01/14/john-jacob-astor-the-voyageur-as-settler-and-explorer/

In a famous council on 27 April 1763, Pontiac urged listeners to rise up against the British. (19th century engraving by Alfred Bobbet)
(please click on picture to enlarge it)
 

The Pontiac Rebellion

The Treaty of Paris had not made provisions for North-American natives, the Amerindians. Somehow and regretfully, the negotiators had not thought of them.  This shameful oversight led to the Pontiac Rebellion which lasted from 1763 to 1766 and opposed the British and Chief Pontiac’s forces. Chief Pontiac was the leader of the Ottawas.  On 25 July 1766, Pontiac met with the British superintendent of Indian affairs, Sir William Johnson, at Fort Oswego, New York. Hostilities ended on that day. As for Chief Pontiac, he was murdered on 20 April 1769. His assassination was not investigated.

—ooo—

I will end this blog here, but it will be followed by an account of the battles that took place during the French and Indian War (or the Seven Years’ War). All I will say for now is that Montcalm died on 14 September 1760. When he learned that his wound would take his life, he is reported to have said that his death was a blessing. The Battle of the Plains of Abraham had also claimed the life of General James P. Wolfe.  (please click on picture to enlarge it)

Wolfe dying, The Battle of the Plains of Abraham by Benjamin West (1738 – 1820)

 ____________________
[i] I am quoting the Quebec Encyclopedia (Marianopolis College) and the Canadian Encyclopedia. <http://faculty.marianopolis.edu/c.belanger/quebechistory/encyclopedia/TreatyofParis1763-QuebecHistory.htm>
W. Stewart Wallace, ed., The Encyclopedia of Canada, Vol. V, Toronto, University Associates of Canada 1948, p. 87
 
[ii] C. P. Stacey (revised by Norman Hillmer), “Battle of the Plains of Abraham”
http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/articles/battle-of-the-plains-of-abraham 
 
 
© Micheline Walker

24 March 2012
WordPress