Caroline
|76| |77| Caroline Albertine Michaelis, born 1862 [!] [1763], was the eldest daughter from my father’s second marriage who grew to adulthood. When she was 14, [1] she went to Gotha to Frau Schläger, née Schauer [?], a native of Hannover married to the famous Hofrath librarian, a woman with a formal education distinguished as much by her refined lifestyle and manners as by her considerable knowledge, and hence a woman visited by scholars and formally educated women and men from the very finest classes.
My sister remained there for 2 years before returning to Göttingen to be confirmed. In Gotha she acquired young lady friends, and had social contact with the Fr[äuleins] von Lichtenstein [2] and [Fräulein] Studnitz, with whom she also carried on a long correspondence until the eldest [i.e., Julie von Studnitz], who was her most intimate friend, died early [1793]. That correspondence was carried on in French. But for the remainder of her life, and I would almost say: with an enduring influence afterward as well, she maintained a close relationship especially with Luise Stieler, married name Gotter, her husband being well known especially as an author of comedies and as an excellent author of occasional poetry.
That she [Caroline] was not pretty, but was indeed intelligent and much admired and loved afterward, is demonstrated by the fact that my dear grandmother left her 1000 Reichsthaler because Caroline [would need to cultivate?] her intellect more than perhaps any young girl or young widow ever had — her intellect being really the [only] feature that could attract suitors — she [the grandmother] believing that otherwise she [Caroline] would go unnoticed and unsought because of her obvious lack of beauty. It was not lovers, it was friends and suitors that she found during her life [or friends as suitors].
I believe it was in 1776 that our brother returned from Strasbourg, where he had attended the university; she lived in lofty friendship with him, [3] and his return also brought numerous men into our family’s home, for example, Herr von Ramdohr, who also paid Caroline the requisite measure of admiration, which I still remember. After she returned from Gotha, where our brother had also visited her, she soon became engaged to privy Justizrath Böhmer’s son after the latter had courted her for a lengthy period. [Marginal note: Before she became engaged to Böhmer, she had also been courted by Herr Blumenbach, who at the time was a Magister.]
Although he was not her intellectual equal, he was an excellent physician and a sensitive man who had connections with many men within Freemasonry |78| when it yet functioned as a sort of bond, and with men associated with Illuminati. [4]
He was a physician and had visited England several times while accompanying an elderly uncle employed in the German chancery on a visit to the latter’s relatives and daughters in Hannover; he [the uncle] was also an in-law of the wife of Geheimrath Böhmer. He also quickly received — I believe it was 1884 [!] [1784] — an extremely good position as a mining physician in Clausthal, marrying that same spring [15 June 1784]. I myself believe Caroline felt more friendship and devotion for him — which young girls so often take to be love — than love itself.
They lived happily married in Clausthal for 3 years, and in the most pleasant circumstances, around the family of General Superintendent Dahme, [the wife being] one of the daughters of that elderly uncle, Herr Best, whom Böhmer had fetched from London.
The houses were next door to each other, and it was there that my sister also perfected her proficiency in English, just as she was already proficient in French. She was also especially proficient and learned in history, so much so, in fact, that the famous Schlözer — who thought extremely highly of her as a young girl, often inviting her to his house in the evening and then never failing to accompany her back home afterward personally with a servant carrying the lantern ahead — suggested that, like his own daughter, Dorothea, who afterward, at the 50th jubilee in Göttingen [1787], received her doctorate, — that Caroline, too, should devote herself wholly to scholarship, and especially history, indeed, even to give talks and presentations. But she rejected this suggestion and left instead as Frau Böhmer, then perfecting her English at the home of General Superintendent Dahme, where only English was spoken.
At that time, Senior Mining Administrator von Reden, an extremely well educated man who was in office in Clausthal, Mining Administrator von Trebra in Zellerfeld-Braunschweig, and Herr von Praun, the later Braunschweig minister — these three men were their extremely close friends, and such company could not but enhance any young woman’s cultivation and education. Her husband, however, fell an early victim to his own profession. He died in the winter of the third marriage[!] [4 February 1788] after she had born him two little daughters, Auguste and Therese; that summer [1788] she also gave birth to a third child, a son.
She returned to her family home, living there again like a daughter, similarly also in that of her father-in-law, respected and loved, until |79| she was again hit hard by the death of her little boy, who was only 2 months old. One of the companions and tutors accompanying the royal princes was an extremely cultivated man, with both an excellent intellect and an excellent heart.
He visited our house quite often [Marginal note: 1787], becoming and remaining the sisters’ lifelong friend; indeed, it was a frequent object of curiosity to which of the three he had given his heart. This was doubtless really Caroline, and he may also have expressed to her [outright] both his respect and his love. In the meantime, however, and while my father was still alive, she followed the urging of my eldest brother in Marburg, moving in with him [1789] with her two little girls to sweeten his solitary life a bit, he not yet being married to Frau von Malzburg. [Marginal note: Trip to Gotha with me in the autumn of 1791 [October]. Proposal of marriage from General Superintendent Löffler, rejected but considered [?].
Probably the reason [there was] no engagement to Tatter. An uninterrupted correspondence with Legation Secretary Tatter showed that there was no alienation between them. When my father came down ill, it was clear that her presence was necessary, indeed, my father himself yearned for his beloved, excellent daughter. So she did indeed return several weeks before he died [Marginal note: 1791], also remaining there in the house with us the following winter [1791–92].
Lotte visited her in Marburg and then traveled [to Mainz] to visit Therese Forster as well as to Offenbach to visit Frau von La Roche, with whom both sisters had become fast friends. Nor was there any lack of those in Marburg who would pay her [Caroline] their attentions, including even a marriage proposal from Frau von Malzburg’s brother, Herr von Breitenstein, I believe that was his name. She similarly made many acquaintances there who remained loyal to her, e.g., with Minister von Schenck [?], who even came to visit her in Göttingen the following winter [Marginal note: 1787(?)].
August Wilhelm Schlegel was also in Göttingen at the time and also paid her his attentions. There were a great many quite excellent young people who often gathered at our home. Such included also Bürger before he entered into that disastrous marriage [1790 to Elise Hahn]. But this was probably the previous winter. — Tatter, because of his position, which was still too indefinite, was unable to make any marriage proposal, nor |80| was there likely ever any proposal in this regard, something about which I myself, by the way, as close to him as I was, was afterward never entirely clear.
That spring Caroline again traveled to her brother’s [in Marburg]. But since she had already lost her little Therese during her first visit [December 1789], she was disinclined to linger in Marburg, and instead accepted an invitation to live for a while near the Forsters in Mainz. [Marginal note: She returned to Göttingen in August 1791 that she might yet see my father.
She stayed (in Göttingen) that winter, then moved directly to Mainz, whence also her letters to me in Hamburg that Schelling still has, so she must have gone there (to Mainz) directly.] [Ed. note: late February 1792] She took Auguste along as well after visiting Frau von La Roche and becoming even more intimate friends with her. Hitherto the bond had been solely by way of Philipp and Frau von Laroche’s son, who was studying in Marburg.
The arrangements in Mainz came together quite marvelously, and the French Revolution had also ignited there. Forster, Wedekind, and many others were active adherents, and my sister doubtless no less. After all, these events stirred everyone’s heart; moreover, letters to the friendly French residents in Göttingen, who were only too excitable themselves, were also already arriving, letters stirring everyone else’s emotions as well.
In the meantime, Forster went to Paris, prompted doubtless by his wife; for even when Lotte was staying with her in Mainz, she noticed that a relationship had developed between Huber and Therese — but she [Therese] was clever enough to manipulate everything in her own favor. She went her own way, Forster died, and it is only too certain that it was she who brought all this about.
All this also became only too clear to Caroline, who could no longer respect Therese as before, and her [Caroline’s] high opinion [of Therese] diminished, indeed disappeared completely. [Marginal note: 1791 acquaintance with Schlegel was (?) that winter. Advice (to Luise herself) regarding (Luise’s relationship with) Bouterwek.]
The siege of Mainz now commenced [10 April–23 July 1793], and my sister had, for Frau Forster’s sake, delayed her own departure too long. Although she certainly now wanted to leave, it was a difficult undertaking. Because women, the elderly, and children could be given safe passage, she took a carriage [30 March 1793] with her child, now 9 [7; born 28 April 1785] years old, with the necessary papers. Wedekind’s sister — the later Frau Liebeskind — along with her small son (she had earlier been married to Musical Director Forkel) was also in one of the carriages. [5]
For more than one reason, Caroline was not friends with this woman, indeed Caroline hardly even knew her even though she, too, was from Göttingen. |81| Which is why, after they were out of the fortress [i.e., Mainz], there were shots, which is allegedly often the case when one wants to draw attention to and [?] protect those being given safe passage. Traveling along the chaussées they encountered retreating troops and had to retrace part of their route; it was there they observed the horrific treatment of the Clubbists, Blauel [Blau], etc.
They then proceeded on slowly up to the Prussian advance positions. When they were stopped there, the soldiers saw the disreputable names of Wedekind and Böhmer in their passports, the latter name having acquired notoriety through the Clubbist Böhmer, my sister’s brother-in-law. Aha! That is why there were shots! I myself do not understand how all this is connected. The women were taken to headquarters, where General Kalckreuth considered them suspicious, bearing as they did the same names as the scorned Clubbists. After their baggage was confiscated — my sister did get hers back in Frankfurt after her release, though everything like money had been taken — they were taken as prisoners to Königstein, where they were in the most terrible company and had to listen to the dreadful mistreatment of the imprisoned Clubbists.
Finally a letter made its way through from Schlözer, who thought so much of my sister and respected her so highly; he had tried everything he could with the government in Hannover to secure Caroline’s release, writing about it in his powerful style. It was only after 8 weeks that her release was secured, to wit the same way as many such things, this time through a friend of my brother, Dr. Michaelis, namely, Sophie Bethmann, later B[aroness?] von Schwarzkopf. Dr. Michaelis happened to be in Pisa at the time, where Prince Augustus was also currently staying, who himself had studied in Göttingen; Tatter was with him.
[Marginal note: I am including letters to me from Tatter [letters 123a, 125c, 150b]. My brother immediately turned to the latter, and yet, at a time when so many things were misinterpreted, Tatter, as excellent a person as he otherwise was, thought it unwise to compromise himself in his current position, believing that speaking up for Caroline [would] raise the suspicion that he was closer to her than merely a friend; he did indeed exhibit weakness in not speaking up on her behalf. —
At the same time, A.W. Schlegel was working in the Haag as a tutor [1791–95]. He feared nothing. He had no reservations at all, and his |82| love, though rejected, nonetheless brought him to Frankfurt. My brother Dr. Michaelis arrived there at the same time and immediately turned to Sophie Bethmann, who told him he should come to her garden the next morning, where the King of Prussia (who was courting her) would be coming as well. He [Philipp Michaelis] was to bring along his petition and come up and hand it to her. She then passed it along to the king, and the following day she [Caroline] was free!!!! [5a] What Schlözer was unable to bring about, the much feared and respected Schlözer, was effected through but a single word by a beautiful young girl who despised the king and never accepted his advances. —
Schlegel now came as well, renewing his courtship and in turn receiving Caroline’s gratitude and acknowledgement, albeit not yet with fulfillment and acceptance. My sister’s health was shattered, and though the entire affair had generated so much talk, her reputation had not suffered. [6] She avoided people, wishing instead to live quietly for a time. Schlegel suggested Dresden, where his married sister lived, whose husband, Herr Ernst, was an official. She went there under an assumed name and lived quietly for a year solely with this family [!] in a village near Dresden. [7]
We in the meantime had sold our house [in Göttingen, 1792], and I myself had been staying with friends in Hamburg; I returned to Göttingen just as my sister Lotte died in childbirth. Because nothing was really keeping my mother and me there now, we decided, after Caroline had lived for a while with her dearest friends, the Gotters, in Gotha, to live together in some larger town.
We chose Braunschweig, where we quickly made new friends [Marginal note: 1795]. Campe, Eschenburg particularly, even more men, who then also attracted Schlegel, who spent a winter there as well [Marginal note: 1796] and who wanted to establish himself as a professor in Jena, something he in fact did put into effect in midsummer.
Caroline gave him her hand [Marginal note: wedding summer 1796], albeit not out of love, but rather out of gratitude for his having helped her in her time of distress. She probably also had a feeling of having been ignored or relegated by Tatter, with whom her correspondence had ceased. Tatter never, during his entire life, got over the painful sundering of these bonds. I kept up my correspondence with him until he accompanied Count Münster to St. Petersburg as a legation secretary and died soon thereafter [1805]; |83| his letters attest what an excellent man and loyal friend he was, capable of the kind of consideration Frau von Staël suggests in Delphine [1802], through which he also came to ruin. [8]
Caroline now moved to Jena, accompanied by her daughter, Auguste. It is unlikely any woman lacking beauty made more conquests through her intellect than did Caroline, who was something quite different than what today is referred to as an educated, cultivated, or perhaps merely overeducated woman. No man ever held her in more appropriate or higher esteem than did Schelling, something attested by a letter he wrote after her death acknowledging her lofty merits (see attached [not extant, but see letter 448]).
One might add that Schlegel, too, never failed to acknowledge her merits and dignity. Unfortunately, they were not really suited to live together in a domestic arrangement. That said, however, had Auguste remained alive they would not have divorced, though even at Auguste’s death [12 July 1800] arrangements for a separation had already been made and indeed announced, whereupon this shared loss then brought them closer together again, namely, his love for Auguste, on the one hand, and her own feelings after Auguste’s death, on the other; indeed, Schlegel never failed to demonstrate how much respect he had for Caroline, and for us all, that is, for me and my family, always remaining loyal and loving and concerned for us, amid all that has happened in my life.
Although Caroline received a great many marriage proposals from the most varied sorts of men, I would here yet mention only General Superintendent Löffler, who lived in Gotha and who courted her for the few days she and I spent there during the autumn following my father’s death [1791]. She, however, resisted the pleas of her Gotha friends, it probably being her intimate relationship with Tatter that held her back.
Her presence in Jena provided [her with] many occasions for enjoyment, and the years up till 1799 with considerable joy even though her relationship with Schlegel was not always quite so pleasant for her. His frequent absences, his many and varied relationships with other women, women who flattered his vanity, as well as the unfettered independence he demonstrated amid those relationships, did not lend to their marital relationship the sort of enduring quality it might have had had she been fortunate enough to become a mother again. The result was that their [marital] bonds increasingly loosened.
In 1799 [1800] Caroline became extremely sick with nervous fever. Schelling was already spending considerable time with the Schlegels, and those bonds [i.e., with Schelling] became increasingly closer. The [84] men were already friends. Although Schelling was not blind toward Schlegel, he did acknowledge his merits. I spent the summer of 1798 [correct: 1799] in Jena with my husband, mother, and Emma, and we enjoyed some extremely happy times, including with the Paulises [Pauluses], who along with Schelling also took their midday meal there that summer, their own cook being sick.
The Hufelands were also there, she being one of Wiedemann’s sisters. Also the Loders, she a native of Göttingen with whom I was already friends, and the Frommanns. All these people along with the later Madam Döderlein and Madam Griesbach made for a circle that was as intimate as it was pleasant.
Unfortunately, things fell apart, including the various relationships. We returned [to Braunschweig], and unfortunately, when after her own illness in 1799 [1800] Caroline went to Bocklet, she lost her extremely dear 15-year-old daughter there, for whom Schlegel composed such beautiful poems, poems one can read under the title Todenopfer: an Auguste Böhmer. [9] Schlegel himself was in Jena when the sad news of her death arrived, whereas Schelling was with the mother and daughter.
It is only too clear to me that he [Schelling] was attached to the youthful Auguste — something also attested by poems, and by the letter about Caroline, in which he writes about how their shared misfortune united them, especially after the separation from Schlegel [May 1803], and how they then always wanted to live together. Schelling was much older [correct: younger] than my sister, who now would be almost 81 years old.
They had traveled to Swabia together, to visit Schelling’s parents; having acquiesced to their requests, he [i.e., Schelling’s father] married them. Thenceforth they were never again separated, sharing both good things along with unpleasant things, first in Würzburg, then through [Schelling’s] increasingly more impressive positions in Munich, though also amid the burdensome periods of war; the death of my sister during a visit to Swabia to visit Schelling’s parents [7 September 1809] prevented their anticipated journey to Italy.
Although my sister was indeed happy, her yearning for the deceased remained with her, later often weakening or softening her disposition. Her love and concern for me in particular, however, never diminished, just as similarly Schelling has always, even unto this very hour, remained a devoted and loyal friend — with whom I had the occasion to converse daily for 6 months. For after Auguste’s death in 1899 [!] [July 1800], my poor, childless sister came to live with me, spending that winter [1800–1801] in our house with my mother and enjoying my own living children, Emma and August, the latter |85| hardly 2 months old at the time.
Schlegel also came to us from Berlin that winter after tiring of the attentions of all the beauties there, occupying a room in our house before returning [to Berlin] the following spring; [10] he came to Jena once more in 1800 [August–November 1801], and then they separated. We spent an extremely pleasant winter with the Viewegs, Himly, [and] Roose, though it, too, was clouded, for I unfortunately lost my beautiful little boy a mere couple of weeks [10 March 1801] before Wiedemann left for Paris. I was to accompany my sister to Jena and remain there until he picked me up that autumn, while my mother stayed in Harburg [with Gottfried Philipp Michaelis].
Although the death of my child did not change those plans, it did make it much more difficult for me to part from Wiedemann. We led a nice, quiet life after arriving in Jena, with Schelling coming to see us whenever he needed a respite, though my poor sister rarely felt well. Madam Unzelmann came to Jena [Weimar] for guest appearances [19 September–2 October 1801], Schlegel also showed up, and Wiedemann soon as well. We departed [ca. 21 October 1801], never to see each other [i.e., Luise and Caroline] again.
After Caroline’s death, Schelling wrote to Jena [correct: Gotha] to Caroline’s best friend, Madam Gotter [see letter 448], saying she should meet him in Würzburg, he now feeling the need to speak with such dear friends as herself and her daughters. There he met Pauline, Auguste’s dear childhood playmate, with whom she had shared absolutely everything back during their stay in Gotha. [11] — He courted Pauline after his return to Munich; Schelling himself describes this as well as his subsequent happiness in the supplements. May God yet grant me the joy of embracing this dear man again, whom I so dearly love and respect as a person. [Later addendum: Schelling’s letters show how highly he regarded Caroline.]
Notes
[1] Having been born on 2 September 1763, Caroline would have turned fourteen in September 1777. Although we are unsure how long Lotte attended the boarding school in Gotha (she returned to Gotha for other reasons from late 1780 till April 1782), Luise herself attended from autumn 1784 till summer 1786 (a couple of months shy of two years).
Caroline, however, is in Göttingen on 4 September 1778 (letter 1), mentioning, moreover, that the previous year (1777) Johann Friedrich Blumenbach (who had been a professor extraordinarius in Göttingen since 1776) had sent her a billet and poem on her birthday through her brother (Fritz), being unable to be with her because of a previous engagement out in the country. Blumenbach did, however, see her that evening after his return.
Brigitte Rossbeck, Zum Trotz glücklich: Caroline Schlegel-Schelling und die romantische Lebenskunst (Munich 2008), 24, maintains (without adducing documentary evidence) that Caroline left for Gotha at Easter 1772, also pointing out (26) that as a rule, young women received no more formal education after fourteen. Luise, writing much later, may be thinking instead of the age at which Caroline returned from Gotha. Back.
[2] Daughters of Minister von Lichtenstein in Gotha. See Friedrich Wilhelm Gotter to Friedrich Ludwig Wilhelm Meyer from Gotha on 25 March 1779 (Elise Campe, Erinnerungen 1:131; excerpted in (Rudolf Schlösser, Friedrich Wilhelm Gotter 100–01); Gotter apologizes from having not responded sooner, but notes that he received Meyer’s last letter while on his way to the amateur theater at court:
But I received it just as I was on my way to the theater, so please forgive me, my dear Meyer, for having simply continued on my way despite all the enthusiasm for your friendship that did indeed flow through me at that moment. For I was being summoned not by one of those performances where merely grouchy actors — or such possessed by the demon of lethargy — regurgitate yet another warmed-over piece for the hundredth time as if half dreaming. No, I was being beckoned instead by a social theater where two girls, as young and charming as Gerstenberg’s graces searching for their third sister, performing with an element of grace and truth and fire such as to utterly and forever ruin for us any performance by any and all of our professional actresses. . . .
But the girls, the girls! — it just occurred to me that I have not yet identified them for you; and yet who among all the ladies of Gotha, whom by now you yourself must certainly know almost as well as I — who else can they be but the two Fräuleins von Lichtenstein? Back.
[3] According to Luise’s biography of Christian Friedrich Michaelis (p. 76), “he greatly loved his family, love that even went as far as the romantic sort in the case of his sister Caroline.” Back.
[4] Even as a student in Göttingen, Böhmer had belonged to the Gustav Loge of the order Concordia. His father was grandmaster of the Friedrich Loge in Göttingen. Back.
[5] Luise does not seem to have realized that Meta’s son Adalbert was not the son of Johann Nikolaus Forkel, but rather her extramarital son with Johann Heinrich Liebeskind. She was, moreover, Caroline’s housemate in Mainz, and Caroline (see letter 118). Back.
[5a] Representative illustration (Marie Thérèse Martinet, Madame Gertrude [ca. 1770]; Herzog Anton Ulrich-Museum; Museums./Signatur MTMartinet AB 3.17):
[6] Quite the opposite was the case; the entire Mainz affair would follow Caroline the rest of her life. Back.
[7] Caroline lived neither with the Ernst family nor near Dresden, but rather with the family of a physician in Lucka, just south of Leipzig and in the Altenburg district. Back.
[8] In her epistolary novel, the relationship between Staël’s love interests (the woman, Delphine, being a widow) ultimately founders because of various misunderstandings and esp. Delphine’s fundamentally different understanding of herself as a woman from those of her more conventional lover, the nobleman Léonce, who, as Julius Steinberger, Erinnerungen 143, remarks, “prefers a marriage of reason to an alliance with the freedom-loving Delphine.” Back.
[9] Wilhelm Schlegel’s cycle Todtenopfer, in Musen-Almanach für das Jahr 1802, 171–86; also Sämmtliche Werke 1:127–40. Back.
[10] Wilhelm Schlegel came to Braunschweig directly from Bamberg with Caroline in October 1800 and did not leave for Berlin until February 1801. Back.
[11] Schelling did not meet Pauline for the first time in Würzburg (see p. 40 with note 71 of Luise’s memoirs of her own life), but rather when she, her mother, and her sister Cäcilie came to visit Caroline in Jena in September 1801 (Julie Gotter was already there with Caroline) and to attend the performances of Friederike Unzelmann in Weimar. Back.