127a. Wilhelm von Humboldt to Wilhelm Schlegel in Amsterdam: Berlin, 25 May 1793 [*]
Berlin, 25 May 1793
|652| Your letter, my dear Schlegel, was all the more pleasant for me because it arrived quite unexpectedly precisely when I had been thinking you had completely forgotten about me, since you wholly neglected to answer a letter I wrote to you shortly after my wedding when you were in Göttingen. [1] All the more sad, however, did I find the contents of that letter, and sadder still the fact that I in my own turn am able to answer you only so late and that, moreover, my answer must nonetheless be so unsatisfactory.
The same evening I received your letter I also received one from your friend herself in which she related to me the unfortunate incident and directed approximately the same request to me that she directed to you. You can imagine, dearest friend, how much these letters upset me and how urgently I tried to think of any means by which I might help. Unfortunately, there were not many.
The first was Dalberg. Dalberg, |653| however, told me he had already received a memorandum through Gotter on her behalf and had delivered it to the prince elector, and that he, as I myself know only too well, was not really in a position to do anything more.
Since this attempt came to nothing, I wrote to Frau von Pfurdt, whom you may perhaps know better by her French name, Ferrette, [2] and with whom I had become acquainted in Erfurt. I received a response from her a few days ago. She wrote that she had indeed passed along my letter to the prince elector but could not become involved any further in legal matters. In the meantime, however, she is certain that after the surrender of Mainz all investigations would be expedited, even if nothing much could really be undertaken before that happened. —
So you see, my friend, how little I am able to offer you in the way of comforting news. In the meantime, however, the entire situation is extremely unfavorable. The danger, the turn away from people on whom one once could rely, along with several other considerations have generated a climate of insurmountable mistrust, and the unfortunate things the citizens of Mainz suffered at the hands of the Clubbists, the embitterment generated by that experience, has made it necessary to conduct an extremely precise, procedurally strict formal investigation of the cases of anyone even remotely suspected of wrongdoing. These are in any event the reasons being adduced.
Even the very best private references are doubtless of no help whatever, and I thus advised Madame Böhmer to solicit intercession from the government administration in Hannover. [3] Do you think you might be able to get something done through young Arenswald?
The ultimate fate of prisoners such as Madame Böhmer is not really something one should worry too much about. I have heard nothing suggesting she incurred even the slightest culpability and have ample reason to suspect that even those who |654| are indeed culpable will be treated with forbearance.
I realize, of course, that this is not much comfort. Her current imprisonment cannot but undermine her health, expose her to the judgment of those who are of ill disposition or are simply ill informed, and moreover robs her of the joy of fulfilling her motherly duties toward her daughter. My heart bleeds when I think of it; unfortunately, however, it is only too true that I now have no other means by which to undertake any new attempts to help her. This imprisonment, however, is allegedly of the sort in which prisoners are able to take advantage of every convenience.
Various business matters prevent me from writing you more today, my dear friend. Please remember me and let me hear from you again soon. With the utmost respect and friendship I remain ever yours,
Humboldt
Notes
[*] Sources: Waitz (1871), 1:378–79; Schmidt (1913), 1:652–54 (Appendix 1). Back.
[1] Humboldt had married Caroline von Dächeroden in Erfurt on 29 June 1791. Wilhelm Schlegel was no longer in Göttingen in late June, however, having received a position as a tutor with the family of Henry Muilman in Amsterdam around Easter 1791 and arriving in Amsterdam itself in mid-May (Körner [1930], 2:5). Back.
[2] Unidentified, though the name Pfurdt (or Ferrette) is associated with a certain Jean-Jacques Pfurdt-Ferrette from Florimont (Haut-Rhin), commander in the order of Maltese Knights of Hohenrain and Ruiden, Switzerland. Back.
[3] As a native of Göttingen, Caroline was still a subject of the Electorate of Hannover. See the chapter on Lower Saxony in the supplementary appendix on Germany in the late eighteenth century, esp. the section on the Elector of Hannover. Back.
Translation © 2011 Doug Stott