• 417. Caroline to Beate Gross in Gaisburg: Munich, June? 1806 [*]
[Munich, June? 1806]
[Beginning of letter is missing.]
|475| . . . we left only a few behind in Würzburg, [1] though among the best, to our astonishment, one must include the Sturzes, who could not yet manage to be called from service even though they certainly do not lack reasonable claims and protection. [2] They feel somewhat unfortunate in that regard and themselves have almost no more acquaintances in Würzburg excepting Professor Klein, whom, worthy man that he is, the new administration dismissed as rector of the Gymnasium. [3]
The Hovens are in Nürnberg because they could not really find an appropriate place for him in Ansbach; [4] everyone is waiting to see how the new territorial distribution will develop, which might still bring Erlangen to Bavaria and thereby also reunite those gentlemen at a single university. [5] Have you heard nothing from the Pauluses? [6] We count ourselves lucky to be hearing virtually nothing from any of those people now.
I entreat you to remember us to your your husband and to your dear parents; [7] I will soon write mother again lest she forget me entirely, and at the first opportunity will also send something for little Caroline. [8] Stay very well and remember us with sisterly love.
C. S.
Notes
[*] First map: Stutgart, mit dero Gegend auf 2 Stund. 81 G. Bodenehr fecit et excudit; Recens emendavit, auxit atque divisit R. H. Stuttgardiae (1716–50); second map: “Central Europe: Wars of the Third Coalition 1805–7,” Cambridge Modern History Atlas (Cambridge 1912):
[1] Viz., good friends and closer acquaintances. Back.
[2] An allusion presumably to a transfer for Karl Joseph Sturz, an employee in the Bavarian territorial directorate in Würzburg, to a new position in another Bavarian territory, similar to the positions being made available to various Protestant professors who were appointed in 1803 when Würzburg became a Bavarian territory. The administrative or professional future of Sturz, however, who is listed as being in Bavarian Würzburg service since 1803, i.e., the commencement of Bavarian rule, is uncertain.
Sturz was in any case not at all positively inclined toward the change of government in 1806; see Caroline’s letter to Schelling on 21 April 1806 (letter 402) and on 25–26 April 1806 (letter 403); in her letter to Schelling on 29 April–1 May 1806 (letter 405), she remarks that “Sturz still does not believe the prince elector is really coming and instead merely laughs sardonically whenever anyone even mentions it.” Back.
[3] Through contacts in Munich, Georg Michael Klein, who had indeed become a close acquaintance of the Schellings in Würzburg, found employment in Bavarian service in Bamberg and Regensburg before returning to Würzburg as a professor in 1818, i.e., after the town had passed back to Bavaria (Rudolf Koch and Fritz Kredel, Deutschland und angrenzende Gebiete [Leipzig 1937]):
Adalbert Friedrich Marcus alerts Schelling to the possibility of a Bavarian position for Klein in his letter to Schelling on 28 July 1806 (letter 417a). See esp. Schelling’s missive to the Intelligenzblatt of the Jenaische Allgemeine Literatur-Zeitung on (Monday, 19 January 1807 (letter/document 420d). Klein himself writes to Caroline on 5 October 1807 (letter 425c). Back.
[4] Concerning the Hovens’ destination, see Henriette von Hoven’s letter to Charlotte Schiller on 8 March 1806 (letter 400i) (J. Walch, Neueste Post-Karte von Deutschland und dessen angrenzenden Laendern [Augsburg 1813 ]):
[5] Concerning the slim possibility of a new university in Erlangen, see Schelling’s missive to the Intelligenzblatt of the Jenaische Allgemeine Literatur-Zeitung on 28 March 1806 (letter/document 401c) (Rudolf Koch and Fritz Kredel, Deutschland und angrenzende Gebiete [Leipzig 1937]):
Concerning Erlangen’s geopolitical status (here in connection with that of the Paulus family), see Dorothea and Friedrich Schlegel’s letter to Karoline Paulus on 23 February 1806 (letter 400h), note 1. Back.
[6] Concerning the professional status of H. E. G. Paulus, see, again, Dorothea and Friedrich Schlegel’s letter to Karoline Paulus on 23 February 1806 (letter 400h), note 1. The Pauluses in any event spent the winter and spring 1806–7 in Swabia, where Beate Gross, whose family was already friends of the family, might well have seen them. See Dorothea and Friedrich Schlegel’s letter to Karoline Paulus on 30 June 1806 (letter 416d), note 9. Back.
[7] Joseph Friedrich and Gottliebin Schelling. Back.
[8] Daughter of Beate and Adolf Gross? Back.
Translation © 2018 Doug Stott