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j
1632.]
Reception of liia news
in Sweden. GUSTAVUS ADOLPHUS. GERMAN WAR. The duke of
Lauenburg suspected.
285
healed. Tlie same person then attempted, with
the help of thirteen peasants of the hamlet, to roll
a great stone to the spot where the king had fallen.
With sighs and wailings they were only able to
bring it to where it now lies (at the so-called
Swede’s Stone) ;
but the place where the king
actually expired is said to be forty paces further,
on a balk, where formerly an acacia tree stood ’.
The trooper was called Jacob Ericson. In Weis-
senfels the king’s body (against his will declared in
life) was embalmed by the apothecary Casparus,
who counted in it nine wounds ^. His inconsolable
spouse carried about her his heart (which was un-
commonly large) in a golden casket, and for a long
time after would not be parted either from the
heart or from the body, so that the Swedish clergy
were at length obliged to make her earnest repre-
sentations on this head^. At Lutzen Gustavus
Adolphus had with him only a small coffer with
Maria Eleonora’s letters *. The king’s body was
conveyed from Weissenfels to Wittemberg, where
it lay one night in the church of the castle. Four
hundred Smaland troopers, all that were left of the
regiment at whose head the king fell, formed the
guard of honour. Beholders found the countenance
still astonishingly like. From Wittemberg the
mournful procession repaired to Woigast. In the
following summer the high-admiral Gyllenhielm
brought the corpse to Nykoping. Here it remained
until its solemn burial on the 2 1st June, 1634, in
Stockholm, where the earthly relics of Gustavus
Adolphus obtained that grave in the church of
Riddarholm which he had himself appointed in his
lifetime *.
Intelligence of the king’s death first came to
the government of Sweden after the lapse of a
month. " First came tidings," says count Peter
Brahe,
" that the battle had had a prosperous
issue. The next day after, which was the 8th De-
cember, 1632, at half-past nine in the forenoon,
word was sent to me, wlien I was sitting in the
palace court, that I should come into the treasury
chamber. When I entered, I saw all the council-
lors mightily troubled, some wiping their eyes,
others wringing their hands. The Palsgrave came
to me at the door lamenting. My heart misgave
me, and I knew not what to fear, till 1 heard to
ray sore grief what had occurred. Both strangers
and countrymen were in great woe and perturba-
tion, despaired of the public welfare, and deemed
that all would go to wreck and niin. We of the
council, as many as were present, agreed to a well-
considered resolution, before we parted, to live and
die with one another in defence and for the weal of
our fatherland ;
and not only here at home to up-
hold our cause with all our power and in unity, but
also to finish the war against the emperor and all
his party, according to the design of the king of
’
According to an account received by me at the spot.
2 Letter of Salvias to the council above cited.
3
Opinion of the bishops and clergy against inspection of
the dead and opening of their graves, July 16, 163-!-. Adler-
sparre, Hist. Col. iii. 49.
* L. c. 354, where we see that in disposing of the effects
left by the king great irregularities took place.
’’
Report to the elector of Saxony by Daniel von Koseritz,
Wittemberg, Dec. 5, 1632, in Glatfey, de gladio Gust. Adol.
6 Count Peter Brahe’s Note-book.
7 ’•
Gustavus Victor Augustissimus ; that is, a hasty and
yet authentic account in what manner the most invincible
happy memory, and for a secure peace ^." We
read with emotion the report on the war addressed
to the estates by the government, as yet igno-
rant of the calamity, dated November 7th, conse-
quently the day after the battle. It comes down
only to the king’s upbreak from the camp at Nu-
remberg, and ends with these words :
" Whither
his majesty further went, of that we have no cer-
tain knowledge."
Those of whom Gustavus Adolphus was the
hope lost in him too much, for their grief not to
have sought an object of accusation. Apprehen-
sions were at an early period expressed that he
would fall by the hand of a traitor. Reports of his
a.ssassination were several times spread, and un-
successful attempts had been made. Remarkably
enough, a broadside which appeared-
—jirobably at
Leipsic
—immediately after the battle ’, assumes
these very rumours as a ground for denying the
king’s death. The fight lasted, it is said, the whole
day, and up to nine o’clock at night ;
Wallenstein
is asserted to have been saved only by the fleet-
ness of his Turkish horse, and to have come wounded
to Leipsic about midnight *. Some say that his
majesty at the first received some hurt in the left
arm; and because the enemy in Leipsic immediately
gave him out to be dead, it is thought that the Je-
suits bought some arch-knave and murderer ui his
army to shoot him secretly, and just as the battle
began. But it is well enough known that a year
ago the Papists, after the battle of Leipsic, alleged
the king to have been shot, which was likewise an
invention. Since the king’s majesty for certain
not only spent the night after this noble victory on
the field of battle, but also the following morning
held a general review in Lutzen.—Thus far the
journalist. It is true that the king’s death was
earlier known in Weissenfels than in Leipsic. To
the former place the tidings were brought by duke
Francis Albert of Lauenburg, who on his fiight
from the field of battle did not halt until he
arrived there; although on the report of the vic-
tory he returned again directly.
" This caused
him," says a narrative of the time,
" to come into
evil repute with the whole army, and to be accused
of worse than cowardice, for the soldiers spared
not to charge him with treason. Those who knew
him better have sought to excuse the scandal given.
The truth is, that he had been in Vienna at the
end of the past January, then served with the Im-
perialists, and had only come to the king three
weeks or a fortnight before, and fearing that
all was lost had left the battle, in order that he
might be able to pretend, in case the Imperialists
conquered, that he had never been present. With
the first news that the Swedes were victorious, he
was back again on the field of battle at four o’clock
the next morning, as bold as any one. It is certain
king and lord, Gustavus Adolphus, king of the Swedes,
Goths, Vandals, &c., by the Divine help, succour, and grace,
utterly routed the armies of Wallenstein and Pappenheim at
Lutzen, two miles from Leipsic, anew upon the 6—16th Nov.
anno 1632." Without name of place. Palmskoid Collections,
t. 38.
8 " His serene highness was struck by a musket-hall in
the left hip, but was preserved by God’s help for his and the
emperor’s service, as well from this shot, which did not
pierce further than the skin, as from a thousand other
cannon and musket balls. Diodati’s Report to the Emperor."
Forster, Letters of Wallenstein, ii. 302.
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