Noble Blood - Queen Caroline Matilda's Personal Doctor

Episode Date: July 21, 2020

King George III's "criminal sister" was sent to marry the King of Denmark when she was a teenager. Her husband wanted very little to do with her, and so her attention wandered over to a charismatic doctor. That doctor slowly gathered power until he became all but an autocrat. But power, and love, are both risky gambles. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. What's up, everyone? I'm Ago Vodam. My next guest, it's Will Ferrell. Woo, woo, woo, woo. My dad gave me the best advice ever. He goes, just give it a shot.

But if you ever reach a point where you're banging your head against the wall and it doesn't feel fun anymore, it's okay to quit. If you saw it written down, it would not be an inspiration. It would not be on a calendar of, you know, The cat, just hang in there. Yeah, it would not be. Right, it wouldn't be that. There's a lot of luck. Listen to Thanks, Dad, on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of IHeart Radio and Grimmin Mild from Aaron Manky. Listener discretion is advised. Even though it was a masquerade ball, the identities of Queen Caroline Matilda and Dr. Struntz were immediately obvious to anyone around them. The doctor was tall, over six feet, and Caroline Matilda hadn't left his side the entire evening. They were flirting in public, and every tiny gesture, every glance,

every hand resting lightly on his arm, unleashed a new shockwave of whispers through the ballroom at Christianborg Palace. It was that sort of behavior that made people certain that the new royal infant, a girl just over six months old, was actually the doctor's daughter and not the kings. Of course, King Christian wasn't at this party.

He hadn't attended a social event in weeks. His condition, which historians sometimes characterize as schizophrenia, meant that there were periods of highs and lows when it came to the king's cognition. But for the winter of 1772, it was a low period. For the past 10 months, the country of Denmark had been ruled, with almost full control not by the king, but by Dr. Strzuntz, a German man born as a commoner.

But the nobles and the people of Denmark wouldn't stand for it for much longer. Depending on which broadsides you read, the doctor and his harlot, the queen, had either kidnapped the king or already poisoned him. And later that very night, the night of the masquerade ball, the king's stepmother, the dowager queen, would give her go-ahead for Strunz and Queen Caroline Matilda to be arrested in their beds and forged evidence of an attempted assassination of the king.

Around the world, the late 1700s was a time of social upheaval. Philosophers like Voltaire and Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Montesquieu wrote widely read treatises arguing for what they saw as more rational, more enlightened forms of government. They argued for individual freedoms and against the powers of absolute monarchy. Their ideas circulated like the smoke in the drawing rooms of Paris. It was an intoxicating notion that nations could achieve a perfectability, that the brand new scientific method could also inform a rational approach to governments.

Over the next decade, enlightenment thinking would affect nations around the world and lead to revolutions. There was one first in the United States and then in France. But something strange happened in Denmark. In America and France, Enlightenment philosophy took hold. of and inspired the people who revolted in favor of more democratic forms of government.

But in Denmark, there was a revolution of only one man, Dr. Johanna Strunz. Dr. Strunz was in a rare position. As the king's personal doctor, he had authority over the king, a medical authority at first, but as the king's condition deteriorated, that authority began to apply to everything. Exerting his control over the incapacitated king, Strunz became, well, sort of an enlightened despot. During his ten months as de facto leader of Denmark,

he enacted over a thousand reforms, including the abolition of torture, freedom of the press, ban on the slave trade, and limiting feudal titles. He single-handedly decided, he would be the one to pull Denmark into the 19th century, even though he never really had the authority to do it. The country didn't respond well. But though struits failed to win over his adoptive nation, he did manage to seduce someone, the queen. Young Caroline Matilda, sister of the British king George III, fell madly in love with the man who was treating her inferring.

husband, and her love would doom them both. I'm Dana Schwartz, and this is Noble Blood. Being the youngest of nine children, Caroline Matilda was used to feeling like an afterthought. Her father, who had been next in line to be the King of England, died just a few months before Caroline Matilda was born, which meant that her older brother, the future George III, would become king upon the death of their grandfather. George was 22 when he became the king of England in 1760. Caroline Matilda was nine.

She would have only a few brief years of childhood left before her brother would use her for the purpose that princesses are born for, forging political alliances. It was actually Caroline Matilda's older sister who was originally supposed to marry their first cousin, Christian of Denmark. It was important that England solidify its relationship with Denmark to make sure Denmark didn't drift too far away into friendship with France.

Heaven forbid. But Caroline Matilda's older sister had what people in the 18th century described as a weak constitution. And so, at age 13, young Caroline was the one who, who became engaged to the future King Christian of Denmark instead. She was told to say goodbye to England, her home, her mother, her friends, and her siblings, and to prepare to spend the rest of her life in a place she had never been before. When she turned 15 years old, Caroline was married to Christian,

who, since their engagement, had become the King of Denmark. He was 17 years old. That first marriage was by proxy in England, but a few weeks later she arrived in Copenhagen and they were married again, this time in person. Two teenagers bound before God to spend their lives together and rule a country side by side. Christian was tired of Caroline Matilda within a week. Caroline Matilda was not unattractive. She was a pretty girl with a round figure and blue eyes and she enjoyed talking about books and politics.

Christian didn't care. Unbeknownst to Caroline Matilda, before she arrived, King Christian of Denmark was already showing troublesome symptoms of mental illness that would only continue to worsen as he grew older and was given more power. When his new bride arrived, he was polite but entirely cold to her.

One of Caroline Matilda's new ladies-in-waiting advised her that to get her husband to be more interested in her sexually, she should play a little hard to get. One night when one of the king's men came to her bedchamber to ask if she was ready for a visit from her husband, Caroline Matilda's lady told him that the queen was indisposed. A little rejection, the lady told Caroline Matilda, will make him want you more. It turns out that That was bad advice. From that point on, Christian barely seemed to regard his wife at all. He also didn't seem to regard any notions of dignity or propriety. He held elaborate orgies, drank obscenely, and covorted so openly with mistresses that Caroline Matilda became able to identify

each one by the sound of her laughter as it echoed through the Christianborg Palace all the way to her bedchamber. The king and queen spent one awkward night together not too long after their marriage, and it led to Queen Caroline giving birth to a son, Frederick. She had fulfilled her purpose, and King Christian had done his duty, which meant that in his mind he had absolutely no more use for his wife, and he would spend his evenings partying without her as he saw fit. But Christian's drinking and womanizing provided a smokescreen for how unwell he actually.

was. Modern scholars sometimes diagnose him as schizophrenic. It's not really possible to say with any certainty. What we do know is that the king's grip on reality would leave him. Christian would dip in and out of lucidity, and when he was out, he was prone to bouts of rage and violence during his worst moments. At better moments, he would just humiliate himself and the crown. much to the shame of Caroline Matilda and Christian stepmother, the Dowager Queen Julianne Marie. Partly in order to hide the fact that the king was mentally ill, and partly because a change in scenery sometimes seemed to help him, the king was taken on lengthy diplomatic tours of Europe, far away from Denmark.

While he was gone, Caroline Matilda lived a lonely, quiet life. She would visit the court of the Dowell. Queen, Julianne Marie, who was pleasant enough to her, even though it was obvious to everyone that Julianne Marie would rather that her son be the one on the throne. Julianne Marie had been the second wife of Christian's father, and she was the mother of Christian's half-brother, who by this point was a surly teenager. Everyone in court knew that Christian wasn't well, and though it would be treason to admit it, well, should he really be the one in charge?

Julianne Marie never said as much while she sipped her tea across from Caroline Matilda, but Caroline Matilda felt it in her sideways glances, her raised eyebrows, her too long sighs. Caroline Matilda did cause a minor scandal by leaving the palace and walking around Copenhagen on foot. I don't understand, Caroline said, when the Dowager Queen gave her a stern reprimand. I was just trying to see the city.

It simply isn't done, Julian Marie replied. Caroline Matilda apologized, and she spent the next few months inside the palace grounds, reading the few books that she had brought with her from England, the ones that had managed to make it through the rigorous Danish censorship of. print. Meanwhile, the king returned from his European tour with a new member of court, a doctor named Johannes Struntz. The king's behavior had become so unpredictable, that two of his nobles had found a local German doctor with a good reputation for success, although they were aware that he had written some anonymous political pamphlets that were

troublingly liberal. Dr. Struntz advised lots of of exercise for Christian, and the two began to spend considerable time together. Christian wasn't cured, but he seemed to be making an improvement, and so Dr. Struntz was invited first to finish the European tour, and then to return to Denmark as his personal physician. Carolyn Matilda dipped low into a courtesy to welcome her husband back to the palace, and when she rose, she felt Strunz's eyes focused. focused on her own. He was 33 years old, with blonde hair and lips that turned up at the ends

in an expression that most people saw as friendly, but that Caroline Matilda knew, was masking something more mischievous. She saw trouble. She was right. The queen resented the doctor at first. While he had been traveling with the king, Strunz had heard for months about what an unattractive bore the queen was. But Strunz still believed that being with a woman would help the king's condition, and so he casually steered Christian towards one of Christian's favorite mistresses. Of course, Caroline Matilda resented him for it. She shot him icy glances every time she caught him looking at her, which was often. Struntz couldn't figure it out. Why did the queen seem to hate him so much. He racked his brain and came up empty. When he finally overheard a few ladies talking about it

a few days later, he was ashamed of his own stupidity. Of course. By this point, the king was spending more time with Strunz than with anyone else. It almost embarrassed Strunz how readily the king acquiesced to his suggestions, medical or otherwise. For the Queen's 20th birthday, Strunt suggested, but the king throw her an elaborate three-day party. It was all Strunz's idea, and he organized it completely, and the queen knew it. Caroline Matilda warmed to him. If King Christian noticed or cared that his wife and his best friend seemed to be spending a lot of time exchanging flirtatious glances, he didn't show it.

In fact, he encouraged them to spend time together one-on-one. volunteering strudes to help treat Caroline Matilda when she came down with a case of dropsy. For the first time in her life, someone was paying attention to Caroline Matilda. Not just to the idea of Caroline Matilda as a princess to be deployed to whichever European country with a marriageable prince happened to be the most convenient, but to Caroline Matilda as a person. She and the doctor talked and rode together. He spoke to her of philosophy and thinkers like Descartes and Rousseau. When she was with him, she felt alive with potential, as if her life might have meaning outside of those four gilded walls.

Maybe she could do more than just sit and read and tend to her son and walk around the palace aimlessly. Strunce's influence over the royal family would be solidified a year later, when an outbreak of smallpox ravaged Copenhagen outside of the palace walls. Young Frederick, the heir to the throne, was at a delicate age. He was vulnerable. Struths, with his more modern conceptions of medicine, suggested to the king and queen that Frederick B. inoculated. The suggestion outraged the other nobles. A common country doctor pricking and infecting their crown prince? Think of the risk. Think of the furor if something went wrong.

Trust me, Strundt said, and Caroline Matilda did. She gave her nod of assent, and Strundt successfully inoculated the crown prince. From that point on, the crown of Denmark more or less belonged to Strundt's. As the king's condition deteriorated, Strundt's influence grew. He became a privy counselor and influenced the king. King into firing his most senior conservative minister, the one who had scoffed and shamed Strunz for all of his liberal suggestions. It was around this point that the flirtation between Caroline Matilda and Dr. Strunz

went from subtle to blatant. King George III wrote from England, telling his sister not to make a scene. Julianne Marie turned up her nose at Caroline Matilda in court. servants had begun dusting sand along the corridor between Caroline Matilda's chambers and the doctors so that they could check for footprints in the morning. For his part, King Christian was too far gone in his madness to have any stake in what or whom his wife was doing. While Caroline Matilda was on tour in the Hanover region, her mother, Princess Augusta, came to visit. Caroline's mother had heard the rumors about her daughter's relationship with the doctor,

and she spent the entire visit waiting to get Caroline alone, so she could tell her that her behavior was causing a scandal. Unfortunately, Princess Augusta never got the chance. For the entire weekend, Dr. Stearns never left Caroline Matilda's side, and so Augusta had no opportunity to speak to her daughter alone. All she could do before she left was beg an advisor to pass along a message to her daughter, telling her to be careful.

It wasn't until a much later visit that her mother, Princess Augusta, was finally able to see her daughter one-on-one. By this point, it was far too late. What are you wearing? Augusta gasped as soon as she stepped out of her carriage. Her daughter was wearing breeches like a man. Do you like them? Caroline Matilda replied.

Dr. Struent says Queen Catherine in Russia wears men's clothing and rides a horse in public and her people adore her for it. Augusta took a deep breath. But she started before faltering off. She was going to say, but you are not Queen Catherine of Russia. Instead, she said, but Denmark is not Russia. Caroline Matilda just laughed, but Augusta didn't. She told her daughter that she was causing a scandal by fraternizing so openly with that Dr. Struntz, and that minister who had been dismissed, did she have anything to do with that?

Caroline Matilda's laugh fell from her face. Pray, madam, she said to her mother, allow me to govern my own kingdom as I please. It was the last time, Carolta's life. Marilyn Matilda would ever see her mother. From March 1771 to January 1772, Denmark entered a period known as the Time of Strunes. The doctor, once a common German man, not even Danish,

had eliminated his rivals from the cabinet, made himself a count, and passed a statute that meant that his signature on documents would have the same effect as the kings. For that 10-month period, Dr. Strunz wielded basically unlimited power, signing 1,069 cabinet orders, or the equivalent of more than three per day. His reforms were sweeping and progressive. Strunz was committed to using his unusual opportunity to craft Denmark into a nation that would embody the principles of the French and English Enlightenment thinkers.

He abolished torture, the slave trade, and capital punishment. He ensured full freedom of the press and removed penalties for illegitimate children. He reduced the army, reorganized courts to prevent corruption, and reformed universities and medical institutions. But perhaps his mistake was cracking down on the indulgences of the nobles. He reduced their privileges. He criminalized bribery. He taxed gambling and taxed luxury horses to fund orphanages.

They were all well-meaning and progressive, forward-looking reforms. But for some reason, the other people in power in Denmark didn't care for them. And they didn't care for this Dr. Struntz, who waltzed his way into a country he didn't know and took over with absolutely no qualifications. Sure, a king didn't really have qualifications, but a king was anointed by God. Strunch was just treating the king. Who was Strunz to be making all of these changes?

He had no idea what Denmark was or what it should be. And the same went for that foreign queen who seemed to love him so much. The two of them were probably in on it together. The nobles knew that the king actually was. incapacitated. But that information had been protected from the people for so long that most Danish people didn't understand why this random doctor was now ruling in place of King Christian. The king hadn't been sick before, right? So maybe the doctor had been poisoning him. Maybe the doctor and the queen were planning on murdering the king so they could be together and

take over Denmark. Meanwhile, the queen during all of this, happily read philosophy and spent her nights with the man she loved. They really were another Catherine the Great and Potemkin, she thought. That summer, the pair left Copenhagen to live at Hirsholm Palace to enjoy a few months of lounging in the sun in one another's company. In July, Caroline Matilda gave birth to a daughter, Louise Augusta. Though everyone at court knew that the daughter was almost certainly struinces, the king still accepted her as his official daughter, and the Dowager Queen Julianne Marie agreed to stand as godmother.

But the idyllic summer wouldn't last. The truth was, Caroline Matilda's mother had been right about her being no Catherine the Great. Catherine the Great had united a nation behind her and inspired them. The country resented to her. Dr. Strunz, and it had begun to hate Caroline Matilda. Public sentiment was so vitriolic that in October of 1771, Strunz had no choice but to pull back on the freedom of the press in order to prevent the waves of criticism being printed about him and the queen. The wind had changed

in Denmark. Strunz's window of opportunity was closing. Sometime that winter, when the streets of Copenhagen that Caroline had once walked as a new queen turned slick and wet. Dr. Struntz asked her for permission to flee. He needed to leave and get to safety. She was taken aback, first that he would want to leave their adoptive country, but second, that he was planning on leaving without her. Caroline Matilda paused and sized up her lover. She refused.

She simply loved him too much. Any shred of hope she had for a bright future as Queen had come from him, and she didn't want to let him go. In January, a group of disgruntled nobles presented manufactured evidence to Julian Marie, implicating Struths and Caroline Matilda in a plot to murder the king. Of course, the claim was ridiculous. The pair had absolutely no reason to murder the king. King Christian being alive protected them.

He was an ally and his holding power was the one thing that afforded Caroline Matilda and Strundt's their power and positions. But that didn't matter. The night of January 16th, after a masquerade ball, Caroline Matilda, Dr. Strundt, and one of Strundt's closest allies, were all arrested in their beds. because the queen had an infant daughter that she was still breastfeeding, she was permitted to take her with her, but otherwise she was brought to her new chambers where she would be kept under house arrest, completely alone. The next morning, the conspirators paraded King Christian around Denmark,

showing him off, proving that the king had been, quote, unquote, rescued. He was as much a pawn as he had ever. been. Despite her arrest, Caroline Matilda refused to confess or implicate her lover in any way. It was only when they showed her the signed confession from Dr. Strunz that she relented. In his confession, he blamed the queen for seducing him and gave her full power and control over their entire relationship. Caroline Matilda finally relented and agreed to cooperate. She signed the paper they put in front of her.

While she was still imprisoned, she learned that her mother died. After Dr. Struntz was found guilty of usurpation of royalty and less majest, his right hand was cut off. Then he was publicly beheaded and drawn and quartered. Within a matter of weeks, two people that Caroline Matilda loved most in the world were both gone. The scandal of Queen Caroline Matilda's arrest meant there was no end to the delighted gossip around Europe about George III's criminal sister. Though her lawyer argued during her trial that Caroline Matilda was completely innocent and had only signed her confession to protect

Strunes, no one really believed that. But as Great Britain attempted to negotiate her release and casually threatened an attack at sea, the judge made what I think is a fairly generous ruling. Caroline Matilda's marriage with Christian was dissolved. Her dowry would be returned to England. The queen would retain her right to a pension and her royal title, and she would go off to live in Hanover, quietly in one of her family's holdings, Sal Castle.

In her exile, Carolyn Matilda lived a simple life. She was visited by relatives, she built a small theater, and she filled a library with books in both English and German. She spent most of her days working at charities for poor children. As for her own children, her son and her daughter, because they were the official royal heirs of Denmark, she would never be permitted to see them again. Back in Denmark, the Dowager Queen, Julianne Marie, took over as regent with her son, King Christian's half-brother.

The pair eliminated every single progressive cabinet order that Strunz had signed in his time as unofficial regent. There was a point when she was in exile where a politician visited Caroline Matilda and tried to convince her that he could rally enough power to overthrow the regency and reinstate her as queen. Caroline Matilda agreed, in the abstract, but she wanted her brother George III support. The politician went to England, but while he was waiting for an audience with the king, he lost his chance. Caroline Matilda died, maybe of scarlet fever, just three years into her royal exile. She was 23 years old, just a few months away from turning 24. For the duration of her short life, from princess to queen to lover, there was only a brief window when Carolyn Matilda could picture a beautiful vision of her future,

one where she was beside a man she loved, changing a country for the better. That vision lasted ten months. The infirm King Christian lived for another 33 years, occasionally expressing regret at having lost his friend Dr. Strunz. Three years after Strunz's brutal execution, the king doodled a little drawing of him in profile. In German, the king wrote underneath, I would have liked to save him,

but regret and sorrow didn't last long for King Christian. His mood changed, and he continued on, ruling a nation as king that he never ruled. really ruled. That's the story of Caroline Matilda and Dr. Strunz. But stick around after a brief sponsor break to hear about what happened to Denmark later. What's up, everyone? I'm Ego Wodom. My next guest, you know from Stepbrothers Anchorman, Saturday Night Live and the Big Money Players Network. It's Will Ferrell. Woo, woo, woo, woo, woo. My dad gave me the best advice ever. I went and had lunch with him one day.

And I was like, and Dad, I think I want to really give this a shot. I don't know what that means, but I just know the groundlings. I'm working my way up through, and I know it's a place that come look for up and coming talent. He said, if it was based solely on talent, I wouldn't worry about you, which is really sweet. Yeah. He goes, but there's so much luck involved. And he's like, just give it a shot. He goes, but if you ever reach a point where you're banging your head against the wall and it doesn't feel fun anymore, it's okay to quit.

If you saw it written down, it would not be an inspiration. It would not be on a calendar of, you know, the cat. Just hang in there. Yeah, it would not be. Right, it wouldn't be that. There's a lot of luck. Listen to Thanks Dad on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. I'm Iris Palmer and my new podcast is called Against All Od, and that's exactly what the show is about, doing whatever it takes to be thoughts.

Get ready to hear from some of your favorite entrepreneurs and entertainers as they share stories about defying expectations, overcoming barriers, and breaking generational patterns. I'm talking to people like award-winning actress, producer, and director, Eva Longoria. I think I had like $200 in my savings account, and my mom goes, what are you going to do? And I was like, I'll figure it out. We got a one-bedroom apartment for like $400 a month, and we all could not afford. Like, I was like, how am I going to make $100 a month? I'm opening up like I've never before. For those of you who think you know me from what you've seen on social media,

get ready to see a whole new side of me. Listen to Against All Odds with Iris Palmer as part of the My Cultura podcast network, available on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Eventually, Prince Frederick, Caroline Matilda and King Christian's son, came of age. He wrestled the regency away from his step-grandmother and step-uncle. a political battle that ultimately culminated in the prince punching his step-uncle in the face. As regent and later king, Frederick reinstalled the progressive ideology into Denmark that he had learned from Dr. Strunz.

He had grown up for a few years under Strunz and had come to see him as almost a father figure. In the end, when Prince Frederick, took power and became King Frederick, he was able to complete Strunce's vision. He was actually the one who went one step further than Strunz. He eliminated Serfdom from Denmark entirely for good. Noble Blood is a production of IHeart Radio and Grimm and Mild from Aaron Manky. The show is written and hosted by Dana Schwartz and produced by Aaron Manky, Matt Frederick, Alex Williams, and Trevor Young. Noble Blood is on social media at Noble Blood Tales

and you can learn more about the show over at Noble Bloodtales.com. For more podcasts from IHeartRadio, visit the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. What's up, everyone? I'm Ago Bodom. My next guest, it's Will Ferrell. Woo, woo, woo, woo, woo. My dad gave me the best advice ever.

He goes, just give it a shot. But if you ever reach a point where you're banging your head against the wall and it doesn't feel fun anymore, it's okay to quit. If you saw it written down, it would not be an inspiration. It would not be on a calendar of, you know, the cat. Just hang in there. Yeah, it would not be.

Right, it wouldn't be that. There's a lot of luck. Listen to Thanks Dad on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an IHeart podcast, guaranteed human. Thank you.