“The broken link I found, after a long search, and threw into my sink. Fortunately for me, nobody had examined my cell because they suspected nothing. With a piece of my hair ribbon I bound the chain together, but when I tried to put the irons on my hands, they were so swollen that every attempt was in vain. I worked the whole night to no purpose. Twelve o’clock, the visiting hour, approached. Necessity and danger urged me on; fresh attempts were made with incredible torture, and when my keepers entered everything was in proper order.”
After this Trenck concentrated all his efforts upon cutting out the locks of his doors. The first yielded within an hour, but the second was a far more difficult task, as it was also closed by a bar and the lock was opened on the outside. The work was carried on in darkness and his self-inflicted wounds bled profusely. But when the second door had been cut through, he came out into half daylight, which enabled him to cut out the third lock as readily as the first. The fourth, however, was placed like the second and involved equal labour. He was attacking it bravely when his knife broke in his hand and the blade fell to the ground.
Despair then seized him, and picking up his knife blade he opened the veins of his left arm and foot, meaning to bleed to death. When almost insensible, a voice crying, “Baron Trenck!” roused him, and on asking who called, he learned that it was his staunch friend and ally, the grenadier Gefhardt, who had come to the rampart to comfort him. He told Gefhardt that he was lying in his blood and at the point of death, but the stout old soldier consoled him with the assurance that it would be much easier to escape here, as there were no sentries over him and only two in the whole fort. Trenck listened with revived hope and determined on a new plan of action. The seat in his prison was built of brickwork, still green, and he quickly tore it down to provide himself with missiles, which he laid out ready for use against his gaolers at their next visit. They came at midday and were horrified to find the three inner doors opened, the last of them barred by a terrific figure, wounded and bleeding, and in a posture of desperate defiance. In one hand he held a brick and with the other he brandished his knife blade, crying fiercely, “Let no one enter; I will kill all who attempt it. You may shoot me down, but I will not live here in chains. Stand back. I am armed.”
The commandant had inadvertently stepped forward but retired at these threats, and ordered his grenadiers to storm the cell. The narrow opening allowed only one to enter at a time and a combined attack was impossible. All halted irresolute under the menace of the missiles, and in the pause the major and chaplain tried to reason with Von der Trenck. The former implored him to yield and surrender the knife blade, as the major was responsible for his possession of it and would no doubt lose his place. These entreaties prevailed, and Trenck gave in, being promised milder treatment. His condition cried aloud for pity; he lay there suffering and exhausted. A surgeon was called in to apply restoratives and dress his wounds, and for four days he was relieved of his irons and was well fed with meat soup. Meanwhile the cell doors were repaired and bound with iron bands. The fetters were reimposed, but that which chained the prisoner to the wall and which he had broken was strengthened. No amelioration of his state was possible, for the king was implacable and still ferociously angry. Von der Trenck remained in extreme discomfort. As his arms were constantly fastened to the iron cross bar and his feet to the wall, he could put on neither his shirt nor his breeches; the former, a soldier’s shirt, was tied together at the seams and renewed every fortnight; the breeches were opened and buttoned up at the sides; on his body he wore a blue frock of coarse common blue cloth, and on his feet were rough ammunition stockings and slippers.
“It is certain,” says Trenck, “that nothing but pride and self-love, or rather a consciousness of my innocence, together with a special confidence in my resolutions, kept me afterward alive. The hard exercise of my body and my mind, always busy in projects to obtain my freedom, preserved at the same time my health. But who would believe that a daily exercise could be taken in my chains? I shook the upper part of my body and leaped up and down till the sweat poured from my brows, and by this means I grew fatigued and slept soundly.
“By degrees I accustomed myself to my chains. I learned to comb my hair and at length even to tie it with one hand. My beard, which had not yet been shaved, gave me a frightful appearance. This I plucked out; the pain was considerable, more especially about the lips; however, I became accustomed to this also and performed the operation during the following years, once every six weeks or two months, for the hairs being pulled out by the roots required that length of time to grow again long enough to lay hold of them with my nails. Vermin never tormented me; the great dampness of the walls was not favourable to them; neither did my limbs swell, because I took the exercise already mentioned; the constant darkness alone was the greatest hardship. However, I had read, learned and already seen and experienced much in the world; therefore I always found matter to banish melancholy from my thoughts, and in spite of every obstacle, could connect my ideas as well as if I had read them, or written them on paper. Habit made me so perfect in this mental exercise that I composed whole speeches, fables, poems and satires, and repeated them aloud to myself. At the same time they were impressed so forcibly on my memory that after I obtained my freedom I could have written a couple of volumes of such works.
“I employed myself in projecting new plans. That I might be more nearly observed, a sentry was posted at my door who was always chosen from what were called the trusty men, or the married men and natives. These, as will be related in the course of my memoirs, were easier and safer to bring over to my relief than strangers; for the Pomeranian is honest and blunt, and consequently easy to move and be persuaded into anything you please. About three weeks after the last attempt, my honest Gefhardt was posted sentry over me. As soon as he came upon his post we had a free opportunity of conversing with each other, for when I stood with one foot on my bedstead my head reached as high as the air-hole of the window. He described the situation of my gaol to me, and the first project we formed was to break under the foundation, which he had seen built and assured me was only two feet deep. I wanted money above all things, and this I contrived to get in the following manner: After Gefhardt was first relieved, he returned with a wire round which a sheet of paper was rolled, and also a piece of small wax candle which luckily he could pass through the grating; I got likewise some sulphur, a piece of burning tinder and a pen; I now had a light, pricked my finger, and my blood served for ink. I wrote to my worthy friend, Captain Ruckhardt, at Vienna, described to him my situation in a few words, gave him a draft for three thousand florins upon my revenues and settled the affair in the following manner: He was to keep one thousand florins for the expenses of his journey and to arrive without fail on the 15th of August in Gummern, a small Saxon town, only two miles from Magdeburg; there he was to appear at twelve o’clock with a letter in his hand, which with the two thousand florins he should give to a man whom he would see there carrying a roll of tobacco. Gefhardt had these instructions, received my letter through the window in the same manner as he had given me the paper, sent his wife with it to Gummern and there put it safely into the post office.
“At length the 15th of August arrived,—but some days passed before Gefhardt was posted as sentry over me. How did my heart leap with happiness when he suddenly called out to me:—‘All is well—we have succeeded.’ In the evening it was agreed in what manner the money was to be conveyed to me; as my hands were fettered, I could not reach to the grate of the window, and as the air-hole was too small, we resolved that he should do the work of cleaning my cell and should convey the money to me by putting it into my water jar when he filled it. This was fortunately effected, but judge of my astonishment when I found the whole sum of two thousand florins, of which I had promised and desired him to take the half. Only five pistoles were wanting, and he absolutely refused any more. Generous Pomeranian, how rare is thy example!
“I now had money to put my designs into execution. The first plan was to undermine the foundation of my prison, and to do this it was necessary that I should be free from chains. Gefhardt conveyed to me a pair of fine files. The cap or staple of the foot-ring was made so wide that I could draw it forward a quarter of an inch; therefore I filed the inside of the iron which passed through it. The more I cut out, the further I could draw the staple, till at last the whole inside iron through which the chain passed was entirely cut through, the cap remaining on the outside entire. Thus my feet were free from the wall and it was impossible, with the most careful examination, to find the cut, as only the outside could be searched. By squeezing my hands every day, I made them more pliant and at last got them through the irons. I then filed round the hinge, made myself a screw-driver with a twelve-inch nail drawn from the floor, and turned the screws as I pleased, so that no marks could be seen when I was visited. The belt round my body did not at all hinder me. I filed a piece out of a link of the chain which fastened the bar to my arms, and the link next to it I filed so small as to be able to get it through the opening. I then rubbed some wet ammunition bread upon the iron to give it the proper colour, stopped the open link with dough, and let it dry over night by the heat of my warm body, then put spittle upon it, to give it the burnish of iron; by this invention, I was sure that without striking upon each with a hammer it would be impossible to find out that which was broken.
“It was now in my power to get loose when I chose. The window never was examined; I took out the hooks with which it was fastened in the wall, but I put them properly in again every morning and made all as it should be with some lime. I procured wire from my friend and endeavoured to make a new grating. This I likewise completed; therefore I took the old one from the window and fixed mine in its place; this opened a free communication with the outside, and by this means I obtained light and fire materials. That my light might not be seen, I hung my bed cover before the window, and thus I could work as it was convenient.”