Just across the canal from the Old Church at Delft still stands the house of William the Silent, now known as the Prinsenhof, where the tragedy took place. It is a low, two-story building with a red-tiled roof, formerly a cloister, but fitted up in 1575 as the residence of the Princes of Orange. Here came William, in the summer of 1584, to join his fourth wife, Louisa de Coligny, at the christening of their son, born in Delft the previous winter, who later became the celebrated governor, Frederic William. The door marked Gymnasium Publicum, opposite the tower of the church, leads through a courtyard to the staircase where the murder was committed; and in a dark corner of the wall at the foot of the steps the custodian will show you a hole made by one of the bullets that killed the Prince. The dining-room beyond, from which William had come to his death, is now a museum containing reminiscences of him.
The Czolgosz of the occasion, the perpetrator of the dastardly act, was Bathazar Gérard, alias Francis Guion, the self-alleged son of a martyred Calvinist, a religious fanatic who had long cherished an insane desire to murder Orange.
“The organization of Bathazar Gérard,” says Motley, “would furnish a subject for profound study, both for the physiologist and the metaphysician. Neither wholly a fanatic nor entirely a ruffian, he combined the most dangerous elements of both characters. In his puny body and mean exterior were inclosed considerable mental powers and accomplishments, a daring ambition, and a courage almost superhuman. Yet those qualities led him only to form upon the threshold of life a deliberate determination to achieve greatness by the assassin’s trade.”
After long and exasperating delays, Gérard had finally succeeded, on account of his ambitions, in nursing himself into the good graces of Alexander of Parma, the Spanish governor of the Netherlands at that time. On the other hand, “Parma had long been looking for a good man to murder Orange, feeling—as Philip, Granvelle, and all former governors of the Netherlands had felt—that this was the only means of saving the royal authority in any part of the provinces. Many unsatisfactory assassins had presented themselves from time to time, and Alexander had paid money in hand to various individuals—Italians, Spaniards, Lorrainers, Scotchmen, Englishmen, who had generally spent the sums received without attempting the job. Others were supposed to be still engaged in the enterprise, and at that moment there were four persons—each unknown to the others, and of different nations—in the city of Delft, seeking to compass the death of William the Silent.”
Upon the death, at this time, of the French Duke of Anjou, Gérard was recommended to Parma by various parties as a capable messenger “to carry this important intelligence to the Prince of Orange.” Concerning the outcome of this mission, I can do no better than to quote John Lothrop Motley from his “The Rise of the Dutch Republic,” as I have done elsewhere in this chapter:
“The dispatches having been intrusted to him” (Gérard), “he traveled post-haste to Delft, and to his astonishment the letters had hardly been delivered before he was summoned in person to the chamber of the Prince. Here was an opportunity such as he had never dared to hope for. The arch-enemy to the Church and to the human race” (that is, the Prince, so called), “whose death would confer upon his destroyer wealth and nobility in this world, besides a crown of glory in the next, lay unarmed, alone, in bed, before the man who had thirsted seven long years for his blood.
“Bathazar could scarcely control his emotions sufficiently to answer the questions which the Prince addressed to him concerning the death of Anjou; but Orange, deeply engaged with the dispatches, and with the reflections which their deeply important contents suggested, did not observe the countenance of the humble Calvinist exile, who had been recently recommended to his patronage by Villers. Gérard had, moreover, made no preparation for an interview so entirely unexpected, had come unarmed, and had formed no plan for escape. He was obliged to forego his prey when most within his reach, and after communicating all the information which the Prince required, he was dismissed from the chamber.
“It was Sunday morning, and the bells were tolling for church. Upon leaving the house he loitered about the courtyard, furtively examining the premises, so that a sergeant of halberdiers asked him why he was waiting there. Bathazar meekly replied that he was desirous of attending divine worship in the church opposite, but added, pointing to his shabby and travel-stained attire, that, without at least a pair of new shoes and stockings, he was unfit to join the congregation. Insignificant as ever, the small, pious, dusty stranger excited no suspicion in the mind of the good-natured sergeant. He forthwith spoke of the wants of Gérard to an officer, by whom they were communicated to Orange himself, and the Prince instantly ordered a sum of money to be given him. Thus Bathazar obtained from William’s charity what Parma’s thrift had denied—a fund for carrying out his purpose!
The Prinsenhof in Delft, revered by every Hollander as the scene where “William the Silent,” the George Washington of the Netherlands, was murdered