Anno 1678 it was brought about for me that my father-confessor, H. Johan Adolf Borneman, should come to me every six weeks and preach a short sermon.
In this year, on Easter-Day, Agneta Sophia Budde was brought to the tower. Her prison was above my innermost apartment. She was accused of having designed to poison the Countess Skeel; and as she was a young person, and had a waiting-woman in her attendance who was also young, they clamoured to such an extent all day that I had no peace for them. I said nothing, however, about it, thinking she would probably be quiet when she knew that her life was at stake. But no! she was merry to the day on which she was executed![144]
In the same year, on the morning of July 9, the tower-warder Gert was killed by a thief who was under sentence of death, and to whom he had allowed too great liberty. I will mention this incident somewhat more in detail, as I had advised Gert not to give this prisoner so much liberty; but to his own misfortune he paid no attention to my advice. This thief had broken by night into the house of a clergyman, and had stolen a boiling-copper, which he had carried on his head to Copenhagen; he was seized with it at the gate in the morning, and was placed here in the tower. He was condemned to be hanged (he had committed various other thefts). The priest allowed the execution to be delayed; he did not wish to have him hanged. Then it was said he was to go to the Holm; but he remained long in prison. At first, and until the time that his going to the Holm was talked of, he was my neighbour in the Dark Church; he behaved quite as a God-fearing man, read (apparently) with devotion, and prayed to God for forgiveness of his sins with most profound sighs. The rogue knew that I could hear him, and I sent him occasionally something to eat. Gert took pity on him, and allowed him to go by day about the basement story of the tower, and shut him up at night again.
Afterwards he allowed him also at night to remain below. And as I had seen the thief once or twice when my door stood open, and he went past, it seemed to me that he had a murderous countenance; and for this reason, when I heard that the thief was not placed of an evening in the Dark Church, I said to Gert that he ventured too far, in letting him remain below at night; that there was roguery lurking in him; that he would certainly some day escape, and then, on his account, Gert would get into trouble. Gert was not of opinion that the thief wished to run away; he had no longer any fear of being hanged; he had been so delighted that he was to go to the Holm, there was no danger in it. I thought ‘That is a delight which does not reach further than the lips,’ and I begged him that he would lock him up at night. No; Gert feared nothing; he even went farther, and allowed the thief to go up the tower instead of himself, and attend to the clock-work.
Three days before the murder took place, I spoke with Gert, when he unlocked my door in the morning, of the danger to which he exposed himself by the liberty he allowed the thief, but Gert did not fear it. Meanwhile my dog placed himself exactly in front of Gert, and howled in his face. When we were at dinner, the dog ran down and howled three times at the tower-warder’s door. Never before had I heard the dog howl.
On July 19 (as I have said), when Gert’s unfortunate morning had arrived, the thief came down from the clock-work, and said that he could not manage it alone, as the cords were entangled. The rogue had an iron rod ready above, in order to effect his project. Gert went upstairs, but was carried down. The thief ran down after Gert was dead, opened his box, took out the money, and went out of the tower.
It was a Friday, and the bells were to be rung for service. Those whose duty it was to ring them knocked at the tower door, but no one opened. Tötzlöff came with the principal key and opened, and spoke to me and wondered that Gert was not there at that time of the day. I said: ‘All is not right; this morning between four and five I was rather unwell, and I heard three people going upstairs and after a time two coming down again.’ Tötzlöff locked my door and went down. Just then one of the ringers came down, and informed them that Gert was lying upstairs dead. When the dead man was examined, he had more than one wound, but all at the back of the head. He was a very bold man, courageous, and strong; one man could not be supposed to have done this to him.
The thief was seized the same evening, and confessed how it had happened: that, namely, a prisoner who was confined in the Witch Cell, a licentiate of the name of Moritius, had persuaded him to it. This same Moritius had great enmity against Gert. It is true that Gert took too much from him weekly for his food. But it is also true that this Moritius was a very godless fellow; the priest who confesses him gives him no good character. I believe, indeed, that Moritius was an accessory, but I believe also that another prisoner, who was confined in the basement of the tower, had a hand in the game. For who should have locked the tower-door again after the imprisoned thief, had not one of these done so? For when the key was looked for, it was found hidden above in the tower; this could not have been done by the thief after he was out of the tower. The thief, moreover, could not have unlocked Gert’s box and taken his money without the knowledge of Moritius. The other prisoner must also have been aware of it. It seems to me that it was hushed up, in order that no more should die for this murder; for the matter was not only not investigated as was befitting, but the thief was confined down below in the tower. He was bound with iron fetters, but Moritius could speak with him everyday: and for this reason the thief departed from his earlier statement, and said that he alone had committed the murder. He was executed on August 8, and Moritius was taken to Borringholm, and kept as a prisoner there.[E55b]
In Gert’s place a tower-warder of the name of Johan, a Norwegian, was appointed—a very simple man. The servants about court often made a fool of him. The imprisoned young woman and her attendant did so the first time after his arrival that the attendant had to perform some menial offices upstairs. The place to which she had to go was not far from the door of their prison. The tower-warder went down in the meanwhile, and left the door open. They ran about and played. When they heard him coming up the stairs, they hid themselves. He found the prison empty, and was grieved and lamented. The young woman giggled like a child, and thus he found her behind a door. Johan was glad, and told me the story afterwards. I asked why he had not remained with them. ‘What,’ he answered, ‘was I to remain at their dirty work?’ There was nothing to say in reply to such foolish talk.
I had repose within my doors, and amused myself with reading, writing and various handiwork, and began to make and embroider my shroud, for which I had bought calico, white taffeta, and thread.