It was in Frankfort also where, not long afterwards, she found the great happiness of her life. The French Revolution, which had broken out in 1789, had grown constantly to greater and more dangerous proportions. In order to assist the threatened kingdom and its allies, who had taken refuge in multitudes along the Rhine, King Frederick William the Second of Prussia entered into an alliance with Austria. The French National Assembly quickly declared war, in April, 1792. Under command of the venerable Duke of Brunswick the campaign in France was so mismanaged that the Allies were obliged to retreat, and the French got possession of Mayence and on October 23, 1792, took Frankfort and burned it. The city was recovered December 2, but Mayence had to be besieged. The King of Prussia established his headquarters in Frankfort.
On the outbreak of hostilities the Landgravine of Hesse-Darmstadt and her two granddaughters took refuge with their older sister, the Princess of Hildburghausen. From there the Landgrave, who was in the suite of the King, sent for them in order to present them to His Majesty, whose consort was also a native of Darmstadt. When the presentation had taken place, the grandmother intended to proceed with her charges that same evening to Darmstadt, but was detained by an invitation to the royal table. Here the twenty-three-year-old Crown-prince, Frederick William, saw the seventeen-year-old Louise. The charm and graciousness of her bearing, her delicate and youthful figure, and the sweetness of her voice affected him; and when she looked at him with an almost frightened expression in her large blue eyes, an inner voice seemed to say to him, as years afterwards he used to relate, “It must be she, or no one else on earth.” Louise had the same feeling; and a clear realization of their destiny (so the King declared in his reminiscences of that exalted moment) brought tears of joy to the eyes of both.
The same evening, Prince Frederick Louis Karl, three years younger than his brother, fell in love with the fifteen-year-old Frederika. The brothers had been close comrades from childhood, and now, through their devotion to the two blooming sisters, they were drawn closer together than ever before.
The Crown-prince, who had borne himself gallantly in the French campaign, was given command of a regiment during the siege of Mayence; but the impression made upon him by Louise was not to be dimmed by the turmoil of war. During several visits to Darmstadt he became more intimately acquainted with the beloved, grew to appreciate her lovely nature, and being sure of himself, he sought and obtained the consent of his father to their union. A month after the first meeting, April 2, 1793, the double betrothal was celebrated in the palace at Darmstadt in the presence of the King of Prussia and the sisters of the two fiancées. Two days later both Princes returned to the field with their father, and six days afterwards the Crown-prince, at the head of his battalion, took the village of Kostheim by storm. His brother, betrothed of Princess Frederika, came very near losing his life one evening from an overheated stove, as he was resting in his tent after an arduous day. Everything about the sleeping Prince was already in flames, when a sentinel who had smelt the smoke rushed in and rescued the unconscious Prince from certain death. The tent was consumed, and the Prince saved nothing but the clothes on his back. The next day the serious and somewhat practical Crown-prince conceived the humorous idea of going to the King and among his suite, and soliciting contributions in aid of the “poor burned-out man.”
The Princesses ventured into the camp several times to visit their betrothed. During one of these visits at Bodenbach, near Mayence, May 29, 1793, young Goethe, who was staying there, had an opportunity of seeing them from his tent near by and was so entranced with both sisters that they seemed to him like “heavenly visions” which he could never forget. There is but one voice concerning the gracious charm of Louise, as Princess and as Queen. She appeared to those who knew her almost like a supernatural being. Her intimates called her an angel. The poet Fouqué, who saw both lovely sisters on their entry into Berlin, spoke of the “angelically beautiful brides.” The King called his gracious daughter-in-law “the Princess of Princesses.” Even a man of intellect like the court physician, Hufeland, tells us in after years of that “indescribably blissful feeling” which one always had when in her presence, “as if in the presence of a heavenly being.” Old Blücher, on hearing of her death, cried: “Our saint is now in Heaven!” May we not also look up with deepest reverence to her who was glorified while still upon earth?
The Crown-prince, who was now burning to distinguish himself and to prove worthy of his beloved, was particularly valiant in the siege of Landau, at which he had command of the royal guard. However, two months later, November 27, 1793, he and his brother were recalled from the field by the King, who had grown tired of the war in consequence of disagreements among the Allies. In the meantime the Crown-prince’s palace, in which Frederick William, as Crown-prince and as King, lived and died, was being newly furnished and made ready to receive the young pair.
Chapter II
Louise as Crown-princess of Prussia
On the seventeenth of December, Louise and her sister left Darmstadt, which had become like home to them. Accompanied by their father and the widowed Landgravine, their grandmother, they travelled by way of Würzburg, Hildburghausen, Weimar, Leipzig, and Wittenberg to Potsdam, where they arrived on the twenty-first of December. In the outskirts of this city of Frederick the Great, they were met by bands of citizens on horseback, carrying the Prussian and Mecklenburg colors, and there sixteen postilions gave them the first salute of welcome. The Brandenburg arch in Potsdam had been furnished with a special gate of honor by the citizens. The street leading westward from this gateway was renamed in honor of the Princess, and the open square before it was called Louise Square. On their arrival, toward evening, all the windows were illuminated and the streets lighted with torches. The guild of butchers in Potsdam particularly distinguished itself. The masters, in brown coats with gold shoulder-straps, red, gold-bordered vests, and high, three-cornered hats with gold tassels, cockades, and red pompons, carried curved hussar sabres and bestrode horses decked with red trappings, and were preceded by three lusty trumpeters and the waving banner of their guild. In memory of this occasion, when (in 1804) the old banner was discarded, Queen Louise presented the honorable guild with a handsome new one.
The entry of the Princesses into Berlin took place on the twenty-second of December. Both Princes escorted their brides-to-be from Potsdam. The guilds and societies of Berlin assembled in the village of Schöneberg, an hour distant, in order to ride in front of the carriage of state. Six postal secretaries, at the head of forty trumpeters in new festal garments, led the torch-light procession from Schöneberg. Next to these came the company of carters in blue; next, the Berlin guild of butchers in blue; the sharpshooters in green with peach-colored trimmings; a company of Berlin citizens in old knightly costumes; the brewers and maltsters in blue; two companies of young clerks; and at the end, the merchants of the three guilds in red and blue.
The streets were lined with soldiers of the royal guard and gentlemen of the court. Thus Louise, with her sister, was received and conducted to the capital, everything being done to honor and delight her. Poetical tributes were not lacking, and the tact and grace with which she received the homage, her wit, and the sincerity of her manner, laid the foundation for that profound reverence and love with which the people of the city always regarded her. At the gates and in the streets of Berlin, the entry became a veritable triumphal procession. Rows of the civil guard and countless masses of the populace lined the streets all the way to “the Linden” and the Crown-prince’s palace, where an arch of honor had been erected, and thirty boys from the French colony and forty young maidens presented her with a festival poem, which ended with the verse: