In the meanwhile, the town council, the police, and military authorities, were making preparations for the execution. Copenhagen is surrounded on the land side, next the three suburbs, by three large fields bordered by neat allées, which are used as exercising grounds for the garrison, and for public festivities. On the easternmost of these fields, situated on the Sound, a scaffold, 8 yards long and broad, and 27 feet in height, was erected; and on the gallows hill, a mile distant, and situated in the western suburb, two poles were planted, both of which were surrounded by four wheel-posts. It took some trouble to complete this job, because no artisans consented to undertake it. It was not until other workmen were persuaded that a pleasure-house was to be built on the field that the scaffold was completed. No wheelwright was willing either to supply the wheels; so that the eight carriage wheels required had to be begged from friends of the court party.
When dawn broke on the 28th of April, 1772, a day which inflicted an eternal stain on the history of Denmark, the troops, consisting of 4,400 sailors belonging to the vessels in ordinary, and armed with pikes, 1,200 infantry, 300 dragoons, and, strange to say, the corps of military cadets, marched through the gates, in order to form a large circle round the stage of blood on the Osterfeld, keep back the eager countless mob, and be ready for any eventualities. General von Eickstedt, town commandant, had the supreme command of all the troops.
The two gates of the citadel were also kept shut till the departure of the criminals; and the posts had been doubled in order to keep off the pressure of the crowd, who also congregated eagerly here.
The two clergymen went at an early hour to the condemned men, and found them both calm and easy in mind. When Münter entered, Struensee was fully dressed, and lying on a couch. He was reading Schlegel's sermons on Christ's Passion, and a religious conversation began between the two, during which Münter looked very often toward the cell door with a fearful expectation; but the count not once.
At length the officer on duty came in and requested Münter to step into the coach, and precede Struensee to the place of execution. Münter was greatly moved, but Struensee, as if it did not concern himself the least, comforted him by saying:—
"Make yourself easy, my dear friend, by considering the happiness I am going to enter into, and with the consciousness that God has made you a means for procuring it for me."
Soon after, the two delinquents were requested to get into their coaches, Brandt going on first. The latter, after praying fervently, had had his chains, which were fixed in the wall, taken off, and he put on the clothes in which he intended to appear on the scaffold. He then drank a dish of coffee and ate something, walking up and down the room, which he had not been able to do before. As often as Dr. Hee asked him how he found himself, he said that he was not afraid of dying. He afterwards asked Hee whether he had seen anybody executed before, and how far he was to lay his body bare for the execution.
Struensee was dressed in a blue cut velvet coat with silver buttons; Brandt in a green court dress richly embroidered with gold, and both had costly fur pelisses thrown over them, but, as if in mockery, still had a chain on their hand and foot. This gay attire had been given them in order to remind the populace that the dizzy fall from the greatest power to the scaffold was the just punishment of their unparalleled crimes. By the side of each of the prisoners sat an officer, and opposite to them two sergeants. The two coaches were surrounded by 200 infantry soldiers with fixed bayonets, and an equal number of dragoons with drawn sabres. The procession was opened by a third coach, in which the Fiscal General and the king's bailiff were seated, and, facing them, the latter's deputy, holding two tin shields, on which the arms of the two counts were painted.
Half-past eight was striking from the tower of the citadel when the three coaches began their progress to the scaffold, where they were expected by upwards of 30,000 persons.
When the procession reached the spot, the Fiscal General and the king's bailiff with his assistant first mounted the scaffold, on which the executioner and his aids were awaiting their victims. They were followed by Brandt; his features were so unchanged, and his bearing was so perfectly calm, that it was generally supposed that a hope of mercy was aroused in his mind at this supreme moment. Dean Hee mounted the scaffold stairs immediately after him, and it was not till they reached the top that the prisoner's fetters were removed. Even here he assured Hee that his mind was composed, and that he was not afraid of death. The dean, however, continued to encourage him, and concluded with the words:—