Köller-Banner, after this, left the country and went to Vienna and the Austrian army, but returned at the beginning of 1777 to Copenhagen, where he was again most graciously received by the old queen. Soon afterwards, however, he was mixed up in a scandalous affair with the magistracy about a child an actress had given birth to. The excitement caused by this was so general, that he received his full discharge from the military service. But the protection which the hero of January 17th still enjoyed was so great, that his 4,400 dollars were left him as a life pension.
When Köller went to take leave of his powerful patroness, Queen Juliana Maria, he requested, as a last proof of her favour, that she should inform him who it really was who had calumniated him so greatly to her and the hereditary prince, and promised, at the same time, to make no use of the information. The queen then acknowledged to him that it was Admiral von Kaas.
"Is it possible!" Köller-Banner exclaimed, in the utmost surprise. "That is the greatest insult that could be offered me! The unworthy wretch—a man who has dishonoured the Danish flag—a man whose wickedness is only comparable with his stupidity—has been able to overthrow a faithful and zealous servant of the royal house by his calumnies! I never could have believed that my hostile destiny would prepare such a humiliation for me."
Köller-Banner returned to his native land of Pomerania, but could not stand it long there, and selected as his last residence the very city where Struensee's memory was honoured. In this city, Altona, the conspirator died in 1811, utterly forgotten, and avoided and detested by everybody.
The Pomeranian knight of the Dannebrog, Hans Henry von Eickstedt, held his ground the longest. In 1773, this utterly ignorant soldier was entrusted with the supervision of the education of the crown prince by a royal letter, which was at the same time a grand panegyric of the nominee. The king, we read in it, had appointed him chief governor of his beloved son, because he could trust to the general's faithful devotedness, Danish heart, and judicious care. But this selection was so bad a one, that the excellent son of Caroline Matilda frequently complained loudly in his maturer years that he had been purposely kept from learning anything. It was the design of the queen and Guldberg to keep the crown prince a minor as long as possible, and the best means for this unscrupulous object were certainly to allow the heir to the throne to grow up in ignorance, to imbue him with an immoderate preference for everything Danish, and to divert his inclinations to unimportant state-matters, such as playing at soldiers. Although the two leaders of the conspiracy succeeded in this treacherous design, the country yet had the consolation and satisfaction that King Frederick VI. inherited the clear natural intellect of his unfortunate mother, and thus made up for his deficiency of knowledge, even though his neglected education entailed other consequences.
In November, 1783, Eickstedt was given the order of the Elephant; and when, in 1784, the education of the crown prince was said to be finished, he was appointed his first chamberlain; but on the very next day after the crown prince attained the government as regent, Eickstedt received from his royal pupil his dismissal as member of the privy council and commandant of the Horse Guards, with a pension of 5,000 dollars, which was some time after raised to 7,000. This terrible fall so greatly insulted the arrogant chamberlain, that he at once left the court and retired to his estate of Boltinggaard, in the island of Fühnen, where he died in the year 1801, in seclusion, and forgotten by the world.
Beringskjold could not endure the loss of his chamberlain's dignity and his banishment to the island of Möen, which I have already described, for it was asking this ambitious man to resign half his life. Hence he left the island secretly a little while after, and went to Sweden. What he undertook there remains a mystery; but it is known that he ordered his wife during his absence to send in a petition for his pardon, and compensation for the losses he had sustained by being deprived of his domain of Nygaard. As no resolution to this effect was issued, he, in the following year, requested, through the same intercessor, pardon and permission to return to his native land. This request had a better result, for he was not only allowed to return to Möen, but the chamberlain's key was also restored him. He received a letter from the king himself, in which his disobedience was graciously forgiven, and he was requested to remain quietly in Möen, or, if he preferred it, somewhere in Jütland, Fühnen, or the duchies, and there enjoy his guaranteed pension of 2,000 dollars. At the same time, however, he was prohibited from travelling again to Sweden, or carrying on a secret correspondence with that country, or leaving Denmark at all; and for his own good he was recommended not to show himself at Copenhagen, or any place where the court was residing. This indulgence toward the accomplices of 1772 was further shown in the fact that, in 1780, Beringskjold's son, who was a page of the bed-chamber, was appointed a conferenz-rath, and the other, who was a captain, a chamberlain. But all this but little satisfied the restless father. He next asked leave to reside at least in the same island where the court was; and when this was granted him, he bought, in a mysterious way, three considerable estates, situate in the southern part of Seeland: Rönnebeksholm, Sparresholm, and Sortebrödre, and selected the first as his residence. When the court was staying at Fredensborg in the summer, he went repeatedly to Elsinore, which was only ten miles from the palace, and thence sent letter after letter, first to one, then to the other of the persons belonging to the king's immediate entourage, in order to obtain further favours; but all these efforts proved unsuccessful.
When Beringskjold saw himself thus passed over, he formed a plan for overthrowing the government, and laid his treacherous scheme before a near relative of the royal family; but one of his own sons, the chamberlain, betrayed his father's designs.