The Sunday after the Queen’s death mourning services were held in the churches of Celle. At the town church, where she was buried, Pastor Lehzen concluded his sermon with the following words:—
“She endeavoured to win the love of every one, even of the humblest, and the many tears shed for her prove that she succeeded in her endeavour. Those who were nearest her person testify how she strove in a higher strength to exercise the most difficult of Christian virtues [forgiveness of her enemies], and that not from a lofty, worldly pride, but from reasons set forth for us by the Pattern of all virtues. The last steps of her life were taken with submissive surrender to the will of God, with trust and hope. O God! we thank Thee for Thy grace, and for its blessed working; we honour, we extol, we praise the same, and offer to Thee our most hearty thanks for all the goodness wrought in this immortalised soul. May she now enjoy the rest, the reward, the bliss of the perfected just! May a blessing rest on her royal children, such as this loving mother sought for them so often from Thee, O God, with many tears! Lighten the sorrow which the news of this unexpected and grievous event will cause to the hearts of our gracious King and Queen [George III. and Charlotte], and for the blessing of the world, and of this country in particular, bring their Majesties to their full term of happy years, and permit them to see their royal house flourish and prosper. Look upon those who are nearest to the deceased Princess, and mourn a Queen who was always full of graciousness and gentleness. Console them in Thy mercy and loving providence, and teach them that Thy counsel is very wonderful, and wise and tender. And thou, Celle, overcome by the death which leaves thee forlorn, look up through thy tears to God! Honour Him with childlike trust, and pray Him to compensate your loss by manifestations of His mercy in other ways, and by granting a long and happy life to our gracious King.”
It was thought that the ducal vault of Celle would prove only a temporary resting-place for the Queen, and, in accordance with her expressed wish, her remains would be removed to England to rest in Westminster Abbey beside those of her father and mother. But George III. did not see his way to grant this last request, and all that is mortal of Matilda remains at Celle to this day. On one side of her George William, the last Duke of Celle, and his consort, Eléonore d’Olbreuse, sleep their last sleep; on the other is the plain leaden coffin of their unfortunate daughter, Sophie Dorothea, whose troubled life in many ways closely resembled that of her great-granddaughter Matilda.
I visited this vault a few years ago. Queen Matilda’s coffin is easily found, as it is the only wooden (mahogany) one there. It is of extraordinary breadth—almost as broad as long—and at the head is the following inscription in Latin: Here are deposited the mortal remains of Caroline Matilda, Princess of Great Britain and Brunswick-Lüneburg, Queen of Denmark and Norway. Born July 22, 1751, died May 11, 1775. A few faded wreaths were lying near the coffin; many of these were deposited many years after her death by pilgrims to her last resting-place; but I was assured that some of them had been there since the funeral. The vault is now closed.
When the news of Queen Matilda’s death reached England general mourning for three weeks was commanded for the King’s sister, and court mourning for six weeks. Among the few English friends who knew her profound sorrow was felt at the early death of this unfortunate daughter of England. On May 24 a deputation of the House of Lords and a deputation of the House of Commons waited on the King at St. James’s, and presented addresses of condolence on the Queen of Denmark’s death. To each George III. replied: “The King returns his thanks to the House for the concern they have expressed for the great loss which has happened to his family by the death of his sister, the Queen of Denmark.” The few thousand pounds the Queen left behind her, and her personal effects, George III. committed to the charge of the regency of Hanover, with orders to guard the property for her children until they came of age, and Baron Seckendorf was entrusted with the administration of the Queen’s estate.
The news of the Queen’s death travelled to Copenhagen as quickly as to London, and completed the revulsion of feeling in her favour. She was henceforth regarded by the people as a saint and martyr, who had been sacrificed to the intrigues of the Queen-Dowager, and the unpopularity of Juliana Maria and her Government was greatly increased. The Queen-Dowager could not conceal her satisfaction at Matilda’s death. The English envoy relates how the Danish court received the news. Writing on May 20 he says:—
“An estafette from Madame Schimmelmann brought the melancholy news from Hamburg to Count Bernstorff very early yesterday morning, and I had the grief to receive the confirmation of it soon after by the post.... Orders were given yesterday, as I am positively assured, to put the Prince and Princess Royal into the deepest mourning worn here for a mother, and I am likewise further assured that Count Bernstorff was the adviser of that measure. But as consistency is not to be expected here, he could not prevent the Royal Family’s appearing at the play on Wednesday and yesterday evenings, and what was worse, their assisting on Thursday night at a ball in dominoes at the theatre, where they made the King of Denmark dance, though they had ordered young Schack to acquaint him on Wednesday with the circumstance he was in, with which he was most [deeply] affected. And yesterday at Court (where I was not) his countenance and manner were such as startled the Foreign Ministers who approached him. The Prince Royal did not see company. And to-day they all went to dine out of town, the King assisting at the launching of two frigates, which resolution was taken suddenly at twelve o’clock. They say they will wait till I, or M. Reiche, notify the Queen of Denmark’s death, in his Majesty’s name.”[113]
[113] De Laval’s despatch, Copenhagen, May 20, 1775.
In accordance with this resolution no notice was taken of the event by the Danish court, nor was any mourning donned, until George III. sent a letter to the King notifying the death of Queen Matilda. This notification was formally delivered by the English envoy at the Christiansborg Palace the day when a court ball was appointed. The Queen-Dowager so far forgot her discretion, or was so blind to decency, that she did not order the ball to be postponed, and the court danced merrily the evening of the day that the Queen’s death was notified at Copenhagen. But the next morning the Danish court went into mourning—not as for the Queen of Denmark (for the Queen was considered politically to have died three years before), but as for a foreign princess who was connected with the Danish royal house—as a princess of Great Britain Caroline Matilda was first cousin to Christian VII. This court mourning lasted for four weeks—the usual time—and the only concession seems to have been that the late Queen’s children, the Crown Prince Frederick and his sister, Princess Louise Augusta, remained in mourning for a longer period.
It is said that George III., to whom the news of the court ball was communicated, deeply resented the affront offered by the Danish court not only to his dead sister but to him. No trace of this appears in the official despatches. On the contrary, we find, soon after this wanton insult to the Queen’s memory, a despatch from England, saying that “the King hoped the Queen’s death would make no difference to the good relations existing between the two courts”.[114] George III. was not a man to allow personal considerations to stand in the way of what he considered to be public good, and he had recently obtained a pledge from the Danish Government to the effect that they would not offer any help, direct or indirect, to the American colonists, recently goaded into revolt. A sister’s memory was nothing to the King in comparison with the prosecution of an unrighteous war which he believed to be righteous.