Katte's Mother, Fieldmarshal Wartensleben's Daughter, died in 1706; leaving Katte only two years old. He is now twenty-six;very young for such grave issues; and his fate is certainly very hard. Poor young soul, he did not resist farther, or quarrel with the inevitable and inexorable. He listened to Chaplain Muller of the Gens-d'Armes; admitted profoundly, after his fashion, that the great God was just, and the poor Katte sinful, foolish, only to be saved by miracle of mercy; and piously prepared himself to die on these terms. There are three Letters of his to his Grandfather, which can still be read, one of them in Wilhelmina's Book, [Wilhelmina, i. 302.] the sound of it like that of dirges borne on the wind, Wilhelmina evidently pities Katte very tenderly; in her heart she has a fine royal-maiden kind of feeling to the poor youth. He did heartily repent and submit; left with Chaplain Muller a Paper of pious considerations, admonishing the Prince to submit. These are Katte's last employments in his prison at Berlin, after sentence had gone forth.
KATTE'S END, 6th NOVEMBER, 1780.
On Sunday evening, 6th November, it is intimated to him, unexpectedly at the moment, that he has to go to Custrin, and there die;--carriage now waiting at the gate. Katte masters the sudden flurry; signifies that all is ready, then; and so, under charge of his old Major and two brother Officers, who, and Chaplain Muller, are in the carriage with him, a troop of his own old Cavalry Regiment escorting, he leaves Berlin (rather on sudden summons); drives all night, towards Custrin and immediate death.
Words of sympathy were not wanting, to which Katte answered cheerily; grim faces wore a cloud of sorrow for the poor youth that night. Chaplain Muller's exhortations were fervent and continual; and, from time to time, there were heard, hoarsely melodious through the damp darkness and the noise of wheels, snatches of "devotional singing," led by Muller.
It was in the gray of the winter morning, 6th November, 1730, that Katte arrived in Custrin garrison. He took kind leave of Major and men: Adieu, my brothers; good be with you evermore!--And, about nine o'clock he is on the road towards the Rampart of the Castle, where a scaffold stands. Katte wore, by order, a brown dress exactly like the Prince's; the Prince is already brought down into a lower room to see Katte as he passes (to "see Katte die," had been the royal order; but they smuggled that into abeyance);and Katte knows he shall see him. Faithful Muller was in the death-car along with Katte: and he had adjoined to himself one Besserer, the Chaplain of the Garrison, in this sad function, since arriving. Here is a glimpse from Besserer, which we may take as better than nothing:--"His (Katte's) eyes were mostly directed to God; and we (Muller and I), on our part, strove to hold his heart up heavenwards, by presenting the examples of those who had died in the Lord,--as of God's Son himself, and Stephen, and the Thief on the Cross,--till, under such discoursing, we approached the Castle. Here, after long wistful looking about, he did get sight of his beloved Jonathan,"Royal Highness the Crown-Prince, "at a window in the Castle;from whom he, with the politest and most tender expression, spoken in French, took leave, with no little emotion of sorrow." [Letter to Katte's Father (Extract, in Preuss, Friedrich mit Freunden und Verwandten, p. 7).]
President Munchow and the Commandant were with the Prince;whose emotions one may fancy; but not describe. Seldom did any Prince or man stand in such a predicament. Vain to say, and again say: "In the name of God, I ask you, stop the execution till Iwrite to the King!" Impossible that; as easily stop the course of the stars. And so here Katte comes; cheerful loyalty still beaming on his face, death now nigh. "PARDONNEZ-MOI, MON CHER KATTE!"cried Priedrich in a tone: Pardon me, dear Katte; oh, that this should be what I have done for you!--"Death is sweet for a Prince I love so well," said Katte, "LA MORT EST DOUCE POUR UN SI AIMABLEPRINCE;" [Wilhelmina, i. 307; Preuss, i. 45.] and fared on,--round some angle of the Fortress, it appears; not in sight of Friedrich;who sank into a faint, and had seen his last glimpse of Katte in this world.
The body lay all day upon the scaffold, by royal order; and was buried at night obscurely in the common churchyard; friends, in silence, took mark of the place against better times,--and Katte's dust now lies elsewhere, among that of his own kindred.
"Never was such a transaction before or since, in Modern History,"cries the angry reader: "cruel, like the grinding of human hearts under millstones, like--" Or indeed like the doings of the gods, which are cruel, though not that alone? This is what, after much sorting and sifting, I could get to know about the definite facts of it. Commentary, not likely to be very final at this epoch, the reader himself shall supply at discretion.
