Hedvig Taube - Public Scandal

Public Scandal

In 1734, shortly after her one-year-old daughter died, the king had the Holy Roman Emperor grant her the title of Countess von Hessenstein, acknowledged her as his official mistress and gave her own palace to live in with her own household. This caused a great scandal, as she thus was the first official royal mistress in Swedish history. Of course, many Swedish kings had mistresses, but they had never previously been official, in the "French way". The Queen locked herself in her rooms, the priests refused to pay homage in the churches to a king "with two wives", satirical pamphlets circulated in Stockholm, the opinion of the public greatly favoured the Queen, as she was respected for her pious behaviour and the last of the old Swedish dynasty, and leaders of the government reminded the king of his promise to always "treat the queen with respect" when she abdicated in his favour. The king publicly acknowledged his offspring with Taube, and denied the rumours that he was to have married her in secret, but answered that the matter of treating the Queen with respect out of gratitude for her abdication had nothing to do with his private life, and wrote a letter to the Queen and asked her to protect Taube after his death. The king answered that the government had promised not to get involved in his personal affairs and refused to accept a written

The Queen was jealous and felt her pride was hurt and had the bishops of the parliament's clerical group lecture Taube. Taube followed the manner of the queen and pretended to be sick, but the bishops forced their way in to "The public sinner" and lectured her lying in bed with half of her face covered by a sheet. She said to them: "I had no idea that Her Majesty was displeased because of this" and the bishops replied: "We can assure you miss that it is so, and how else should it be?", and she said to them that they should have lectured her when she was younger and defenceless. They said that they were discussions to expel her from the country, and she answered that they should have more important things to discuss than someone who was never involved in politics.