Johann Friedrich Struensee - Arrest and Execution

Arrest and Execution

Things were at their worst during the winter of 1771. Struensee created himself and Brandt counts on 30 November that year. But the countless dismissals of government officials and officers in the course of his administrative reforms, he steadily built up a large group of enemies. This feeling of unhappiness with his reign spread through the populace as well.

The king, queen, Struensee and Enevold Brandt, along with the royal court spent the summer of 1771 at Hirschholm Palace north of Copenhagen, and stayed there until late in the autumn. On 7 July the Queen gave birth to a daughter, Louise Augusta; and a proclamation commanded that a Te Deum in honour of the event should be sung in all the churches.

The court moved to Frederiksberg Palace just west of Copenhagen on 19 November.

The general ill will against Struensee, which had been smouldering all through the autumn of 1771, found expression at last in a secret conspiracy against him, headed by Rantzau-Ascheburg and others, in the name of the Queen Dowager Juliana Maria, who in this way was willing to wrest power away from the king, and secure her and her son’s position of power for many years to come.

The court returned to Christiansborg Palace on 8 January 1772. The season's first masquerade ball was held at the Court Theatre on 16 January.

Early in the morning of 17 January 1772, Struensee, Brandt and Queen Caroline Matilda were arrested in their respective bedrooms, and the perceived liberation of the king, who was driven round Copenhagen by his deliverers in a gold carriage, was received with universal rejoicing. The chief charge against Struensee was that he had usurped the royal authority in contravention of the Royal Law (Kongelov). He defended himself with considerable ability and, at first, confident that the prosecution would not dare to lay hands on the queen, he denied that their liaison had ever been criminal. The queen was taken as prisoner of state to Kronborg Castle.

On 27 April/28 April Struensee and Brandt were condemned first to lose their right hands and then to be beheaded; their bodies were afterwards to be drawn and quartered. Sentence of death was the least that Struensee had to expect. The Kongelov had no provisions for when the ruler was insane and unfit for government, so as a commoner who had imposed himself in the circles of nobility, he was condemned as being guilty of lèse majesté and usurpation of the royal authority, both capital offences according to paragraphs 2 and 26 of the Kongelov, although he had only done what many had done before him, and others would do after him with no repercussions.

He awaited his execution at Kastellet, Copenhagen. The sentences were carried out on the 28 April 1772 with Brandt being executed first. First, Struensee's right hand was cut off; next, after a failed attempt, his head was severed, stuck on a pole and presented to 30,000 bystanders; then, after disembowelment, his remains were quartered.

The King himself considered Struensee a great man, even after his death. Written in German on a drawing the king made in 1775, three years after Struensee’s execution, was the following: "Ich hätte gern beide gerettet" ("I would have liked to have saved them both"), referring to Struensee and Brandt.