Source:
Memoirs of Christina, Queen of Sweden, volume 1, pages 247 to 252, by Henry Woodhead, 1863; original at the University of Michigan
The account:
It would not be easy to realize the blessings which Christina conferred on Germany by the restoration of peace, without dwelling on the horrors of the Thirty Years' War. The lowest and vilest of men, the refuse of Europe, held the power of life and death over all that was noble and good, and used that power so mercilessly, that whole districts were depopulated. Both armies used to practise atrocious tortures on the inhabitants, to make them discover hidden property, long after they had nothing left to hide. Every enormity that we shudder to hear of when practised for a few hours in a town taken by assault, was suffered by the people of Germany for more than fifteen years. Those who escaped from their plundered and burning houses were chased for sport like beasts of prey. Those who did not escape were stuck up for targets to shoot at, and the soldiers took a fiendish amusement in their agonies.
The Croat troops, always infamous for their cruelty, and often for their cowardice, used to put their wretched victims into ovens, and bake them alive.
It is difficult to imagine how the misery of the people could have been aggravated, but many contemporary accounts state that when the French took the field, the enormities they perpetrated exceeded those of the other troops. Turenne, still remembered by the French as one of their model heroes, now began the cruelties which he afterwards practised in the Palatinate, and which have not injured his fame with his polite nation. It is not necessary to detail these crimes, as wherever there is an account of a French army among a defenceless people, the same story is repeated. Many of the victims died disbelieving in a God, as they thought such crimes must certainly provoke His interference.
A little longer duration of the war would have destroyed the very elements of civilization, and have reduced Germany to a more savage state than it was found in by the Romans. Already cannibalism began to prevail. Corpses were snatched from the churchyards to furnish a loathsome meal. Sometimes starving men chased dogs and tore them up with their teeth, sometimes starving dogs did the same to men. Prisoners watched for a comrade's last breath, to throw themselves like wolves on his body. Brothers and sisters ate one another. Parents in a fit of madness killed and devoured their children, then reflected on what they had done and killed themselves in despair. A troop of peasants and deserters established themselves in one of the forests of Franconia, and carried on a regular system of man-hunting from their dens. They were at last taken by surprise, when they were found sitting round a caldron full of human flesh.
Christina did more than any one else towards putting an end to this war. She met with little assistance in Sweden, and she made the nobles her enemies by her zeal in the cause of peace. She knew the danger of offending that powerful order, and she shrank from doing so, as has already been related, in the matter of the Crown donains; but no fear could hinder her from carrying out her great and noble object. There is little doubt that she foresaw the ill-will of her nobles would render her position untenable, and all honour is due to her for her firmness in so good a cause.
Her high rank and her great ability would hardly have sufficed to carry the point against the greatest men in her kingdom, if it had not been for her wonderful industry. Sickness and languor did not make her relax her efforts, and she was better acquainted with the details of business than any of her Council except Oxenstiern.
Everyone knows the power which an able and industrious under-secretary exercises over his superiors, when he is familiar with details of which they are ignorant. Christina was able to unite this kind of influence with the prestige of rank and the charm of eloquence.
She had already acted in the same way in regard to the war[s] in Poland and Denmark, yet her enemies have been able to represent her as a monster of cruelty on account of one violent act, which was totally at variance with the rest of her conduct.
More crimes were enacted in one day by the orders of her contemporary Louis the Fourteenth, than Christina can be reproached with during her whole life, yet the "Grand Monarque" was long considered by the French the type of all that was magnanimous, while she has been held up to general obloquy. Whilst such verdicts are given, tyrants have only to perform their deeds on a large scale, in order to become respectable.
It is common to generalize vaguely and to particularize distinctly, and thus an isolated fault may appear more odious than a whole series of crimes.
Louis XIV. caused thousands of innocent men, women, and children to be tortured and murdered, yet he was not considered cruel. Christina ordered the irregular execution of one man — probably a guilty one — and the generality of people knew her only by that deed.
Above: Kristina.
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