Dorothea Ritter
Dorothea Elisabeth (Doris) Ritter (born March 21, 1714 in Halle (Saale) ; † September 23, 1762 in Berlin ) was a musical childhood friend of Frederick the Great .
She was the daughter of the theologian Matthias Ritter and grew up in Perleberg from 1720 , where her father was rector. In 1728 the family moved to Potsdam , as their father became principal at the grammar school there and thus also cantor of St. Nikolai . The very musical daughter played the piano and had a beautiful voice, which is why she was allowed to sing the solo parts in St. Nikolai. So 16-year-old Dorothea made the acquaintance of the then 18-year-old Crown Prince Friedrich. They made music together and went for walks in the company of Johann Ludwig von Ingersleben , a lieutenant from the Crown Prince's close circle of friends. He once brought Dorothea a present from Friedrich, a “blue slack skirt”.
This six-month friendship (January to June 1730) was enough to consider Dorothea Ritter an accomplice after the crown prince's failed escape from the strict discipline of his father on August 5, 1730. On September 5, she was arrested and taken to prison, and King Friedrich Wilhelm ordered:
"The Hoff Rath Klinte that he morning in arrest allhier imprisoned border Cantor's daughter should be flogged, and to the same alßdann be brought forever Spandow in the Spinnhauß, the first place to the same to be whipped before Rath home afterwards before the Father's home, and then in all corners of the city. "
All efforts of the father to avert the whipping and induction into the spinning house - at that time a shameful punishment for prostitutes - did not work. On September 7th, Dorothea Ritter was flogged six times and then taken to the spinning house in Spandau , where she had to stay for three years. The father was immediately released from school.
It is not clear whether there ever were closer relationships between Dorothea and Friedrich, as was assumed, for example, by Wilhelmine , Friedrich's sister. It is unlikely, however, that the highly embarrassing investigations that followed the escape would probably have brought such things to light, in the course of which the Lieutenant von Ingersleben was also questioned in detail and finally sentenced to six months' imprisonment because he "could have known and judged that SKM such [walks] would be most displeasing ”. In any case, there was no sexual intercourse, as a gynecological examination ordered by the king of Dorothea Ritter revealed that she was a virgin.
On July 11, 1733, Dorothea Ritter was released from Spandau on her father's petition for clemency. She eventually married the spice dealer Franz Heinrich Schommer (or Schomer) and became the mother of three sons and three daughters. In 1744 she asked Friedrich II. For her husband to be a fiaker tenant , which was approved. There seems to have been no further contact between Friedrich and Dorothea Ritter.
Voltaire saw her again in her later years and describes her:
"A tall, lean woman who resembles a sibyl and by no means has the appearance that she deserves to be flogged for a prince."
She last lived on Behrenstrasse in Berlin and died in 1762.
literature
- Günther Holm: Doris Ritter, the Potsdam cantor's daughter. Women of Love, Vol. 133. Freya publishing house, Heidenau near Dresden 1930
- Michael Pantenius: Cruelly punished friend of the heart: Dorothea Elisabeth (Doris) Ritter (1714–1762), childhood sweetheart of the Prussian King Friedrich II. In: ders .: Scholars, world viewers, also poets ... literary portraits of famous Halle residents. Mitteldeutscher Verlag, Hall ad Saale 2006, ISBN 978-3-89812-393-8 , pp. 80-83
- Wilhelm Petsch: Doris Ritter. Westermanns Monatshefte, Volume 27 (1870), pp. 257-262, digitized
- Anna Eunike Röhrig : The secret companion of Friedrich of Prussia. The fate of the Doris Ritter. Tauchaer Verlag, Taucha 2003, ISBN 3-89772-060-4 .
- Hermann Wagener: Doris Ritter. In: Communications of the Association for the History of Potsdam. Vol. 4 (1869), pp. 336-343
- Jürgen Kloosterhuis: Katte, ordre and war articles. File-analysis and military-historical aspects of a “technical” story. (Partial print from: Research on Brandenburg and Prussian History, new series, edited on behalf of the Prussian Historical Commission by Johannes Kunisch and Wolfgang Neugebauer, 15 vol. 2005, ISSN 0934-1234 .) Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 2006, ISBN 3 -428-12193-7 .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ Jürgen Kloosterhuis: Katte, Ordre and articles of war. File-analysis and military-historical aspects of a “technical” story. Here in particular pages 44–50: V. Crown Prince Friedrich: Absalom in right. Apollo in spe .
- ↑ Handwritten Cabinetsordre printed in: Johann DE Preuss: Document book for the life story of Frederick the Great. Nauck, Berlin 1833, vol. 2, p. 150, no. 5
- ↑ Quoted in Petsch: Doris Ritter. 1870, p. 260
- ↑ Holger Skorupa: The Katteprocess - Judicial murder or law-abiding? GRIN, Munich 2008, p. 19
- ↑ Quoted in Petsch: Doris Ritter. 1870, p. 262.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Knight, Dorothea |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Ritter, Doris; Ritter, Dorothea Elisabeth; Schommer, Dorothea |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Childhood friend of Frederick the Great |
| DATE OF BIRTH | March 21, 1714 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Hall |
| DATE OF DEATH | September 23, 1762 |
| Place of death | Berlin |