<h1 class="pgc-h-center-line" > Chapter 1 Sophia's Childhood</h1>
In 18th-century Germany, the princes were divided, and the upper class was filled with a variety of obscure, poor and miserly nobles, who were everywhere, and Prince Christian Augustus of the Principality of Anhalt-Zebst was no different from these people. Prince Augustus was nothing but a fearsome villain. In fact, he inherited the real qualities of the Junker class—absolute obedience, self-discipline, integrity, frugality, piety, and unmoving the right and wrong of others, the affair, and all sorts of news in print. Overall, he was indifferent to the world outside of his life. Born in 1690, Christian became a professional soldier while serving in the army of King Frederick William I of Prussia. Christian has been conscientious in his battles against Sweden, France, and Austria, but he has not established much merit on the battlefield. He has never soared, nor has he stood still. It is said that the king once called his loyal commander "the idiot of Zebst", but despite this, after the war, the king promoted him to the head of the infantry regiment and stationed him in Steding, a land newly seized by the Kingdom of Prussia from the Kingdom of Sweden. At that time, Sweden controlled Pomerania's region along the Baltic Sea coast. Christian, stationed in Stedin, remained a bachelor, but by 1727 the forty-two-year-old prince had heeded his family's advice and decided to marry and have children. He put on the most elaborate blue uniform, hung a polished sword, and married Princess Johanna Elizabeth, who was only fifteen years old at the time. Before the marriage, the prince knew almost nothing about the princess of the Principality of Holstein-Gottorp, and their union was completely arranged by the parents of both parties. The marriage was a great joy to the prince's family, first of all, the marriage could ensure that the Anhalt-Zebst family had a successor, and secondly, from the doorway, the prince's family was obviously high.
The marriage was a tragedy, and the age gap between the couples led to a lot of problems. Generally speaking, the combination of young women and middle-aged men is always based on various comprehensive factors. Johanna was from a good background, and her family was not very rich, but she also belonged to a wealthy family. As soon as childhood was over, her parents, without her consent, selected a respectable man for her, who was almost three times her age. Johanna had no choice. What is even more disheartening is that the couple's personality and temper can almost be said to be contrary to each other. Christian Augustus is simple and honest, serious, does not like to socialize and does not like extravagance, while Johanna is a complex-minded, lively and active person who likes to have fun and live a luxurious life. She was a recognized beauty, with curved eyebrows, curly blonde hair, a body full of charm, and she was always eager to please everyone, all of which made her easily capture the eyes of everyone. As long as there are people around, Johanna feels that everyone should fall for themselves. But as she got older, she had to put in more and more effort, because her flaws were exposed in time. The chatter of light-hearted gossip reveals her shallowness, and once she is hit, her charm disappears and is replaced by a look of irritation, and then her fiery temper explodes. Johanna had always been well aware that she was doing this because her marriage was a terrible mistake and that there was no way for her to escape it.
Johanna realized this the first time she saw the mansion her newlywed husband had bought for her in Staten. Throughout her teenage years, Johanna lived a life of fine clothes. Their family was one of the less prominent members of the Holstein family, her father was a Lutheran bishop in Lübeck, the family had a total of twelve children, johanna was raised by her godmother, the heirless Duchess of Brunswick. In the most lavish court in northern Germany, Johanna had long been accustomed to ornate gifts, numerous servants, balls, operas, concerts, fireworks displays, group hunting, and endless gossip.
Johanna's new husband, Christian Augustus, a professional soldier, was struggling to survive on a meager military salary, unable to maintain any of Johanna's hobbies, and at best he could only do his best to ensure a decent bluestone house. The house sits in a cobbled alley that endures wind and rain all year round. Surrounded by walls, Stedin is a fortress town, looking far to the north to a desolate sea, the whole town is full of rigid military atmosphere, in this place can not find much fun, can not enjoy the rich and comfortable life, not even a little social circle of elegance can not be seen. The wives living in the garrison lived a monotonous life, while the life of the officers and ladies in the town was even more prosaic. A young woman full of vitality, who had previously been immersed in the luxuries and pastimes of the Brunswick court, had to live on her husband's meager income under the arrangement of others, and the Puritan husband devoted himself to the life of the army, loved the life of the poor, was good at giving orders, but could not communicate with others normally, and he hoped that his wife would realize the hopes he had given him for the marriage and give birth to a man and a half woman. Johanna did her best, and although she was unhappy, she still fulfilled her duties as a wife, but deep down she always longed to regain her freedom, to stay away from her boring husband, to get rid of poverty, to escape from the narrow and rude Stettin, and she always thought that she deserved a better life. She became pregnant just eighteen months after her marriage.
Sixteen-year-old Johanna was not ready to become a mother, and in the face of this pregnancy, she just blindly cowered in her daydreams. She envisioned that the child would continue her past life, that they would eventually be able to move to the big city, and that she herself would wander down the wide avenues so that her past wishes could be fulfilled. In her daydreams, Johanna took it for granted that her firstborn child must be a boy, that the child would inherit her father's title, and more importantly, that the child must be dignified and otherworldly, and that under Johanna's guidance, he would have a glorious career, and Johanna would share his glory with him.
At 2:30 a.m. on April 21, 1729, Johanna gave birth at a gray, cold dawn on the Baltic Sea, but the little one was a girl. Faced with this reality, Christian Augustus was not as negative as Johanna. Johanna reluctantly and her husband named the child, Sophia Augusta Frederica, but from the beginning she showed no or no maternal love for the child. Johanna had never fed her young daughter, nor caressed her, nor had she even looked after the cradle or held her. In fact, she hurriedly left the child to the servants and nurses.
It was explained that this was because Johanna almost lost her life during childbirth, because her mother, who was not yet an adult, was still bedridden nineteen weeks after Sophia was born. Another explanation is that Johanna was still young, and she still had a lot of dazzling ambitions for life, and the day when her dream came true was out of reach. However, the real deep reason is that this is a girl, not a boy. Ironically, although Johanna did not realize it at the time, the birth of this girl was the supreme achievement of Johanna's life. If the boy who came to earth was johnna's long-awaited boy, and the boy could grow up, he would inherit his father's title as Prince of Anhalt-Zebst, and the history of Russia would be transformed, and the little place that Johanna Elizabeth had won for herself in history would cease to exist.
Eighteen months after the birth of her eldest daughter, Johanna gave birth to another son, and she devoted herself to the child. When she discovers that her second child, William Christian, has a serious physical defect, Johanna loves the child even more. Johanna was enchanted by the boy who had suffered from rickets, she doted on him, spoiled him blindly, stared at him almost all the time, and poured out the love she had never given to her daughter into this son. Sophia had known full well that her birth had disappointed her mother, and now she was witnessing her mother taking great care of her brother, giving the boy all the gentle kisses, caresses and murmurs, while she could only watch from the sidelines. Of course, for mothers, if one of their children has a disability or chronic disease, it is not too much to spend a little more effort on this child, and it is also normal for other children in the family to have hatred for the mother's unbalanced love. However, Johanna's rejection of Sophia existed long before The birth of William Christian, and the birth of her brother made her mother's rejection of her even stronger, and her mother's eccentricity left a wound in Sophia's heart that could never be healed. In families where parents have a preference for their children, most of the children who are rejected or neglected will be more or less like Sophia, in order to avoid being hurt, she does not reveal her true feelings to others, she does not get anything, and the family does not expect much from her. Little William just accepted his mother's love for granted, and her mother's faults had nothing to do with him. Despite this, Sophia was full of hatred for him. Forty years later, when writing the Memoirs, Sophia's heart was still boiling with resentment toward William: they told me that someone was waiting for my birth with joy... My father regarded me as an angel, while my mother paid no attention to me. A year and a half later, she (Johanna) gave birth to a son whom she regarded as a jewel in her hand. I endured all this, but I was often met with unjust rebukes. I can't understand what all this is all about.
Because of this, in the Memoirs Catherine only mentions that William Christian died in 1742, at the age of twelve. Subsequently, Catherine coldly wrote an account of him in a few words:
He lived only to be twelve years old, died of spotted fever (i.e., scarlet fever), and it was not until after his death that the cause of his use of crutches was identified. Because the various treatments added to him by the macule fever were ineffective, they sought out the most famous doctors in Germany for this disease. They suggested sending him to Baden and Carlsbad for a hot spring, but each time he returned he was limping as before, and his legs grew longer and thinner as he grew taller. After his death, after autopsies, it was discovered that his hips were misaligned, a condition that must have occurred in his infancy... His death left my mother heartbroken, and the whole family had to go along with her.
This resentment only meant sophia's great indignation towards her mother, and the damage caused by Johanna's unbridled eccentricity to the young Sophia left a deep imprint on Sophia's character. Rejection in childhood can help us understand why, as an adult, she continues to seek what she once lacked. Even when she became Empress Catherine, at the height of her dictatorship, she still wanted people not only to admire her extraordinary wisdom, or to respect her for considering her status, but to seek the most basic warmth between people, just as her brother received from his mother and she did not receive.
In the 18th century, even the monarchs of the small principalities sought to show their identity and status in carriages, costumes, and so on. Children from aristocratic families were accompanied by nannies, female tutors, male teachers, and various instructors to take care of them, teaching them music, dance, horsemanship, and religion, and training them to ensure that their manners, manners, and beliefs met the standards of the European court. The first thing to learn is etiquette, and young students practice bowing and bending their knees until they are able to make the most standard movements without thinking. The study of the language was a top priority, and French was the lingua franca of intellectuals throughout Europe, and young princes and princesses had to be able to speak, speak, read and write in this language. At the time, the German aristocracy generally considered the German language to be too vulgar.
During this period, Sophia's governess, Elizabeth Babette Khadr, had a crucial influence on Sophia's life. Babet, a Frenchman of the Huguenots, believed that a Protestant Germany was safer and more temperamental than Catholic France. Sophia's education was entrusted to this woman. Babette soon realized that her students were frequently in conflict because she was suffering from loneliness, a little girl who longed for encouragement and warmth from others. Babet satisfied Sophia, and she did her best to cultivate Sophia's love of French with the logic and subtlety of the French language, as well as the wit and vividness of the language. Sophia's love of French has never disappeared. French classes developed from the original Fables of La Fontaine to the works of the French playwrights Goneil, Racine and Molière, and sophia later decided that she had spent most of the time rote memorization, "I was noticed early on that I had a good memory, so I was tormented by memorization." I still have a German version of the Bible at hand, in which all the chapters I had to memorize at that time were marked with red lines. ”
Compared with the priests, Babette's method of education is already very gentle. Sophia's father, an avid Lutheran, chose Wagner, a pedantic army priest, to serve as his daughter's teacher of religion, geography, and history. Wagner's teaching methods are rigid, he only knows how to let students memorize textbooks constantly, and as a result, his students learn almost nothing. In Babette's description, the student is a complete "clever fool", and she is constantly asking embarrassing questions— why did a great sage like Marco Aurelius suffer from endless curses because he did not know the salvation of Christ, and he himself could not be saved? Wagner replied that it was God's will. Wagner's answer to the question of what the universe looked like before Genesis was a chaotic world. Sophia asked her teacher to tell her about the chaotic world of the beginning, and Wagner couldn't find the answer. When Wagner mentions the word "circumcision," it naturally begs the question — what does the word mean? Wagner, who was in that position, was terrified and refused to answer the question. Explaining in detail the horrors of the apocalyptic trial and the difficulties of salvation, Wagner frightened his students into "going to the window every evening and crying." But the next day the students will fight back against the teacher—how can God's infinite mercy be reconciled with the horrors of the last judgment? Wagner shouted that there was no plausible explanation for such a problem, and that whatever he taught her had to be accepted without any doubt, waving her cane to intimidate his students. Babette stepped in to interrupt their argument. Later, Sophia said, "Mr. Wagner is an elm knot, and I have no doubt about that." She then added: "All my life I have always been willing to succumb to gentleness and reason, and oppression will only make me resist." ”
However, Sophia's music teacher, Mr. Rowling, has no effect on Sophia, whether with tenderness or suppression. In a later letter to her friend Baron Frederick Melchio Green, Sophia wrote: "He always brought a man with a rooster's voice, and he made that man sing in my room. I listened to the man's singing and thought, 'He cried out like a bull.' But as soon as the rooster's throat opened, Mr. Rollin was always happy to accompany him. "Sophia lacks an appreciation for the art of harmony, and she has never improved much in this regard." I longed to listen to music, to enjoy the beauty of music, but my efforts were in vain. It sounds like all noise to me. Sophia, later Catherine, wrote in her Memoirs.
Catherine the Great always remembered Babette Caader's way of educating her children, and many years later the Empress poured out her gratitude to Babette, "She has a noble soul, a culture, and a heart of gold, she is patient, gentle, cheerful, just, and consistent." In short, all want to find such a female governess for their children. In a letter to Voltaire the Empress proclaimed herself "a pupil of Teacher Kader"; in 1776 the forty-seven-year-old Empress wrote in a letter to Grimm:
Children cannot always guess the minds of children, and children are difficult to understand, especially after receiving comprehensive training, children have become accustomed to obeying the will of others, and everything they have experienced makes them cautious when talking to teachers. Can you clearly summarize a principle from this? Children should not be excessively scolded, and their trust in others should be cultivated so that they do not bury their stupid ideas in front of us.
The more independent Sophia appeared, the more worried her mother became about her. Johanna decided that the girl was arrogant and difficult to control, and in order to marry her off, these problems in her body must be removed. For the princesses of the little principality, marriage was their only way out, and Johanna was determined to drive "the devil of pride away from her." Johanna kept telling her daughter that she was ugly and rude. Unless someone spoke to Sophia first, Sophia was not allowed to say anything or express her views to the adults, and she was forced to kneel down to every visiting female guest and kiss the hem of their skirts. Sophia did not disobey her mother's orders. Although she was not loved and recognized, Sophia was still respectful to her mother, always silent in front of her mother, obedient to her mother's will, and hid her thoughts. Later, Sophia, who changed her name to Catherine, was seen hiding her pride with the same deference as a deliberate and effective means of dealing with crises and threats. Under threat, Sophia wrapped herself in douting and obedience, as well as temporary submission, and Babette Khadr also demonstrated to Sophia in this regard. The noble-born woman accepted her low status as a governess, but still managed to maintain her self-respect, dignity and pride, qualities that made the teacher more worthy of her respect in Sophia's eyes than her mother.
On the surface, Sophia was always elated at the time, and the curiosity that was constantly bubbling up in her head was one thing, and her abundant energy also played a role. Sophia needs a lot of exercise, and walking in the park with Babette Khadr doesn't meet her requirements, so her parents allow her to play with the other children in the town. It didn't take much effort for Sophia to become the child king, and it wasn't simply the princess who played a role. Sophia is born a leader, and the games she designed with her imagination have won the love of all children.
Finally, Christian Augustus, the commander of the border guards, was promoted to ruler of the town of Stetting, and by this time he moved into the wing of the granite castle on stetting's central square. Living in the castle still did not change Johanna, she was still sullen and unhappy, and she still could not accept the fate of her arrangement. She got married. She had dreamed of a glorious life, and now she was just a hillbilly in a border town. After the first two births, she gave birth to two more children—one son and one daughter—but neither did they bring her much joy.
Johanna was eager to escape from all this, and remembering that she still had some powerful relatives, she planned to turn to them for help. In terms of pedigree, Johanna was part of one of the most important families in Germany, the Duke of Holstein. She was convinced that with her family status, coupled with her own intelligence, charm and vitality, she still had the opportunity to climb to a higher position. She began to spend a lot of time writing letters to her relatives, visiting them and maintaining her ties with them. She often visited the House of the Duke of Brunswick, and her teenage years were spent in this splendid court with paintings by Rembrandt and Van Dyck. In addition, every February, during the popular season of gatherings, she went to Berlin to pay her respects to the King of Prussia. Johanna was so passionate about scheming that even the conspiracies that took place in the small German principalities caught her attention, and she was thrilled to hear such gossip, and she always felt that she could shine in political intrigue. However, wherever she went, Johanna always realized that she was just a poor relative of prominent relatives, a little girl with a good birth but a bleak prospect of married life.
When Sophia was 8 years old, Johanna began to take her out with her. It was Johanna's vocation to find the right in-laws for her daughter, and even if she did it when she was young, it would not cause any harm, and she had to let the outside world know that Stedin had an increasingly mature little princess. In fact, in the days when they are away from home, "marriage" has become the most important topic between mother and daughter. By this time, Sophia was ten years old, and her aunts and uncles often talked about the right husband candidates. Sophia never resented traveling with her mother, but instead loved to go out. As she grew older, she not only became more and more aware of the purpose of these visits to relatives and friends, but she was also full of joy. Not only was marriage the best way for her to escape her mother and family, but she had also witnessed another terrible future—the life of her unmarried aunts for life. The surplus women of the small aristocratic families of northern Germany were either sent to live in the wing at the very end of the family castle or permanently housed in remote Catholic convents. Sophia's mother had more than one sister in such a miserable situation, and Sophia remembered visiting one of them. The aunt had sixteen pugs, and the dogs ate and lived in the same room as the hostess, completely unrestrained, "and there were many big parrots living in that room." Anyone can imagine the smell that hung over that room."
Although Sophia herself is very eager to get married, the hope of finding a good marriage seems very slim. Every year, a new group of young, marriageable princesses are produced in Europe, and for the royal and aristocratic families in power, the vast majority of them offer much more favorable conditions than the insignificant Zebst family, and Sophia is not a girl with excellent looks. At the age of ten, she was plain-looking and had a thin, sharp chin, and Babette Khadr had advised her to pay attention to tightening her jaw. Sophia understood that her appearance was flawed, and she later wrote:
I don't know if I was an ugly person as a child, but I distinctly remember people telling me I was ugly, so I had to try to show my inner virtue and intelligence. By the time I was fourteen or fifteen years old, I was already very convinced that I was an ugly girl, so I paid more attention to how to have inner qualities and tried not to care about my appearance. When I was ten years old, I saw a portrait of myself, and if the portrait really resembled me, then everyone was right, I was indeed an ugly monster.
Despite her bleak future and mediocre appearance, Sophia followed her mother throughout northern Germany, further enriching her "studies" and learning about the family ties of most of Europe's royal families through gossip from the adults. One of the many visits was particularly interesting. In 1739, the eleven-year-old Petr Ulrich, Duke of Holstein, had just lost both parents, and Johanna's brother, Adolf Frederick, Bishop of Lübeck, was appointed guardian of the young duke. The boy, who was closely related to the Johanna family, was likely to rise to prominence in the future, as the only surviving grandson of Tsar Peter the Great of Russia, and the first heir to the throne of the Kingdom of Sweden in the entire family. Moreover, Peter, who is a year older than Sophia, is Also Sophia's little cousin. As soon as the child was placed in the custody of Johanna's brother, Johanna immediately took Sophia to visit the Prince-Bishop once. Catherine, who is still Sophia in The Memoirs, called Peter Ulrich "pleasant and well-educated, but his problems with alcoholism have been revealed." Catherine's description of the eleven-year-old orphan is far from the actual situation. In fact, Peter Ulrich was short and slender, morbid, with a pair of goldfish eyes, a jaw so short that it was almost invisible, a thin blond hair hunched over his shoulders, and the child was somewhat stunted both emotionally and physically. He was shy, withdrawn, surrounded all day by a bunch of teachers and military instructors, with no contact with his peers. He doesn't read, but he has a gluttonous appetite. But, like the mother of every daughter to be married, Johanna watched Peter Ulrich's every move tightly, and Johanna's heart blossomed when she saw her ten-year-old Sophia talking to him. Then Sophia saw her mother and aunts muttering head to ear. Despite being only ten years old, Sophia could understand how much she was talking about how likely she was to marry the strange boy. Sophia didn't mind the elders' arguments, she had already fantasized about it:
I knew he was going to be King of Sweden sooner or later, and even though I was a child, the title of Queen sounded so pleasant to me. Since then, people around me have started to joke about him, and gradually I got used to it, and I felt destined to be his wife.
At the same time, Sophia is getting more and more beautiful. By the age of thirteen, she had become a slender girl, with satin-like dark chestnut hair, a full forehead, a pair of dark blue eyes shining, upturned lips like buds, and the original sharp jaw was less obvious, but in other ways she gradually attracted everyone's attention. Sophia is not only smart, but also very responsive, and some people are beginning to realize that she will never be an insignificant little girl. The Swedish diplomat, Count Henning Ulunbury, had met Sophia at her grandmother's house in Hamburg, and he was impressed by Sophia's wit. He said to Johanna in front of Sophia, "Madam, you don't know this child. I dare say that you underestimated her intelligence and character, so I beg you to pay more attention to this daughter of yours, who deserves your attention no matter what. Johanna was not impressed, but Sophia remembered these words forever.
Sophia has been trying to win the love of outsiders, and as soon as she learned this skill, she used it quite effectively, not that she used feminine features to attract the attention of others. Sophia, the future Catherine, was never a flirtatious woman, and she wished she could arouse not the sexual desires of others, but the enthusiasm, identification, and understanding of her, just as Count Henning had done to her. The methods she uses are not out of line, and she is also very restrained, so she is even a little arrogant to outsiders. Sophia knew that people preferred to talk to rather than listen, to talk about themselves more than to other topics, and in this respect her poor mother, anxious to get attention from the outside world, became Sophia's perfect negative teaching material.
In addition, Sophia's heart was also surging with other emotions, and by the time she was thirteen or fourteen years old, her sexual consciousness had awakened, and the restless energy of returning to her bedroom at night often disturbed her very anxious. In order to release her emotions, she stood on the bed, sandwiched a stocky pillow between her legs, and imagined herself straddling her horse and "galloping until she was exhausted." When the maids outside the bedroom heard movement and entered the room to inquire about the situation, they always saw Sophia lying silently on the bed, completely sleeping. "I've never been caught on the spot." She said. She shows great self-control in the face of outsiders, because she has an overriding desire to escape from her mother. Sophia understands that the only way out of her mother is to get married, she must get married in order for her dream to come true, and she not only finds a husband, she needs to rely on this man to improve her status as much as possible and put herself above Johanna.
However, at this time, Sophia is trapped in a green love affair. At the age of fourteen, she spent a short time with her handsome young uncle. Uncle George Louis was 10 years older than Sophia, and the vigor and innocence of her budding niece seduced the oil-faced cavalry officer to pay homage to her niece. Sophia mentions this small romance in the book, because Uncle George suddenly proposed to her, and the relationship came to an abrupt end. She was stunned, "I don't know anything about love, and I've never associated love with him." The flattered Sophia was apprehensive, after all, the man was her mother's brother, "My parents don't want to see this marriage." George Luis told sophia that blood ties would not be an obstacle between the two of them, and that intermarriage was common in aristocratic european families. Sophia vaguely allowed Uncle George to continue his pursuit. "He was handsome, had beautiful eyes, and he knew my personality well. I'm used to having him by my side. Gradually, I felt that he was very attractive to me, so I stopped avoiding him. In the end, Sophia even nearly accepted her uncle's marriage proposal, if "her parents agreed." At that time, my uncle was completely lost in the passion of fanaticism, not missing any opportunity to hug me, and he was very good at creating such opportunities. However, except for kissing me a few times, his hugs have always been pure."
Will Sophia really forget her ambition to become empress in order to be her mother's younger sibling? Sophia did hesitate for a moment, perhaps abandoning her ambitions and allowing Uncle George Louis to act recklessly and eventually marry him. However, just before the dust had settled, Sophia's family received a letter from St. Petersburg.
<h1 class="pgc-h-center-line" > Chapter II Summoned to Russia</h1>
The letter from Russia surprised everyone in the Zebst family, but the letter mentioned the exact thing Johanna had always dreamed of. The ambitious mother led her daughter throughout the little nobles of northern Germany while trying to use her noble relatives to realize her dreams. For a long time, the Johanna family, the Holstein family, maintained an in-law relationship with the Romanov dynasty that ruled Tsarist Russia. In 1741, the year Sophia was twelve, Peter the Great's youngest daughter, Elizabeth, seized the Russian throne in November by means of a midnight coup. There was a strong emotional bond between the newly enthroned Empress and the Holstein family. First, Anna, Elizabeth's beloved sister, The Eldest Daughter of Peter the Great, married Johanna's cousin, Charles Frederick, Duke of Holstein. The product of this marriage is the pathetic little Peter Ulrich. Anna died three months after Peter was born.
Elizabeth herself and the Holstein family were more intimate. At the age of seventeen, she had been married to Johanna's brother, Charlie Augustus. In 1726, the prince of Holstein went to St. Petersburg to marry Elizabeth. However, just a few weeks before the wedding day, the prince, who could have become a groom, contracted smallpox in the Russian capital and died before returning home. The heartbroken Elizabeth has not been able to completely eliminate the pain in her heart since then, so in her heart, the Holstein family is basically equivalent to her own family.
Now, suddenly hearing that it was this Elizabeth who had taken the throne of Tsarist Russia overnight, Johanna immediately sent a congratulatory letter to the empress, who had almost become her sister-in-law. Elizabeth's reply was kind and cordial, the letter was full of affection, and the relationship between the two families would become even closer. Johanna had in her possession a portrait of Elizabeth's deceased sister Anna, which the Empress was bent on getting. Elizabeth wrote to her "dear niece" asking if she could return the portrait to Russia, and Johanna, the niece's mother, agreed ecstatically. Not long after, a Russian minister in Berlin came to Steting, and he brought Johanna a miniature portrait of Elizabeth, set in a splendid diamond frame. That picture frame alone was worth eighteen thousand rubles.
Seeing great promise for her relationship with the Russian royal family, Johanna intended to continue to strengthen it. She took her daughter to Berlin, where the Russian court painter Anthony Pisni painted a portrait of Sophia, which would be given as a gift to the Empress. There is nothing remarkable about the portrait, most of Pisni's works on canvas are no different, and his portrait of Sophia looks like an ordinary portrait of an 18th-century young girl. However, when the portrait arrived in St. Petersburg, Johanna received a reply that pleased her – "the expressive face of the young princess captivated the empress".
Johanna then began to strengthen the new bond between the two families. At the end of 1742 Johanna gave birth to her fifth child, her second daughter, Sophia's only sister. As soon as the baby's gender was determined, Johanna immediately wrote to the Empress, in which she declared that the child would be named "Elizabeth" and asked the Empress to be the child's godmother. Elizabeth not only granted Johanna's request, but soon another portrait of the Empress was sent to Steting. The portrait is also set in a diamond frame.
At the same time, a series of things happened that also satisfied Johanna. In January 1742, Peter Ulrich jr. of holstein suddenly disappeared in Kiel and then in St. Petersburg. The boy, whose parents had died, was adopted by his aunt Elizabeth and declared heir to the throne of Tsarist Russia. Sophia had met the boy once three years earlier, and now he was the future Tsar. Peter is a relative of Johanna and is naturally related to Sophia. In 1743, another good thing happened that surprised Johanna. Since Peter Ulrich became the heir to the Russian throne, the young Prince Holstein renounced his right to the Swedish throne. Under the agreement between Russia and Sweden, Empress Elizabeth had the right to choose a successor for her nephew. The Empress chose Johanna's brother, The Bishop of Prince Lübeck, Adolf Frederick, the guardian of Peter Ulrich Jr., to succeed Peter as heir to the Swedish throne. As soon as the announcement was issued, the inheritance rights were handed over, and after various other changes were settled one by one, Johanna suddenly found herself surrounded by good luck. Her luck was surprisingly good. Because of smallpox, she lost her brother, who could have become the husband of the new Empress of Russia, but now she has one more relative who will one day become the Tsar, and the living brother will also become the King of Sweden.
The wife was trying to promote the family's contacts with St. Petersburg, accompanying her daughter throughout the northern German principalities, while Prince Christian Augustus, as husband and father, remained at home. The fifty-four-year-old prince still adhered to his simple way of life, because of the stroke his body was paralyzed for a while, but eventually recovered, and he witnessed his rank and status being promoted again and again. In July 1742, frederick II, the new King of Prussia, promoted him to Field Marshal of the Prussian Army. In November of the same year, the Prince and his brother jointly inherited the rule of the small principality of Anhalt Zebst, southwest of Berlin. Anhalt-Zebst is surrounded by medieval walls, and the city's towers and gabled houses were built in the Middle Ages. Christian Augustus resigned from his military post and left Stetting, where he moved with his family to Zebst, busy with the interests of his twenty thousand subjects. Johanna was somewhat satisfied, and now she was the prince and wife of a small German principality the size of a sesame green bean, holding the rule of the principality and living in a Baroque palace the same size as a sesame green bean. Although she maintained correspondence with the Russian Empress and often visited her relatives, she was still worried that her life would pass so quietly.
On January 1, 1744, just after the family had finished their prayers in the castle chapel, just as they had sat down to enjoy the New Year's dinner, a messenger sent Johanna a secret letter. Johanna immediately opened the letter. The letter came from St. Petersburg and was sent by Grand Marshal Otto Brumer, Duke of Holstein, apparently also the heir to the Russian throne. In his letter, Brumer wrote:
In view of the explicit decree of Her Majesty the Empress (Empress Elizabeth), I am compelled to inform you, Madame, that the Empress wishes your eldest daughter, Her Royal Highness, to leave for Russia as soon as possible, accompanied by your princess, and to arrive at the seat of the court without delay. Her Royal Highness the Princess is brilliant and will not be unaware of the Empress's true intentions in her eagerness to summon you and your daughter here at once. It is said that your daughter is very cute... At the same time, our unparalleled monarch has also explicitly asked me to inform Your Royal Highness the Princess that the Prince will walk with you no matter what. Her Majesty the Empress has very urgent reasons for this. I am sure that a single word from Her Royal Highness the Princess will satisfy our extraordinary Empress.
Brummer made several other demands in his letter. He demanded that Johanna use a pseudonym along the way up to Riga on the Russian border, and if possible she should keep a tight eye on the destination of the trip, and in case the destination was exposed, she should explain to the other party that the trip was out of the need for duty and courtesy, and personally thank the Russian Empress for her generosity to the Holstein family. In order to ensure the use of Johanna's trip, Brummer also attached a money order worth 10,000 rubles issued by a bank in Berlin. The letter did not indicate the true intention of the empress's summons, but a few hours later a letter from another messenger explained everything. The second letter, from King Frederick II of Prussia, also indicates that the recipient was only Johanna.
I will no longer hide the long-cherished respect I have held for you and your daughter, the little princess, and I will tell you that I have always hoped to bring the latter unusual good fortune. It occurred to me that it might be possible to marry her cousin, Grand Duke Peter of Russia.
Brummer explicitly excluded Prince Christian Augustus from the Empress's invitation list, while Frederick's letter to Johanna—his letter, of course, disgraced the titular head of the family—further sidelined Prince Christian Augustus. The wording of both letters makes it clear that all those involved in the matter believe that no matter what reasons Prince Christian Augustus gives to protest his rejection and otherwise rejects the potential marriage, his wife will seek to overturn the objections raised by her dazed husband. In order to marry the future Tsar, the German princess would be required to renounce her Protestant faith and convert to the Greek Orthodox Church, fearing that the prince would interfere primarily in the matter. Prince Christian Augustus is known to be a devout Lutheran, and all parties involved in Sophia's marriage know that he would not agree to his daughter leaving her faith behind.
It was a glorious day for Johanna. After fifteen years of frustrating married life, an empress and a king paved a prosperous road for her, and her exciting dreams and adventures will be realized. She will become a big person, a big player on the world stage, and the precious qualities she has worn away will be used. Johanna immediately became triumphant. As the days passed, Russia and Berlin continued to send letters to Zebst urging Johanna to hurry up. Brumer in St. Petersburg had been under pressure from Empress Elizabeth, who was very restless. Bloomer told Empress Johanna to write back that "just missing a pair of wings, otherwise she would fly to Russia". There was nothing wrong with that, and in just ten days Johanna was ready to go.
Sophia's mother relished the peak moments of her life, while her father locked himself in his study. The veteran had always known exactly how to fight, but now he was overwhelmed. He was annoyed to be excluded from the whole thing, but he still wished he could give his daughter some help. He hated the fact that his daughter would be forced to change religion, and he was distracted at the thought that she would be sent to a country so far from home and as politically turbulent as Russia. Eventually, despite all his worries and apprehensions, the fine veteran realized that he had no choice but to obey his wife's orders and obey King Frederick's orders. He locked the study door and admonished his daughter, teaching her how to behave in the Russian court:
In addition to honoring Her Majesty the Empress, the most important thing is to respect the Grand Duke (Peter, Sophia's future husband) as you respect your Master, your Father and your Lord. However, you must also do your best to care for him and obey him in order to win his trust and love for you. Your Lord and His will love all the pleasures and treasures of the world, and nothing will happen against His will.
In just three days, Johanna was able to reply to Frederick.
The Prince, my husband, has already approved. Traveling at this time of year can become extremely dangerous, but I have nothing to fear for this trip. I have made a decision, and I firmly believe that everything that is going to happen is providential.
For this great task, the role of Prince Christian, not only in the Zebst family, was unequivocally devalued. While Johanna read the letters, replied, gave orders, and picked out clothes, Sophia was ignored. The money was used to enrich her mother's wardrobe, and the daughter did not get a single child. Sophia's outfit—which was supposed to be a dowry bag—contained only three old dresses, a dozen underwear, pairs of stockings and a few handkerchiefs, and the sheets and pillowcases for the big wedding were made of her mother's old sheets. In total, these things were filled with only the kind of small suitcase that a local girl had brought up when she married into a neighboring village.
Sophia was already aware of what was going to happen, and she glanced at Bloomer's letter, saw that it was from Russia, and that her mother had read it out as she opened it: "... Bring the princess, her eldest daughter. In addition, the mother's breathless look, and then the parents hurriedly dodging to the side and muttering, made Sophia more convinced that the letter was about her future. Sophia knew the meaning of marriage, she still remembered her mother's excitement when she met the young Duke Peter Ulrich four years ago, and she knew that her portrait had been sent to Russia. Finally, Sophia could no longer restrain her curiosity, and she found her mother. Johanna confessed the contents of the letter to Sophia, and she confirmed what the other party did not explicitly state. Catherine also wrote in her autobiography: "She told me that there was a great risk in this matter because of the turmoil in that country. I said to her that if it was God's will, then she would calm everything down, and my courage gave me enough to face the risk, and my heart told me that everything would be all right. The bitter thing that upset Sophia's father, that she had to convert, did not make Sophia feel bitter, as Pastor Wagner had learned, sophia's attitude towards religious belief was very practical.
During her last week with Babette Khadr, Sophia remained silent about what was to happen to her female teacher. Sophia's parents did not allow her to leak out, declaring that they and their daughter had left Zebst only for an annual visit to Berlin. Babett, who had a heart for her students, realized that no one had told her the truth, even when she tearfully bid farewell to her beloved teacher, her students still did not tell her the truth. After this parting, the teachers and students never met again.
On 10 January 1744, mothers, fathers and daughters boarded a carriage to Berlin, where they would meet King Frederick. Sophia was as impatient as her mother, and she had been looking forward to this escape. From this moment on, her extraordinary life began. Leaving Zebst and leaving for the capital of Prussia, there were no sad scenes. Sophia kissed her nine-year-old brother Frederick, the brother she hated at the time, William, who had died, and then she kissed her newborn little sister, Elizabeth. Her uncle George Louis, whom she had kissed and even promised her, had been forgotten by her. The carriage passed through the city gates and drove up the main road, and Sophia never looked back. She never returned to this place for more than fifty years.