Frederica of Baden (German: Frederica Dorothea Wilhelmina; 12 March 1781 – 25 September 1826) was Queen of Sweden from 1797 to 1809 as the consort of King Gustav IV Adolf.
Frederica was the fourth of eight children (including six daughters) to Charles Louis, Hereditary Prince of Baden, the only surviving legitimate son of Charles Frederick, Margrave (and later Grand Duke) of Baden, and Amalie of Hesse-Darmstadt.
In 1797, at the age of sixteen, she married King Gustav IV Adolf of Sweden, and they had five children, but the marriage was otherwise unsuccessful. Despite being admired for her beauty, she made a poor impression due to her reserved nature. Frederica was shocked by and disliked the promiscuous Swedish court.
By 1809, the political atmosphere at the Swedish court had become unstable, and King Gustaf was captured in Stockholm during the Coup of 1809, the day after leaving his wife and children at the Haga Palace, and imprisoned then deposed in favor of his uncle, now King Charles XIII. Frederica later joined her husband, and their relationship improved. Her son Gustav, however, was removed from the succession and the former royal family was forced to go into exile.
In exile, the formal royal couple's relationship took a turn for the worse; they divorced in 1812, despite Frederica's resistance, and after several attempts at reconciliation.
Her final years were spent in poor health, and she died of heart disease in 1826, at the age of 45. She had been in exile for over fifteen years.
Life Early life Friederike Wilhelmina Dorothea of Baden was born at Karlsruhe Palace in the Margraviate of Baden on 12 March 1781 as the daughter of Karl Ludwig of Baden and Amalie of Hesse-Darmstadt.
Frederica, in her family known as Frick (Frique), was given a conventional and shallow education by a French-Swiss governess in Karlsruhe, and was described as intellectually shallow.Fredrika Dorothea Wilhelmina, urn:sbl:14445, Svenskt biografiskt lexikon (article by Sten Carlsson), retrieved 2016-03-26. Already as a child, she was described as a beauty, but she was also reported to have a weak constitution, having had rheumatism from the age of 2.
Because her maternal aunt Natalia Alexeievna had been the first wife of Tsarevich Paul of Russia, empress Catherine the Great considered early on to choose one of them as a bride for her eldest grandson, Grand Duke Alexander of Russia. In 1792, her mother visited Russia in the company of Frederica and her sister Louise of Baden. The purpose was, unofficially, for the empress to choose one of them as a bride for her grandson. Her sister was chosen to marry Alexander, and Frederica returned to Baden in the autumn of 1793. Many of her other siblings went on to make politically important marriages.
In October 1797, Frederica of Baden married King Gustav IV Adolf of Sweden. The marriage had been arranged by Gustav IV Adolf himself, after he had refused to marry first Duchess Louise Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, since his desired marriage to Ebba Modée had been refused him, and second the Russian Grand Duchess Alexandra Pavlovna, because her proposed marriage contract would have allowed Alexandra to keep her Orthodox faith. Frederica was seen as a suitable choice: Russia could not officially disapprove a new bride after the Russian Grand Duchess had been refused if the bride was the sister-in-law of Grand Duke Alexander, which indirectly preserved an alliance between Sweden and Russia, and additionally, Gustaf IV Adolf wanted a beautiful spouse and expected her to be so after having had a good impression of her sister during his visit to Russia the year prior. The king visited Erfurt to see her and her family himself in August 1797, the engagement was declared immediately after, and the first marriage ceremony conducted in October.
Queen On 6 October 1797, Frederica of Baden was married per procura to king Gustav IV Adolf of Sweden in Stralsund in Swedish Pomerania, with the Swedish negotiator baron Evert Taube as proxy for the monarch. She left her mother and sister Maria, who had accompanied her to Swedish Pomerania, and was escorted by baron Taube by sea to Karlskrona in Sweden, where she was welcomed by the king. The entourage continued to Drottningholm Palace, where she was introduced to the members of the royal house and court. Finally, she made her official entrance in the capital, and the second wedding ceremony was conducted in the royal chapel on 31 October 1797. She was 16 years old.
Queen Frederica was admired for her beauty but made a bad impression because of her shyness, which caused her to isolate herself and refrain from fulfilling her ceremonial duties, and she disliked society life and representation. Her chief lady in waiting, countess Hedda Piper, reportedly contributed to her isolation by claiming that etiquette banned the queen from engaging in conversation unless introduced by her chief lady in waiting: this was in fact incorrect, but it made the queen dependent on Piper. Frederica found it difficult to adapt to court etiquette and protocol and isolated herself with her courtiers. With the exception of her chief lady in waiting, countess Piper, the king had appointed girls of about the same age as herself to be her courtiers, such as Aurora Wilhelmina Koskull, Fredrika von Kaulbars and Emilie De Geer, with whom she reportedly played children's games.
She was treated with kindness by her mother-in-law, Sophia Magdalena of Denmark, who remembered how ill she herself had been treated by her own mother-in-law.
The relationship between Frederica and Gustav IV Adolf was initially not good. Both being inexperienced, they reportedly had difficulty in connecting sexually, which frustrated the king and caused him to behave with impatient displeasure and suspicion toward her, which worsened the problems because of the shyness of the introverted Frederica. This attracted attention when the king had the queen's favorite maid of honor, Anna Charlotta von Friesendorff, exiled from court for impertinence. The problems were eventually solved through the mediation of duchess Charlotte, and for the rest of her marriage, Frederica was almost constantly pregnant. This did not benefit the marriage from her point of view, as they were not sexually compatible: the king, who had a strong sexual drive but disliked extramarital sex, was sometimes delayed for hours after "having entered the queen's bed chamber" in the morning, so much that the members of the royal council saw themselves obliged to interrupt and ask the king to "spare the queen's health", while Frederica complained in letters to her mother how it tired and exhausted her without giving fulfillment. Frederica was shocked and intrigued by the sexually liberal Swedish court, and wrote to her mother that she was likely the only woman there who did not have at least three or four lovers, and that the royal duchess Charlotte was said to have both male and female lovers.
The relationship between the king and the queen improved after the birth of their first child in 1799, after which they lived an intimate and harmonious family life in which they grew close through their mutual interest in their children. The king was reportedly protective toward her and guarded her sexual innocence. In 1800, he had all her young maids of honor relieved from their positions because of their frivolous behavior and replaced with older married ladies-in-waiting, such as Hedvig Amalia Charlotta Klinckowström and Charlotta Aurora De Geer, and six years later, when a frivolous play was performed by a French theater company at the Royal Swedish Opera in the presence of the queen, the king had the French theater company exiled and the Opera closed down.
Queen Frederica was crowned with her spouse in Norrköping 3 April 1800. The royal couple did not participate much in representation and preferred an intimate family life in the small Haga Palace, where they isolated themselves from court life with a small entourage. Frederica amused the king by her skillful clavichord playing, was reportedly joyful in the company of her small circle of friends, especially in the absence of the monarch, and devoted herself to the upbringing of her children. She kept in close correspondence with her family, and in 1801 welcomed her parents, who visited Sweden after having been in Russia to see her sister. During this visit she was reportedly reproached by her mother for her stiff and distant behavior in public and not being able to make herself popular. The visit ended in tragedy when her father died when his carriage skidded off the icy road and overturned. In 1802, Frederica accompanied her spouse to the province of Finland, during which a meeting was arranged between her and her sisters, the Russian empress Elizabeth and Amalie, in Abborrfors on the border. Gustav IV Adolf promised to visit her family in Baden, and in the summer of 1803, they traveled to Karlsruhe. They did not return until February 1805, which created some friction in Sweden, and Frederica was somewhat blamed for the long absence of the monarch.
She was not allowed to accompany the king when he left for Germany to participate in the War of the Fourth Coalition in November 1805, nor was she appointed to serve in the regency during his absence. During his absence, however, she came to be regarded as a symbol of moral support, and duchess Charlotte describes the dramatic scene when the queen returned to the royal palace in Stockholm after having said goodbye to the king: "The members of government and the court of their majesties met her in the palace hall. Crying of bitterness she walked upstairs directly to the apartments of the children, where the members of the royal house were gathered. Close to faint, she could hardly breath and fell down upon a couch. There she lay with the handkerchief to her eyes, exposed to the deepest pain, surrounded by the children, who rushed to her, and the rest of us who, very concerned, tried to show her sympathy. She truly gave the impression of already being a widow, especially since she was dressed in black. I can not describe the touching scene! Add her youth and beauty, a beauty highlighted by the sorrow, and nothing was lacking to arouse the most fervent compassion for the poor queen." During the rest of the king's absence, she attracted public sympathy for isolating herself completely as a display of sorrow and longing after the king.
In the winter of 1806–1807, she joined the king in Malmö, where she hosted her sister Princess Marie of Baden, who was a refugee after having fled Napoleon's conquest of the Duchy of Brunswick.
Frederica had no direct influence on the affairs of state, and does not seem to have been interested in them except when they affected her small circle of family and friends. She was, however, indirectly involved in politics through her family and especially through her mother, who reportedly influenced her spouse against emperor Napoleon.