19. Von Fersen’s Efforts to Help His Love Backfired and Doomed Her
After Louis XVI rejected von Fersen’s escape plan, the Swedish count departed France. His and the French emigres’ efforts to stir up war between Europe’s monarchies and revolutionary France finally bore fruit in the summer of 1792 when war broke out between France and Austria. Rather than help von Fersen’s love and her family, however, it doomed them. That September, the French National Assembly abolished the monarchy and declared French Republic. King Louis XVI was tried for treason in December of 1792, convicted, and guillotined a month later. Von Fersen tried to arrange a cavalry raid to try and snatch his love Marie Antoinette from Paris, but the generals he pitched the plan to rejected it as hopeless.
The French queen met the same fate as the king and was guillotined in October 1793. Von Fersen wrote about his reaction: “Though I was prepared for it and expected it since the transfer to the Conciergerie, I was devastated by the reality. I did not have the strength to feel anything … I thought about her constantly, about all the horrible circumstances of her sufferings, of the doubt she might have had about me, my attachment, my interest. That thought tortured me“. Devastated, he returned to Sweden, where he fell into disfavor at court and lost much of his political clout. From his home country, he was forced to stand by helplessly and watch as Revolutionary France, which had killed his love, expanded its reach across Europe.