page_title: Louisa Ulrika of Prussia
section_title: Crown Princess
hierarchical_section_title: Louisa Ulrika of Prussia / Crown Princess
context_page_description: Louisa Ulrika of Prussia was Queen of Sweden from 1751 to 1771 as the consort of King Adolf Frederick. She was queen mother during the reign of King Gustav III.
context_section_description: On 17 July 1744, Louisa Ulrika and Adolf Frederick were married per procura in Berlin, with her favorite brother August Wilhelm as proxy for the absent groom. She was escorted from Berlin to Swedish Pomerania by the Swedish envoy count Carl Gustaf Tessin, his spouse Ulla Tessin and his wife's niece Charlotta Sparre, who was appointed her maid of honor. In Swedish Pomerania, the entourage was welcomed by the Swedish General Governor of the province and the court of the late queen under the leadership of her Mistress of the Robes, countess Hedvig Elisabet Strömfelt: she kept only her lady-in-waiting Wilhelmine von der Knesebeck and a couple of footmen of her Prussian entourage.
  The entourage left from Rügen and arrived in Sweden in Karlskrona, where she was officially welcomed by her spouse, Crown Prince Adolf Frederick of Sweden. On 18 August 1744, they were welcomed by King Frederick I at Drottningholm Palace, where their second wedding ceremony was performed the same day, followed by a ball, a court reception and the consummation of the marriage. Louisa Ulrika and Adolf Frederick reportedly had a mutually good impression of each other at their first meeting, and their personal relationship is described as mutually happy and harmonious. Adolf Frederick is described as introverted, gentle, and submissive. Reportedly, Louisa Ulrika was pleased with him because she immediately felt secure in the fact that she was his superior. Already during their first day together, she informed him that her brother Frederick the Great had plans for the alliance between Sweden, Russia and Prussia, and asked him to raise the subject with the Prussian envoy, which he also agreed to.
  Louisa Ulrika was received with enthusiasm in Sweden as the hope for the salvation of succession crisis. At the birth of her first child in 1745, no children had been born in the Swedish royal house in over 50 years and she gained initial popularity with her beauty, wit and interest in science and culture.  Carl Gustaf Tessin described her as "the wisdom of a god in the image of an angel",. Despite French being her native language, she was tutored in Swedish by Carl Jesper Benzelius and mastered it well after only two years. She studied Swedish literature and gathered a Swedish language library, she corresponded with the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and created a nature scientific collection. Her arrogant and haughty demeanor, however, eventually made her less popular outside of the royal court.
  Upon her arrival, she was granted Drottningholm Palace as her summer residence, where the "Young Court", as it was called, amused themselves with picnics, masquerades and French language amateur theater. The Crown Prince's court was dominated by Carl Gustaf Tessin, who escorted Louisa Ulrika to Sweden and remained an influential favorite during her years as Crown Princess. Adolf Frederick never cared much for Tessin, but Louisa Ulrika had him appointed marshal at court and eventually royal governor of her son Prince Gustav. Tessin was behind many amusements in the circle of the Crown Princess, and it was said that he was only too eager to please Louisa Ulrika in any way possible. There were unconfirmed rumors that Tessin was the lover of Louisa Ulrika during her tenure as Crown Princess. Her son Gustav III later addressed these rumors, that although Count Tessin had been in love with her, his feelings were one-sided and not answered by his mother, as a love affair with a noble contradicted the "natural contempt" which Louisa Ulrika herself as a royal felt for every subject, noble or not. Her circle at court included Henrika Juliana von Liewen, who immediately became her favorite among her ladies-in-waiting; the intellectual Cathérine Charlotte De la Gardie, the scientist Eva Ekeblad, and the witty Anders Johan von Höpken.
  From the moment she arrived in Sweden, Louisa Ulrika engaged in political activity. Her political ideal was absolute monarchy, and she disliked the Swedish constitutional monarchy from the moment it was explained to her. She also disliked the system
caption: Louisa Ulrika of Prussia as the goddess Aurora by Francois-Adrien Latinville (1747).
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