Sweden and Norway Monarch. Of the Oldenburg Dynasty, she was the daughter of the Prince Bishop of Lübeck, Duke Frederick August I of Oldenburg (Holstein-Gottorp) and Duchess Ulrica Frederica, originally of Hesse-Cassel. Charlotte's father was her late father-in-law's brother and her mother's uncle was a brother of his predecessor, Sweden's King Frederick. On the initiative of her first cousin King Gustav III of Sweden, she was married to his younger brother, Duke Carl, later King Carl XIII of Sweden and Norway. In 1809 Carl XIII took the throne upon the abdication of his nephew, King Gustav IV Adolph. The new and elderly royal couple were childless. The following year the king adopted a French Napoleonic marshal, Jean Baptiste Jules Bernadotte, though the queen had leanings toward the more legitimate former Crown Prince Gustav (son of deposed King Gustav Adolph) to be their heir. With Bernadotte, renamed Carl John, actually running things, Carl and Charlotte gained the Norwegian throne in 1814, and in 1818 she became a widow, dying herself later that year at Rosersberg Palace. The marriage between Carl XIII and Charlotte was assumed to be strained by the existence of the king's mistresses. The queen was a charming and prolific diary writer, and her many volumes of personal notes, published in Swedish under her full name, are of value to history, though also considered gossipy, often sensationalist and far from objective.
Sweden and Norway Monarch. Of the Oldenburg Dynasty, she was the daughter of the Prince Bishop of Lübeck, Duke Frederick August I of Oldenburg (Holstein-Gottorp) and Duchess Ulrica Frederica, originally of Hesse-Cassel. Charlotte's father was her late father-in-law's brother and her mother's uncle was a brother of his predecessor, Sweden's King Frederick. On the initiative of her first cousin King Gustav III of Sweden, she was married to his younger brother, Duke Carl, later King Carl XIII of Sweden and Norway. In 1809 Carl XIII took the throne upon the abdication of his nephew, King Gustav IV Adolph. The new and elderly royal couple were childless. The following year the king adopted a French Napoleonic marshal, Jean Baptiste Jules Bernadotte, though the queen had leanings toward the more legitimate former Crown Prince Gustav (son of deposed King Gustav Adolph) to be their heir. With Bernadotte, renamed Carl John, actually running things, Carl and Charlotte gained the Norwegian throne in 1814, and in 1818 she became a widow, dying herself later that year at Rosersberg Palace. The marriage between Carl XIII and Charlotte was assumed to be strained by the existence of the king's mistresses. The queen was a charming and prolific diary writer, and her many volumes of personal notes, published in Swedish under her full name, are of value to history, though also considered gossipy, often sensationalist and far from objective.
Bio by: Benny Chordt Hansen
Family Members
Parents
Advertisement
