200 Years of The House Bernadotte in Sweden

In 1792, King Gustav III was murdered and his son Gustav IV Adolf became king of Sweden. As he was a minor, his uncle Carl was appointed regent during his minority. Gustav was opposed to France and soon embroiled in a war against the French-Russian coalition. This move cost him Finland. This in turn didn’t impress the Swedish parliament which imprisoned and deposed him, then sent him into exile with his family.

In 1809, Gustav’s uncle and former regent Carl XIII was voted in as king of Sweden. He had no living children and parliament chose Carl’s nephew Prince Christian August of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Augustenburg as crown prince. But the prince died suddenly in 1810, if through poisoning or from a stroke is unclear to date.

Parliament was facing a real crisis. They didn’t want to elect Christian’s older brother as crown prince as he was seen as lazy and weak. This left only one family member open for election, King Christian VIII of Denmark. Parliament decided to cast its net wider to prevent an unwelcome union with Denmark.

Believing that France would soon attack Russia, they started to look around in France for a likely candidate. They thought they had found him in a French Field-Marshall by name of Jean-Baptiste Jules Bernadotte. Bernadotte was a cit who had been made Prince of Ponte Corvo by Napoleon; Ponte Corvo was a nominally independent principality in Italy with 5600 inhabitants.

Looking back, one can’t quite get rid of the notion that Swedish parliament hadn’t done its research to completion. Bernadotte was a republican and had been opposed to Napoleon proclaiming himself emperor. But as the brother-in-law of the Queen of Naples (wife of Joseph Bonaparte), he was not an active opponent. He was an able military leader who put defensibility of territory over dreams of grandeur.

Bernadotte made his acceptance dependent on the agreement of Napoleon, which was duly given. To become crown prince, he had to renounce his French citizenship and become a Swede. The paper of renouncement presented to him by his emperor contained a clause stating that he should never raise arms against France. Bernadotte informed Napoleon that he was unable to accept the Swedish crown until that paragraph had been removed from the paper.

On August 21st, 1810, Bernadotte accepted his election as crown prince of Sweden. On October 19th, he converted to Protestant Faith and on October 20th, he entered Sweden for the first time. On November 5th, he was adopted by King Carl XIII and Bernadotte took on the name of Carl Johann.

The Swedish nobility expected to regain Finland with the help of their newfound French friends but their new crown prince couldn’t have cared less. A look at the map had convinced him that Finland was a lost cause; it was too remote from Sweden and too easily accessed from Russia. He turned his eyes on gaining Norway instead, an aim he would achieve.

The latest Bernadotte on the throne of Sweden is Carl XVI Gustav. The Royal Family commemorated the 200 year jubilee of the Bernadotte accession with a church service on August 21st, 2010.

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