16. The Count’s Codename for the Queen
Axel von Fersen was present when the allied French and American armies besieged and forced a British surrender at Yorktown in 1781. He returned to France in 1783, and resumed his love affair with France’s queen. Secret letters were exchanged, and his diary contains numerous entries about a woman named “Elle” – his codename for Marie Antoinette – whom he madly loved but could not wed because she was already married. In the meantime, it was an open secret that whenever von Fersen was in Paris, he spent days on end at Marie Antoinette’s private chateau, the Petit Trianon. When he returned to Sweden a year later, von Fersen got the queen a dog, which she cherished and named Odin. It seems that the king knew of his wife’s love for the Swedish count, but did nothing to about it.
