The law of history would not permit us to disguise or palliate aught in the relation of this tragic event. All Europe was divided in its sentiments, whether most to pity a young prince, prosecuted by his own father, and condemned to lose his life, by those who were one day to have been his subjects; or the father, who thought himself under a necessity to sacrifice his own son to the welfare of his nation.
It was asserted in several books, published on this subject, that the czar sent to Spain for a copy of the proceedings against Don Carlos, who had been condemned to death by his father, king Philip II. But this is false, inasmuch as Don Carlos was never brought to his trial: the conduct of Peter I. was totally different from that of Philip. The Spanish monarch never made known to the world the reasons for which he had confined his son, nor in what manner that prince died. He wrote letters on this occasion to the pope and the empress, which were absolutely contradictory to each other. William prince of Orange accused Philip publicly of having sacrificed his son and his wife to his jealousy, and to have behaved rather like a jealous and cruel husband, and an unnatural and murderous father, than a severe and upright judge. Philip suffered this accusation against him to pass unanswered: Peter, on the contrary, did nothing but in the eye of the world; he openly declared, that he preferred his people to his own son, submitted his cause to the judgment of the principal persons of his kingdom, and made the whole world the judge of their proceedings and his own.
There was another extraordinary circumstance attending this unhappy affair, which was, that the empress Catherine, who was hated by the czarowitz, and whom he had publicly threatened with the worst of treatment, whenever he should mount the throne, was not in any way accessary to his misfortunes; and was neither accused, nor even suspected by any foreign minister residing at the court of Russia, of having taken the least step against a son-in-law, from whom she had so much to fear. It is true, indeed, that no one pretends to say she interceded with the czar for his pardon: but all the accounts of these times, and especially those of the count de Bassewitz, agree, that she was greatly affected with his misfortunes.