The inhabitants in some of these provinces also rose against their new rulers. Amongst others, the citizens of Malmö, where Ulfeldt at the time resided, entered into a conspiracy to throw off the Swedish dominion; but it was betrayed, and Ulfeldt was indicated as one of the principal instigators, although he himself had accepted their forced homage to the Swedish King, as his deputy. Very probably he had thought that, if he took a part in the rising, he might, if this were successful, return to Denmark, having as it were thus wiped out his former crimes, but having also shown his countrymen what a terrible foe he could be. As it was, Denmark was prevented by her own allies from regaining her losses, and Ulfeldt was placed in custody in Malmö, by order of Carl Gustav, in order that his conduct might be subjected to a rigorous examination.
Ulfeldt was then apparently seized with a remarkable malady, a kind of apoplexy, depriving him of speech, and Leonora Christina conducted his defence. She wrote three lengthy, vigorous, and skilful replies to the charges, which still exist in the originals. He was acquitted, or rather escaped by a verdict of Not Proven; but as conscience makes cowards, he contrived to escape before the verdict was given. Leonora Christina describes all this in her Autobiography, according to which Ulfeldt was to go to Lubeck, while she would go to Copenhagen, and try to put matters straight there. Ulfeldt, however, changed his plan without her knowledge, and also repaired to Copenhagen, where they were both arrested and sent to the Castle of Hammershuus, on the island of Bornholm in the Baltic, an ancient fortress, now a most picturesque ruin, perched at the edge of perpendicular rocks, overhanging the sea, and almost surrounded by it.
The Autobiography relates circumstantially, and no doubt truthfully, the cruel treatment to which they were here subjected by the governor, a Major-General Fuchs. After a desperate attempt at escape, they were still more rigorously guarded, and at length they had to purchase their liberty by surrendering the whole of their property, excepting one estate in Fyen. Ulfeldt had to make the most humble apologies, and to promise not to leave the island of Fyen, where this estate was situated, without special permission. He was also compelled to renounce on the part of his wife the title of a Countess of Slesvig-Holstein, which Fredrik III. had never acknowledged. She never made use of that title afterwards, nor is she generally known by it in history. Corfits Ulfeldt being a Count of the German Empire, of course Leonora and her children were, and remained, Counts and Countesses of Ulfeldt. This compromise was effected in 1661.