to high office in the court of their cousin; only William returned to Germany upon inheriting the principality of Hanau. He also later succeeded Frederick as Landgrave of Hesse-Kassel. Mary died in 1772, and Frederick lost little time in marrying again. On 10 January 1773, at Berlin, he married Margravine Philippine, daughter of Frederick William, Margrave of Brandenburg-Schwedt and Sophia Dorothea of Prussia. No children were born of this marriage. Ruler After being formally separated from his wife in 1755, Friedrich entered active service in the Prussian military. In 1760, he succeeded his father as Landgrave of Hesse-Kassel. Despite Frederick's Catholicism, the principality remained Calvinist, and Frederick's children were raised as Protestants in Denmark. During the 17th and 18th centuries, it was a fairly widespread practice for smaller principalities to rent out troops to other princes. However, the practise was carried to excess in Hesse-Kassel, which maintained 7% of its entire population under arms throughout the eighteenth century. Frederick hired out so many troops to his nephew, King George III of Great Britain, for use in the American War of Independence, that "Hessian" has become an American term for all German soldiers deployed by the British in the War. Frederick used the revenue to finance his patronage of the arts and his opulent lifestyle. The architect Simon Louis du Ry transformed for Frederick II the town of Kassel into a modern capital. Landgrave Frederick II died in 1785 at Castle Weißenstein, Kassel. He was succeeded by his eldest surviving son, William. Ancestry References Further reading Charles W. Ingrao, The Hessian Mercenary State: Ideas, Institutions, and Reform under Frederick II, 1760–1785 (2003) External links |- Landgraves of Hesse-Kassel Hereditary Princes of Hesse-Kassel People from the Landgraviate of Hesse-Kassel 1720 births 1785 deaths Landgraves of Hesse Knights of the Garter German Roman Catholics Converts to Roman Catholicism from Calvinism Members of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres 18th-century German people