The German Shame Trials

The German Shame Trials took off a year following the "Great Shame" of Emperor Chen. Naturally all association with Chen was shunned and would have you socially isolated and likely excommunicated from the church. Technically though, there was no law against it. However, a year after the World Leader's meeting at which the event occurred, Prince Henry had realized that attention was shifting off of him (as you may remember, he started the event in the first place because nobody was paying attention to him, so he played a victim) and simply onto the Shame that followed Chen. He decided that he needed to do something big to kill Chen's name, and become the focal point again for a while. He concluded to pester his father to make any contact with Emperor Chen a crime punishable by death. His father was strongly against it at first, telling Prince Henry, "Don't hold ye breath, this will never happen." Prince Henry took that as a personal challenge and held his breath until his father passed the law. Prince Henry passed out 7 times during this exchange, but in the end his father passed the law (Henry's brain cells were dying due to oxygen deprivation).

By the end of the event, 419 people had executed, and the law was repealed within a year. However that year was one of the darkest and most blood filled years of Emperor Henry IV's reign. The first victim was a local blacksmith named Reginald Axman. Prince Henry had come to his shop a week earlier looking to buy food. When Axman explained that blacksmiths do not sell food, Prince Henry was outraged and swore he would pay for "this vile injustice" (Henrian Diary, Pg. 549). Henry planted fake letters from Chen onto Axman's person, and accused him. After a speedy trial where judges picked by Prince Henry read over the false letters, he was sentenced guilty. He was beheaded a week later. The next victim was a postman who delivered Henry's mail an hour late, he too had documents planted on him, quickly judged guilty

. The next was a local farmer named Gerard Hallow. Henry had bought apples from a few days prior and forgot about them and left them in the sun for 4 days straight. When Henry remembered them ate them he got sick because of how long they were in the sun. He blamed Gerard for selling him rotten apples and had him accused and beheaded. This process was repeated for the first 20 people who died. Prince Henry had all the focus on him and people were being exceptionally nice to him out of fear of being accused next - his plan was working perfectly.

People soon realized just how easy it was to falsely accuse people and have them killed. They began forging fake letters to send to their enemies. Soon politicians were being killed after their rivals accused them, parents being accused by children, rivaling families accusing each other, competing businessman accused each other, and every one of the accused was killed. The blood shed would not stop. Change did not occur until the first accusation was proven false. A local farmer accused the merchant who he was selling his food too, claiming he had letters on him to prove it. The farmer made a fatal mistake however, because he had signed the letter "Emperor Chenn", with two "Ns". This lead to an investigation of the farmer where it was revealed he had several fake letters prepared for further investigations, and that he only accused the merchant because he felt his prices were unfair. Politicians used this to show just how easy it would have been to have the merchant killed. If Chen was spelled correctly he would have been beheaded within the week. They said that most of the accusations were probably falsified just as easily, and the law needed to be repealed. Emperor Henry IV quickly agreed as the people in his kingdom began to fear for their lives and flee the country. Thus, the German Shame Trials were ended a year after they had begun with the deaths of over 400 people. It is regarded as one of Germany's biggest tragedies, and a driving force behind people's hatred of Prince Henry.