Hoesch (family)

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The Hoesch family , also called Husche , Hoisch or Huesch in some old writings , is an entrepreneurial family that has existed for several centuries and was mainly active in metal processing in the Aachen , Düren and Stolberg / Eschweiler areas as well as in Dortmund . A significant branch of the family is written in Heusch . Both family branches go back to the common progenitor Heinrich Hoesch († 1552).

The name Heusch / Huesch derives from Middle Dutch heufsch, heuvesch, hovesch and means about courtly, handsome and polite , calling mostly people who belonged to the court.

In the Cologne and Aachen dialect as well as in the Dutch language, the adjective heusch is still used today.

Origins

The Hoesch , Heusch family originally comes from the village of Kettenis in the Eupener Land with their headquarters at Libermé Castle , but also with properties in Walhorn , Dolhain and Baelen . The oldest proven ancestor is a Husche de Libermé († before 1403) at the end of the 14th century , whose son Hein Husche von Kettenis († around 1459) as well as Hein Husche's son Mays (Bartholomäus) Hoesch von Libermé and Kettenis († around 1530) to be named as lay judges at Walhorn. Mays Hoesch is also mentioned as a feudal man of the Aachen cathedral , as is his son Hein Hoesch von Kettenis (1475–1552), who is the common ancestor of all the branches of the Heusch / Hoesch families that are now branching out and still exist today .

Branch Peter Hoesch (Hoesch / Heusch)

Michael Heusch, Hamburg

Hein Hoesch von Kettenis had six sons and four daughters. His eldest son Peter Hoesch († before 1561) initially moved to Zülpich , where he was elected lay judge, but soon moved to Antwerp . His two sons Johann (1530–1580) and Michael (1533–1596) were successful merchants in Antwerp and got married there too. Their respective children joined the Protestant faith, as a result of which they suffered considerable professional and social disadvantages in the predominantly Catholic Antwerp. For this reason, they then moved to Hamburg or Frankfurt am Main . Their other offspring were now all called Heusch . In Hamburg, a certain Michael Heusch (1601–1684) drew attention to himself when he was elected President of the Hamburg Chamber of Commerce from 1665 to 1667 . The lieutenant general in Italian service, Nicola Heusch (1837-1902), who, after the overthrow of Prime Minister Antonio Starabba di Rudinì on May 9, 1898, took command of the siege troops stationed in Tuscany to suppress the May riots, is also a descendant of these Hamburgers Line.

Aachen main branch (Hoesch / Heusch)

Coat of arms of the Aachen patrician family Heusch

The second son of Hein Hoesch von Kettenis, Bartholomäus Hoesch (1533–1596), lay judge of the high court in Limbourg , is the founder of the widely ramified main branch of Aachen. He and his family accepted the Protestant faith, which is why they were banned from the Reich in 1568 . But after both Mays himself and his son Hermann († 1582), who had served as an officer in the army of William I of Orange-Nassau , returned to the Catholic faith, they were restituted in 1574. Since then, their other descendants, who now uniformly called themselves Heusch , have been mostly Catholic and have held considerable offices in Aachen.

One of these descendants was Aegidius Heusch (1629–1685), who was the first from this branch of the family to come to Aachen, where he took a position as a spa doctor and became the founder of the Hirsch Pharmacy, the second oldest pharmacy in Aachen. Both his son Gerhard (1678–1759) and his grandson Franz Aegidius (1712–1780) were appointed city ​​physician of Aachen. A grandson of Franz Aegidius, Gerhard Heusch (1744–1829), took over the dilapidated Rahe Castle in 1784 and had it renovated in an extensive and representative manner.

Monument to Hermann Heusch , Lord Mayor of Aachen

With his grandson August (1807–1875) a successful time as a needle and scratch maker began . In 1825 he founded the first and thus the oldest scratching factory in Aachen, which initially operated under the name August Heusch & Kern , later August Heusch & Sons and, from 1861 , moved its headquarters to the Wylre'sche Haus in Aachen. This is why it is sometimes called Palais Heusch and is still owned by the family today. The last significant and well-known representative of this line is the great-grandson of August Heusch, the former Mayor of Aachen Hermann Heusch . After his death, the preserved front building, which is under monument protection, was auctioned off within the family with the highest bidder in 1996 and is still owned by the family today. The scratching factory, including the equipment and aft cabin, had been given up years earlier.

A second cousin of August Heusch, Severin Heusch (1827–1873), began to manufacture cloth shearers by machine in 1859 together with the locksmith Wilhelm Oebel. With this innovation, your company was the first cloth cutter factory in Germany, which today has become the leading specialist company for high-performance knives and cutting systems Heusch GmbH & Co. KG .

August Heusch's nephews and great-nephews also got involved in needle manufacture and, after purchasing the former needle factory from Laurenz Jecker, founded the Heusch & Butenberg needle factory , which later renamed Hugo Heusch & Co. and which started manufacturing in 1908 Lochner cloth factory at Karlsgraben in Aachen, which was taken over and liquidated by Rudolf Lochner . In 1955, this company was incorporated into the Rheinische Nadelfabrik AG .

Majorica pearls from the Heusch company

With Eduard Friedrich Hugo Heusch (1865–1937) the family also started a successful entrepreneurship in Spain . In 1902 he founded the needle factory La Metalurgica Espanola in Barcelona , which remained in family ownership until it closed in 1978, and two years later in Manacor on Mallorca the noble Mallorcan artificial pearl factory Industria Espanola de Perlas Imitacion SA , which his son Alberto Carlos (1932– 2007) was transferred to Alpha Invest Holding in 1997 .

Stolberger main branch (Hoesch)

Hein Hoesch's fifth son, Lenert alias Leonard Hoesch (1525–1582), sold his properties in Kettenis around 1560 and moved to Aachen, where he received civil rights. Since he had already joined the Protestant faith, he was also banished in 1569. After a temporary job as a master builder in Frankenthal , he initially returned to Aachen in a phase in which the evangelical minority was granted more rights. About his son Jeremias I (1568–1643) the family's iron and steel industrial branch, which has been successful up to modern times and which has remained predominantly Protestant and has retained the name Hoesch and also consistently with the umlaut oe , was founded.

Copper master

Jeremias I. Hoesch

Jeremias I, later also called the Elder, was a member of the evangelical community of Aachen, had learned the trade of copper master and married into the Aachen copper master family Hansen. However, like the copper master families Peltzer , Schleicher , Amya and others, he was forced to permanently emigrate to neighboring Stolberg due to the disadvantages and reenactments of the re-emerging Aachen religious unrest, where he first established the Kupferhof Alte Krautlade around 1610 took over. In the following generations, the Hoeschs also owned the Östlinger mills on the Unterster Hof copper farm and the Ellermühle .

Riding master

The real rise of the family in iron processing began with his son, Jeremias II, the younger . He became a riding master in Vicht and concentrated the charcoal rights of other riding stables at the Junkershammer , which he expanded into the most modern operation in the Duchy of Jülich . His wife Katharina Prym (1610–1681) built for their sons Jeremias III. (1641–1716) and Wilhelm (1642–1704) in 1664 the Platenhammer . Its initially shared use, however, subsequently led to a dispute and to a division into a Junkershammer and Platenhammer line of the Hoeschs.

The Junkershammer Line, descendants of Jeremias III, continued to operate their equestrian workshops for five generations until 1869. In that year the Junkershammer was shut down as the last riding facility on the Vichtbach , after the attempt of the last riding master of this line, Henri Hoeschs III. (1800–1879) to convert the Junkershammer to coke had failed due to the resistance of his partner Jeremias Reidt. The Junkershammer remained in the possession of the Hoesch family even after it was closed. Henri Hoesch also ran the Schevenhütte until it was closed in 1870. This Junkershammer line also includes the grandson of Jeremias III, the later statesman and diplomat and coal and steel entrepreneur Matthias Gerhard von Hoesch , who converted back to Catholicism and in 1744 the imperial baron status was raised.

The sons of Wilhelm Hoesch, Leonard (1684–1761) and Philipp Wilhelm (1686–1756) built the Neuenhammer in the immediate vicinity of the Platenhammer in 1724 , which formed a unit with the Platenhammer and was operated jointly as an extended courtyard. The Neuenhammer was only run by the descendants of Leonhard until the beginning of the 18th century, whereas the Platenhammer remained with the descendants of Philipp Wilhelm and was later also used for brass processing. After the death of the last owner, Johann Philipp II. Hoesch (1834–1885), it was sold and finally demolished in 1903.

The constant fragmentation of family property and the resulting increased competition for water and charcoal rights, which the copper masters also successfully claimed, ultimately led to the partial emigration of family members from the Vichttal . This is particularly evident in the sons of the last-named Leonhard Hoesch, from whom the Düren line split into four main branches: Johann Peter (1723–1785) moved to Moers , Hugo Ludolf (1727–1790) took over his father's business in Düren- Schneidhausen , Johann Heinrich (1732–1788) moved to Dadenberg, a Lehnhof near Lamersdorf / Inden (Rhineland) and Jeremias IV. Hoesch (1737–1803) stayed on the Neuenhammer. Some married into Eifel's riding master families in the Kalltal and Schleidener Tal (today western district of Euskirchen ). However, family members who moved to Düren should be of business importance.

Iron manufacturers

Eberhard Hoesch

Said Leonhard Hoesch built a steelworks and an attached mansion, called Haus Schneidhausen , in Schneidhausen in 1742 . In 1772, his son Hugo Ludolf added a paper factory and an oil mill to the facility. Today's Hoesch Design GmbH bathtub factory emerged from the ironworks and is one of the largest bathtub manufacturers in Europe.

Eberhard Hoesch, senior (1790-1852), a grandson of cutting home agent Hugo Ludolf, acquired in 1819 together with his brother Wilhelm (1791-1831), both by then two smelters in Monschau had operated and as brothers Eberhard and Wilhelm Hoesch also the existing plants in Krauthausen , Schneidhausen, Zweifall and Simonskall were in charge of the ironworks in Düren- Lendersdorf , which were not yet significant at the time and which became the cornerstone of what would later become the global Hoeschs group. Eberhard was able to expand this company considerably by introducing the English puddling process for iron and steel production. After three of his sons joined the company later, Hoesch renamed his company in 1846 to Eberhard Hoesch & Sons , to which the new plant in Eschweiler was added. The hut in Lendersdorf itself was later closed in the second half of the 20th century.

Plant at Sticher Berg

In addition, Eberhard Hoesch senior founded a puddling and rolling mill with three blast furnaces , ten puddling furnaces and three melting furnaces for up to 600 workers as Hoesch & Söhne am Sticher Berg in Eschweiler in 1846 . In addition to the Lendersdorf plant, the Sticher Berg plant became the second location for the production of railroad tracks . Around the same time, Eschweiler was connected to the rail network and the neighboring Eschweiler Hauptbahnhof was built in 1841. After relocating to Dortmund in 1871, the Aachen-based company FA Neuman took over the company premises at Eschweiler Stich on May 13, 1887, the official headquarters of which it has been since 1897.

Mining industry

View of the Westfalenhütte around 1896
Leopold Hoesch , Düren - Dortmund

Leopold Hoesch (1820–1899), son of Eberhard's brother Wilhelm, became the new, authoritative head of the family and head of the family business after the death of his uncle Eberhard. In the 1860s, the switch to the Bessemer process made iron ores low in phosphorus and sulfur necessary. The previous Hoeschwerke threatened to become unprofitable due to their poor traffic situation. Hoesch therefore relocated the company's headquarters to the Ruhr area in order to benefit from low freight costs and the proximity to the coal mines. Together with his sons Wilhelm (1845–1923) and Albert (1847–1898), as well as with Eberhard sons, Viktor (1824–1888) and Eberhard Hoesch, jun. (1827-1907), he founded on September 1, 1871 the establishment of the Westfalenhütte the iron and steel plant Hoesch in Dortmund, which two years later Hoesch AG renamed. In 1991, Hoesch AG was bought up by what was then Friedrich Krupp AG as part of a hostile takeover .

Over time, the so-called Hoeschians came up with the term Karl Hoesch , a lovingly intended declaration of respect which, as an idiom, stands for everything that has to do with the steel company Hoesch AG.

Other activities (selection)

Instead of the paper mill in Schneidhausen, which did not exist for a long time, Ludolf Matthias Hoesch (1788-1859), the older brother of Eberhard and Wilhelm Hoesch in Lendersdorf, acquired the paper mill in Krauthausen and, in 1829, the concession to build the Friedenau paper mill in Niederau , a neighboring town of Kreuzau and was the first in the family to devote himself exclusively to papermaking. For more than three generations, these works were passed on to his descendants under different company names and were an important economic factor for many decades despite the multiple competition in the area, especially from the nearby Schoellershammer . Most of the plants had to close later or were taken over and only the paper factory known today under the name Niederauer Mühle still exists and is considered a leading supplier of white- lined corrugated cardboard base paper for the packaging industry.

A great-nephew of his father Eberhard (1756–1811) and the grandson of his youngest brother, Jeremias Ludolf Hoesch (1774–1842), Hugo Hoesch (1859–1912), initially worked as plant manager and later partner in the cellulose factory founded by Felix Heinrich Schoeller and Georg Schultz Schultz & Cie. in Gernsbach . This factory, which focused on the production of cigarette and later tea bag paper , was renamed Schoeller & Hoesch in 1905 , remained exclusively owned by the Hoesch family for two generations and was taken over in 1998 by the American manufacturer Glatfelter GmbH & Co KG .

With Emil Hoesch (1859–1928) another member of this line worked as a paper manufacturer. Among other things, he founded the Kabel bei Hagen paper factory together with the pulp manufacturer Fritz Klagges and expanded it through further company takeovers. His son Hans Eberhard (1891–1972) took over the company, but had to sell it to the Feldmühle Group in 1959 . Today it belongs to the Scandinavian Stora Enso Group.

Another son of Leopold Hoesch, Hugo von Hoesch (1850–1916), also moved into the paper industry. Among other things, he took over a paper mill in Königstein , Saxony , which his father had bought at auction in 1876, and which he expanded into one of the most modern paper mills in Germany. In addition, Hoesch was appointed a lifetime member of the first chamber of the Saxon state parliament and in 1912 was granted the hereditary title of nobility. His son Leopold von Hoesch went through a career as a civil servant and became ambassador to Paris and London.

A descendant of the warped on the Lehnhof to Inden line, Julius Hoesch (1832-1896) founded 1865 in Düren- Hoven the Julius Hoesch GmbH & Co. KG, one of the largest still existing wholesale company for chemicals .

Cultural and social engagement

In accordance with their outstanding position, the family has repeatedly supported a variety of social and cultural projects at their respective locations, the most important of which are briefly listed here as examples.

The manufacturer from Düren, Eberhard Hoesch jun. provided 500,000 marks for the new building of the Düren City Theater , the foundation stone of which was laid in 1905 and was inaugurated in January 1907. His wife Agnes Hoesch , née Pfeifer (1839–1903), was the chairwoman of the Düren women's association and donated generous sums for the construction of a game and ballroom and for the construction of workers' apartments.

Leopold Hoesch Museum Düren

The founding of the Leopold Hoesch Museum goes back to Leopold's son Wilhelm Hoesch, who after the death of the family father in 1899 provided the city of Düren with the amount of 300,000 marks for the establishment of an art museum, which was finally inaugurated in 1905.

Just a few years after the establishment of Hoesch AG, Leopold Hoesch initiated the establishment of a company health insurance fund , the BKK Hoesch . Furthermore, with the support of the Management Board, the employees of Hoesch AG founded the pension fund Hoesch as a death benefit fund before the Second World War . In addition, Hoesch AG supported the establishment of a company-owned sports club in 1930 and, from 1938, the expansion of a large park with sports facilities and leisure facilities, the Hoeschpark , which today belongs to the city of Dortmund . Also supported by the board of this company, the Hoesch Museum in Dortmund was set up in 1989 by former employees of the company and the citizenship as a museum for art and cultural history of the Westphalian Economic Archive Foundation and as a place of remembrance of the company and city history.

The Hoesch family's paper manufacturers who work in Gernsbach founded the Gernsbach cultural community in 1955 and have been responsible for a diverse and challenging cultural life in the region ever since.

The family members who work in Hagen, especially Hans Eberhard Hoesch, founded the Kabeler Chamber Music Series and, through their sponsorship activities , became an important pioneer for historical performance practice of classical music.

In their memory, in addition to the personal honors, numerous streets, public spaces, facilities and facilities at their respective places of activity were named after the name of the deserving family member concerned.

Important personalities (selection)

Aachen Line (Heusch)
Stolberger Line (Hoesch)
The following people are sorted genealogically for a better understanding of the text
More family members

literature

  • Hans Jaeger:  Hoesch. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 9, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1972, ISBN 3-428-00190-7 , p. 364 f. ( Digitized version ).
  • Erich Meuthen:  Heusch. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 9, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1972, ISBN 3-428-00190-7 , p. 45 f. ( Digitized version ).
  • Justus Hashagen / Fritz Brüggemann : History of the Hoesch Family , Volume 1.1 - The Beginnings , Cologne, 1911. ( google online )
  • ditto: History of the Hoesch Family , Volume 1.2 - The Beginnings , Cologne, 1912.
  • ditto: History of the Hoesch Family , Volume 2.1 - From the Age of Religious Unrest to the Present , Cologne, 1916.
  • ditto: History of the Hoesch Family , Volume 2.2 - From the Age of Religious Unrest to the Present , Cologne, 1916.
  • Schleicher, Karl: History of the Stolberg brass industry in contributions to Stolberg history and local history , Vol. 6, Stolberg 1956
  • Horst Mönnich: Departure for the area. Departure to Europe. Hoesch 1871–1971 . Munich: Verlag F. Bruckmann, 1971, ISBN 3-7654-1441-7 (anniversary volume of Hoesch Aktiengesellschaft, Dortmund)
  • Papierfabrik Schoeller & Hoesch GmbH & Co. KG (ed.): 125 years of Schoeller & Hoesch - special edition for the company anniversary - not available in bookshops.
  • Heinrich Philip Bartels: Chronicle of the Pfeifer family , around 1975 (only published in the family circle)
  • Hermann Ariovist von Fürth : Contributions and material on the history of Aachen patrician families , Vol. I, 1890;

Web links

Commons : Hoesch  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Erich Meuthen:  Heusch. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 9, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1972, ISBN 3-428-00190-7 , p. 45 f. ( Digitized version ).
  2. ↑ Etymology Heusch
  3. ↑ Michael Heusch , on Hamburg personalities
  4. ↑ Heusch needle and scratching manufacture
  5. ^ Wylre'sches Haus (Palais Heusch) Aachen
  6. ^ Heusch GmbH & Co KG Aachen
  7. ↑ Hoesch - Schneidhausen
  8. ↑ History of Lendersdorfer Hütte in "Rheinische Industriekultur"
  9. ↑ Hoesch - Hagen
  10. ^ BKK Hoesch ( Memento from February 11, 2010 in the Internet Archive )
  11. ↑ Gernsbach cultural community
  12. ↑ Kabeler chamber music donated by the Hoesch family