Ludwigshütte near Biedenkopf

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The Biedenköpfer district of Ludwigshütte in 2015

The Ludwigshütte near Biedenkopf was one of the most important ironworks in the north-western Lahn-Dill region and was located in the Ludwigshütte district of the central Hessian town of Biedenkopf named after it . Their origins go back to the first half of the 16th century. In the relevant files from the 16th to the 18th centuries, it traded under the name Hut zu Biedenkopf . It received its later name "Ludwigshütte" in the 1770s and at the latest since the correspondence from Philipp Engel Klippstein "History and description of the Ludwigshütte and the associated rod hammers" of 1781, the name "Ludwigshütte" has become established.

The origins of the Ludwigshütte near Biedenkopf

The founding of the Ludwigshütte near Biedenkopf cannot be precisely dated in terms of sources, as an award certificate and other contemporary files are no longer available. The first written mention is on December 14, 1569, when the princely chancellery of the Landgraviate of Hesse-Marburg asked the operators of the forest smithy in Biedenkopf to renew the concession for the hut, which had expired a year ago. The correspondence between the operators and the office shows that the award of the hut was confirmed as early as 1562 and that this extension had already happened several times. The mountain bills for the Dillenburg office show iron stone deliveries u. a. also for the iron and steel works in Biedenkopf for the years 1547 to 1552, so that the Biedenkopfer hut must have existed as early as 1547.

The hut near Biedenkopf passed into the possession of Landgrave Ludwig IV of Hessen-Marburg (1537-1604) in 1588 , after his death in 1604 briefly to Landgrave Moritz von Hessen-Kassel (1572-1632) and then to the Landgraves until 1866 from Hessen-Darmstadt . In the second volume of the history of Buderus 's ironworks , G. Schache explained in detail the eventful history of the smelter's operation either as a sovereign or as a leased operation up to the beginning of the 19th century . The depiction of Klippstein zur Ludwigshütte from 1781 provides a detailed overview with historical reviews of the state of Ludwigshütte at that time.

In order to keep the smelter going, residents, including those from distant villages, had to drive iron stones to the hut with cow and ox carts. When the Hüttner Hut ( Wommelshausen -Hütte) early 17th century. Was closed had the inhabitants of Bottenhorn 1668 ore to Ludwig hut teach Biedenkopf. A list from this time shows which municipality had to drive how much iron ore to Ludwigshütte “for cheap wages”: Bottenhorn 126 Maß, Günterod 102 Maß, Endbach 100 Maß, Hartenrod 91 Maß, Schlierbach 45 Maß and Wommelshausen 85 Maß. A trip to Eisenstein (there and back) in a wooden van took longer than a day. As early as 1660, Eisenstein was driven from Wommelshausen to the Bieberhütte near Rodheim-Bieber .

The Ludwigshütte developed in the 18th century with its two attached rod hammers to Ludwigshütte and Hatzfeld to one of the largest steelworks in the Lahn-Dill region . At times at the end of the 18th century it produced more pig iron than could be processed on its two hammers. The surplus pig iron was sold to Wittgenstein and Cologne. In 1789, with the acquisition of the Battenberger Auhammer, the state rulers of Hesse-Darmstadt expanded the smelter with a third hammer in order to be able to process the pig iron that had previously been exported into finished products in the country. Their sale brought in a higher income than that of the exported pig iron.

Ludwigshütte in the early 19th century as a fiscal company

At the beginning of the 19th century, the Ludwigshütte was again leased to the Chamberlain von Breidenstein , who expanded the plant to include the Breidensteiner Hammer in his possession. Until the 1830s, the Ludwigshütte switched between rulers' own operation, if the rulers could not find a new interested party after the lease had expired, and renewed leasing.

The leasing of the fiscal operations became more and more difficult and costly, as private entrepreneurs hardly wanted to submit to the restrictive conditions of the lease agreements, especially since this type of economic system still originated from an 18th century world of thought and no longer came from the ideas of free economic activity from the early days 19th century corresponded.

As early as September 1823 - a good 1¼ years before the lease contract expired at the end of 1824 - the Grand Ducal Hessian state government tried to find a new private operator with corresponding tenders and set the date for the public auction on November 10, 1823. However, there was no interested party and the state government had to operate the hut on its own again. Her plan to sell the smelter for 80,000 guilders also failed because she feared that she would have to operate the smelter at a loss in the future. The annual net income of the Ludwigshütte for the state coffers was only 1,644 guilders. It was not until 1830 that the Ludwigshütte was leased again.

At the beginning of the 1830s, the Ludwigshütte had grown into a respectable steelworks. She had an older, but equipped with a new double cylinder blower blast furnace , a bar hammer with two appointed by a cylinder blower fires, the Hatzfelder rod hammer with two fires and Auhammer with a equipped with two fires rod hammer and operated with a fire Zainhammer . There were also numerous company buildings and residential buildings for the employees. In addition, numerous iron stone mines were attached to the iron and steel works. Ludwigshütte produced around 11,000 quintals of pig iron a year, the majority of which the smelter processed into bar iron itself . Another part went to the hammers in Hatzfeld , Battenberg , Breidenstein and the excess pig iron was sold abroad.

The number of employees in the entire iron and steel works was quite extensive. Its head was supported by an accountant, four office workers and a supervisor as well as a factor zu Battenberg. The blast furnace counted eight workers and day laborers, the molding shop consisted of ten to 20 people depending on requirements, the hammer mills each had six hammer smiths per hammer. The associated mines employed around 80 miners. The direct workforce at Ludwigshütte comprised around 140 employees. In addition, a large number of day laborers, carters, charcoal burners and other workers worked indirectly for the iron and steel works.

The sale of the Ludwigshütte to Krafft & Wernher in 1835

The March Revolution of 1830 led to a turn in the economic policy of the Grand Duchy of Hesse towards free entrepreneurship, which, however, was also due to the overall economic and financial situation. The elector's autocratic style of government, worried about the sovereignty of his state, led to a complete overestimation of his own economic performance in the customs disputes with his neighbors. The customs policy defensive measures brought the Grand Duchy of Hesse to the brink of a financial crisis that could only be averted by joining the Prussian-dominated Zollverein in 1834.

This reorientation in economic policy was evident in the mining industry with the construction of the Kilianshütte , when Justus Kilian (1792-1859) received the concession from the government of the Grand Duchy of Hesse in 1831 to build an iron smelter with a hammer, which he put into operation in 1834. The Kilianshütte later became part of the Hessen-Nassau Hüttenverein . After Kilian ran into financial difficulties in the early 1850s and the state government and the Chamber of Estates had refused fiscal support, he was forced to sell the hut in 1852 to Count Wilhelm von Reichenbach-Lessonitz (1824–1866). After his death in 1866, the work, which had meanwhile been renamed Wilhelmshütte, passed to his heirs, Countess Amélie von Reichenbach-Lessonitz (1838–1912) and Princess Pauline von Löwenstein-Wertheim-Freudenberg (1858–1925), who they then passed on in 1892 sold the Hessian-Nassau Hüttenverein after lengthy takeover negotiations.

The newly built Kilianshütte with its two blast furnaces, its hammer mill and its foundry made considerable competition for the clumsy and bureaucratic Ludwigshütte, and reduced its profitability. In addition, the state government would have had to raise substantial funds for replacement investments, and this would have further reduced its profits in the future. The second chamber of the estates of the Grand Duchy repeatedly questioned the financial benefits of the Ludwigshütte as a sovereign enterprise in its deliberations. The committee noted that "the state itself is only doing business with damage everywhere, and as a rule is actually working against the purpose of the state."

Therefore, the state government decided in 1834/35 to sell the iron and steel works. With this decision, it also followed the economic policy of that time, which was gradually becoming established, to transfer the state-owned companies into private companies and offered the sale of the iron and steel works with its connected hammers and the associated mines in the districts of Königsberg, Lixfeld, Rachelshausen, Rodheim in several newspapers District of Giessen and Wommelshausen in the Biedenkopf district.

The grand ducal state government published an announcement in the Grand Ducal Hessische Zeitung on February 4, 1835, "Sale of the Ludwigshütte ironworks near Biedenkopf with the associated iron hammers, mines and goods" for their auction on March 27, 1835 and set the minimum bid at 200,000 guilders . This tender contains a detailed list of the plants belonging to the steelworks, which provides a good insight into its technical equipment. The Grand Duchy repeated the invitation to tender in a short version on February 12 and again on March 3, 1835. A parallel announcement was made in the Allgemeine Zeitung of February 10, 1835, which was published on February 19, March 5 and shortly before the auction on March 23, 1835 March 1835 appeared again.

Friedrich August Wernher (1811–1887) from Darmstadt, whose father Johann Wilhelm Wernher (1767–1827) was Grand Ducal Hessian Privy Councilor, and Joseph B. Barth from Frankfurt a. M. on behalf of the mountain councilor Georg Buderus I (1777-1840) applied to buy the Ludwigshütte. Wernher had found out about the latest technologies in the iron and steel industry through several years of travel and stays in England, France and the Netherlands, and now saw the opportunity to put this knowledge into practice with the acquisition of the Ludwigshütte. In the run-up to the auction, he offered to pay Barth a sum of 8,000 guilders if he were to withdraw from the auction. Barth accepted this offer after consulting Georg Buderus and the Ludwigshütte went to him and his co-partners, the Privy Councilor of State Friedrich Schenck (1790–1868) in Darmstadt and the tobacco entrepreneur Philipp Casimir Krafft in Offenbach (1773–1836).

It is possible that Wernher and Barth wanted to avoid mutually driving up the purchase price of the iron and steel works at the auction, which would later have meant that they would not have the necessary financial resources for a comprehensive modernization of the plant. Wernher and his co-partners paid Buderus 204,000 guilders for the smelting works and 74,175 guilders for the raw materials, semi-finished and finished goods still on the smelter, as well as the agreed amount of 8,000 guilders, so that they came to a total of 286,175 guilders. The new company operated under the name "Krafft & Wernher".

The new owners immediately invested in the Ludwigshütte. They built a second blast furnace and added a machine shop to the smelter, which had around 60 employees. The machine shop had a small steam engine to drive the machine tools. It produced axles, mill dishes, furnace fittings, coarse machine parts and other equipment. The notable innovation was the use of blast furnace top gases to heat the wind and the introduction of the puddling process . Both processes were regarded as technological innovations in Germany around 1837 and Ludwigshütte was now one of the most modern and progressive steelworks.

Another innovation was the commissioning of two coke-heated cupola furnaces , the efficiency of which was further increased by utilizing the blast furnace gases from the two blast furnaces. By using the puddling process and the two cupola furnaces, Ludwigshütte was able to produce a very high-quality wrought iron in a second melt. The Ludwigshütte sold the surplus pig iron to the hammer mill in Arfeld near Battenberg and to the Niederlaaspher hammer, which the Jung family expanded into the Amalienhütte after it was acquired in 1850 .

However, the operation of the puddle furnace using the furnace gases was technically not fully developed and did not meet expectations, so that it could only be kept going with a loss. Finally, Ludwigshütte abandoned the unprofitable puddling process in 1843, until it tried again in the early 1850s with two puddling ovens, only one of which went into operation, although it was only temporarily in production due to the lack of water to drive the water wheels for the heater was standing.

The operation of the cupolas also caused many difficulties, especially with the supply of sufficient fuel. The Ludwigshütte obtained hard coal coke from the Ruhr area to heat it despite the lack of a railway line. The overland transport of bulk goods such as hard coal caused enormous costs in the poor road conditions prevailing at the time, so that the cupolas did not run continuously and probably also came to a standstill at the end of the 1840s.

The economic crisis from 1840 to 1844, which particularly affected the iron and steel industry, further worsened the financial situation of Ludwigshütte. Wernher's co-partners were no longer willing to support his forward-looking, but costly technical innovations. He left the company in May 1842, losing his share and his private assets. Wernher immediately found a new job as director of the ironworks of the Benckiser brothers in Pforzheim and later made a name for himself as an outstanding railway engineer as construction director of the Taunus Railway and the Hessian Ludwig Railway.

After Wernher's departure, the Ludwigshütte continued to operate under the company name “Verwaltung der Ludwigshütte”. It was initially under the direction of the accountant August Voelcker and after his departure from 1844 under the leadership of the mountain council Ludwig Wilhelm Schenck (1817–1868), who was the son of the co-founder Friedrich Schenck. The company now operated under the name "Gesellschaft Ludwigshütte". The new company management acquired further mining licenses in the Biedenkopf mining area and made numerous technical improvements to increase the productivity of the plant.

The Ludwig hut, which so far as general partnership acted, was in 1852 into a joint stock company transformed "Directorate of the company Ludwig hut" with a share capital of 360,000 guilders, which was held in equal parts by the two families Krafft and Schenck. However, they seem to have had little hope of future economic prosperity in Ludwigshütte and sold the plant in 1857 to the Bank for Commerce and Industry in Darmstadt and the Mitteldeutsche Creditbank in Meiningen to promote industry and commerce, with Friedrich Schenck as the former director the second chamber of the upper finance chamber knew how to use its good relations with the Darmstadt banks.

Ludwigshütte is owned by Darmstädter Bank and Mitteldeutsche Creditbank

The Cologne banking industry as a major lender of the iron industry in the Lahn-Dill area, also for the Schelderhütte and the Adolfshütte, entered into a far-reaching and future-oriented project via the "Bank for Trade and Industry in Darmstadt" at the end of the 1850s “Approached the local coal and steel companies. In a comprehensive “program” in 1857, the Darmstädter Bank and the Mitteldeutsche Creditbank proposed the amalgamation of all smelting operations with their mines to form a single company, which “began producing raw, cast and fresh iron for charcoal or Coaks and hard or brown coal Hand takes. (...) It does not seem to be saying too much if one assumes that through a rational and contemporary operation (: where we especially reduce the number of blast furnaces from 17 to 6 to 7 of relatively greater production capacity, construction of some Coakshof furnaces when the railway is completed, conversion of 8 to 10 smelters in foundries, puddling and rolling mills reckon :) the net profit could easily be doubled ”.

Both banks advocated a merger of the owners Freiherr von Wittgenstein with the Friedrichshütte, Jung with the Amalienhütte, Bergrat Schenck von der Ludwigshütte, Ludwig Haas for the Oberschelderhütte and Giebeler for the Adolfshütte with their mediation and participation “to establish an anonymous company for the purpose of debt enforcement the iron industry in the broadest sense ”. This circle was supposed to form the core society, which other huts could join if necessary. It was also planned that the company should take the Eibelshäuser Hütte operated by Jung and the Ebersbacher Hütte (Neuhütte) managed by Wilhelm Hennes & Co. from Bensberg under lease. In the final stage of the plan of the two banks, a total of 14 huts with their mine property should merge to form a joint mining group in the Lahn-Dill area.

In May 1857, the Darmstädter and Meininger Bank acquired the "Directorate of the Ludwigshütte Company" from the heirs of the State Councilor Schenck and the Philipp Krafft zu Offenbach company for 360,000 guilders. In addition, they had to pay compensation for cash, bills of exchange, outstanding debts, raw materials and finished goods in the amount of 160,704 guilders. The bank for trade and industry in Darmstadt took over 2/3 of the shares with 240,000 guilders and the Mitteldeutsche Creditbank zu Meiningen with 120,000 guilders 1/3 of the shares. In 1859 they converted the iron and steel works under the company name “Oberhessischer Hüttenverein zu Ludwigshütte” into a stock corporation with a capital of 600,000 guilders, of which 400,000 went to the Darmstadt and 200,000 to the Meininger Bank.

The Darmstädter Bank in particular tried to gain a foothold in individual industrial regions by means of very different company investments. With the takeover of Ludwigshütte, she intended to gain influence on the coal and steel industry in the Lahn-Dill region in order to persuade the local entrepreneurial families to accept their plan to create a comprehensive coal and steel group. The “Upper Hessian Hüttenverein zu Ludwigshütte” was to serve as the core of this envisaged group, which the other hut owners could join.

The Nassau smelter operators, including the Jung family, did not, however, accept the offer of the two banks, but continued to advocate a corporate concept based on the regional family networks as a tradition. She certainly also feared that the entrepreneurial influence of these two foreign banks in a joint group would be too strong. These concerns did not seem to have been unfounded, as behind the Darmstädter Bank, founded in April 1853 as the first modern German stock credit bank, a consortium of the influential Cologne bankers Abraham (1804–1878) and Simon Oppenheim (1803–1880) from the Sal. Oppenheim jun. & Cie. and Gustav von Mevissen (1815–1899), Wilhelm Ludwig Deichmann (1798–1876), Victor Wendelstadt (1819–1884) from the Schaaffhausen'schen Bankverein . The Parisian bank Société Générale du Crédit Mobilier was extensively involved in the Darmstädter Bank through the Oppenheim family. A consortium of Frankfurt, Cologne and Hamburg bankers held the Mitteldeutsche Creditbank zu Meiningen, which was founded in February 1856.

The plan to create an overall group in the Lahn-Dill area failed due to the resistance of the regional smelter operators, and both banks had to operate the Ludwigshütte alone. However, it did not generate any profits in the next few years and burdened its balance sheets with considerable write-offs, although the management of the hut was in the hands of experienced specialists from the point of view of the owners and extensive investments were made to modernize the technical equipment: “The same was able to succeed do not deliver results favorable to the circumstances of the time; however, the prospects for the future appear better and the management is in good hands. ”However, this expectation expressed by Meininger Creditbank in 1860 for an economic recovery in Ludwigshütte was not fulfilled. Two years later, in 1862, she had to state: “Since the iron industry was completely down in the previous year, Ludwigshütte could not deliver a dividend either.” Nevertheless, Meininger Bank did not give up hope of economic recovery. Three years later, in 1865, she was a little more optimistic about the future that Ludwigshütte would now make profits.

In 1861, Ludwigshütte produced pig iron, cast goods, wrought iron, wagon axles and machine parts to the value of 441,953 guilders. However, the considerable production costs of the charcoal-powered plant compared to the coke-powered smelters, especially in the Ruhr area, hardly allowed sufficient profits. The smelting works often had to offer its charcoal pig iron on the market for less than the cost price. As a result of this ruinous competition, Ludwighütte reduced its pig iron production and tried to compensate for the losses in pig iron production by increasing sales of cast goods, wrought iron, wagon axles and machine parts.

The lack of a railway connection to the Ruhr area also made it difficult to transport coke in a cost-effective manner, so converting the charcoal-fueled blast furnaces and hammer mills to coke would not have brought any economic advantage due to the high transport costs. Even the participation of Ludwigshütte in the general exhibition in Paris and its award with the title “Honorable Mention” could not improve its economic prosperity.

Finally, in 1869, both banks decided to sell this loss-making company again. The Darmstädter Bank now followed the corporate philosophy of its initiator Gustav von Mevissen: “As a rule, it is stipulated that Bank direct only works with well-founded industrial institutes, joint stock companies and first-rate industrial and banking houses, but no connection with the smaller and medium-sized ones Industry as being too far removed from its sphere of activity and too difficult to assess from Darmstadt for its operation ”.

The Darmstädter Bank gradually separated from its holdings in small and medium-sized industrial companies, including Ludwigshütte. A later communication from the bank judged this period of participation in the coal and steel sector as follows: "The other plants brought such significant financial losses that the bank management retained a decided aversion to such undertakings and in particular to participation in coal and steel works for decades." Meininger Creditbank, too, finally considered its stakes in industrial companies to be unsuccessful and followed the step of Darmstädter Bank by giving up.

The Jung family and the Ludwigshütte

The Jung family took advantage of the two banks' withdrawal from their industrial holdings, especially in the coal and steel sector, for their entrepreneurial interests. With the acquisition of Ludwigshütte, she saw great entrepreneurial potential for her entire company, which she was able to expand to include a third steelworks in addition to the Eibelshäuser Hütte and the Amalienhütte . It is possible that the Schenck family, as former co-owners of the Ludwigshütte, gave them insider tips that the two banks were planning to sell the steelworks. The Jung family was related to the Schenck family through the Vogel family from Siegen and Gustav Jung knew the Bergrat Ludwig Wilhelm Schenck from their joint membership in the "Association for the Sale of Nassau Pig Iron".

The Jung family signed a contract with both banks on June 15, 1869 and took over the shares in the Oberhessischer Hüttenverein with a nominal value of 600,000 guilders, of which the Darmstadt-based bank received 400,000 guilders and the Meininger Bank 200,000 guilders according to their shares. The share capital had not increased in the ten years from 1859 to 1869; rather, adjusted for inflation, it had even decreased. If their considerable investments in the iron and steel works are also taken into account, then their participation was a considerable loss. The boys, on the other hand, were an established business family from the region who had the necessary experience, commercial skills, the necessary business networks and the necessary capital to run Ludwigshütte profitably.

Initially, the Jung family did not make any changes to the external structure of the company, only the management of their extensive mine holdings was merged. In accordance with her corporate policy, she now filled the positions on the board of directors: On August 1, 1869, Ferdinand Jung (1811–1883) joined Dillenburg, Friedrich Jung (1820–1902), Julius Jung (1822–1892), Gustav August Jung (1824–1904) ) and Julius Conrad (1839–1894), the son of the daughter Amalie (1812–1860) of Johann Jakob Jung (1779–1847), all of them in stone bridges. The Jung family appointed Ferdinand Jung as President of the Board of Directors and Gustav Jung as his deputy.

Georg Noll, who had already managed it under the direction of the two banks, initially retained technical management of the iron and steel works. However, this did not correspond to the corporate philosophy of the Jung family of leaving the management of one of their companies in hands outside the family. Noll left the Upper Hessian Hüttenverein at the beginning of 1870 and three employees appointed as directors - Georg Conrad Frohnhäuser, Georg Fleischhauer and Emil Hecker - took over management of the company, of which Emil Hecker (1848–1902), who was born through his marriage to his daughter Amalie ( 1850–1935) by Gustav Jung became his son-in-law when he later played an important role as managing director of Ludwigshütte.

With the takeover of the iron and steel works, the Jung family was able to gain significant mine ownership. The most important mines that allowed continuous extraction were the Königsberg mine in the district of the same name north-west of Gießen and Unverhofft Glück in the Nanzenbach district , which had already extracted large amounts of iron stone and was further expanded by the Jung family. In 1872, unexpected luck, with a workforce of 36 miners, mined 161,805 quintals of Eisenstein worth 20,876 Reichstaler, which was the highest output of all Jung mines. In the same year, the Königsberg mine with 24 miners won 33,145 quintals of Roteisenstein worth 5,477 rich dollars.

The Ludwigshütte continuously expanded its mine holdings under the direction of the Jung family over the next few years. In August 1869, received from the Mining Office Bonn mines Bellnhausen in the communities Bellnhausen , Sinkershausen and Runzhausen - Kreis Biedenkopf in the administrative district of Wiesbaden - that pit Alberg in the communities Runzhausen and Bellnhausen and Ritschtal in the communities Rachel Hausen both in the circle Biedenkopf - and Runtzhausen in the administrative region of Wiesbaden - awarded. This was followed in 1871 the pit Gotthelf in the communities Römershausen and Dernbach - Kreis Biedenkopf in the district of Wiesbaden, 1872, the hollow pit garden in the town Rodheim - Kreis Biedenkopf in the district Wiesbaden -, 1873, the iron ore mine Hermann in the town of Lower Laasphe - Kreis Wittgenstein in Arnsberg - and in 1874 the pits Köpfchen, Capitol, Eselskopf and Geisberg in the municipality of Königberg - district of Biedenkopf in the administrative district of Wiesbaden -, Stumpf in the municipality of Königsberg - district of Biedenkopf in the administrative district of Wiesbaden - and Ariadne II and Rillscheid II in the municipality of Rodheim - district of Biedenkopf in the administrative district Wiesbaden.

On January 1, 1874, the Jung family dissolved the previous joint stock company Oberhessischer Hüttenverein zu Ludwigshütte and ran the steelworks while retaining the management and operations under the company name "JJ Jung zu Ludwigshütte" alongside the other two companies of the family "JJ Jung zu Steinbrücken" ( Eibelshäuser Hut) and "JJ zu Amalienhütte". When the Hessen-Nassauische Hüttenverein (HNHV) was created in 1883 with the organizational amalgamation of these previously largely independent companies, Ludwigshütte became part of this new company, the aim of which was to overlap in production through closer cooperation and division of tasks between the three companies to avoid. The Jung family took the name "Oberhessischer Hüttenverein" as a model for the naming of the new company "Hessen-Nassauischer Hüttenverein".

The old hammer mills were no longer competitive with the puddling process, unless they specialized in the manufacture of small iron tools. Like the other works of the HNHV, the Ludwigshütte gave up its hammer mills. The Auhammer near Battenberg went to the company Hasenclever & Sohn in May 1874 for 12,000 Reichstaler . Two years later, in 1876, the Jung family also broke down the hammer in Hatzfeld and sold its facility for 6,000 Reichsmarks. The Jung family decided to build a puddling and rolling mill in Wetzlar-Niedergirmes as a replacement for wrought iron extraction and to create a bulk buyer for the ingot and scrap iron produced by Jung's charcoal blast furnaces . This work went on 20 March 1876 the company name "JJ Jung-mill" in operation and later, after the mother of Heinrich Jung Caroline (1802-1892), born pen in her honor in Carolinenhütte renamed.

The first volume of the “Handbook of the Efficiency of the Entire Industry of Germany, Austria, Alsace-Lorraine and Switzerland” by Christoph Sander, published in 1873, contains an advertisement of the Ludwigshütte under its new owners, the Jung family, which provides an informative overview of the production facilities and products : “Upper Hessian Hüttenverein zu Ludwigshütte b. Biedenkopf. Province of Hesse, Government District Wiesbaden. Establishments: iron and steel works, cast iron factory, wagon axles factory, hammer mill at Ludwigshütte, hammer mill at Hatzfeld u. Hammerwerk zu Auhammer delivers: from Rotheisenstein from its own mines the purest charcoal iron, as: a) pig iron. b) Cast goods, cast directly from the furnace. Stoves of all kinds, cooking stoves, pottery of all kinds, drain pipes, chimney pipes, stovepipes, water and fountain pipes, garden furniture, grave crosses and grave monument enclosures, machine pieces of all kinds. The cast is beautiful in color, cleanly cast, light and durable. c) Wrought iron with charcoal refreshed and hammered, plow parts of all kinds. d) Machines of various kinds, axles for wagons, chaise plows. "

The Jung family took part in the trade and art exhibition in Düsseldorf with products from Ludwigshütte in 1880 to point out their capabilities: “JJ Jung, Eisengiesserei zu Ludwigshütte b. Biedenkopf, as well as mine, rolling mill and blast furnace owners. Collection of iron stones and pig iron samples, rolling mill products, cast goods and furnaces “This event in Düsseldorf was perceived by the general public as an exhibition of national and international importance.

In the 1880s and 1890s, the family gradually gave up the unprofitable iron production in the charcoal blast furnace and switched to the cupola business. When, after the completion of the Marburg-Laasphe railway line in 1883, the Ludwigshütte siding was given, the ironworks was able to purchase hard coal coke from the Ruhr area at low cost. At the same time, it put cupola furnaces into operation and later shut down three charcoal-based blast furnaces in 1886. Ludwigshütte had had cupola furnaces since the 1830s, but it is not clear whether the Jung family shut down the cupola furnaces there after taking over or whether they continued to operate them.

Like the other HNHV plants, Ludwigshütte was now a mining company on the one hand and a foundry company on the other. The iron smelting stage in between was missing and the plant had to buy its cast iron from outside producers, making it heavily dependent on market fluctuations. It was only when the HNHV put the Oberscheld blast furnace into operation in 1905 that this gap in the production chain was closed again. The new blast furnace plant now supplied the HNHV plants with the necessary cast iron.

With the restart of the cupola furnaces on the Ludwigshütte, the Jung family expanded their production program with the addition of new operating facilities. Ludwigshütte was the first foundry in Hessen-Nassau to receive an enamelling plant in 1888, in which sanitary casting and pottery goods were initially enamelled using the wet application process. The Ludwig hut led commissions for enamelling of the other works of HNHVs and also from the Buderuswerken out. Eventually the factory switched to enamelling stoves and stoves. In 1897 Ludwigshütte produced a total of 3,115 t of castings with a workforce of 348 workers and 14 civil servants. Around 1900 their product range comprised almost all items that could be manufactured using the casting process.

From 1910 onwards, the Ludwigshütte was supplied with electrical energy via the ring line of the HNHV's overland center, which served as the driving force for the lift-off molding machines, cranes and power tools. The line was connected via a branch line to the transformer house on Kranberg, which was one of the oldest transformer houses in the region.

The Ludwigshütte in the Buderus Group

Like the other HNHV locations, Ludwigshütte ran into considerable financial difficulties in the 1920s. When, in the course of the global economic crisis of 1929, two banks reclaimed the loans they had granted to the HNHV, the Jung family had to enter into a syndicate with the Buderus Group in 1932 in order to save the company from collapse. On December 1, 1935, the HNHV, together with Ludwigshütte, was completely transferred to the Buderus Group, which now determined the corporate strategy.

During the Second World War, Ludwigshütte was involved in the war economy like the other companies in the region. After the end of the war, Ludwigshütte resumed oven and stove production with a focus on heating and cooking appliances. Buderus phased out stove production in 1950 and oven production in 1965 at the Ludwigshütte. Instead, in order to maintain the foundry and the enamelling plant, she took over the manufacture of cast products for the electrical industry and the enameling of large boilers. Buderus finally shut down the foundry and the enamelling plant in 1976 and relocated the production of air and air conditioning units to the Biedenkopf plant. As a replacement, the Ludwig lodge took over parts for the aircraft Kitchen Manufacture of Buderus work Sell from Herborn Castle . Finally, as a result of internal structural adjustments, Buderus reduced this area of ​​production at the Ludwigshütte and the buildings no longer needed were sold or leased. The city of Biedenkopf converted the area into an industrial area .

The Ludwigshütte today

The director's villa from 1906 in 2015
The administration building from 1919 in 2015

After the transition from Buderus to Robert Bosch GmbH in 2003, Bosch founded Buderus Guss GmbH with headquarters in neighboring Breidenbach, and in 2007 Ludwigshütte became a subsidiary of this company. It primarily produces brake discs for the automotive industry, so u. a. as a technological innovation brake disks without fine dust abrasion, which today have won several prizes for innovations under the name “iDisc”. In March 2018, the Ludwigshütte plant received a new robot-assisted coating system that applies the hard metal coating to the friction rings of the iDisc using the high-speed flame spraying process HVOF (derived from high-velocity oxygen fuel). This investment of 1.6 million euros doubles the coating capacity and guarantees the ramp-up of the iDisc in series production. Another system has been in operation since 2019.

Most of the extensive Ludwigshütte buildings were demolished in 2001/02. Only a few buildings have been preserved from the centuries-old Ludwigshütte; so u. a. the director's villa from 1906, the administration building from 1919 and a large warehouse building that now houses a metal company. The director's villa and the administration building are now a listed building.

See also

Web links

literature

  • Beck, Ludwig: The history of iron in technical and cultural-historical relation . Second division. The XVI. and XVII. Century , Braunschweig 1895.
  • Burhop, Carsten: The credit banks in the early days , Wiesbaden 2004.
  • Ferger, Michael: Blast furnaces on the Lahn, Dill and in Upper Hesse. From forest forge to global player , Petersberg 2018.
  • Fessner, Michael: The greens. An entrepreneurial family in Hessen-Nassau , Kiel 2013.
  • Hansen, Joseph: Gustav von Mevissen: A Rhenish Life Picture, 1815–1899 , Vol. 1, Berlin 1906.
  • Holtfrerich, Carl-Ludwig: Frankfurt as a financial center: from medieval trade fair to European banking center , Munich 1999.
  • Klippstein, Philipp Engel: History and description of the Ludwigshütte and the associated rod hammers , in: Ders .: Mineralogical letters and other articles for friends of mining science , Volume II, first and second booklet, Gießen 1782, first booklet, p. 93– 114.
  • Krüger, Alfred: The Cologne banking industry from the end of the 18th century to 1875 , Essen 1925.
  • Langenbrinck, Max: The Ludwigshütte near Biedenkopf . In: Stories and History of our City , Volume 1, editor Hans-Günther Möntnich and KJ Günter Hinz, 2004, pp. 263–282.
  • Mischler, Peter: The German iron and steel industry from the point of view of the state economy. With use of official sources . First volume, Stuttgart / Tübingen 1852.
  • Sander, Christoph: Handbook of the efficiency of the entire industry in Germany, Austria, Alsace-Lorraine and Switzerland . Volume I: Handbook of the Efficiency of the Entire Industry of the Prussian State , Leipzig 1873.
  • Schache, Georg: The Hessen-Nassauische Hüttenverein, GmbH, Steinbrücken, later Biedenkopf-Ludwigshütte , in: Schubert, Hans / Ferfer, Joseph / Schache, Georg (ed.): From the origin and development of the Buderus'schen Eisenwerke Wetzlar , vol. 2, Munich 1938, pp. 183-338.
  • Taschen, Hans: Brief overview of the mining, metallurgy and saltworks in the Grand Duchy of Hesse , Darmstadt 1858.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ A short description of the eventful operational history of Ludwigshütte can be found in Langebrink 2004 and Ferger 2018, pp. 109–117.
  2. ↑ Schache 1938, p. 241.
  3. ↑ Klippstein 1781.
  4. ↑ Schache 1938, p. 239.
  5. ↑ Beck 1895, p. 738.
  6. ↑ Schache 1938, pp. 239-274. See also Reinhardt 1999, pp. 124–128.
  7. ↑ Klippstein 1782.
  8. ↑ Ph. E. Klippstein: Mineralogical letters. Giessen 1781, p. 57.
  9. ↑ Schache 1938, p. 252.
  10. ↑ Schache 1938, p. 254.
  11. ^ Frankfurter Ober = Post = Official = Newspaper. No. 266. Tuesday, September 23, 1823. Supplement to no. 266 of the Frankfurter Ober = Post = Official = Newspaper. Tuesday, September 23, 1823, (2037) lease by the Grand Duke. Hessian steel works to Ludwigshütte near Biedenkopf. The same notices appeared on September 27th (supplement to No. 270 of the Frankfurter Ober = Post = Official = newspaper. Tuesday, Saturday, September 27, 1823) and on October 4, 1823 (supplement to No. 277 of the Frankfurter Ober = Post = official = newspaper. Saturday, October 4th, 1823). Lease of the Großhzl. Hess. Eisenhüttenwerk zur Ludwigshütte bey Biedenkopf, in: Allgemeiner Anzeiger der Deutschen. Dedicated to public entertainment about charitable items around the world. At the same time General Intelligence = sheet on behalf of the judiciary, the police and civil trade. Volume sixty-six, year 1823, volume two, Gotha, Num. 276, Freytag October 10, 1823, col. 3193-3195. The notice of leasing the hut contains a detailed list of the technical equipment.
  12. ^ Negotiations in the second chamber of the estates of the Grand Duchy of Hesse in 1823/24. 5th volume. Extraordinary supplements. 1st to 3rd division, Darmstadt 1824, Ausserord. Ax. XVIII. P. 11.
  13. ^ Negotiations of the second chamber of the estates of the Grand Duchy of Hesse in 1835. Minutes. Second volume. First division No. 33–38 14 ½ sheets, Darmstadt 1835, protocol 26, p. 11.
  14. ^ General organ for trade and commerce at home and abroad and related objects, fourth year, 1838, Cologne 1838, p. 562 (ironworks).
  15. ↑ On Kilianshütte see: Negotiations in the fifth meeting of the united committees on July 23, 1838, Eisenhüttenwesen, pp. 59–61, in: Negotiations of the trade association for the Grand Duchy of Hesse. Darmstadt, II. And III. Quarterly Bulletin, 1838.
  16. ^ Negotiations of the second chamber of the estates of the Grand Duchy of Hesse in 1851. Extraordinary (fourteenth) Landtag. Logs. Second volume. No. 24-39. 50 ½ sheet, Darmstadt 1851, protocol 29, pp. 9–27.
  17. ↑ Fessner 2013, p. 234. Ferger 2018, pp. 122–125.
  18. ^ Negotiations of the second chamber of the estates of the Grand Duchy of Hesse in 1833, minutes. Fourth volume. Protocol LXXXI., Darmstadt 1833, pp. 84-85. Reinhardt 1999, p. 55.
  19. ^ Negotiations of the second chamber of the estates of the Grand Duchy of Hesse in 1829/30. Logs. Second volume, Darmstadt 1830, Protocol XLVI, p. 188.
  20. ^ Negotiations of the second chamber of the estates of the Grand Duchy of Hesse in 1835, protocols. Second volume. First section No. 33–38 14 ½ sheets. Darmstadt 1835, Protocol 35, pp. 10-14.
  21. ↑ Grand Ducal Hessian Newspaper. Darmstadt, February 4, 1835, Num. 35, pp. 170–171.
  22. ↑ Grand Ducal Hessian Newspaper. Darmstadt, February 12, 1835, Num. 43, p. 212.
  23. ↑ Grand Ducal Hessian Newspaper. Darmstadt, March 3, 1835, Num. 62, p. 310.
  24. ↑ Allgemeine Zeitung for the year 1835, Stuttgart and Augsburg 1836, February 10, 1835, No. 41. Extraordinary supplement to the Allgemeine Zeitung, Nro. 52, 1835, p. 208.
  25. ↑ Allgemeine Zeitung for the year 1835, Stuttgart and Augsburg 1836, February 19, 1835, No. 50. Extraordinary supplement to Allgemeine Zeitung, Nro. 64, 1835, p. 256.
  26. ↑ Allgemeine Zeitung for the year 1835, Stuttgart and Augsburg 1836, March 5, 1835, No. 64. Extraordinary supplement to Allgemeine Zeitung Nro. 82 and 83, 1835, p. 329
  27. ↑ Allgemeine Zeitung for the year 1835, Stuttgart and Augsburg 1836, Nro. 82, March 23, 1835. Extraordinary supplement to Allgemeine Zeitung Nro. 108, 1835, p. 432.
  28. ↑ Wernher, Carl: Chronicle of the Wernher family together with information about their relatives and related families. Based on documents and the records and letters received from the family, edited by Carl Wernher, Oppenheim, Oppenheim a. Rh. (1906), p. 21 and 34-36 (Friedrich August Wernher).
  29. ↑ HStAM inventory 110, no. 7801–7803 u. No. 4106, Vol. 1–4, 1834–1862: Sale of the Ludwigshütte near Biedenkopf. These files on the sale of Ludwigshütte by the Grand Duchy of Hesse in the Hessian State Archives in Marburg have been adequately evaluated, just as the extensive files on Ludwigshütte in the Hessian Main State Archives Wiesbaden and in the two Hessian State Archives in Darmstadt and Marburg have so far been little researched.
  30. ↑ Schache 1938, pp. 257-258.
  31. ↑ Negotiations in the fifth meeting of the united committees on July 23, 1838, Eisenhüttenwesen, pp. 55–59, in: Negotiations of the trade association for the Grand Duchy of Hesse. II. And III. Quarterly magazine, 1838. This article contains a detailed description of the technical equipment of the Ludwigshütte under its new owners. Schache 1938, pp. 259-269. Ferfer 2018, p. 112.
  32. ^ Polytechnical Journal. Edited by Dr. Johann Gottfried Dingler and Dr. Emil Maximilian Dingler. Ninety-second volume. New episode. Forty-second volume. Born in 1844, Stuttgart and Tübingen, p. 109. According to the information provided there, the construction of the puddle furnace was faulty and the local workers were not sufficiently familiar with puddling. After the mill management asked the inventor of the use of blast furnace top gases Wilhelm Friedrich von Faber du Faur (1786–1855) from the Wuerttemberg plant in Wasseralfingen for experienced workers, the gas puddling was carried out with success.
  33. ↑ Schache 1938, p. 270.
  34. ↑ Reinhardt 1999, p. 70.
  35. ↑ Schache 1938, p. 269.
  36. ↑ Genealogical Handbook, fifteenth volume, 1909, Görlitz, p. 462.
  37. ↑ Schache 1938, p. 270. Mischler 1852, pp. 494-500. These pages contain a detailed description of the Ludwigshütte with its technical facilities and its production conditions around the year 1850. Mischler also provides an extensive table on the production of the Ludwigshütte for the years 1834–1850.
  38. ↑ Krüger 1925, p. 54.
  39. ↑ Schache 1938, p. 234.
  40. ↑ Schache 1938, pp. 235-236.
  41. ↑ Reinhard 1999, pp. 178-180.
  42. ↑ Schache 1938, p. 271.
  43. ↑ Reinhard 1999, p. 57.
  44. ↑ Burhop 2004, pp. 81-83. Hansen 1906, pp. 649-658.
  45. ↑ Herzoglich Sachsen-Meiningen'sches Hof = and State Handbook 1867, Meiningen 1867, pp. 156–157. Holtfrerich 1999, p. 158.
  46. ↑ Taschen, Hans: Brief overview of the mining, metallurgy and saltworks in the Grand Duchy of Hesse, Darmstadt 1858, pp. 25-26.
  47. ^ Report of the board of directors of the Mitteldeutsche Kreditbank to the 5th ordinary general meeting (1860), in: Der Aktionär. Central organ for fund and share owners in railroads, insurance companies, banks and industrial companies, together with an advertisement for American Fons and securities and the Frankfurt general raffle advertisement. Edited by Dr. Hermann Scherer. Siebenter Jargang, January to December 1860. No. 314–366, Frankfurt am Main 1860, pp. 280–283, p. 282.
  48. ↑ Time. Tageblatt für Politik, Handel und Wissenschaft, No. 314, Frankfurt am Main, Thursday April 10, 1862, pp. 3968–3937 (Commerce and Economics, Mitteldeutsche Creditbank administrative report).
  49. ↑ Neue Frankfurter Zeitung. Tenth year. No. 101. Tuesday, April 11, 1865, p. 4 (Mitteldeutsche Creditbank: “... and since Ludwigshütte has now delivered some income, the iron industry in general has also improved, the administration hopes that the company will be in the near future regular intake. ").
  50. ↑ Trade paper for the Grand Duchy of Hesse. Journal of the Landesgewerbevereins, twenty-fifth year, 1862, p. 182.
  51. ↑ Reinhardt 1999, p. 49.
  52. ↑ Prussian Trade Archives. Weekly for trade, commerce and transport companies. Published from official sources with the permission of the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Public Works. Born in 1863. Second half, Berlin 1863, no. 38 Berlin, September 18, 1863, p. 248. On the problem of an adequate supply of charcoal, see Reinhardt 1999, pp. 24–32.
  53. ^ Report on the general exhibition in Paris in 1867, submitted by the members of the international jury appointed for Prussia and the North German states, Berlin 1868, p. 569.
  54. ↑ Quoted from Reinhardt 1999, p. 42.
  55. ↑ Quoted from Reinhardt 1999, p. 48.
  56. ↑ Journal for Capital and Rents. Systematic communications from the fields of statistics, economics, stock exchange, finance and credit legislation, third volume, Stuttgart 1867, pp. 160–162 (5. Mitteldeutsche Creditbank zu Meinigen). Fessner 2013, pp. 231-234.
  57. ↑ Fessner 2013, p. 122.
  58. ^ Darmstädter Kreditbank, in: Der Aktionär. Central organ for fund and share owners in railroads, insurance companies, banks and industrial companies, together with an advertisement for American Fons and securities and the Frankfurt general raffle advertisement. Edited by Dr. Hermann Scherer. Siebenter Jargang, January to December 1860. No. 314–366, Frankfurt am Main 1860, pp. 373–377.
  59. ↑ Schache 1938, p. 239.
  60. ↑ Königlich Preußischer Staats-Anzeiger, No. 78, Berlin, Friday evening April 1st, 1870. Supplement to the Königlich Preußischer Staatsanzeiger. Friday April 1, 1870, p. 1290. Public gazette on the official gazette of the Royal Government of Wiesbaden. No. 14. Thursday, April 7, 1870, p. 98, No. 628.
  61. ↑ Schache 1938, pp. 295-298.
  62. ^ Official = Journal of the Royal Government of Wiesbaden, No. 36, Issued Thursday, August 12, 1869, pp. 240–241, No. 794
  63. ^ Official = Journal of the Royal Government of Wiesbaden. No. 17. Issued Thursday April 27, 1871, p. 184, No. 474.
  64. ^ Official = Journal of the Royal Government of Wiesbaden, No. 42, Issued Thursday, October 17, 1872, p. 527, No. 1258.
  65. ^ Official = Journal of the Royal Government of Arnsberg, Item 22, Issued in Arnsberg, May 31, 1873, p. 127.
  66. ↑ Official = Journal of the Royal Government of Wiesbaden, No. 1, published on Thursday January 1, 1874, pp. 1–2, No. 4.
  67. ^ Official = Journal of the Royal Government of Wiesbaden, No. 2, published Thursday January 8, 1874, pp. 7–8, No. 19.
  68. ↑ Schache 1938, p. 276 and P. 303.
  69. ↑ Schache 1938, p. 278.
  70. ↑ Schache 1938, pp. 278-279. Fessner 2013, p. 241.
  71. ↑ Sander, Christoph: Handbook of the efficiency of the entire industry of Germany, Austria, Alsace-Lorraine and Switzerland. Volume I: Handbook of the efficiency of the entire industry of the Prussian state, Leipzig 1873, p. 589. On page 824 an advertisement of the Eibelhauser hut is shown, which the company "JJ Jung" as owner of the stock corporation of the Upper Hessian hut association to Ludwigshütte with Biedenkopf next to the Eibelshäuser Hütte near Dillenburg and the Amalienhütte near Laasphe.
  72. ^ Official catalog of the trade exhibition in Düsseldorf 1880, second edition, Düsseldorf (1880), group 2, p. 24.
  73. ↑ Fessner 2013, p. 125.
  74. ↑ Schache 1938, p. 309.
  75. ↑ Fessner 2013, p. 244.
  76. ↑ Schache 1938, pp. 310-311.
  77. ↑ Ferger 2018, pp. 113–114.
  78. ↑ Ferger 2018, p. 114.
  79. ↑ Fessner 2013, pp. 453–456.
  80. ↑ Ferger 2018, pp. 115–116.
  81. ↑ Ferger 2018, p. 116.
  82. ↑ http://www.buderus-guss.de/index.php?id=176 (as of April 2020).

Coordinates: 50 ° 55 ′ 18.3 ″  N , 8 ° 30 ′ 19.5 ″  E