Adolph von Hansemann
Adolph Hansemann , from 1872 by Hansemann , (born July 27, 1826 in Aachen , † December 9, 1903 in Berlin ) was a German entrepreneur and banker .
Life
Economic rise
Born in Aachen in 1826 as the son of businessman David Hansemann , Adolph Hansemann developed an early interest in business administration . In 1841 he started his commercial training in Hamburg , the trading metropolis of northern Germany. On January 24, 1845, his father had him declared of legal age and thus legally competent. He then joined the cloth factory Wm. Peters & Cie. his cousin Wilhelm Peters in Eupen initially as managing director. Between March 31, 1850 and July 1857, he was a partner authorized to sign there, before moving to the management of his father's Disconto-Gesellschaft .
After David Hansemann's death in 1864, Adolph Hansemann continued to run the Disconto-Gesellschaft alone. He made it the largest private bank in the German Empire and one of the most renowned in all of Europe.
After he , like Gerson von Bleichröder, had ensured that the royal Prussian army was financed in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870/1871 , Adolph Hansemann was raised to the hereditary nobility by the Prussian King Wilhelm I on March 8, 1872 because of that of in the name.
Colonial interests of Hansemann and the Disconto-Gesellschaft
In the next few years he tried to develop his relationships with the West German coal and steel industry : He became a member of the supervisory board of Krupp and, in 1896, chairman of the supervisory board of Gelsenkirchener Bergwerk AG . The Mengeder Bergwerks AG , which he redeveloped and converted into a mining union , received Hansemann's name, as did a Dortmund mine . Adolph von Hansemann was also involved in the railroad industry .
His Disconto-Gesellschaft financed the construction of a railway line in Venezuela , and he was also on the board of directors of the Schantung railway company from 1899 . In general, von Hansemann showed great interest in Germany's colonial endeavors . He was fascinated by China and collected literature on the subject. In 1901 he described China as Germany's future market . Furthermore, von Hansemann founded the Deutsche See-Handelsgesellschaft , which, together with Wilhelm Solf, prepared the acquisition of the Samoa Islands . As early as 1882, von Hansemann founded the New Guinea Consortium (later New Guinea Company ) and in 1891 the Astrolabe Compagnie . Under his leadership, the Disconto-Gesellschaft participated in the Schantung mining company and the Otavi mining and railway company in German South West Africa and the Romanian railway . The construction of the South West Africa Railway and the East African Midland Railway were made possible by loans from Disconto-Gesellschaft.
All these business ventures made Adolph von Hansemann one of the richest men in the empire. In his villa in Berlin and his castle Dwasieden near Sassnitz on Rügen , the leading society up to Kaiser Wilhelm II frequented .
From 1887 to 1896 he modernized the city of Sassnitz at his own expense. Among other things, he had the fishing port moored.
The magazine " Echo der Gegenwart " wrote on July 28, 1926 about Adolph von Hansemann:
- In the 39 years of his leadership, the bank's capital rose from 36 million to 200 million marks, to which 100 million marks were added in reserves.
Hermann Münch wrote in his book Adolph von Hansemann 1932:
- In other respects, the success did not change his character or personality. As early as January 13, 1868, he had been appointed to the Privy Council of Commerce, four years later he was raised to the hereditary nobility, he had received the highest medal awards, he was a member of the Colonial Council , a member of the Central Committee of the Reichsbank, in the administration of many and important ones Enterprises, he was a large landowner on a scale that otherwise only occurs with old noble families, had a large fortune amounting to many millions and remained the simple, hard-working, personally reserved and tirelessly active man for the flourishing of his institute, which he also worked for Was the beginning of his career. In summer as in winter he got up at 6 o'clock in the morning and, after a short breakfast, began his day's work, like every businessman, reading domestic and foreign newspapers. In the archive of the Disconto-Gesellschaft a compilation of the news from the domestic and foreign press that was important for him was made for him, but he was not satisfied with this, but used to get more information from the newspapers. He did not return home at lunchtime, but had a small, second breakfast in his study, which was brought to him from home and which consisted of a dish and half a bottle of wine. Work then went on uninterrupted until 6 or 7 p.m., after which he left the bank to - following a request from his wife - often walked home via Linden and Tiergartenstrasse .
Private life
In addition to Dwasieden and his Berlin villa - both buildings designed by Friedrich Hitzig - von Hansemann owned the Lissa-Laube estate and the Pempowo estate . By acquiring his extensive property, on the one hand, he wanted to invest his assets permanently in the interests of future generations, on the other hand, after his elevation to the nobility, von Hansemann saw himself practically obliged to a noble lifestyle . He also showed this through his numerous hunting parties and his highly luxurious living conditions in Dwasieden. The villa in the Tiergarten district in Berlin was adorned with valuable handicrafts by the sculptor Otto Lessing , who created the marble figure "Bacchante with Cupid" for the villa's winter garden.
From the marriage of Adolph von Hansemann with Ottilie von Kusserow (1840-1919), a daughter of Lieutenant General Ferdinand von Kusserow (1792-1855), a son ( Ferdinand von Hansemann ) and a daughter (Davide Eveline) were born. Ottilie von Hansemann was a supporter of the women's movement all her life and willingly made large sums of money available. A student residence at the Humboldt University in Berlin on today's Otto-Suhr-Allee in Charlottenburg has been named after her.
death
In October 1903 Adolph von Hansemann traveled to his possessions in Pempowo, from where he soon returned because he was not feeling well. On the evening of December 8th, he fell asleep in his study and, after waking up again, asked about his secretary, who had long since driven home. Then von Hansemann: Well, then we'll continue working tomorrow. These were his last words; he died at his desk, working for the bank until death.
On December 20, the Disconto Society held a memorial service in honor of the deceased. The Chairman of the Supervisory Board, Undersecretary a. D. Paul David Fischer , honored Adolph von Hansemann in the following way:
- A German oak, firmly rooted, with a far-reaching and towering crown, the bark rough, gnarled the branches, the inside solid and full of healthy marrow, unshakable, tenaciously powerful, that's how he stood before us and so his image is not pale by any disease live on fresh in our memories. Like the world around him, posterity will count him to an even greater extent among the men whose loyal, tireless work under Kaiser Wilhelm's blessed regiment under the leadership of Prince Bismarck has re-established Germany's position of power in the world.
Adolph von Hansemann was buried in a mausoleum designed by Hermann Ende in 1902 within a grave complex created by Friedrich Hitzig in 1874 in field F, FS-008 in the old St.-Matthäus-Kirchhof Berlin .
literature
- Walther Däbritz: David Hansemann and Adolph von Hansemann. Scherpe, Krefeld 1954.
- Cornelius Steckner: Museum cemetery. Important tombs in Berlin, Berlin 1984.
- Jörg Kuhn: Otto Lessing (1846–1912), sculptor, painter, craftsman. Life and work of an artist of late historicism with special consideration of his work as a building sculptor, Berlin FU B, 1994, 2 volumes (including the Berlin Art Library).
- Ralf Lindemann: The white castle by the sea. Dwasieden Castle in Sassnitz on the island of Ruegen. 2nd Edition. Reprint-Verlag Rügen, Bergen 2007, ISBN 978-3-935137-05-8 .
- Paul Thomes, Peter M. Quadflieg : Debit and credit - The cloth factory Wm. Peters & C °. in Eupen . In: Marga van den Heuvel (ed.): The fine cloth . GEV (Grenz-Echo-Verlag), Eupen 2014, ISBN 978-3-86712-089-0 , pp. 53-103.
Web links
- Biography of the Historical Society of Deutsche Bank
- Saßnitz-Dwasieden manor house
- Castle Dwasieden in the book "The White Castle by the Sea"
- Newspaper article about Adolph von Hansemann in the 20th century press kit of the ZBW - Leibniz Information Center for Economics .
Individual evidence
- ↑ Horst founder : History of the German Colonies (= UTB. History 1332). 5th edition with a new introduction and updated bibliography. Schöningh, Paderborn et al. 2004, ISBN 3-8252-1332-3 , p. 91.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Hansemann, Adolph von |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Hansemann, Adolph |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German banker and entrepreneur |
| DATE OF BIRTH | July 27, 1826 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Aachen |
| DATE OF DEATH | December 9, 1903 |
| Place of death | Berlin |