Charles Schmidt (archivist)

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Charles Schmidt (born October 21, 1872 in Sankt Diedolt , Reichsland Alsace-Lorraine , † February 6, 1956 in Sceaux , Hauts-de-Seine department ) was a French archivist and historian .

Life

Schmidt was the son of the Evangelical Lutheran pastor Charles Schmidt from Strasbourg , grandson of the theologian and historian Charles Schmidt and through his sister Elisabeth (1871–1964) brother-in-law of the Germanist Charles Andler . After the Lycée Janson de Sailly in Paris , he went to the Sorbonne Université . At the École nationale des chartes , he completed a degree in archives in 1897. In 1905 he received his doctorate at the humanities faculty of the Sorbonne with the work Le grand-duché de Berg (1806-1813) , a fundamental work on the history of the Grand Duchy of Berg and the supremacy of France in Germany under Napoleon I.

As a young archivist, he worked for the archives of the Yonne department in 1897 , and from 1899 for the French national archive . From 1902 he published writings on various archival sources from French history since 1789 and economic history of the 19th century, for example in the quarterly journal for social and economic history . After the Armistice of Compiègne in 1919 he was responsible for restructuring the Alsace-Lorraine archives and was then appointed director of these archives.

On January 15, 1919, he received the state order to travel to the headquarters of the French Army Command under Ferdinand Foch in Luxembourg and from there to join the French and Allied armies, which had territorial power before the signing of a peace treaty and the establishment of the Inter-Allied Rhineland Commission exercised in the occupied Rhineland to be accredited. From January 18 to 31, 1919, he then visited the Rhenish State Archives in Darmstadt , Düsseldorf , Koblenz and Speyer , where he found out about the holdings and announced further French archive uses, which ultimately took a period of more than two years. In 1921 he published on sources of the history of the Rhine regions from 1792 to 1814 in Rhenish archives and in Paris and in 1922 on secret plans of German politics in Alsace-Lorraine (1915-1918).

By decree of January 15, 1928, Schmidt was appointed as the successor to Alexandre Vidier (1874–1927) General Inspector of the French Libraries and Archives. He retired at the end of 1940, and Marcel Bouteron replaced him on January 1, 1941 .

Schmidt was honorary president of the Société de l'École de chartes , the Société d'histoire moderne , the Société de l'histoire de 1848 , the Association des archivistes français and the Société de l'Histoire du Protestantisme Français .

Works (selection)

  • Le grand-duché de Berg (1806-1813). Étude sur la domination française en Allemagne sous Napolèon Ier . Paris 1905 ( digitized ).
  • The sources de l'histoire des territoires rhénans de 1792 à 1814 in the archives rhénanes et à Paris . Paris 1921.
  • Les plans secrets de la politique allemande en Alsace-Lorraine (1915–1918) . Paris 1922.

literature

  • Marcel Baudot: Charles Schmidt . In: Bibliothèque de l'École des chartes . Volume CXIV, year 1956, pp. 338-340 ( digitized version ).
  • Charles Schmidt 1872-1956 . In: Bulletin des bibliothèques de France (BBF) , 1956, No. 2, pp. 83-84.
  • Necrology: Charles Schmidt . In: Bulletin de la Société de l'Histoire du Protestantisme Français , Volume 102 (April-June 1956), pp. 114-119.
  • Burkhard Dietz : Charles Schmidt. Pioneer of the history of the Grand Duchy of Berg . In: Burkhard Dietz (ed.): The Grand Duchy of Berg as a Napoleonic model state. A regional historical interim balance . Cologne 1995, pp. 93-106.
  • Burkhard Dietz: Charles Schmidt (1872-1956). On the intellectual biography of a historian and 'political archivist' in the context of the history of French historiography . In: Burkhard Dietz, Jörg Engelbrecht (ed.): The Grand Duchy of Berg 1806–1813. A study of French supremacy in Germany under Napoleon I. German translation of the French original with contributions by Burkhard Dietz, Jörg Engelbrecht and Heinz-K. Junk, Neustadt an der Aisch 1999, ISBN 3-877-07535-5 , pp. 370-406.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Henning Trüper: The quarterly journal for social and economic history and its editor Hermann Aubin in National Socialism (= VWSG-Beihefte, 181). Franz Steiner Verlag, Wiesbaden 2005, ISBN 3-515-08670-6 , p. 100 ( Google Books )
  2. ^ Wolfgang Hans Stein: Archives as an object of cultural imperialisms: French archives in Germany - German archives in France . In: Michel Espagne , Katharina Middell, Matthias Middell (eds.): Archive and memory. Studies on intercultural transmission . German-French Culture Library, Volume 13, Leipziger Universitätsverlag, Leipzig 2000, ISBN 3-934565-30-1 , p. 91 f. ( Google Books )
personal data
SURNAME Schmidt, Charles
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French archivist and historian
DATE OF BIRTH October 21, 1872
PLACE OF BIRTH Sankt Diedolt , Reichsland Alsace-Lorraine
DATE OF DEATH February 6, 1956
Place of death Sceaux , Hauts-de-Seine department