Cornelius of Guaita

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Cornelius von Guaita with daughter Maria Catharina Josepha (later von Limpens)

Cornelius Maria Paulus von Guaita (baptized March 15, 1766 in Aachen ; † July 12, 1821 there ; also called Corneille de Guaita ) was a German needle manufacturer and long-time mayor of the city of Aachen.

Life

Cornelius von Guaita, son of needle industrial Johann Franz Xaver von Guaita from a collateral branch in Frankfurt established family Guaita and Maria Anna Catharina Chorus, daughter of the mayor Cornelius Chorus from the active also in the needle industry Family Chorus, visited in his hometown Aachen the imperial city Mariengymnasium (short: Marianum , later Kaiser-Karls-Gymnasium ), afterwards however, according to the family tradition, he started the professional career of a needle manufacturer.

As was customary for members of influential families at the time, Guaita also took on public and political responsibilities. When the Conseil du Commerce , the historical beginnings of today's Aachen Chamber of Commerce and Industry , was founded for the first time in Aachen during the French occupation in the Département de la Roer under Napoleon Bonaparte , Guaita immediately joined and was later from 1808 to 1820 also its chairman. The Conseil du Commerce was called the Commercial Council Chamber from 1804 and lasted until the end of the French occupation in 1815. Its administrative district also extended beyond Aachen into the Arrondissement de Clèves . Guaita also acted as one of the first five "judges" of the commercial court in Aachen, which was installed on May 27, 1805 and which can be compared with a council of experts. From this later on August 7, 1846, the Royal Commercial Court arose. From 1809 to 1814 von Guaita was also active in the presidium of the departmental electoral college, which appointed the candidates for the legislative assembly and the Senate in Paris as well as the candidates for the departmental council.

In the meantime, von Guaita had also been elected to the council chamber and on May 28, 1808, as successor to Johann Wilhelm Gottfried von Lommessem, he was elected mayor of the city of Aachen. His powers and those of the Council Chamber also extended to the cantons of Burtscheid , Linnich , Heinsberg , Sittard / NL and Geilenkirchen . After the end of the French occupation and the incorporation of the Rhineland into the Kingdom of Prussia , Cornelius von Guaita was re-elected as the first Lord Mayor of Aachen. He held this position, despite efforts on the part of the Prussian government, to depose him in 1818 until his health-related resignation in 1820.

Guaita's merits were largely in the uncompromising implementation of Napoleonic economic policy and in the promotion and strengthening of the commercial and artisanal middle class. From the beginning he was regarded as an ardent admirer of Napoleon and hoped for a new golden age through his politics. For his extraordinary services during this time, Cornelius von Guaita was appointed with the Prussian Order of the Red Eagle and in 1811 by Emperor Napoleon as a member of the Legion of Honor . In 1811 von Guaita applied for himself and his son to be raised to the status of baron de l'Empire .

In addition, von Guaita promoted the implementation of the vaccination against smallpox introduced in Aachen in 1801 by Gerhard Reumont and Kaspar Ludwig Dorschel as mayor of the city of Aachen in 1813 .

In his honor, a street near his former home on Rosstrasse was named after him in Aachen in 1905.

family

Former four-winged manor Berger Hochkirchen in the Laurensberg district
Guaita garden staircase, Rococo, ca.1780 by Jakob Couven

Cornelius von Guaita had been married to Auguste von Heinsberg, a daughter of the postal director of the Thurn and Taxis Post Office in Aachen, since November 17, 1790 , and had five daughters and a son with her. Augusta von Guaita died on July 12, 1819. A portrait of him, painted in 1817 by Johann Baptist Joseph Bastiné, hangs in the Stedelijk Museum Het Domein in Sittard . It shows the Mayor of Aachen together with his daughter Maria Katharina Josepha Sophina von Guaita and carries the French Order of the Legion of Honor and the Order of the Red Eagle.

Over the years, von Guaita and his family had achieved considerable wealth and acquired, among other things, the Berger-Hochkirchen estates in the Laurensberg district and Soerser Hochkirchen in the Soers district, as well as other estates in the vicinity. In addition, they owned a comfortable row of houses at Rosstrasse 46/48 in Aachen, which included a Rococo staircase designed by Jakob Couven around 1780 , which was known as the Guaita garden staircase . This was partially after the war in the city of Aachen garden translocated . The lattice crowning with the initials Guaitas that belonged to the staircase was lost.

Today there seem to be no more descendants in the Aachen area. However, the family's graves can be visited in the listed Aachen East Cemetery .

literature

  • Hermann Krüssel: Horatius Aquisgranensis - Aachen in the mirror of the neo-Latin poet Johann Gerhard Joseph von Asten (1765–1831) (=  Noctes Neolatinae . Volume 3 ). Georg Olms Verlag, Hildesheim - Zurich - New York 2004, ISBN 978-3-487-12720-0 , chap. 10, p. 467–477 ( digitized in the Google book search).
  • Lothar Gall : From the old to the new bourgeoisie. The Central European city in upheaval 1780–1820 (=  supplements of the historical magazine . Volume 14 (new episode)) (= city ​​and bourgeoisie . Volume 3 ). Oldenbourg, Munich 1991, ISBN 978-3-486-64414-2 , pp. 219 ( digitized version in the Google book search).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Karl Kiefer (Ed.): Frankfurter Blätter für Familiengeschichte . Volume 1, Issue 7, pp. 118-119.
  2. ↑ Thomas F. Kraus: On the way to modernity. Bonne ville d'Aix-la-Chapelle. Aachen in French times - 1792/93, 1794–1814. Handbook catalog for the exhibition in the coronation hall of the Aachen town hall from January 14th to March 5th, 1995 (= supplement to the magazine of the Aachener Geschichtsverein . Vol. 4). Published by Herbert Lepper , Verlag des Aachener Geschichtsverein , Aachen 1994, ISBN 978-3-9802705-1-9 , p. 502 on behalf of the Scientific Committee .
  3. ↑ Thomas F. Kraus: On the way to modernity. Bonne ville d'Aix-la-Chapelle. Aachen in French times - 1792/93, 1794–1814. Handbook catalog for the exhibition in the coronation hall of the Aachen town hall from January 14th to March 5th, 1995 (= supplement to the magazine of the Aachener Geschichtsverein . Vol. 4). Published on behalf of the Scientific Committee by Herbert Lepper, Verlag des Aachener Geschichtsverein, Aachen 1994, ISBN 978-3-9802705-1-9 , pp. 584f.
  4. ^ Ingeborg Schild , Elisabeth Janssen: The Aachen East Cemetery . Mayer, Aachen 1991, p. 330.
  5. ↑ Manor Guaita Laurensberg and Soers ( Memento from August 4, 2012 in the web archive archive.today )
  6. ↑ Bodo von Koppen: Old Aachen Gardens . Publishing house Dr. Rudolf Georgi, Aachen 1987, ISBN 3-87248-049-9 , p. 35.
personal data
SURNAME Guaita, Cornelius of
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Guaita, Cornelius Maria Paulus von (full name); Guaita, Corneille de
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German needle manufacturer and mayor of Aachen
DATE OF BIRTH baptized March 15, 1766
PLACE OF BIRTH Aachen
DATE OF DEATH July 12, 1821
Place of death Aachen