August Ferdinand Ludwig Dörffurt

August Ferdinand Ludwig Dörffurt (born August 12, 1767 in Berlin , † January 27, 1825 in Wittenberg ) was a German pharmacist and mayor of Wittenberg .

Life

August Ferdinand Ludwig Dörffurt (not Dörrführer or Dörfuhrt , as one often reads it in letters and writings) came from Berlin, where he was born on August 12, 1767. He was a pharmacist and became a provisional agent in the company that is still managed by the painter Lucas Cranach the Elder. Ä. famous pharmacy of Christian Ehrenfried Nicolei located at Markt 4 . His father Christian Nicolei had the former pharmacy of Lucas Cranach the Elder. Ä. Acquired in 1707 and his widow continued to run it from 1735.

As early as 1792, Dörffurt had become scientifically known for his "Treatise on Camphor". He was considered a promising candidate for the pharmacy-chemical teaching post applied for by the university, but this was not approved. As a private lecturer , he had prepared a commentary on the Prussian Pharmacopoeia from 1799, which appeared in 1801 as the “New German Pharmacist Book”. When he married the only daughter of Christian Ehrenfried Nicolei, Johanne Friederike in Pratau in February 1789, he took over the pharmacy at Markt 4.

On March 24, 1797 Dörffurt was sworn in as a pharmacist and chemical expert in the city of Wittenberg. In 1798 he applied for a vacant position in the city council, which was also awarded to him by receiving the pharmacy. In 1799, Dörffurt moved the pharmacy from Markt 4 to Schloßstraße 1, where it is still located today and has been known as the "Cranach Pharmacy" since 1960.

The city of Wittenberg, which was once occupied by the French, was ravaged by the besieging Prussians in 1813 with repeated heavy bombardments. The suburbs that were in the firing range of the Wittenberg Fortress were demolished in early 1813 and the suburban citizens were relocated. The increasing shortage of food and lack of wood and water, plus the incessant requisitions of cattle and grain, weighed more and more on the citizens and on the city council, which was filled with great concern, especially on the mayors at the time, Adler and Giese. Because of a house search ordered by the French governor to get food and the very arduous establishment of barracks for the prisoners, the latter had given up. When the second mayor's position was re-occupied on October 30, 1813, the choice fell on Dörffurt.

After 25 years of marriage, his wife died on January 20, 1814, leaving him with a son and three daughters after a son and two daughters had died earlier. His only surviving daughter married the Royal Prussian Premier Lieutenant Lorenz Alberty in 1817, who served in Garrison Battalion No. 28 stationed in Wittenberg.

Wittenberg came to Prussia in 1815 as a result of the resolutions of the Congress of Vienna and had lost its university. In 1815 a "Retablissement Commission" was set up in order to create a new home for the people who had once been evacuated. This should ensure that the suburbs received new building sites that were outside the firing range of the fortified Wittenberg. Dörffurt, who has since become mayor, was part of this “Retablissement Commission”. In this way, the current districts of Friedrichstadt and Kleinwittenberg were created from 1819 to 1820 under the direction of Dörffurt.

Two years after the death of his first wife, Dörffurth married the 31-year-old maid Caroline Elisabeth Dietrich, eldest daughter of the late Royal Saxon District Administrator Gottlob Traugott Dietrich, on January 18, 1816. Dörffuhrt reached the age of almost 58 years and died on January 27, 1825 from dropsy .

With the relocation of the university to Halle , Wittenberg lost its function as a university town and became a garrison town. For this purpose, the university buildings were converted into barracks. In addition to the "Fridricanum barracks", the barracks next to it was named "Dörffurt barracks". Today a street in Lutherstadt Wittenberg bears his name (Dörffurtstraße) and there is a memorial plaque on the building at Schloßstraße 1.

Works

• Treatise on camphor, which describes its natural history, cleaning, behavior towards other bodies, decomposition and use . Zimmermann, Wittenberg 1793 ( digitized edition of the University and State Library Düsseldorf )
• New German Pharmacist Book , 3 volumes, Leipzig, 1801–1812. Digitized edition of the University and State Library Düsseldorf
• Description of the celebration of the third centenary of the church reform in Wittenberg , 1817

literature

• Heinrich Kühne and Heinz Motel: Famous personalities and their connection to Wittenberg . Verlag Göttinger Tageblatt, 1990 ISBN 3-924781-17-6
• Famous Wittenberg guests of the Rotary Club Wittenberg, 2nd edition
• Our homeland , supplement to the Wittenberger Tageblatt of September 8, 1927