David Biedermann

David Biedermann (* 1869 ; † December 1929 in Nice ) was at times one of the most important tobacco merchants in the world fur trading center in Leipziger Brühl .

Personal

Walter Fellmann wrote in a short biography about David Biedermann: He “was - including his London property - an 80-fold millionaire; arrested for tax fraud in 1928; was released under mysterious circumstances and left for Nice ”. - Biedermann's competitor, the tobacco merchant Bernhard Mayer, called Biedermann a gambler and said in his memoirs, “a great speculator, had neither wife nor children and died so poor that the heirs refused to accept the inheritance”.

At the Leipziger Brühl, David Biedermann was considered a "gray eminence". He remained largely invisible and never appeared in public, did not join any association or take part in any events. The tobacco goods commissioner Philipp Manes, who was later murdered by the National Socialists, reported:

In Leipzig Biedermann lived in “a princely furnished property in which he led his lonely, reclusive life, only looked after by a housekeeper. During the winter months he sought relaxation in Nice, where he owned a villa.

The business gave him life's purpose. He was sworn to that, and all his feelings and thoughts were directed towards it, so that there was no room for women and friendship. Biedermann was one of the few very big speculators that Brühl had to show. Can he be put in line with Robert Ehrmann and Max Ariowitsch ? The question must remain open. "

“Few people got closer to Biedermann, and it was a sensation when Louis Friedländer and his authorized signatory and buyer Franz Völkel were invited to dinner. The Brühl talked about this event for days, and in this way one got the first insight into the private sphere of this lonely man. No one knew how rich he was. Serious people spoke of 20 million. "

Company history

David Biedermann, tobacco products
legal form	one-man business
founding	1892
resolution	1931
Seat	Leipzig
management	David Biedermann
Branch	Tobacco shop (fur skins)

Portal to Steibs Hof , Nikolaistraße 28-32 in 2017 (the company was in stairway A III)

David Biedermann founded his Leipzig company in 1892. In the address book of 1920, the tobacco shop is listed at Nikolaistraße 28–32, stairway A III and in the Gohlis district at Montbéstraße 17 (now Trufanowstraße), ground floor. Ten years later, in 1930, shortly before the end of the company, it is Nikolaistraße 12-14 and, in the Eutritzsch district, Mothesstraße 1, ground floor. In a later review, Nikolaistraße 13 is mentioned for the camp. The associated company in London was the Fur & Wool Trading Company .

David Biedermann was one of the pioneers of the German fur wholesalers operating in the Far East , although he never traveled to Russia himself. With a turnover of 2.6 million marks in 1908, his company was one of the largest in Leipzig's Brühl. The main branch in the Far East was in Urga, Russia, a center of the wool trade, today's Ulaanbaatar . Further branches were in Manchuria , in Harbin as well as Chialar and Uljajutas in Mongolia. There were thriving Jewish communities in Harbin and Tianjin that traded in fur . David Biedermann, Rauchwaren was one of the few Leipzig companies that did business in the exchange of goods in the Far East. The company delivered supplies, tea, sugar, leather and silver to tribes and hunting communities in Central Asia via trade caravans and received furs, wool and animal hair in return. The flow of goods from Russia from the Far East mostly crossed the border to China. The business on the classic fur trading places of Russia, Nizhny Novgorod and Irbit , was done by Biedermann's brother Sebastian from Moscow for the company. Sebastian Biedermann was a partner in the company from 1875 to 1926.

"For centuries, the Brühl was the center of the international tobacco trade, also shaped by Jewish traders" (memorial plaque on the Brühl)

As a Russian Jew, Biedermann benefited from the advantages that resulted from his dual citizenship. His tobacco shop was also one of the few Leipzig companies that were able to maintain their business relations with Russia even during the First World War . A military law requiring citizens of hostile states to leave the city was not strictly enforced against those of economic importance. A special law for Leipzig also prevented their possessions from being treated as enemy assets. David was initially able to sell the existing goods from Leipzig to London and America. While the possessions of the important American fur trading company Eitingon Schild in Russia were expropriated, Biedermann's brother was able to continue to run the business there. Many of the company's factories and trading posts existed until 1924. The barter of its agents in Manchuria and Mongolia continued, and in the tobacco trade it was said that “good man dominated the fur trade on the Russian-Chinese border”.

The company not only played an important role in the tobacco trade, but also in the cotton trade. Whole shiploads were on his account in London. The main business there was independently run by a Dr. Moses, who received his instructions from Leipzig. "Hundreds of thousands of marbles were bought and stored, or a major part of the Australian rabbit harvest was taken over, and huge lots of feh or foxes were bought in free trade in Russia ."

Biedermann was only interested in "very large objects". Smaller companies did not come to his hidden warehouse on Nikolaistraße, which also did not advertise itself. His authorized signatory Leo Cohn led and administered the city and commission business for him.

The huge expansion of the company happened largely through bank loans. It had one of the highest accounts at Deutsche Bank. In 1913, a time of poor economic conditions and shortly before the outbreak of the First World War, the company's economic situation was viewed as critical by one of the commercial banks. After the war, bank loans were quickly taken up again. Short-term loans made it possible for the Leipzig tobacco companies to attend the fur auctions in London from 1921 onwards. That also applied to Biedermann, one of the few who still had a London office. An internal bank assessment said: "Biedermann has largely maintained Russian business and can therefore achieve higher profits in peacetime than ever before". In line with these expectations, he quickly received high loan commitments again. The Deutsche Bank in Leipzig granted a limit of 400 thousand marks, in 1920, the time of hyperinflation, an unsecured loan of 2 million marks, then 100 thousand marks.

In the spring of 1928 "it hit like a bomb" when the Berlin BZ wrote: "Eighty-fold Leipzig millionaire arrested". Biedermann and Leo Cohn were taken into custody. The allegation was to have violated the foreign exchange laws. Philipp Manes commented: "As the process went out the conditions under which the authorities refrained from prosecution, know only the defender, the famous Judicial printer ." After a brief detention period Biedermann retired to his estate in Nice. Physically suffering for years, he died there, “lonely as he lived” in December 1929.

After his unexpected death, the company was liquidated in 1931. The Deutsche Bank's claim amounted to 5 million marks, of which, however, not much could be realized because of the largely unsecured credit. Several other tobacco companies in business relations with the company, which had received trade credits from it, also had to give up. The situation also deteriorated for other companies as the banks cut their loan commitments for the industry.

Quote

Philipp Manes had occasional contact with David Biedermann as a trade and association representative, including when the fur manufacturer Julius Aronstein - Deutsche Pelzindustrie Gesellschaft mbH had financial difficulties:

How efficient Aronstein was is shown by a statement by D. Biedermann to me when I came to him as a member of the committee of creditors, asking him as the largest creditor - the sum was about 200,000 marks - for his approval of the proposed settlement, said the following : »Aronstein is the only person in my long life who has managed to trick me with such a sum. I want to lose her completely, but make a deal with the man - never «.

"I would like to fulfill your every wish, but never again come up with this matter, which makes me extremely upset, if only I hear about it."

Anyone who has known the quiet honest man will understand what such excitement means. It was not the loss of money that offended him, it left the (then) multiple millionaire indifferent, but that a man in the industry managed to get unsecured loans from him was the greatest and unforgivable offense. Aronstein's brother - director of the Leipzig Karstadt house - wanted to save him and offered 18%. Many believers, who had to ask for large sums, swore Biedermann, whose word was decisive, to join the settlement. Vain. Biedermann remained tough - he refused. "

Individual evidence

1. ^ Walter Fellmann: The Leipziger Brühl . VEB Fachbuchverlag, Leipzig 1989, p. 208.
2. ^ Bernhard Mayer: Interesting contemporaries - Interesting Cotemporaries. Erhard Roy Wiehn (Hsgr.), Hartung-Gorre Verlag Konstanz, 1993, pp. 121, 368 (German / English). ISBN 3-89191-888-7
3. ^ ^{A b c d e f} Philipp Manes : The German fur industry and its associations 1900-1940, attempt at a story . Berlin 1941 Volume 4. Copy of the original manuscript, pp. 31, 33, 105, 176–178. ( → Table of Contents ).
4. ^ ^{A b c} Wilhelm Harmelin: Jews in the Leipziger Rauchwarenwirtschaft . In: Tradition - magazine for company history and entrepreneur biography . 6th issue, December 1966, p. 274.
5. ^ Jury Fränkel : One-way street - report of a life , volume 2. Rifra-Verlag, Murrhardt, 1972, p. 21.
6. ^ Robrecht Declercq: The Leipzig Fur Industry as an Industrial District. . European University Institute - Department of History and Civilization, Florence, 2015. P. 71ff (English).
7. ^ ^{A b c d} Robrecht Declercq: World Market Transformation - Inside the German Fur Capital - Leipzig 1870-1939. Routledge New York, Taylor & Francis Abingdon Oxon, 2017, pp. 31, 37-38, 86, 110 (English). ISBN 978-1-138-66725-9 . Retrieved March 21, 2020.