Eberhard Bacmeister

Eberhard Bacmeister (born September 8, 1659 in Tübingen , † April 17, 1742 in Aurich ) was a German physician, princely East Frisian personal physician and government and consistorial councilor.

Live and act

Little is known about the early years of Eberhard Bacmeister, the son of the Württemberg senior councilor and chamber procurator Heinrich Bacmeister and Anna Barbara Seefried (1629–1676). After studying medicine, he must have settled in the Stuttgart area and acquired a good reputation there. According to the records in the sixth volume of Tileman Dothias Wiarda's "East Frisian Stories" , Eberhard Bacmeister was born in 1684 by the ruling Duke Friedrich Karl von Württemberg-Winnental , his sister Christine Charlotte von Württemberg , the reigning Prince Regent of East Frisia , on the occasion of her visit to Stuttgart Hofe recommended her as her personal physician.

Bacmeister accompanied the princely regent and her son Christian Eberhard von Ostfriesland in 1686 on their trips to Bayreuth and Vienna . In Vienna, Bacmeister managed to cure his son , who was seriously ill with smallpox . In 1689 the prince regent and her son returned to the court in Aurich and Bacmeister remained in her court staff from then on. Here Bacmeister was mainly responsible for the further medical care of Christian Eberhard, who ruled from 1690, as he was always susceptible to illnesses and required constant medical supervision. In addition, he took over the free medical care of the poor in Aurich on behalf of the Princely House.

Thanks to the great trust at court, Bacmeister was recommended to other princely family members as personal physician. For example, Duke Ludwig Rudolf von Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel asked him at the end of August 1691 when his wife Christine Luise von Oettingen-Oettingen was born , and Elisabeth Christine von Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel , who later became the wife of Charles VI, was born. to assist.

Bacmeister accompanied Prince Christian Eberhard as well as his wife Eberhardine Sophie zu Oettingen-Oettingen (1666–1700) on their numerous journeys. It could not prevent the state of health of the princess's wife, who had been ailing since the birth of her tenth child Christine Charlotte on September 17, 1699 and was meanwhile pregnant again, from worsening after one of these grueling trips, so that she was on October 30 Died in 1700. After Prince Christian Eberhard died on June 30, 1708, his son and successor Georg Albrecht von Ostfriesland also gave Bacmeister his full confidence and took him over as his official personal physician for life.

During the many years at the princely court of Aurich, a deep relationship of trust and friendship had developed between Eberhard Bacmeister and Prince Christian Eberhard, as well as later with his son Georg Albrecht, as a result of which the prince appointed him to his government council in 1699, which Bacmeister did also received a seat and vote in the consistory . There Bacmeister often clashed with the court preacher and general superintendent Johann Theodor Heinson, who in the consistory did not consider him competent as a doctor and avowed pietist in theological questions. Bacmeister, however, was sure of his cause and the backing of the prince, so that in 1711 Heinson moved to Hamburg , annoyed , and in his place the theologian Levin Coldewey was appointed superintendent for the entire Harlinger Land .

family

Eberhard Bacmeister was married to Maria Elisabeth Eckmeyer († 1700), with whom he had two sons, of whom Heinrich Sigismund Bacmeister (1695–1772) later became court judge and city counsel of Stade and married Coldewey's daughter Catharina Amalia (* 1705) . After Maria's death, Eberhard married Juliane Elisabeth Görgens (1677–1752), who also bore him two sons. The elder, Georg Albrecht Bacmeister (1702–1785) was a respected government and consistorial councilor in Aurich and the younger son, Matthias Jakob Bacmeister (1704–1775) followed his father as a doctor and was also at the East Frisian court until the Kingdom took over Prussia appointed as personal physician in 1744. Then he settled in Bremen .

When Eberhard Bacmeister moved to East Frisia, he is considered the progenitor of an important and again widespread branch of the Bacmeister family , originally from Lower Saxony , whose descendants later mostly left East Frisia. A few generations later, this East Frisian branch of the family included generals Ernst von Bacmeister and Hugo Karl August Bacmeister, as well as the Mexican ambassador Enrique Bacmeister Gudiño from a branch who emigrated to Mexico.

Literature and Sources

• Clamor Freiherr von dem Bussche-Ippenburg: The family chronicle of the Bacmeister from Lower Saxony , part I – V, 1904

Web links

• Biography and genealogical information
• The East Frisian line of the Bacmeister family