Ernst August Scherling

Ernst August Scherling (born April 20, 1859 in Lübeck ; † August 3, 1939 ) was the first managing director of the Großeinkaufs-Gesellschaft Deutscher Consumvereine mbH (GEG), Hamburg.

youth

Scherling was born in Lübeck as the son of the mathematics teacher Johann Christian Scherling . He attended the secondary school branch of the Katharineum in Lübeck , which he left with the one-year-old in 1875. In 1875 he signed up for one-year voluntary military service. From 1876 to 1879 he was an apprentice wholesaler at the colonial goods company Boye & Schweighofer in the Hanseatic cities of Lübeck and Hamburg . From 1879 to 1880 he fulfilled his one-year military service in his hometown of Lübeck.

Stays abroad

He went to Venezuela in 1880 , but returned to Germany after a year due to the continued unrest there. In spring 1882 he went to Laboen-Deli on the island of Sumatra for the company F. Kehding, shipping company , import , export and banking business. The company owner was also the German consul . Violent malarial fever repeatedly forced Scherling to travel to Straits Settlements , China and Japan. In 1886 he became an authorized signatory of the company, as which he specifically had to manage the banking, export and shipping company. From 1890 to 1892 he also had to administer the consulate in the absence of the German consul. In 1893, repeated violent attacks of malaria forced him to leave Sumatra and return to Hamburg.

Managing Director of the GEG

On January 7, 1894, he was elected managing director of the Großeinkaufs-Gesellschaft deutscher Consumvereine mbH. He was their sole managing director until 1900. Then the number of managing directors was increased to two and later to three. It is noteworthy that when he was appointed managing director in 1894, he did not emerge from the labor movement or the consumer cooperative movement , but was a comprehensively trained and world-experienced specialist. This not only in the goods but also in the banking business. His merit was in particular the establishment of the banking department of the GEG, which was extremely important for the financing of the consumer cooperative movement in the Hamburg direction .

In 1899 he traveled to England with seven members of the GEG's supervisory board and another consumer cooperative at the invitation of the Co-operative Wholesale Society Limited (CWS) to get to know the organization and operations of the CWS.

In 1914 he was forced to give up his post for health reasons. It was probably the malaria fever that he fell ill with early on during a stay abroad.

Private life

Ernst Scherling married Magdalena Boutin on November 10, 1888 in Hamburg. With her he had the children Gertrud Elisabeth (* 1896) and Kurt Rudolph (* 1897). After Magdalena's death in 1907, Scherling married for the second time on January 14, 1911. Margarethe Dorothee Lorenz (née Heins) became his wife, who remained so until his death. Ernst August Scherling died on August 3, 1939 in the Ebenezer hospital and deaconess home at Friedrichsberger Strasse 53.

Street name

The Ernst-Scherling-Weg in Hamburg-Horn has been named after him since May 2nd, 1966 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Death register Hamburg VI a, 1939, entry no.546
2. ^ Marriage register Hamburg I, 1888, entry No. 1389
3. ↑ Birth register Hamburg XXI, 1896/1897, entry no. 854/2212
4. ^ Marriage register Hamburg XXI, 1911, entry no.16
5. ↑ Death register Hamburg VI a, 1939, entry no.546
6. ↑ Hamburg-Horn History Workshop , accessed on April 3, 2008

literature

• Heinrich Kaufmann : The large purchasing company of German consumer associations mb H. GEG. For the 25th anniversary 1894–1919. Hamburg 1919. This article essentially follows the presentation there.