François Ignace de Wendel
François Ignace de Wendel (born September 23, 1741 in Thionville , Lorraine, † May 2, 1795 in Ilmenau , Thuringia) was a French industrialist.
Life
He came from the de Wendel family , who had been active in the Lorraine coal and steel industry since 1704.
After attending the artillery school in Metz, he became a French artillery officer.
In 1779, Wendel acquired the Indret foundries near Nantes , which produced the cannons for the French Navy. In 1781, together with William Wilkinson , he founded a foundry in Le Creusot (Burgundy), through which the small village developed into an industrial town. The foundry was taken over in 1836 by the Schneider concern, which still operates it today. Using royal funds he developed together with Gabriel Jars a casting process in which coal coke replaced the previously used charcoal. Until now, only British industry had this procedure at its disposal.
On May 12, 1772, Wendel married Cécile du Tertre, with whom he had three children. In 1793 he emigrated to Ilmenau in Thuringia with one of his sons because of the developments in the French Revolution . During his Ilmenau years there was an exchange of letters with Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (who was mining minister in Saxony-Weimar-Eisenach at the time), Johann Karl Wilhelm Voigt and Ernst Christian Wilhelm Ackermann about the opening of a steelworks at Grenzhammer in the east of the city. This did not happen, however, as Wendel , who was now dependent on opium , suffered a nervous breakdown in 1795 and committed suicide.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Regest "Briefe an Goethe" of the Böhlau publishing house
- ↑ Paper on Goethe's activities for the economy of Saxony-Weimar (PDF; 3.9 MB)
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Wendel, François Ignace de |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | French entrepreneur |
| DATE OF BIRTH | September 23, 1741 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Thionville , Lorraine |
| DATE OF DEATH | May 2, 1795 |
| Place of death | Ilmenau , Thuringia |