Franz Leopold Lafontaine
Franz Anton Leopold Lafontaine (born January 14, 1756 in Biberach an der Riss ; † December 12, 1812 in Mogilew ) was a German military doctor in Polish and Austrian services. He was the maternal grandfather of Princess Julia von Battenberg .
Life
Franz Leopold was the son of the art dealer Benno Leopold Ignaz Lafontaine and Marie Katharina Franziska geb. Leonhardt, and received his first training with the Benedictines in Biberach, later he worked for four years as an intern in a pharmacy . From 1774 he studied medicine at the University of Strasbourg , where he was awarded a master's degree in surgery in 1777 . He then went to Vienna , where he received practical training in the von Stoll clinic until 1778 . in 1780 he joined the Austrian army as a surgeon and served there until 1782, in the Crimea and in Galicia .
During these years his regiment came to Tarnów , which was then part of Austria. After leaving the army, Lafontaine practiced in this city, then on the Galician estate of Princess Lubomirski and finally in Krakow , where he opened a private medical practice . In 1787 he went to Warsaw , where he received the post of court doctor to King Stanislaus August Poniatowski . He soon became a doctor highly valued in court circles, achieved a great reputation and made a considerable fortune. In 1803 he bought the manor Falęcin in Czersk . In 1791 he received a doctorate in medicine and surgery from the University of Halle without an examination .
Around 1789 he married Theresia de Cornelly (* in 1768, † in 1827), a lady-in-waiting of King Stanislaus August, of Hungarian origin, who was later elevated to a baroness by genealogists of the Battenberg-Mountbatten family (like simple bourgeois Lafontaines, from which one “ de la Fontaines ”). The Lafontaine couple ran a so-called open house in which many celebrities of the era (such as Tadeusz Kościuszko , General Jan Henryk Dąbrowski and Prince Józef Poniatowski ) frequented. Doctor Lafontaine also owned a large picture gallery.
After the creation of the Duchy of Warsaw in 1807, Lafontaine was appointed chief surgeon of the Duchy's army with the task of organizing the military health service. He created a school for field surgeons and military doctors and equipped their library with books from his own collection. In 1811 he was appointed chief physician in the duchy's army. As such, he took part in Napoléon's Russian campaign in 1812 , was captured by the Russians and died in Mogilew as a prisoner of war .
Franz Lafontaine left seven scientific publications (three of them are lost), was one of the pioneers of smallpox - vaccination in Poland, organized military hospitals in the country according to new principles, was also interested in animal science and wrote a treatise on the foot-and-mouth disease , also dealt with cowpox . He became very famous after a successful cataract operation on a woman who had been blind since childhood.
His knowledge of the Polish language remained poor until the end - he wrote his articles and letters in German, Latin or French - but he also worked as a playwright , his play "Konskription" was performed in 1809 in Polish translation in Warsaw.
Lafontaine was also an active Freemason , member of the lodge "To the overwhelming advantage" in Cracow (founded in 1786) and belonged to the lodge there, "Goddess of Eleusis" (founded in 1780) since he moved to Warsaw .
The Lafontaine couple had two daughters, Sophie († in 1831), who married General Hans Moritz Hauke , and Victoria († in 1835), wife of the wealthy Warsaw confectioner Karl Joseph Lessel.
Awards and honors
- Orden Virtuti Militari , (1809);
- Order of the Legion of Honor , (1811);
- Corresponding member of the Royal Academy of Sciences in Göttingen since 1802;
- Member of the Warsaw Scientific Society since 1804;
- Member of the Medical Academy in Paris since 1806;
- Member of the Medical Society of Vilna since 1809;
- Honorary professor at the University of Cracow since 1811
Connection to the British royal family
His granddaughter Julia Hauke married into the nobility, so Franz Leopold Lafontaine is one of the great-great-great-great-grandfathers of Prince Charles .
literature
- Polski Słownik Biograficzny (Polish Biographical Dictionary) , Volume XVI, Wrocław 1971
- Stanisław Szenic: Cmentarz Powązkowski 1790–1850 . Warsaw 1979
Individual evidence
- ↑ Holger Krahnke: The members of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen 1751-2001 (= Treatises of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen, Philological-Historical Class. Volume 3, Vol. 246 = Treatises of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen, Mathematical-Physical Class. Episode 3, vol. 50). Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2001, ISBN 3-525-82516-1 , p. 143.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Lafontaine, Franz Leopold |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Lafontaine, Franz Anton Leopold (full name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German military doctor |
| DATE OF BIRTH | January 14, 1756 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Biberach an der Riss |
| DATE OF DEATH | December 12, 1812 |
| Place of death | Mogilev |