Friedrich Ernst Witte

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Friedrich Ernst Witte (* 1803 in Hanover ; † September 2, 1872 ibid) was a German administrative lawyer who also worked as a geologist and paleontologist .

Life

Witte was born in 1803 as the son of Wilhelmine Sophie Elisabeth, née Boettcher (1777-1854), and the consistorial and councilor Christian von Witte (1773-1854) in Hanover. His sister was the poet Minna Witte . After attending grammar school, he studied law  at the University of Göttingen from 1820 to 1824 . In Göttingen he joined the Corps Hannovera . He was one of the co-signers of the SC-Comment of the Göttingen Seniors' Convent of January 20, 1822 and played a larger role in the investigations of the Vice-Rector of the University of Karl Gustav Himly in the summer of 1822.

After completing his training, he joined the Hanoverian judicial service in 1825 and initially became an auditor in Calenberg . Witte became Procurator at the Hanover Justice Chancellery in 1833 and Hofrat there in 1842 . In 1844 he became chief finance officer in the Royal Hanoverian Ministry of Finance and Trade. In 1856 Witte was appointed senior judge and judge at the Hanover Higher Court and at the General Court Martial. From 1863 he was Vice Director of the Hanover Higher Court. On November 1, 1866, he retired, which he spent in Hanover.

"Diploma" from the Natural History Society of Hanover from October 1, 1859 for Minister of State Alexander von Münchhausen with the signature of the Witte Board of Directors;
Print by Julius Giere's lithographic press

Witte was the first chairman of the Natural History Society of Hanover from 1853 to 1866 . In the summer of 1861 Witte had visited the district doctor and fossil collector Carl Friedrich Häberlein (1787–1871) in Pappenheim near Solnhofen and saw a fossil skeleton of an ancient bird that had been found shortly before in Langenaltheim . This skeleton later became known as the Archeopteryx . Witte foresaw the importance of the find and tried, with the involvement of the zoologist Johann Andreas Wagner , to convince the owner of the find, Häberlein, to sell the find to him. The fossil was then sold to what is now the Natural History Museum in London at the instigation of the Darwin- critical naturalist Richard Owen , where it was initially stored in the magazine for years.

Witte was a member of the Hanover State Council until 1851 and as an extraordinary member from 1857 to 1866 (Justice Department).

Witte was unmarried and died in Hanover in 1872. He bequeathed his paleontological collection to the University of Göttingen.

literature

Web links

Commons : Friedrich Ernst Witte  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ enrolled on October 19, 1820
  2. ↑ Kösener Corpslisten 1960, 42 , 254
  3. ^ Franz Stadtmüller : History of the Corps Hannovera zu Göttingen 1809-1959 . Göttingen 1963, pp. 75-80
  4. ↑ a b c d e Archeopteryx: Seasonal publication of the Friends of the Jura Museum Eichstätt. Volume 6, 1988, p. 21 ff.
personal data
SURNAME Witte, Friedrich Ernst
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German administrative lawyer
DATE OF BIRTH 1803
PLACE OF BIRTH Hanover
DATE OF DEATH September 2, 1872
Place of death Hanover