Friedrich von Gerolt

Friedrich Joseph Karl Freiherr von Gerolt (born March 5, 1797 in Bonn , † July 27, 1879 in Linz am Rhein ) was Royal Prussian Real Privy Councilor , Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary in the USA in Washington, DC

family

Gerolt was born as the son of the German lawyer and politician Bernhard Franz Josef von Gerolt and his wife, Anna Katharina Josepha Karoline v. Bouget from Odenkirchen , born and descended from the Gerolt family , who were awarded the coat of arms in Prague on January 3, 1558 and who were ennobled by Emperor Matthias on April 16, 1614 in Linz Castle in Austria . He married on August 28, 1837 in Bonn Josephine Henriette Huberta Walter, daughter of the court counselor at the former Reich Chamber of Commerce in Wetzlar , Franz Martin Walter, and his wife Maria Anna von Noël, a daughter of Peter Franz von Noël .

At the age of 16, Gerolt took part in the wars of liberation . Afterwards he studied mining and geology at the Bergakademie Freiberg (matriculation number 941) and in 1823 was led as mining office secretary in Düren . In March 1824, he traveled to Mexico , where he suspected considerable silver mines . From King Friedrich Wilhelm III. he and his brothers were enfeoffed with the Rittergut zur Leyen (today Ockenfels Castle ) in Ockenfels in 1830 . In 1837 he was chargé d'affaires in Mexico and was on a proposal by Alexander von Humboldt in 1844 to Extraordinary Envoy and bevollm. Minister of the Kingdom of Prussia ordered in the United States of America, where he in October 1848 by Friedrich Ludwig von Rönne was replaced. From 1849 to 1868 he was again sent to Washington as the Prussian ambassador , and from 1868 until the founding of the German Empire in 1871 he worked for the North German Confederation as an envoy in Washington. In 1858 Gerolt was raised to the Prussian baron status.

Gerolt was a diplomat in the United States for 27 years and is still Germany's longest-serving ambassador to the United States. During his time in Washington he maintained good contacts with many politicians. In the quarter century of his tenure, Gerolt met Presidents James K. Polk , Zachary Taylor , Millard Fillmore , Franklin Pierce , James Buchanan , Abraham Lincoln , Andrew Johnson, and Ulysses S. Grant . Millard Fillmore was the only US president to visit Germany in the 19th century. In 1855 he met Alexander von Humboldt and King Friedrich Wilhelm IV in Berlin . During this time, 1.5 million Germans emigrated to the USA and there were a total of 14 German consulates in New York , Philadelphia , Baltimore , Charleston , New Orleans , St. Louis , Galveston , Savannah , Cincinnati , San Francisco , Louisville , Milwaukee , Chicago , Boston and New Bedford .

Ralph Lutz: Relations between Germany and the United States during the Civil War . Heidelberg 1911.
Enno Eimers : Prussia and the USA 1850 to 1867. Transatlantic interactions . Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 2004, ISBN 3-428-11577-5 .

personal data
SURNAME	Gerolt, Friedrich von
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Gerolt, Friedrich Joseph Karl Freiherr von
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	German politician and ambassador (Washington DC, USA)
DATE OF BIRTH	March 5, 1797
PLACE OF BIRTH	Bonn
DATE OF DEATH	July 27, 1879
Place of death	Linz on the Rhine