Fritz Graf von Schwerin

The title of this article is ambiguous. For more people with a similar name, see Friedrich von Schwerin .

Friedrich Kurt Alexander Graf von Schwerin (born May 16, 1856 in Berlin , † March 9, 1934 in Berlin) was a Prussian , German dendrologist , writer and manor owner. He was the longstanding President of the German Dendrological Society . Its official botanical author abbreviation is “ Schwer. "

Life

Fritz Graf von Schwerin was a late-born son of the Privy Councilor of Justice Christian Friedrich Wilhelm Ludwig Graf von Schwerin (1787–1858) and the ballet figure Luise Wilhelmine Christiane born. Ebel (1819-1901). After the death of her first husband, his mother married the industrialist Johannes Maria von Renard (1829–1874).

He attended school in Liegnitz , Oleśnica and Stargard in Pomerania , where he graduated from high school. In 1877 he joined the Hussar Regiment No. 15, where he became an officer in 1879 and a regimental adjutant in 1880. In 1885 he traveled to the Orient and then joined the 1st Dragoons Regiment. 1886–89 attended the military academy. In 1890 he gave up his career as an officer and took over the heir and previously leased Gut Märkisch Wilmersdorf into self-management. Since then he has mainly lived on this estate, which today belongs to Trebbin . There he had designed the Märkisch Wilmersdorf landscape park from the age of 15 , which he gradually expanded to a size of 125 hectares. In doing so, he also implemented his dendrological passion for collecting and planted numerous conifers. His maple range, which comprised around 400 species and varieties, was well known. From 1901 to 1903 he had the manor house rebuilt in the Tudor style. From 1902 until his death he was President of the German Dendrological Society , whose membership increased from about 300 to about 7,600 under his dedicated leadership.

In 1910 he leased the agriculture and the castle gardening, which since then has operated under the name of Gräflich Schwerin'sche Staudenkulturen , published catalogs and brought a number of own varieties onto the market with Schwerin's participation. The focus was on dahlias and phlox .

In 1913 he was on the faculty of philosophy of the University of Königsberg Dr. phil. hc doctorate.

On October 1, 1933, Schwerin had to sell the park and palace. The 77-year-old is said to have suffered a heart attack while clearing the library. According to the obituaries, however, he succumbed to a long illness in a Berlin hospital.

Shortly after his death, the Dendrological Society honored him on August 9, 1934 at their annual general meeting in Magdeburg with a memorial stone placed in the Herrenkrugpark there .

Marriages and offspring

Schwerin's first marriage was on June 24, 1884, Countess Augusta Henriette Margaretha Wilhelmine von Plessen (1866–1957), from whom he soon divorced, and his second marriage (Augsburg, September 22, 1890) was with Anna Steppes (1868–1935) ) married.

His two sons from his second marriage, the twins Fritz (1893–1932) and Curt (1893–1935) von Schwerin were trained as agronomists and foresters.

Works

Schwerin wrote scientific articles on the genus Acer and Sambucus, among others . From 1906 he published the communications of the German Dendrological Society . Under the pseudonym F. G. Schwerm he was also active as a writer of aesthetics .

• The mass father and other beautiful stories, humoresques and grotesques , 1928.

Web links

• Author entry and list of the plant names described for Fritz Graf von Schwerin at the IPNI
• Historical information about the city of Trebbin
• Evidence of biographical messages

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Die Mark No. 9, pp. 18-21