Hinrich Christian Olde

Hinrich Christian Olde (born March 9, 1727 in Hamburg ; † July 1, 1789 in Poppenbüttel , buried in Bergstedt ) was a German merchant.

Live and act

Hinrich Christian Olde was a son of the confectioner Hinrich Olde (probably baptized on April 1, 1686 in Hamburg; † before 1749) and his wife Anna Gesa, née Osewald (* October 16, 1698 in Altona ; † April 16, 1750). His mother married the confectioner Jochim Hinrich Martens in Hamburg for the second time.

Ode's first half of life is largely undocumented. In 1749 he acquired Hamburg citizenship . His uncle Hans Olde, who was also a confectioner, vouched for him. On January 22, 1759, he married Henriette Elisabeth Rosenhagen in Hamburg (born September 17, 1733 in Eddesse ; † June 15, 1787 in Poppenbüttel). Her father Heinrich Conrad Rosenhagen worked as a pastor in Eddesse. The marriage remained childless.

In March 1763 Olde acquired one of two copper mills in Poppenbüttel. A little later he became insolvent , obviously due to events on the Hamburg stock exchange . Therefore, he sold the mill in August 1763. Three months later, he again had sufficient capital to take over the mill again. In 1764 he had not yet completely overcome his financial problems. However, he was able to raise sufficient outside capital to acquire the second copper mill.

Olde moved into a residence in Poppenbüttel and initially processed copper. He later set up a silver smelter. The works created there were probably unique in Germany at the time. He maintained close business relationships with the treasurer Heinrich Carl Schimmelmann , from which he should have benefited. From 1771 Olde produced the blanks of the new royal copper coin from Altona . In 1775 his works received a license from the Danish government.

Olde was obviously making big profits. His fortune enabled him to negotiate the sale of the entire village in 1781 with the Hamburg cathedral chapter, to which Poppenbüttel belonged. It is not known why the purchase did not materialize. Instead, he only took over one of the hooves there in 1782 . In the same year, new buildings were erected on the site, presumably a smelter with two rolling mills.

In 1782 Olde had a ship fitted with copper plates he had made himself. Around a quarter of the copper that was delivered to Hamburg from Mexico and Peru went through Oldes' works. He used it to make kettles that were intended, for example, for sugar refineries in the West Indies, brass wire for pins and plates for ship fittings. He produced blanks for the Altona coins from mostly English copper. In addition, he carried out significant trade in the Mediterranean.

From 1785 to 1786 Olde negotiated with the finance college in Copenhagen about major deals. He received the Altona Mint as a lease; In return, the Danish king received the ownership rights to Oldes land, including mills, buildings and furnishings. However, he continued production in the factories. The Finance College, headed by Ernst Heinrich von Schimmelmann , hoped to be able to produce the coins more cheaply and to enlarge the coinage. Due to a new coinage system for the duchies, there was a great need for silver money from 1788. Then there was the newly founded Altona Species Bank.

When August Adolph von Hennings visited Olde in 1785, the silver melt was still inactive. Business flourished with the new coinage system. Therefore, rumors existed in the duchies that Olde was the person who drove the reform. August Adolph von Hennings reported about Olde as “a good man who is very experienced in trading, coin and cours matters”. Since bankruptcy proceedings had to be carried out after Olde's death in which not all claims could be settled, it can be assumed that he did not conduct the business properly.

personality

The writer Friedrich Johann Lorenz Meyer described Olde as a person "of head and education". He had gardens laid out on the property in Poppenbüttel, the scenic beauty of which was highly praised at the time. As a generous host, he welcomed authors from Hamburg and Holstein, including Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock , Matthias Claudius , Friedrich Leopold zu Stolberg-Stolberg , Christian zu Stolberg-Stolberg , his friend Paschen von Cossel and the Copenhagen-based Friederike Brun and Jens Immanuel Baggesen .

In September 1788, at one of the meetings, Matthias Claudius had an excursion on the Alster . Baggesen described this in the "labyrinth" as the "journey to the end of the world".

literature

•  Dieter Lohmeier: Olde, Hinrich Christian . in: Biographical Lexicon for Schleswig-Holstein and Lübeck . Volume 8. Wachholtz Verlag, Neumünster 1987, pp. 260-261.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d e f} Dieter Lohmeier: Olde, Hinrich Christian . In: Biographical Lexicon for Schleswig-Holstein and Lübeck . Volume 8. Wachholtz Verlag, Neumünster 1987, p. 260.
2. ^ Dieter Lohmeier: Olde, Hinrich Christian . in: Biographical Lexicon for Schleswig-Holstein and Lübeck . Volume 8. Wachholtz Verlag, Neumünster 1987, pp. 260-261.
3. ↑ ^{a b c} Dieter Lohmeier: Olde, Hinrich Christian . In: Biographical Lexicon for Schleswig-Holstein and Lübeck . Volume 8. Wachholtz Verlag, Neumünster 1987, p. 261.