Jakob Leisler

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Jacob Leisler's statue on North Avenue in New Rochelle

Jakob Leisler (* around 1640 in Bockenheim , County Hanau (today in Frankfurt am Main); † May 17, 1691 in New York City ) was a German-American colonist. From 1689 on, he led what became known as the Leisler's Rebellion in colonial New York . He took control of the colony until he was arrested and convicted of treason and executed.

Life

Around 1640 he was born in the village of Bockenheim , today a district of Frankfurt am Main , as the son of the Reformed pastor Jaques (Jakob) Victorien Leisler (1606–1653) and Susanne Adelheid, nee. Wissenbach. In 1660 he emigrated to the Dutch colony of Nieuw Nederland (today: New York), married a wealthy widow, dealt with trade and made a fortune in a short time. In 1664, the British took control of New York from the Dutch after Richard Nicolls ' fleet threatened the Dutch colony. Leisler thereby became subject to the British Crown.

The Glorious Revolution in England of 1688 divided the population of New York into two clearly distinguishable groups. Small shopkeepers and farmers, seamen, poor sales representatives and artisans in general were opposed to the patricians, wealthy fur traders, merchants, lawyers and officers of the Crown. The first group was led by Leisler, while the second group was its leaders in Peter Schuyler (1657-1724), Nicholas Bayard (ca 1644-1707), Stephen van Cortlandt (1643-1700), William Nicolls (1657-1723) and other representatives of the aristocratic families of the Hudson Valley.

The Leislerians are assumed to be more loyal to the Protestant line of succession. When the news of the capture of Governor Edmund Andros in Massachusetts was known, they took on 31 May 1689, an Fort James one, renamed it to Fort William and expressed their willingness to hold the fort until a governor of the new rule had arrived. The aristocrats were also on the side of the revolution, but preferred the continuation of the rule of James II in order to avoid the risk of a period of interregional rule without a ruler.

Vice-Governor ( Lieutenant-Governor ) Francis Nicholson set sail for England on June 24th. A vigilante group of the plebeian party was formed and Leisler was appointed its head. In December he made himself vice governor by the authority of a letter from the Home Government to Nicholson, convened a council and took over the government of the entire province of New York to ensure the peace and enforcement of His Majesty's laws in that province.

He invited to the first inter-colonial congress in New York on May 1, 1690, which had a concerted action against the French and Indians on the agenda. Colonel Henry Sloughter became the actual acting governor on September 3, 1689, but did not reach New York until March 19, 1691. In the meantime, on January 28, 1691, Major Richard Ingoldsby and two companies landed and demanded the surrender of the fort. Leisler refused to surrender . This was followed by an attack on March 17, in the course of which two soldiers died and many were wounded.

When Sloughter arrived in New York two days later, Leisler hurried to hand over the fort and the regalia of power to him. Leisler and his son-in-law Jacob Milbourne were charged with high treason for disobeying Major Richard Ingoldsby, convicted and executed on May 17th. There has been much controversy among historians as to the facts and significance of Leisler's brief reign in New York.

literature

Leisler as a person of history

  • Jerome R. Reich: Leisler's Rebellion. A Study of Democracy in New York, 1674-1720. University of Chicago Press, Chicago IL 1953.
  • Claudia Schnurmann : The reconstruction of an Atlantic network. The example of Jakob Leisler, 1660–1691. An edition project. In: Yearbook for European Overseas History. Volume 2, 2002, pp. 19-39, ISSN  1436-6371 (description of the international project, funded by the German Research Foundation, of a two-volume source edition of documents from Jakob Leisler's environment).
  • Antonia Kolb: Old and new networks of historical research in Europe and America: the Leisler family. In: New magazine for Hanau history. Announcements from the Hanau History Association. 2006, ZDB -ID 535233-2 , pp. 117-138.
  • Hermann Wellenreuther : decline and rise. History of North America from the beginning of settlement to the end of the 17th century (= history of North America in an Atlantic perspective from the beginning to the present , Volume 1). Lit, Hamburg a. a. 2000, ISBN 3-8258-4447-1 , pp. 543-545: The rise and fall of Jakob Leisler.
  • Hermann Wellenreuther (Ed.): Jacob Leisler's Atlantic World in the Later Seventeenth Century. Essays on Religion, Militia, Trade, and Networks (= Atlantic Cultural Studies , Volume 8). Lit, Berlin a. a. 2009, ISBN 978-3-643-10324-6 .
  • Leisler, Jacob . In: James Grant Wilson, John Fiske (Eds.): Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography . tape 3 : Grinnell - Lockwood . D. Appleton and Company, New York 1887, p. 681 (English, full text [ Wikisource ]).
  • Jakob Leisler . In: German-American history sheets 1913. P. 149 f.

Leisler as a literary figure

  • Curt Langenbeck: The traitor. Tragic drama . Albert Langen / Georg Müller, Munich 1938.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Leisler, Jakob
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American colonialist of German descent
DATE OF BIRTH around 1640
PLACE OF BIRTH Bockenheim
DATE OF DEATH May 17, 1691
Place of death new York