Jacquier & Securius
Jacquier & Securius is the name of a private bank that existed from 1817 to 1945. Their seat was the Red Castle, An der Stechbahn , in the center of Berlin .
history
Foundation and development (1817–1872)
The Jacquier & Securius Bank was founded on August 11, 1817 by Friedrich Wilhelm Jacquier and John August Securius. Both founders had previously worked together at the Huguenot bank L. Guillemot and FW Jacquier and acted as senior partners and treasurers. Since 1833 at the latest, the location had been on An der Stechbahn, opposite the Berlin Palace , only about 10 minutes from the Berlin Stock Exchange . Initially, the bank's main customers were small and medium-sized companies whose money was invested in fixed income securities . Later there was an increasing diversification and investments in industrial companies . In 1867, the old bank on Stechbahn 1/2 was renewed with a four-story residential and commercial building.
The golden years (1872–1933)
After the founding of the Reich , the bank founded a subsidiary in 1872, the Berliner Handels- und Börsenbank, with the management of the then 22-year-old Jewish banker Hermann Frenkel as "Senior Manager". After this branch bank was liquidated on July 1, 1878 , Frenkel was taken over by Jacquier & Securius along with a few other employees. Frenkel became one of the three partners of the bank and was the leading figure until 1902. Jacquier's involvement, on the other hand, had grown weaker with age, and Securius had given his share of the bank's fortune to a close friend, Sigismund Samuel.
In November 1902, Hermann Frenkel bought his partners' shares with a capital investment of around 900,000 German gold marks . He hired two junior partners, Eugene Panofsky (1855-1922) and Albert Pinkuss. Panofsky had started as a cashier at Jacquier & Securius in 1875 , was politically active and sat on the boards of a number of community committees. Impressed by his political clout, Frenkel recognized his value as a potential partner and quickly promoted him. Pinkuss, Frenkel's brother-in-law, was a pioneer of German hard coal mining with an estimated fortune of 8,100,000 gold marks. In 1918 Arthur Frenkel, Hermann Frenkel's eldest son, became a partner. After Albert Pinkuss's death in 1919, Arthur Frenkel's brother Erich and the Czech banker Max Landesmann (1884–1972), to whose niece Panowski was married, were accepted as partners. The banking house Jacquier & Securius also gained importance as the German interest group for the Czech lignite and heavy industry group Petschek . In 1924, Alfred Panofsky took over his father's position in the bank. After six years of mediocre success, Arthur Frenkel gave his share of the profits to his younger brother Erich in December 1925.
Before that, Friedrich Minoux had invested one million gold marks in 1923 to become a partner of Jacquier & Securius and to secure liquidity for his various business interests. This sum made up about a quarter of the bank's capital. During his time as a partner of the bank, Minoux participated in a 150 million dollar project to build canals in Constantinople . In addition, a consortium of other banks led by Minoux, Jacquier & Securius secured a majority stake in the cigarette manufacturer August Batschari . On January 31, 1931, Minoux sold his shares in Jacquier & Securius, but kept his offices in the bank's headquarters.
During National Socialism (1933–1945)
In January 1933, the Jacquier & Securius bank had three owners of Jewish descent: Frenkel, Landesmann and Panowski. Adolf Hitler's rise to power in 1933 led to serious political, economic and social changes and, in particular, to systematic social and economic discrimination against the Jewish population in Germany. However, the need to maintain a solid banking system initially kept the owners of Jacquier & Securius from facing any acute threat until the mid-1930s. Nevertheless, even the “appropriate” conditions demanded by politicians were sufficient to convince Erich Frenkel that “Germany has no future”.
In the summer of 1933, Jacquier & Securius were forced by the incumbent government to find a new partner. Gerhard Ueltzen became the new partner of the bank, although according to all information he turned out to be "not very reliable". Max Landesmann was asked to leave the company on September 1, 1933, which he did. Alfred Panofsky, the son of former partner Eugene Panofsky, was banned from management for a few months. In addition, the Reichsbank demanded the integration of another “ Aryan ” partner into the bank. This time, however, the Jewish bankers were allowed to choose this new partner themselves and chose Robert Kraus.
In 1936, parts of the bank building at An der Stechbahn were lowered, so that the central building had to be demolished.
Alfred Panofsky and Erich Frenkel wanted to emigrate and tried to sell their shares in Jacquier & Securius from the beginning of 1937, which turned out to be difficult. Finally, an agreement was reached with Robert Kraus and Richard Lenz (1878-1953). Lenz was very successful in the five years after Hitler came to power. He was a member of the NSDAP and had used his connections to Friedrich Reinhart , the President of the Berlin Chamber of Commerce and Industry and a supporter of the authoritarian government, to turn the banking house Richard Lenz und Co., founded in 1911, into a prosperous company. On March 1, 1938 Richard Lenz and Robert Kraus took over the claims and liabilities for 3,600,000 Reichsmarks and the name Jacquier & Securius. The old bank was renamed Alfred Panofsky and Co. in liquidation .
The new Jacquier & Securius bank urgently needed start-up capital in order to remain liquid in the short term. This was provided in part by Deutsche Bank , which put in a million Reichsmarks in a silent investment. Another half a million Reichsmarks came from Richard Lenz. The negotiations on behalf of Deutsche Bank were conducted by Hermann Josef Abs and Eduard Mosler . The state participated through the Reich Credit Commissioner Friedrich Ernst . Richard Lenz tried to take advantage of the situation and bought five more small Jewish banks under the name Jacquier & Securius the next year. Unfortunately for Lenz and Kraus, the vast majority of the acquired customers were also Jewish, and many became impoverished due to the anti-Semitic laws and ordinances passed by the National Socialists . By 1938, a third of the original Jacquier & Securius shares had been lost. Even after that, at least five Jewish employees worked for Jacquier & Securius in “Aryan” ownership. One of them was able to hide his identity until 1943, well into the Second World War . This illegal employment of Jewish employees by Lenz and Kraus under the prevailing laws brought them a considerable risk of being denounced as sympathizers. In 1945 the business was finally stopped and the Deutsche Bank paid off by releasing equity . The bank building was destroyed by bombs.
Claims for damages (from 1945)
Immediately after the end of World War II, legal proceedings began between Lenz's heirs and the Jewish banking families living in the USA. Finally, an agreement was reached in 1964 according to which Lenz paid the families 35,000 DM in compensation. Erich Frenkel died on January 4, 1967 in West Babylon, Suffolk County , New York . Alfred Panofsky died on January 22, 1973 in Tucson , Pima County , Arizona .
After the reunification of Germany , the heirs of Lenz and Kraus fought over a payment of 100,000 DM, which Kraus had paid back to the bank in 1941. Far greater demands than these concerned the private property of the three Jewish banking families. Of particular interest are the compensation for the physical estate of Hermann Frenkel and some paintings (including one by Bartolomé Esteban Murillo and one by Adriaen van de Velde ), which, according to his wishes, were supposed to be kept at the bank's headquarters in the Red Castle.
literature
- Monika Fraser: The private banker: Niche strategies in past and present , Steiner-Verlag, Stuttgart , 2001, ISBN 3-515-08311-1
- Harold James : The Deutsche Bank and the Nazi economic war against the Jews, Cambridge University Press , Cambridge , England, 2000, ISBN 0-521-80329-2 Google Books
- Henning Kahmann: The bankers by Jacquier and Securius 1933-1945, a legal-historical case study on the 'Aryanization' of a Berlin bank , with a foreword by John Kornblum . Peter Lang Publishing Group , Frankfurt am Main , 2002, ISBN 9783631389874
- Benedikt Koehler: Review note on the book by Henning Kahmann, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , Frankfurt, April 22, 2003
- Ingo Köhler: The "Aryanization" of the private banks in the Third Reich: repression, elimination and the question of reparation, CH Beck , Munich, 2005, 602 S., ISBN 9783406532009
- Christoph Kreutzmüller: Eugen Panofsky: (1855-1922), Berlin banker, city councilor and city elder , Hentrich & Hentrich , Teetz 2007, ISBN 3-938485-60-4
- Steven Lehrer: Wannsee House and the Holocaust , McFarland, Jefferson, North Carolina , 2000, ISBN 978-0-7864-0792-7
- Steven Lehrer: Hitler Sites: A City-by-city Guidebook (Austria, Germany, France, United States) , McFarland, Jefferson, North Carolina, 2002, 224 pp. ISBN 0-7864-1045-0 ( Google Books )
- Gerhard Schulz : Between Democracy and Dictatorship: Constitutional Policy and Reich Reform in the Weimar Republic Walter de Gruyter , Berlin, 1992, ISBN 3-11-013525-6