Jan Jacobs (politician)

Jan Jacobs (born December 9, 1818 in Neue Piccardie , Grafschaft Bentheim , Kingdom of Hanover ; † May 21, 1886 in Berlin , Kingdom of Prussia , German Empire ), was a German bog colonist and politician. From 1885 to 1886 he was a member of the Prussian House of Representatives in Berlin.

Life

Jan Jacobs (by whose name the variations Jan Jakobs and Jann Jacobs are also known) was born on December 9, 1818 in the New Piccardie moor colony , in the south of the Bourtanger moor . His parents were Jan Hindrik Snieders (1790-1860, also known as Jan Hendrik Schnieders or Snyders ) and his wife Jenne Jacobs (1797-1839), who had married in 1818. Jan Hindrik Snieders took on the name Jacobs when they married because Jenne Jacobs was her father's heir and Jan Hindrik married into her colonist position.

Jacobs attended the Dutch-language elementary school in the New Piccardie. The official and church language in the Lower County of Bentheim at that time was Dutch. The everyday language of the moor colonists, however, was Grafschafter Platt . Jacobs learned the standard of German by himself.

The Neue Piccardie belonged to the parish of Veldhausen, so the residents had to travel a long and arduous way to the church services through impassable moor. In 1862 Jacobs gave a speech in Neuenhaus on the occasion of the visit of King George V of Hanover and asked the monarch for a donation for the construction of his own church in the Neue Piccardie. The king granted the donation and out of gratitude the residents renamed the Neue Piccardie to Georgsdorf in the same year. However, since the money collected and donated was insufficient for the construction, Jacobs traveled to Berlin in 1866 to ask King Wilhelm I of Prussia , to whose country Georgsdorf belonged after the annexation of Hanover, for a donation. Wilhelm I also accepted the request. The new church building was completed in 1866.

Jacobs was an active member of the Evangelical Reformed Church. He was a church council and as a lay preacher and catechesant. In addition, the board member of the district synod, member of the regional church council and delegate of the county of Bentheim at the Aurich Synod in 1881, which created the structures for today's Evangelical Reformed Church in northwest Germany .

From 1866 until his death, Jacobs was the mayor of the community and from 1874 a registrar in Georgsdorf. In the 1870s he was a member of the district council of the Lingen-Bentheim steering committee . In 1873, 1876, 1879, 1882 and 1885 he was elected elector for the indirect primary elections to the Prussian House of Representatives. On November 5, 1885, the Protestant Jacobs was elected a member of the Prussian House of Representatives (commonly known as a member of the state parliament ) with the support of the Catholic Center Party . The choice of a simple farmer caused quite a stir at the time. The beginning of the electoral period was on January 14, 1886. Jacobs joined the agrarian Protestant German conservative party . He was particularly committed to the construction of canals in the moor and the financial support of poor communities by the state. His parliamentary activity was short-lived, as he died six months after the election, on May 21, 1886 in Berlin of complications from pneumonia. Jacobs was 67 years old. His body was transferred to Georgsdorf and buried in the local cemetery.

From his marriage to Gese, b. Kluthe (1822-1892, also called Geeze and Kloeten or Kluten ), whom he married on April 26, 1846 in the Evangelical Reformed Church in Veldhausen, had six children: Jenne (1847-1877) and Jan Hendrik (1850-1851 ), Jan Hendrik (1852–1854), Janna (1858–1895), Jan Hendrik (1861–1893, also called Jan Hindrik ) and an unnamed daughter (* / † 1865). Only three children reached adulthood.

The Jan-Jacob Street in George village was named after him.

literature

• Helmut Lensing: Article: Jann Jacobs , in: Emsländische Geschichte, Volume 8, Haselünne 2000., pp. 205–210.
• Helmut Lensing: Jann Jacobs - A Georgsdorfer in the Prussian House of Representatives, in: Bentheimer Jahrbuch 1996 (Das Bentheimer Land, Volume 135), Bad Bentheim 1995, SS 151-174.
• Helmut Lensing: Jann Jacobs, champion for his homeland. Grafschafter member of the Prussian state parliament, in: DG 2/1996, Nordhorn 1996, p. 8.
• Helmut Lensing: Intrepid Georgsdorf community leader. Jan Jacobs - A rural lobbyist in the 19th century, in: Bentheimer Jahrbuch 2014 (Das Bentheimer Land, Volume 215), Nordhorn 2013, pp. 139–154.
• Karl Naber: Jan Jacobs. A pioneer in the history of the cultivation and settlement of the Bentheim high moor, in: Der Grafschafter, Episode 117, 11/1962, Nordhorn 1962, pp. 941–942.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Jan Jacobs in the online local family book Georgsdorf , accessed on September 26, 2017.
2. ↑ Jan Jacobs in the online local family book Veldhausen , accessed on September 26, 2017.