Karl August von Malchus

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Karl August Malchus around 1800

Baron Karl August von Malchus (born September 27, 1770 in Mannheim , † October 24, 1840 in Heidelberg ) was a German statesman and political science writer .

Career

Malchus grew up in Zweibrücken , where his father was bailiff of the ducal castles and at the same time was in charge of the manorial buildings of the residence of Duke Charles II August von Zweibrücken . Since he was ten, Malchus attended the local high school. In autumn 1785 he moved to the grammar school in Mannheim and began studying in Heidelberg in autumn 1787. He chose political science and camera science as a subject. In addition, he did law studies in Heidelberg and Göttingen , where he moved in autumn 1789, and diplomacy under the guidance of Johann Christoph Gatterer . In 1790, even before he had finished his studies, he became the private secretary of Count Clemens August von Westphalen zu Fürstenberg (1754-1818), who was Minister of State of the Archbishopric of Mainz . Graf Westphalen was appointed imperial minister at the court of the Elector of Trier in Koblenz and of the Elector of Cologne in Bonn and of the Westphalian Circle . Malchus remained at his side as the legation secretary. The double relationship of the imperial court, as head of the empire and as the house power of the Habsburg hereditary lands , the stay of the French princes in Koblenz, the First Coalition War that broke out soon afterwards , the relations with the general command of the imperial armies and many other circumstances were faced by the Count Westphalen led legation made one of the most important in the whole empire. Correspondence with the imperial court, with the imperial and district director's envoy, as well as with the other electoral courts went through the hand of Malchus, and on the other hand his position in 1794 and 1795 brought him into personal contact with the headquarters of General Charles Joseph de Croix, comte de Clerfait . In 1792 he attended the coronation of Franz II as emperor, in the same year also the election of Franciscus-Antonius de Méan as Prince-Bishop of Liège , in 1793 the Lower Rhine-Westphalian district convention in Cologne and in 1794 the election of Ferdinand von Lüninck as bishop in Corvey . In 1795 he accompanied the Minister Clemens August von Westphalen to Lower Saxony , and in autumn to Vienna . In March 1796 he returned to Hildesheim . With the dismissal of the minister, the activity of Malchus as his legation secretary came to an end, since the political circumstances had paralyzed the effectiveness of the legation. During this time Malchus began to publish treatises on financial issues.

Friendship with Beethoven

During the months that Malchus spent in Bonn, he became one of the closest friends of the young Ludwig van Beethoven . This is particularly evidenced by the entry that Malchus made in Beethoven's register on October 24, 1792. He closes with the words: “Heaven, my dearly beloved, bind our hearts with an indissoluble bond - and only death can separate them. - Give me your hand, my dear, and so to the goal of life. Your Malchus ”. Beethoven's friends in Bonn created the studbook and presented it to the composer as a souvenir when he moved to Vienna in early November 1792.

On November 2, 1793, Beethoven wrote from Vienna to his friend Eleonore von Breuning in Bonn: “If you should see B. [abette] Koch, I ask her to tell her that it is not nice not even to write to me about her . I wrote 2 times, I wrote to Malchus 3 times and - no answer, tell her that if she doesn't want to write, she should at least urge Malchus to do so. "

Later Malchus probably used his influence when Beethoven was called to Kassel. Beethoven was to take over the position of court conductor there in 1809 as the successor to Johann Friedrich Reichardt .

Hildesheim Cathedral Secretary

At the beginning of 1799, Malchus was elected cathedral secretary and treasury actuary by the Hildesheim cathedral chapter and soon afterwards also appointed court judge. As cathedral secretary he had to do with the asset management of the cathedral chapter, as treasury actuary he was its legal representative in landscape matters. As a result of the secularization of the Principality of Hildesheim and its incorporation into the Kingdom of Prussia on August 1, 1802, the Prussian government appointed him a member of the Special Organizing Commission soon after the principality had taken possession. It fell to Malchus to abolish the monasteries and monasteries. In July 1803, the Prussian government appointed him real war and domain councilor at the Chamber in Halberstadt. After the lost battle of Jena , he conducted negotiations with the French government, which resulted in considerably easing the occupation burden for his province.

Westphalian State Councilor and Minister

Malchus was now aiming for the prefecture of the Saale department in the newly founded Kingdom of Westphalia . Instead, he received his appointment to the Westphalian State Council on January 9, 1808. In April 1808 he was appointed general director of taxes and in May 1808 at the same time general liquidator of the state debt and general director of the amortization fund. Due to differences in content with the Westphalian finance minister Hans Graf von Bülow , he resigned the general directorate of the national debt and the amortization fund in June 1809. When Malchus returned from a trip to Paris on April 7, 1811 , he succeeded Bülow's finance minister and, from October 1813, also became interior minister. At the end of October 1813, after the occupation of the Kingdom of Westphalia, he accompanied King Jérôme to Paris and stayed there until he was dismissed from the king's service after the peace of Paris was concluded. He returned to Germany and took up residence in Heidelberg to devote himself to his studies and publications.

Württemberg Finance Minister

An opportunity for renewed statesmanship opened up for him with the accession to the throne of King Wilhelm of Württemberg , a brother-in-law of the overthrown King Jerome. On November 10, 1817, Malchus was appointed head of the finance department in Württemberg, where he immediately developed a very extensive and varied activity. He reformed the state forestry, tried to partially reduce the base load, initiated the establishment of the agricultural academy in Hohenheim , took care of the improvement of the equipment at the University of Tübingen and countered the traditional power of the Württemberg clerkship. After only one year he was removed from his office in Stuttgart on September 5, 1818 for reasons that are not clear .

Private citizen

Now Malchus returned to Heidelberg, where he continued to work as a writer until his death. Long plagued by an asthmatic condition, he died of a stroke on October 24, 1840 in Heidelberg. Malchus left a family with a daughter and three sons. The sons were officers in the Württemberg army .

Fonts

  • About the matricular system of the Lower Rhine-Westphalian district , 1793
  • About the verification of the archducal Austrian envoys with those of the electors of the Holy Roman Empire , 1794
  • Anti-Fragments , 1795
  • On the transfer of the debts of the countries on the left bank of the Rhine to the right bank demanded by France , 1798
  • Something about the Hildesheim peasant trial , 1799
  • Something about the Accise , 1799
  • About the Hochstift-Hildesheim State Administration , 1800
  • About the legality of the exclusion from the state parliament and the members of the Paderborn knighthood who are not capable of revolting , 1801
  • About the administration of the finances of the Kingdom of Westphalia, especially since April 1811, by Count Malchus von Marienrode, former finance minister in the same , Stuttgart-Tübingen 1814.
  • Autobiography . In: Friedrich August Koethe (Ed.): Contemporaries. Biographies and characteristics . Volume 1, part 3. Leipzig-Altenburg 1816, pp. 159–176
  • The Organization of Authorities for State Administration , 2 vol., 1821
  • Politics of Internal State Administration , 2 vol., 1823
  • Statistics and State Studies , 1826
  • Handbuch der Finanzwissenschaft und Finanzverwaltung , 2 vol., 1830
  • Handbook of Military Geography , 2 vols., 1833
  • The savings banks in Europe , 1838

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ The family books of Beethoven and Babette Koch , ed. by Max Braubach , 2nd edition, Bonn 1995, p. 5
  2. ^ Ludwig van Beethoven, Correspondence. Complete edition , ed. by Sieghard Brandenburg , Volume 1, Munich 1996, No. 11
  3. ^ Klaus Martin Kopitz , Beethoven's appointment to Kassel at the court of Jérôme Bonaparte . A search for traces , in: Die Tonkunst , Vol. 5, No. 3 from July 2011, pp. 134–143
predecessor Office successor
Christian Friedrich von Otto Head of the Department of Finance in the Privy Council of Württemberg
1817-1818 		Ferdinand Heinrich August von Weckherlin
personal data
SURNAME Malchus, Karl August von
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German statesman and political science writer
DATE OF BIRTH September 27, 1770
PLACE OF BIRTH Mannheim
DATE OF DEATH October 24, 1840
Place of death Heidelberg