Kort Kamphues

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Kort Kamphues (* 1530 in Winterswijk ; † December 9, 1578 in Bevergern ), in a different spelling also Kord ("Konrad") or Cord Kamphuis or Kamphus , sometimes with the title of nobility from or van Kamphus , was a notorious Coesfeld city ​​judge who the He was accused of mugging and arson in his hometown, fell out of favor and was eventually executed . He is considered the most colorful figure in Coesfeld's history.

Life

Origin and family relationships

Kort Kamphue's parents Johann and Maria Kamphues lived on a cottage in the Meddo peasantry near the Dutch town of Winterswijk. His mother came from the Rave family in Münsterland and was a great-granddaughter of Friedrich Rave, the former mayor of Coesfeld and in turn predecessor of Kort Kamphues in the office of Coesfeld city judge. Kort Kamphues saw the light of day in 1530. His siblings were named Reinhold (Reiner), Adelheid, Henrike, Gertrud and Anna. He was married to Margarethe von Berll, the marriage was concluded in 1552 at the latest. With Margarethe Kamphues had three sons, Wilhelm (* approx. 1552), Johann (* approx. 1555) and Friedrich (* approx. 1556), as well as two daughters named Margarethe (* 1557) and Maria (* 1561). Kort Kamphues' wife Margarethe died before 1574. After her death he took Margarethe Lohaus in as housekeeper and housekeeper, who also shared the camp with him.

City judge of Coesfeld

On February 8, 1553, the Prince-Bishop of Münster, Franz von Waldeck, appointed Kort Kamphues as Coesfeld city judge, although his qualification for this office was in doubt due to a previously committed manslaughter . A week later, on February 15, 1553, Kamphues received civil rights in the city. In Coesfeld he lived in Rosenstrasse between 1557 and 1562, but in 1565 he moved with his children and his lover Margarethe Lohaus to the Brink, which was within the Stadthagens (a Landwehr surrounding the town ) but outside the so-called "Fredepkolle" and thus outside the Coesfeld jurisdiction at the gates of the city. As a city judge, he thereby violated the residence obligation imposed on him , according to which he had to live within the city limits. This led to a dispute with the city officials. Further disputes concerned the unlawful erection of a fence near his house in the Gaupeler Mark, quarrels with his neighbor Joachim Meiners, which involved assault, trespassing and rights of way, and various other crimes. Kamphues' sons, who were decried as brawls, were also involved. In this environment, the city of Coesfeld tried unsuccessfully in 1569 to have Kort Kamphues removed from the judge's office.

Final break with the city

In order to improve his economic situation, Kamphues recruited mercenaries for the Spanish crown in the war against the Netherlands in 1572 . He gathered the troops on June 2, 1572 for the march to Arnhem in Coesfeld. In response to this provocation, the Coesfeld authorities locked the city gates and locked Kamphues and his mercenaries in the city. Kamphues and his men escaped over the walls and moat of the city. After this breach of the peace , Kamphues was denied civil rights and prohibited from staying within the fredepiles. At the latest with this, his activity as a city judge was de facto at an end, although Kamphues also later spoke of himself as a city judge.

Alleged raids by the Kamphues clan

In his history of the city of Coesfeld, Bernhard Sökeland reports on raids that Kort Kamphues and his colleagues began as a result of the economic decline. From today's perspective, this picture cannot be maintained. However Kamphues and his sons were the mercenary leader Martin Schenk von Nideggen suggests that for arson and looting was known. They were not only on friendly terms with him, but also on a family level, because Schenk's sister Maria Margaretha was married to an Adrian von Kamphausen. Johann and Wilhelm Kamphues were also involved in Schenk's illegal storming of Bleijenbeek Castle in 1576.

Arson attack on Coesfeld in 1578

It has also not been proven whether and to what extent Kort Kamphues was involved in the arson attack on Coesfeld that was carried out in 1578, but ultimately foiled. From today's point of view, the main culprit is his son Wilhelm. During this attack, fires broke out in various Coesfeld houses on Tuesday, March 18, 1578, after the beggar Trude Bosekers was caught two days earlier trying to attach a threatening letter to the house of the new city judge Goddert von Merveldt. Under the torture, she confessed that she was supposed to deliver the letter on behalf of the Kamphues clan. On March 19, 1578, Maria Kamphues, Margarethe Lohaus and the servant Hinrich von Cologne were arrested on entering the city.

Persecution, lawsuits, judgments

After the failed arson attack, Kamphues and his sons left Coesfeld's surroundings; Margarethe Kamphues was arrested. The volatile Kort Kamphues was picked up on June 19, 1578 near Bocholt. Since Coesfeld was out of the question as the place of jurisdiction for such a well-known personality because the city was involved in the process, Kamphues was brought to Bevergern via Südlohn and Ahaus . There he was tried for breach of the peace; he was not tried against him because of arson and highway robbery. A confession was extracted from Kamphues under torture , whereupon he was sentenced to death at the stake. On December 9th, 1578 Kamphues died - after he had been pardoned for death by the sword - in Bevergern at the hand of the executioner . In a will, written the day before the execution, he revoked all the confessions he had confessed under torture.

Andreas Sonderhaus , a kind of late medieval bounty hunter, was commissioned to pursue Kamphues' sons . Wilhelm Kamphues and his cousin Johann von Clarholz were tracked down by Sonderhaus in 's-Hertogenbosch and imprisoned there. After four years of tactical scrambling for extradition to Coesfeld or Ahaus, both were transferred to Bevergern, where they were ultimately released on the intercession of relatives and after they had sworn primal feuds . Johann Kamphues died on August 28, 1583 in Emmerich , where Sonderhaus tracked him down and fatally injured him. His sisters Margarethe and Maria, imprisoned in Coesfeld, were released from Coesfeld prison in the spring of 1581. The youngest son Friedrich successfully evaded arrest; his further fate is unknown.

The stepmother Margaretha Lohaus was less fortunate. She was - like Trude Bosekers and Engel Lodding, who delivered threatening letters and placed fuses - burned alive on the Brink. Margaretha Lohaus' sister Anna von Gescher was beheaded with the sword. The maid Aleke Bundthove and Johann von Gescher preferred suicide to further torture. The servant Hinrich von Spaek suffered a particularly cruel fate, he was quartered alive .

Kamphues dagger

Replica of the Kamphues dagger

The so-called Kamphues dagger is an art-historically significant dagger . It was probably made between 1300 and 1335 and is one of only five known gothic pompous daggers worldwide, all of which were made with a handle from elephant or narwhal ivory . Its scabbard bears the coat of arms of the noble lords of Ahaus . It is believed that the dagger was commissioned by members of this Westphalian noble family. Whether and to what extent he can actually be associated with Kort Kamphues is unknown and rather unlikely; The dagger named after him is definitely not found in the list of objects confiscated from Kamphues. The Coesfeld City Archives have had the dagger at least since 1717.

In 1879 the city sold the dagger together with a bronze aquamanile for 13,000 marks to the Bourgeois brothers (Cologne) and used the proceeds to purchase the municipal gas works, a forerunner of the Coesfeld municipal utility . After almost 130 years in which nothing was known about his whereabouts, Rudy von Graes found him in 2007 in the Benjamin de Rothschild collection in Pregny Castle on Lake Geneva . A replica is now in the possession of the city of Coesfeld. It shows the dagger as it looked at the time it was sold. The replica is exhibited in the city museum in the Walkenbrückentor .

Literature and film adaptation

In 1919, director Richard Kirsch made a silent film entitled Kord Kamphues, the judge of Coesfeld . Karl Bernhard played the main role. The film was produced by Cela-Film GmbH . The historical novel Kord Kamphues by Felix Ernst Corsepius , which was published in Leipzig a year later, served as a template for the script . The film is considered lost.

literature

  • Kurt Fischer: Kort Kamphus, judge in Coesfeld. (= Contributions to Coesfeld history and folklore. Issue 4). Published by the Heimatverein Coesfeld e. V., 1963.
  • Bernhard Sökeland : History of the city of Coesfeld . 1839 ( full text in the Google book search).
  • Erwin Dickhoff: Coesfeld Biographies. (= Contributions to Coesfeld history and folklore. Volume 8). Published by the Heimatverein Coesfeld e. V. im Ardey Verlag, Münster 2002, ISBN 3-87023-248-X , pp. 120f.
  • Norbert Damberg: The dagger of Cord Kamphues (=  publications from the Coesfeld town archive . Volume 2 ). Coesfeld 2010, ISBN 978-3-00-037677-7  ( formally incorrect ) .

Web links

Footnotes and individual references

  1. ^ Wilhelm Rave: The time of the patricians. (PDF; 199 kB) In: The history of the Westphalian family Rave. 1948, p. 27 , accessed April 19, 2011 .
  2. ^ Kurt Fischer: Kort Kamphus, judge in Coesfeld. (= Contributions to Coesfeld history and folklore. Issue 4). Published by the Heimatverein Coesfeld e. V., 1963, pp. 7 and 10.
  3. ^ Kurt Fischer: Kort Kamphus, judge in Coesfeld. (= Contributions to Coesfeld history and folklore. Issue 4). Published by the Heimatverein Coesfeld e. V., 1963, p. 16.
  4. ^ Kurt Fischer: Kort Kamphus, judge in Coesfeld. (= Contributions to Coesfeld history and folklore. Issue 4). Published by the Heimatverein Coesfeld e. V., 1963, pp. 18f.
  5. ^ Erwin Dickhoff: Coesfeld Biographies. (= Contributions to Coesfeld history and folklore. Volume 8). Published by the Heimatverein Coesfeld e. V. im Ardey Verlag, Münster 2002, ISBN 3-87023-248-X , pp. 120f
  6. ↑ A document in the Coesfeld city archive dated September 9, 1551 reports that Kamphues was obliged to compensate the widow of Johann Albert zu Winterswijk, who was slain by him, cf. Kurt Fischer: Kort Kamphus, judge in Coesfeld. (= Contributions to Coesfeld history and folklore. Issue 4). Published by the Heimatverein Coesfeld e. V., 1963, p. 15.
  7. ^ A b Bernhard Sökeland : History of the city of Coesfeld . 1839 ( full text in the Google book search).
  8. ^ Kurt Fischer: Kort Kamphus, judge in Coesfeld. (= Contributions to Coesfeld history and folklore. Issue 4). Published by the Heimatverein Coesfeld e. V., 1963, p. 21 fn. 17.
  9. ↑ Sökeland cites the reason that one of Kamphues' sons should be arrested for an attack on a Coesfeld citizen, cf. Bernhard Sökeland : History of the city of Coesfeld . 1839, p. 103 ( full text in Google Book Search).
  10. ^ The term of office of Kort Kamphues as city judge is given in the three-volume city history as March 13, 1553 - April 6, 1571, cf. Monika M. Schulte: Coesfeld 1197-1997 . Contributions to 800 years of urban history. Ed .: Norbert Damberg. 1st edition. tape 1 . Ardey-Verlag, Münster 1999, ISBN 3-87023-140-8 , rule and administration in a late medieval city: Coesfeld between 1320 and 1600, p. 124 .
  11. ^ Kurt Fischer: Kort Kamphus, judge in Coesfeld. (= Contributions to Coesfeld history and folklore. Issue 4). Published by the Heimatverein Coesfeld e. V., 1963, pp. 27-28.
  12. ↑ The alleged misdeeds stem from the confession of the servant Hinrich von Köln, who as a key witness with various confessions and as one of the few involved, ultimately got away with his life, cf. Kurt Fischer: Kort Kamphus, judge in Coesfeld. (= Contributions to Coesfeld history and folklore. Issue 4). Published by the Heimatverein Coesfeld e. V., 1963, p. 27. The other family members vehemently denied that the father was entangled (ibid, p. 36), but Wilhelm was mentioned several times as the author (ibid, p. 38).
  13. ^ Kurt Fischer: Kort Kamphus, judge in Coesfeld. (= Contributions to Coesfeld history and folklore. Issue 4). Published by the Heimatverein Coesfeld e. V., 1963, pp. 28-31.
  14. ^ Kurt Fischer: Kort Kamphus, judge in Coesfeld. (= Contributions to Coesfeld history and folklore. Issue 4). Published by the Heimatverein Coesfeld e. V., 1963, pp. 30-38.
  15. ^ For Sonderhaus (also called Sunders or Sunderhaus in another spelling ), who was not allowed to enter the Principality of Münster due to manslaughter, this offered the opportunity to return legally to his home town of Coesfeld. He opened an inn there, whose dubious clientele included muggers, with whom he made common cause. After an ambush he had planned on mounted merchants, whom he pretended to be accompanying to Bocholt, he was arrested and sentenced to death in 1588. See Bernhard Sökeland : History of the City of Coesfeld . 1839, p. 110 ( full text in Google book search).
  16. ↑ Referred to as Johann van Halen in Sökeland's town history .
  17. ^ Kurt Fischer: Kort Kamphus, judge in Coesfeld. (= Contributions to Coesfeld history and folklore. Issue 4). Published by the Heimatverein Coesfeld e. V., 1963, pp. 38-47.
  18. ^ Kurt Fischer: Kort Kamphus, judge in Coesfeld. (= Contributions to Coesfeld history and folklore. Issue 4). Published by the Heimatverein Coesfeld e. V., 1963, p. 48.
  19. ↑ Sökeland reports on several other death sentences, cf. Bernhard Sökeland : History of the city of Coesfeld . 1839 ( full text in the Google book search).
  20. ^ Norbert Damberg: The dagger of Cord Kamphues (=  publications from the Coesfeld town archive . Volume 2 ). Coesfeld 2010, ISBN 978-3-00-037677-7  ( formally incorrect ) , p. 6th f .
  21. ↑ When searching, it was originally assumed that the dagger bears the quartered, black and white coat of arms of the Lords of Graes . The coat of arms on the dagger, however, was red and yellow and could be assigned to the noble lords of Ahaus. Cf. Norbert Damberg: Der Dolch des Cord Kamphues (=  publications from the Coesfeld town archive . Volume 2 ). Coesfeld 2010, ISBN 978-3-00-037677-7  ( formally incorrect ) , p. 1 ff .
  22. ↑ Kamphues dagger was back in Coesfeld's hands after 130 years. (URL) (No longer available online.) City of Coesfeld (press archive), January 26, 2009, archived from the original on June 1, 2016 ; Retrieved April 16, 2011 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.coesfeld.de
  23. ↑ Robert Klein: Kamphues dagger: "A symbol for the communal economic power". (PDF) (No longer available online.) Sparkasse Westmünsterland, September 15, 2010, archived from the original on June 1, 2016 ; Retrieved April 14, 2011 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.coesfeld.de
  24. ↑ Kord Kamphues, the judge von Coesfeld in the Internet Movie Database (English)
  25. ↑ Information on Corsepius' novel Kord Kamphues from the German National Library
  26. ↑ The Eternal Robber. (PDF; 484 kB) (No longer available online.) In: Pro Coesfelder Rundschau No. 2. Independent voter community Pro Coesfeld e. V., August 22, 2005, p. 8 , archived from the original on June 21, 2015 ; Retrieved April 16, 2011 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.pro-coesfeld.de
personal data
SURNAME Kamphues, Kort
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Kamphuis, cord; Kamphus, cord
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Coesfeld city judge, executed for breach of the peace
DATE OF BIRTH 1530
PLACE OF BIRTH Winterswijk
DATE OF DEATH December 9, 1578
Place of death Bevergern