Le Fort (noble family)

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Coat of arms of the Barons le Fort

Le Fort , also Lefort (the Strong), originally Lifforti is the name of a native to Piedmont originating Geneva patrician family and one of them derived Mecklenburg and Pomeranian noble family.

history

François le Fort

Legend of origin

According to a family legend, the history of the Lefort family goes back to the Capetians . Robert Le Fort is said to have received the County of Tours from the West Franconian King Charles the Bald with the task of protecting the empire against attacks by the Normans. Robert died in 866 and left his sons Eudes and Robert only a small empire, what was then Neustria . Eudes received the county of Paris in 882 . Because of his military service in the defense of Paris, he was even elected king in 888 by the aristocracy. He was the first Robertine king. His great-nephew Hugo ruled between 987 and 996 and was nicknamed Hugo Capet . All rulers were then named Capetians after him.

According to another tradition, the family is said to come from France. The family was of Norman origin and was fiefdoms of the English kings in Normandy around 1160. Wilhelm le Fort took part in the crusade of King Richard the Lionheart of England, after his return acquired property in northern Italy and in 1229 led a delegation of knights to the court of Emperor Frederick II. He may have been the ancestor of a le Fort de Vallerin who was responsible for the In 1237 he set out for Rome from the island of Cyprus to participate in the disputes between Pope Gregory IX. and to mediate with Emperor Friedrich II. The emperor enfeoffed him with property. Since then, the family belonged to the German imperial nobility. This legend has references to the ancestral legend of the English aristocratic family Fortescue, who consider the Norman knight Richard le Fort as their ancestor, who is said to have saved William the Conqueror's life in the Battle of Hastings in 1066.

In the Saxon diploma for the elevation of Ludwig Carl Le Fort in 1790 to the imperial baron status, it was stated that the ancestors of the impetrant came from Scotland, from there to Piedmont and in 1565 to Geneva. The proven origins of the family are in Cuneo in Piedmont. From here, they fled as Huguenots in the Romandie and then were based in Geneva.

The Mecklenburg family Le Fort

The Mecklenburg family branch of le Fort goes back to Francois / Franz Le Fort , who is probably the most famous member of the entire family to this day.

François Le Fort (1656–1699) was the son of the Geneva merchant Jacques Le Fort. He entered the Russian service as a naval officer in 1680 and in 1694 became admiral of the Russian fleet . Tsar Peter I of Russia raised him on 10 December 1698 by a diploma Baron status with improvement of the ancestral coat of arms in the Russian nobility and barons . Since Tsar Peter I was also the godfather of his son, he derived the family custom of adding the name Peter or Petrea to the other first name for each child of the Le Forts.

His brother, the Geneva State Council Ami Lefort (1635-1719), was in 1698 by Emperor Leopold I in the kingdom knighthood raised. His son Peter (Pierre Chevalier de Le Fort) Le Fort (1676–1754), born in Geneva, inherited his uncle's extensive fortune in Russia. He entered Russian service in 1696 and rose to the position of General and Governor General of Estonia , Livonia and Astrakhan . Tsarina Catherine I appointed him commanding general in 1722. In 1713 he married Elisabeth Justine de Weide, daughter of the Russian general Adam de Weide (n), in Smolensk . In his second marriage in 1717 he married Sophia, daughter of Friedrich von Barner auf Ganzkow and his wife Lucia, née von Jasmund . In 1733 Peter Le Fort took over the Möllenhagen , Marin, Rethwisch, Lehsten, Bocksee and Klockow goods in Mecklenburg. He became the founder of the Mecklenburg family line, whose work then took place in northern Germany. The fact that Friedrich Heinrich von le Fort (1762–1833) employed the young Friedrich Ludwig Jahn as a tutor for his children in Neubrandenburg from 1803 onwards is certainly only a marginal gloss, but had a lasting patriotic and patriotic influence on his sons.

Elector Friedrich August von Sachsen , as imperial vicar with a diploma from September 23, 1790, confirmed the imperial nobility for the great-great-nephew of the admiral, Baron Ludwig (Louis) le Fort (1759–1831) auf Gottin. In 1803 he was inherited from Wendhof with his sons August (1797–1864, later Mecklenburg-Schwerin Chamberlain ) and Karl among the Mecklenburg nobility. While the Le Fort were officially designated with the title of baron in Prussia, it was officially customary in Mecklenburg to designate them with the title of baron.

Many family members served as officers, such as Baron August le Fort in the King's German Legion , and Lothar von le Fort (1831–1902), the father of the poet Gertrud von Le Fort , as a colonel in the Prussian army. His son, Rittmeister Stephan von le Fort (1884–1953), gathered a number of Free Corps fighters from the Baltic States around him in 1920 , and during the Kapp Putsch on March 17, 1920, the city of Waren was under siege. On March 18, 1920, he and his cousin, Reichswehr Lieutenant Peter Alexander von le Fort, had the city bombarded with a cannon and three machine guns from the Galgenberg, with 11 seriously injured and five dead, including a seventeen-year-old girl. After the coup was suppressed, both fled to Munich and Austria. The bullet hole of a grenade in memory of the bombardment can still be seen today on the south side of Waren town hall , and Uwe Johnson processed this event in his novel Anniversaries .

The Boek Family Fideikommiss was dissolved by the Free State of Mecklenburg-Strelitz on the basis of existing laws.

Peter Alexander von Le Fort later became General Secretary of the Organizing Committee of the 1936 Winter Olympics .

The Pomeranian branch

Friedrich Adolf Heinrich von Le Fort, born on April 1, 1801 in Möllenhagen, was the Grand Duke of Mecklenburg-Strelitz Chamberlain and married Elisabeth von Bornstaedt on October 9, 1829 in Retzow. He acquired several estates in Pomerania and became the actual founder of the Pomeranian line of the family. He died in Lassan on July 20, 1875.

In Papendorf, Chamberlain was Baron Peter von Le Fort sen. since 1833 landowner. His son later leased this property to Pulow. The Pulow estate near Lassan was bought in 1843 by the chamberlain, Baron von Le Fort auf Papendorf, who gave the estate to his son Baron Peter von Le Fort in 1856, who had previously served in the 2nd Landwehr Regiment. Around 1928 General Landschaftsrat Baron Friedrich Wilhelm von Lefort (new name spelling) was the owner of the manor on Papendorf with the pertinances Pulow and Klein Jasedow. Until the 1930s he was chairman of the supervisory board of the United Anklam-Friedländer potato starch and flake factory with headquarters in Anklam, the Friedland potato flour and glucose factory, the Pasewalk flake factory and the Gützkow starch and flake factory. Before 1945, the Lefort family was one of the ten largest landowners in Western Pomerania, where they were also a member of the corporate district council of the Greifswald district.

Possessions

Mecklenburg
  • Boek, today part of Rechlin , with Pertinenzien, 1841–1920
  • Gottin with Tellow, today districts of Warnkenhagen , 1790–1795
  • Lehsten, today part of Möllenhagen , before 1755–1802
  • Marin, before 1755–1804 (pledged since 1790)
  • Möllenhagen , before 1755–1831
  • Poppentin, 1802-1853
  • Rethwisch (Möllenhagen), Bocksee ( Ankershagen ) and Klockow ( Groß Dratow ), before 1755–1790
  • Wendhof with part of Poppentin, today both districts of Göhren-Lebbin , pledge 1798, hereditary 1800–1853
Pomerania
  • Papendorf, today the municipality of Lassan , 1833– after 1928
  • Pulow, today the parish of Lassan , 1843–1911
  • Klein Jasedow, today the municipality of Lassan , 1833– after 1928

coat of arms

Family coat of arms

The family coat of arms shows a natural-colored elephant standing in front of a palm tree in a blue shield. Crest apparently unknown. Motto : Fortitudine et fide .

Baron coat of arms

The coat of arms awarded on December 22, 1698 twelve days after the elevation to the Russian baron class for the elevation to the Roman-German imperial knighthood shows in blue a natural-colored elephant with a raised trunk, covered with a golden cover, followed by a black double-headed eagle with golden halos . The elephant carries a wooden-colored tower with three windows (1: 2) on its back. On the crowned helmet with blue-silver covers the double-headed eagle. In 1790, on the occasion of the elevation to the Roman-German imperial baron class, two opposed natural-colored lions were added as shield holders . Historical depictions also show a baron's crown between the shield and helmet .

The coat of arms of the Baron von Lefort auf Pulow, Papendorf and Kl. Jasedow near Lassan in Western Pomerania is part of a coat of arms frieze (coat of arms of 24 landlords and 3 cities) in the Greifswald district house, where he was a member of the district council of the Greifswald district.

Historical coats of arms

Important representatives

Monastery captain Carl Peter Baron von Le Fort

literature

  • Gustav von Lehsten: The nobility of Mecklenburg since the constitutional hereditary comparisons (1755). Rostock 1864, p. 73
  • Genealogisches Handbuch des Adels , Adelslexikon Volume III, Volume 61 of the complete series, CA Starke Verlag Limburg / Lahn 1975, p. 334

Web links

Commons : Le Fort family  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Stadtgeschichtliches Museum Waren (Müritz): On the family history LE FORT. Were 2007.
  2. ↑ Stadtgeschichtliches Museum Waren (Müritz): On the family history LE FORT. Were 2007.
  3. ^ Stephan Baron Le Fort: Typescript . Boek, July 26, 1934.
  4. ↑ Stadtgeschichtliches Museum Waren (Müritz): On the family history LE FORT. Were 2007.
  5. ↑ Otto Titan von Hüfner: The flourishing nobility of the Grand Duchies of Mecklenburg (Schwerin and Strelitz). Nuremberg 1858.
  6. ^ Martine Piquet: Francois Le Fort Historical Lexicon of Switzerland (HLS).
  7. ↑ Otto Titan von Hefner : The flourishing nobility of the Grand Duchies of Mecklenburg (Schwerin and Strelitz). Nuremberg 1858.
  8. ↑ Antje Kleinewefers: The family of le Fort A bit of genealogy .... . In: Ways with Gertrud von le Foert in Mecklenburg. Anweiler o. JS 34.
  9. ^ Johann Georg Korb: Diary of an Austrian Secretary of Legation at the court of Czar Peter The Great. Volume 2, London 1863, p. 296.
  10. ↑ HLS: 17.
  11. ^ Stephan Baron Le Fort: Typescript Boek, July 26, 1934.
  12. ↑ Eberhard Jeran: Jahn's work and his legacy in Neubrandenburg. In: Neubrandenburg Mosaic. Neubrandenburg 1978. pp. 29-36.
  13. ^ Fr. Brüssow: Louis Baron Le Fort , in: Neuer Nekrolog der Deutschen 9 (1831), Ilmenau 1833, pp. 873-875.
  14. ^ Stephan Baron Le Fort: Typescript. Boek, July 26, 193X.
  15. ^ Stephan Baron Le Fort: Typescript Boek, July 26, 1934.
  16. ↑ Original documents in LAG-Rep. 38b no .: 2034
  17. ↑ a b Genealogisches Handbuch des Adels, Adelslexikon Volume III, Volume 61 of the complete series, CA Starke Verlag Limburg / Lahn 1975, p. 334
  18. ^ Etienne Burgy: Pierre Le Fort. In: Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz . August 21, 2006 , accessed June 7, 2019 .
  19. ^ Etienne Burgy: Pierre Le Fort. In: Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz . March 18, 2009 , accessed June 7, 2019 .
  20. ^ Etienne Burgy: Pierre-Frédéric Le Fort. In: Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz . December 4, 2007 , accessed June 7, 2019 .