Leonhard Demmely

Leonhard Demmely, after 1798 Demmelin (* May 2, 1739 in Basel ; † May 30, 1819 in Aarau ) was a substitute for the Bernese land clerk in Lenzburg and a notary . In 1784 he speculated that the Bernese Aargau would be reconquered by Emperor Joseph II. As a result, he spied for Austria for 14 years . In 1798 he was taken over into the service of the Helvetic Republic , which suggests that there were local clusters of opponents of Bern that outlived its rule.

Life

Origin and career

Demmely was a citizen of Frauenfeld , where the family is called Dumelin and at times provided the town clerk . His father Johann Jakob (1685–1758) was a teacher, organist and cantor at the Basel orphanage . In his second marriage he married Susanna Brenner (1697–1767) from Basel. Leonhard was the fifteenth of sixteen children (five of them from the father's first marriage). In 1756 he began studying philosophy at the University of Basel , but had to drop out after his father's death. Afterwards he seems to have worked in a country writing in the Bernese Vaud . For several years he worked for the Landschreiber von Aarburg and Zofingen . In 1771 he married Anna Margareta Pagan (1742-1822) von Nidau , where her family held the office of land clerk. The marriage had four children.

Employee of the Bernese bailiff in Lenzburg

Former country writing, now Löwenapotheke in Lenzburg.

Demmely probably hoped to become a town or country clerk, but he did not succeed. In 1773 we find him as a substitute in the Lenzburg Landschreiberei. In 1774 he took the oath that allowed him to work as a Bernese notary. In the same year he acquired the title of imperial-royal notary from the abbot of St. Blasien . Nevertheless, he was only considered a servant of his employer and had no chance of advancement. Because Bern's land clerks were elected for life and had to be citizens of the city of Bern in lucrative bailiffs like that of Lenzburg.

Austrian spy

Balthasar Moll: equestrian statue of Joseph II in Laxenburg , 1776/77 (detail).

During his sole rule in the states of the House of Austria (1780–1790), Emperor Joseph II carried out radical reforms. Among other things, he eliminated childbirth privileges. Two bestsellers, which appeared in Zurich in 1783 , paint a positive image of the “Monarque philosophe”. On the other hand, France , Prussia and the Swiss aristocracy spread that Joseph wanted to recapture the Habsburg homeland. In 1784 mercenaries under the Swiss flag helped the Dutch to block ports in Austrian Belgium . It was feared in Aargau that a war would break out between the Kaiser and the Swiss Confederation .

Against this background, Demmely signaled to the imperial-royal resident (envoy) in Basel that the people of Unteraargau could be won over to a return under Austrian rule. For the next 14 years he served Vienna's diplomats as a paid informant. He received 90 guilders a year for this, and later doubled. In return he had to report once a month and later twice a month. Under the conservative Emperor Franz II , he continued the espionage activity only pro forma , the payments were given the character of hush money.

The reports that Demmely sent to Basel have only survived in exceptional cases, but their content can be deduced from those of the Austrian diplomats. They represent a still untapped source for the history of the Bernese Aargau and its neighborhood. However, like all reports by spies, they should be used with caution.

In the service of the Canton of Aargau

In 1789 Demmely was elected clerk of their Schafisheim jurisdiction by the Huguenot family Brutel . However, he continued to live in Lenzburg.

Even after the Helvetic Revolution (1798), nothing of his espionage was made public. Although the national assembly of the newly founded canton of Aargau rejected his application to give him honorary citizenship, he must have had influential protectors among the opponents of Bern, as he became secretary of the cantonal administrative chamber. He also worked as a notary in Aarau . His son Samuel Gottlieb (1773–1800), who died early, was appointed senior secretary of the administrative chamber of the canton of Thurgau , his son-in-law Dr. med. Andreas Scheller (1770–1834) Deputy Governor of the Lenzburg District.

Demmely remained in the service of the canton of Aargau even after the end of the Helvetic Republic (1803), first as secretary of the administrative commission, then as a substitute for the finance council. As was customary at the time, he worked until his death, that is, until he was 81.

literature

• Peter Genner: An employee of the Bernese land clerk in Lenzburg as an Austrian spy. Notary Leonhard Demmely (Dumelin) speculated in 1784 on a reconquest of Aargau by Emperor Joseph II. In: Lenzburger Neujahrsblätter, 76/2005, pp. 29–54.

References and comments

1. ↑ Deputy.
2. ↑ A compatriot of Demmely's wife, Sigmund Renner from Nidau, was an adjutant of Field Marshal Lacy to Joseph II and became a baron and in 1783 major general .
3. ^ (Kaspar Riesbeck :) Letters from a French traveler about Germany. 2 volumes, (Zurich) 1783; (Johann Pezzl :) Faustin or the philosophical century. (Zurich) 1783.
4. ↑ (Pierre-Julien) de Lanjuinais : Le Monarque accompli, ou Prodiges de bonté, de savoir et de sagesse, qui font l'éloge da Sa Majesté Impériale Joseph II. 3 volumes, Lausanne 1774, quote: 1st volume, p. 1, et passim.
5. ↑ General Renner to his sister Marianne Meyer in Aarau, Vienna, March 9, 1785: “On dirait, chère Nani, à en juger par un passage de votre lettre, que vous avés peur, dans vos contrées, que nous n'y venions faire la guerre (…) ”(Bern Burger Library, Mss. hh XIX 72, no. 21).
6. ↑ Demmely to Resident Emanuel von Tassara, Lenzburg, December 17, 1784: “The admission of the precious trials, the twitching (abolition) of the freedoms with which the cities were gifted under the former Austrian (Chi) rule, and various other deficiencies in Government matters and the printing of the governing provincial bailiffs were certainly in occurrence (l) s, the change in the minds of local citizens and subjects perceived. "(House, Court and State Archives Vienna, Switzerland 161, bundle 1785 / 1, No. 2B, Supplements, fol. 478 recto.)
7. ↑ 135 Livres suisses / Swiss Francs.
8. ↑ Ernst Jörin: The Aargau 1798-1803 ( Argovia  42). Aarau 1929, p. 55 (April 4, 1798).