Napoléon Schroeder

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Napoléon Schroeder (* before 1857; † July 26, 1922 in Cannes ) was a German - Belgian entrepreneur. As a confidante of Georges Nagelmackers , the founder of the Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits (CIWL), he became general director of the CIWL after his death in 1905.

Life

The exact place and year of Schroeder's birth are unknown. It is presumed that he comes from the Bavarian Palatinate , since, according to the CIWL, he was a Bavarian by birth, according to other information he was a Rhinelander.

After attending the trade school in Cologne , Georges Nagelmackers hired him as a volunteer in 1872 . Very soon he became the closest confidante of the CIWL founder. In 1874 he went to Berlin as an inspector of the CIWL operations department there . In 1875, Nagelmackers brought him back to Brussels as a secretary at the CIWL headquarters , and a year later he became head of the entire CIWL operations department in Paris . Schroeder also acquired Belgian citizenship in 1876 .

In the following years, Schroeder mainly took over negotiations for the CIWL with the European railway companies, with which he concluded contracts for the use of the CIWL sleeping cars and, from 1880, also for dining cars . From 1881 he was also involved in the introduction of the new CIWL luxury trains , starting with the Orient Express, which first ran in 1883 .

After the death of Nagelmackers, who died in 1905, Schroeder, who had been CIWL's “second man” for years, succeeded him as head of the CIWL. In 1907 he was accepted as an officer in the French Legion of Honor . From November 18, 1910, he officially received the title of "General Director".

From 1899 Schroeder was also a member of the supervisory board of the German Railway Dining Car Company (DESG). With the help of DESG, whose ownership CIWL shared with various German banks, including Disconto-Gesellschaft , Sal. Oppenheim and Dresdner Bank , the CIWL avoided the Prussian State Railways' aversion to that of French capital, hence the “ arch enemy “ Of the German Reich influenced CIWL. In 1909, after the death of Eduard von Oppenheim , Schroeder took over the chairmanship of the DESG supervisory board.

With the outbreak of the First World War , Schroeder, a native of Germany, asked the CIWL's board of directors to retire. He also resigned from the DESG supervisory board in 1914. Schroeder first relocated to neutral Switzerland, recognized as "Honorary General Director" of the CIWL . After the end of the war he lived in the south of France, where he died in 1922.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Albert Mühl: Dining car in Germany. The history of the dining car business in Germany from the beginning to the transition to Mitropa . EK-Verlag, Freiburg 1994, ISBN 3-88255-675-7 , p. 122
  2. ^ Albert Mühl: Dining car in Germany. The history of the dining car business in Germany from the beginning to the transition to Mitropa . EK-Verlag, Freiburg 1994, ISBN 3-88255-675-7 , p. 91

literature

  • Albert Mühl: Dining car in Germany. The history of the dining car business in Germany from the beginning to the transition to Mitropa . EK-Verlag, Freiburg 1994, ISBN 3-88255-675-7
personal data
SURNAME Schroeder, Napoleon
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Belgian entrepreneur
DATE OF BIRTH 19th century
DATE OF DEATH July 26, 1922
Place of death Cannes