Otto Ehrenfried Ehlers

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Otto Ehlers

Otto Ehrenfried Ehlers (born January 31, 1855 in Hamburg ; † October 3, 1895 in Kaiser-Wilhelms-Land ) was a German explorer and travel writer.

Life

Otto Ehrenfried Ehlers was the son of a Hamburg architect. His school education began under Wichard Lange . His lyrical talent emerged early on, which was initially expressed in satires. After graduating from high school in Harburg , he became a farmer on the Heisch estate in Holstein . The nearby Baltic Sea inspired him to write seals that showed his love for the sea.

Ehlers studied law and agriculture at the Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg , the Universität Jena and the Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität . In 1876 he became a member of the Corps Vandalia Heidelberg and the Corps Franconia Jena . After traveling extensively in Germany and Austria, he bought an estate in Pomerania, which he soon gave up again to settle at Seegenfelde Castle near Schneidemühl in West Prussia . From 1883 he edited the newspaper for the Pomerania in Stolp . Ehlers then became the owner of another manor in Pomerania . A fire destroyed the main house of his estate. Despite the restoration, he left it, turned the management over to an employee, and went on a journey. In 1887 he entered the service of the German East African Society and in the summer of 1888 took part in an expedition to the Rufiji and Rovuma rivers . In autumn he went to Kilimanjaro , which he climbed almost to the highest peak on November 18.

As head of the Moschi station , he caused the chief Mandara to send an embassy to the German Kaiser Wilhelm II . With this mission he arrived in Berlin in May 1889 . Two months later he returned to Zanzibar , accompanied Hermann von Wissmann during the Arab uprising on his procession to Mpapua and again in December of the same year went to Kilimanjaro to deliver the gifts of the German emperor to Mandara.

Because of his poor health, Ehlers had to travel to northern India to relax in the spring of 1890 . There he took part in the punitive expedition against Manipur . He also toured Kashmir and Nepal in 1891 . He then went to Burma and roamed Southeast Asia from Malmen to Hanoi ( Tongking ). In 1892 he went to China . In 1893 he returned to Germany via America. A little later he went back to British India , visited Southeast Asia and went up the Brahmaputra , but had to return wounded after dangerous experiences.

After a long stay in Samoa in 1895, Ehlers went to Kaiser-Wilhelms-Land. He planned his own expedition to cross it. She was badly prepared. He and his companion, the police sergeant Piering, were soon shot from behind by his servants, so that the two victims sank in the river. The murder was not known as such until 1897. The then governor of German New Guinea Curt von Hagen was also shot while trying to find the murderers .

Works

  • Ears of corn of poetry . Bremen 1875, Norden 1888 (poems)
  • At Indian royal courts , 2 volumes, Berlin 1894.
  • In the saddle through Indo-China , 2 volumes 1894.
  • Travel pictures from Siam. (Voigtländers Volksbücher; 45). Leipzig undated (1927).
  • Samoa, the pearl of the South Seas - up to date , 3rd edition 1896. New edition: Samoa, the pearl of the South Seas. (With an afterword by Hermann Joseph Hiery), Lilienfeld Verlag, Düsseldorf 2008, ISBN 978-3-940357-04-5
  • In East Asia , 4th edition 1900.

  • At Indian royal courts

  • Samoa

literature

  • Friedrich Ratzel:  Ehlers, Otto . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 48, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1904, p. 282 f.
  • Hans F. Rose: Otto Ehrenfried Ehlers. In: Einst und Jetzt , yearbook of the association for corps student history research, Volume 27 (1982), pp. 229–241.

Web links

Commons : Otto Ehrenfried Ehlers  - Album with pictures, videos and audio files
Wikisource: Otto Ehrenfried Ehlers  - Sources and full texts

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Kösener corps lists 1910, 122/510; 124/434
  2. ^ Franz Brümmer: German Poet Lexicon . 1876
  3. ^ Rudolf Eckart: Lexicon of the Lower Saxony writers . 1891
  4. ↑ Hagen, Curt v. In: Biographisches Handbuch Deutsch-Neuguinea . 2nd Edition. Fassberg, 2002
personal data
SURNAME Ehlers, Otto Ehrenfried
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Ehlers, Otto
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German poet, farmer and travel writer
DATE OF BIRTH January 31, 1855
PLACE OF BIRTH Hamburg
DATE OF DEATH October 3, 1895
Place of death Kaiser-Wilhelms-Land