Philipp Heinrich Cockerill

Philipp Heinrich (Henri) Cockerill (born August 1, 1821 in Aachen ; † January 23, 1903 in Frankfurt am Main ) was a German entrepreneur and patron as well as manorial and mine owner.

Live and act

Philipp Heinrich Cockerill was the son of the industrialist Charles James Cockerill and the Caroline Elisa Pastor, daughter of the Burtscheider cloth manufacturer Philipp Heinrich Pastor, from whom he got his first name. As a nine-year-old student, he witnessed the Aachen riot of August 30, 1830 in front of his parents' town villa on Friedrich-Wilhelm-Platz in Aachen, which was directed against his father's undertakings, and was significantly influenced by this event with regard to his later social attitude .

After the early death of his father in 1837 and the restructuring of the Belgian Cockerill works of his childless uncle John Cockerill, who died in 1840, by Philipp Heinrich's brother-in-law Barthold Suermondt , he became a partner in the Belgian family business. In 1849 he joined the Aachener Casino Club and married Thusnelda Emilie Haniel (1830–1903) in 1853, the only daughter of the industrialist Franz Haniel from Duisburg and Friederike Christine Huyssen. Through her, he also acquired shares in the Zechen Zollverein , Rheinpreussen , Neumühl and Gutehoffnungshütte as well as in the investment holding Franz Haniel & Cie. in Ruhrort .

This made Cockerill one of the richest men in Aachen. He established several foundations with the aim of promoting municipal institutions and schools such as the Viktoriaschule Aachen , as well as hospitals, including the Marianneninstitut and the Luisenhospital Aachen . In addition, in 1883 he acquired Allner Castle near Hennef an der Sieg , which he passed on to his daughter Lucy (1860–1913) and her first husband, the writer Count Alfred Adelmann von Adelmannsfelden (1848–1887). On January 23, 1903, Cockerill died in Frankfurt as a result of pneumonia. He was buried together with his wife, who died just four days later, in the family crypt in Aachen's Westfriedhof . The couple left only their daughter Lucy; another three children had died at a young age.

Even before his death, Cockerill had decreed in his will that the company Franz Haniel, which administered Cockerill's assets posthumously, should use a list drawn up by him to transfer further significant donations, in particular to hospitals, schools and foundations, including both to facilities in the Aachen area and to the Cockerill Foundation in Seraing in Belgium, to the Haniel collieries in the Ruhr area and to the Franz Haniel pension fund in Ruhrort . Allner Castle remained in the possession of Lucy, née Cockerill, who was married to the Jewish writer Richard Fleischer (1849–1937) from Wiesbaden in 1889. She was considered one of the richest Germans of her time. After her death, the castle passed to the Pagenstecher and later Horstmann families, who used it as a children's home for Deutsche Caritas .

In honor of Philipp Heinrich Cockerill, a building complex at the corner of Wilhelmstrasse and Zollernstrasse in Aachen was later named the Cockerill House , which was built in 1957 by the Cockerill community of heirs on the property of his former city ​​villa, which was destroyed in the Second World War , and which was partially listed. Furthermore, a meeting room in the Luisenhospital was baptized as a cockerill hall .

Literature and Sources

• Hermann Friedrich Macco: History and genealogy of the Pastor family , Aachen 1905, p. 163/164
• Eduard Arens / Wilhelm Leopold Janssen : Club Aachener Casino Druck Metz, Aachen 1964, p. 160

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Kurt Pritzkoleit : Who Owns Germany? A chronicle of property and power. Kurt Desch Verlag, Munich 1957, p. 65.
2. ↑ Schloss Allner, Schlossstrasse , brief information on the website of the Transport and Improvement Association Hennef e. V. 1881
3. ↑ Gas station in the Cockerill garage in Burtscheid , In: KuLaDig, Kultur.Landschaft.Digital, accessed on March 29, 2020