Wilhelm Crusius

Heinrich Wilhelm Leberecht Crusius (born June 20, 1790 in Leipzig , † August 26, 1858 in Rüdigsdorf ) was a German farmer and agricultural scientist .

Crusius is the youngest child and the fourth son of the wealthy bookseller Siegfried Leberecht Crusius and his wife Dorothea Charlotte Ploß and a great-great-grandson of the Mayor of Chemnitz, Atlas Crusius .

He first studied law at the University of Leipzig . After completing his doctorate, he managed the family estate, the Rüdigsdorf and Sahlis manors . Here he worked as a plant cultivation experimenter. He carried out fertilization experiments, tried out newly developed agricultural implements and was one of the first farmers to employ an agricultural chemist on their properties. He sustainably promoted the development of agricultural associations in Saxony.

From 1831 until the end of his life he was chairman of the traditional “ Leipziger Ökonomische Sozietät ” and played a decisive role in setting up the first agricultural test station in Germany on a lease owned by this company in 1850.

Crusius is one of the founders of the "Assemblies of German Agriculture and Forestry Managers". The first of these all-German annual meetings took place in Dresden in 1837. Crusius was committed to the plan of German farmers to erect a memorial to the agricultural scientist Albrecht Daniel Thaer in Leipzig. At the ceremonial unveiling of this monument on September 28, 1850, he gave the celebratory speech.

His goods Sahlis and Rüdigsdorf were administered after his death by his son Friedrich Leberecht Crusius and later by his grandson Heinrich Crusius . Great-grandson Siegfried Crusius was expropriated without compensation in 1945, "state-owned" until 1990, since 1990 the areas and buildings have belonged to the Federal Republic of Germany and have been abandoned after several privatizations. The purchase price of 2.8 million DM was collected and the heirs were compensated with 10,000 DM. Sahlis Castle is temporarily used by the founder of the military sports group Hoffmann for "meetings".

His family list is contained in the family list of his great, great, great grandfather Balthasar Crusius .

literature

• Festschrift for the 150th anniversary of the Economic Society in Leipzig and the Economic Society in the Kingdom of Saxony in Dresden. Leipzig 1914
• Bruno Schöne : Wilhelm Crusius. In: Sächsische Lebensbilder Vol. 1, 1930, pp. 25–35
• William Löbe:  Crusius, Wilhelm . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 4, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1876, p. 635 f.
• Heinz Haushofer :  Crusius, Heinrich Wilhelm Leberecht. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 3, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1957, ISBN 3-428-00184-2 , p. 431 f. ( Digitized version ).
• Thomas Bertz: Wilhelm Crusius on Sahlis and Rüdigsdorf. From the life of a Leipzig manor owner, Beucha: Sax-Verl., 1999, ISBN 3-930076-81-0

Web links

• Literature by and about Wilhelm Crusius in the catalog of the German National Library
• Wilhelm Crusius (including portrait) in 250 Years of the Leipzig Economic Society at Saxony-Reading (2015)