Hans Ernst von Kottwitz
Hans Ernst von Kottwitz ( born September 1, 1757 Tschepplau (now Krzepielów, part of Sława ) at Glogau, Lower Silesia, † May 13, 1843 in Berlin) was a German philanthropist and leading figure of the revivalist movement.
Life
Kottwitz, a descendant of the noble family of Kottwitz in Silesia, was 13 years old Page at the court of Frederick II in Potsdam in 1777 and studied briefly Law at the University of Frankfurt / Oder. Subsequently, he traveled extensively through Germany. In Hamburg, he met Matthias Claudius. Through contacts with the Moravians and their Bishop August Gottlieb Spangenberg, he decided about 1788 to devote his life to the realization of Christianity make and deploy manpower and assets for the poor. His marriage to Charlotte Helene Countess of Zedlitz (1756-1829) he had gained more goods. A first attempt to deal with the distressed weavers in factories for processing flat on his estates in Silesia, but ended with a bankruptcy.
1806 Kottwitz moved to Berlin. There he began the same, to deal in the turmoil of the Napoleonic wars unemployed artisans spinning wheel and loom. This resulted in Alexanderplatz a "Voluntary Employment Agency ", by King Friedrich Wilhelm III. was funded and was still on Kottwitz ' death. The king encouraged Kottwitz to establish more spinning and weaving mills in Silesia, so 1812 in Grüssau, and later in Glatz and Spiller. All these factories remained but to rely on grants and ultimately unsuccessful. Kottwitz ' social projects were influenced by Enlightenment thought, and put more on social work and job-creation measures than on conversion, because working for him one of the most important requirements of " bliss " showed. He influenced with them but also the pioneers of the early Protestant diakonia or Inner Mission. Johann Hinrich Wichern Kottwitz learned while studying theology in Berlin from 1829 to 1832 and know later relied often on his example. With Theodor Fliedner he corresponded about the founding of the Berlin Association for the Improvement of Prisoners ( 1830).
In Berlin Kottwitz belonged to the circle of the Great Awakening, which was initially rooted in nobility. He was involved in the founding of the Prussian main Bible Society (1814 ) and the Society for the promotion of Christianity among the Jews ( Berlin Israel mission) and friends with the brothers Leopold, Ernst Ludwig and Otto von Gerlach and the theologian Johannes Jaenicke, August Neander and Johannes Evangelista Gossner. Numerous young theologians such as Wichern, Rudolf Ewald Stier, Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg, August Tholuck, Richard Rothe and Claus Harms he could characterize in terms of a revival of piety.
Works
- About poor relief. 1809
- About public prisons, and the most appropriate means to excite the common man to action. 1810
- Baron Hans Ernst von Kottwitz and the revival movement in Silesia, Pomerania and Berlin. Correspondence, inlaid. and ed. v. Frederick William Kantzenbach, 1963
Remembrance
May 13 in the Protestant calendar name.