Philip Henry Stanhope, 4th Earl Stanhope
Philip Henry Stanhope, 4th Earl Stanhope ( born December 7, 1781 Chevening, Kent, † March 2, 1855 ) was an English aristocrat, politician and independent scholar.
He presided from 1829 to 1837 the " Medico - Botanical Society " in London, was a member of the " Royal Society ", driving vice president of the " Society of Arts " and was involved in numerous political, economic and social associations and clubs in the 1830s he was involved in the affair of Kaspar Hauser.
Family, life and politics
As the eldest son of the politician and inventor Charles 3.Earl Stanhope Philip Henry led first the title of Viscount Mahon. His half sister was Lady Hester Stanhope, the fabled " Queen of the East ". The German politician and jurist Gustav Radbruch thought they were "strange people without balance ", at least they seem to have been gifted and idiosyncratic personalities. The historian Aubrey Newman refers to Stanhope's diverse interests, his unusual enthusiasm, but also on his own contradictions.
Philip Henry fled as a young man in front of his authoritarian father Charles, an ardent supporter of the French Revolution, to Germany, where he led the University of Erlangen visited for a short time and 1800 in Dresden anonymously published a prayer book for believers and unbelievers, for Christians and non-Christians. Returned home he married in 1803 the daughter of Robert Smith, 1.Baron Carrington; a reconciliation with the father failed. Support came from Prime Minister William Pitt, a second cousin of Lord Mahon mediated two sinecures and the place of Lieutenant-Governor of Dover Castle. He represented several years various election districts in the House of Commons, in the spirit of liberal political ideas of his father. When in December 1816 Charles 3rd Earl Stanhope died, inherited Philip Henry titles, wealth and independence, as well as a seat in the House of Lords. Politically, he was now the anti-Catholic Ultra - Tories close, but increasingly isolated, including because he himself did not belong to any party. He campaigned for land and agrarian reform, campaigned for protective tariffs and against free trade, advocated the abolition of slavery and worked in his rejection of the new poor law with Chartists and worker organizations without abandoning his rather paternalistic view. For fear of revolutionary upheavals, he appealed to the social responsibility of his peers in the House of Lords. Basically, he aspired to a parliamentary reform to allow a broader and more equitable participation of all social classes.
Whether his numerous trips on the European continent in terms of a systematic have been spying activities (double), based on arbitrary assumptions. By contrast, in England irritated his great passion for all things German.
In May 1831, he learned the Nuremberg " foundling " Kaspar Hauser, for whose history he had been interested for some time. He was fascinated about the dimensions of him as the no less enthusiastic Paul Johann Anselm of Hauser of Feuerbach. Stanhope trusted the opinion of the famous jurists about the young man and immediately granted financial support. He bestowed Kaspar with useful and less useful things; several times he financed trips to elucidate its origin.
On 2 December 1831, he received the guardianship over Kaspar Hauser, while Feuerbach took over the care of the moral and physical well-being. The guardianship was passed by the court assessor Gottlieb von Tucher on the Nuremberg Mayor Jakob Friedrich Binder. From Tucher Stanhope had criticized behavior, which had undermined his educational principles.
On the recommendation of Feuerbach Kaspar Hauser was placed in Ansbach in the family of the teacher Meyer and gendarmerie lieutenant Joseph Hickel as a "special trustee " placed on the side of the pupil. The total maintenance costs, until then supported by the city of Nuremberg, took Lord Stanhope.
In the summer of 1831 Stanhope Feuerbach had encouraged to write a book about Hauser. A project that Feuerbach had previously discussed with the Berlin publisher Julius Eduard Hitzig and lawyers. Turn of the year, immediately after the release of Kaspar Hauser or example of a crime on the inner life of a people Feuerbach made by Stanhope and Hickel his work in person at the Baden and give the Bavarian court. Their letters and reports seemed Feuerbach mainly excited by newspaper reports suspected not to confirm, therefore Kaspar Hauser could be exchanged Hereditary Prince of Baden. Stanhope had this assumption also represented only half-heartedly, he saw Kaspar rather the descendant of an Hungarian magnate. For this assumption, the publicly debated, seemingly Hungarian language skills Hauser had him moved. The " special trustee " Hickel was sent again on the trip, but did not provide any confirmation and no evidence of a Hungarian origin Hauser. The inconclusiveness of this research was so at odds with the previously made statements and the behavior Hauser that Stanhope was first doubts about his credibility. In the end, more questions than answers and Stanhope were only held on to the presumption of early isolation Hauser fixed, although it could not be done, as Kaspar told it. Because of these doubts, he decided not to pass an examination by his English translation of Feuerbach book a publisher, but only to let private print and distribute it to friends.
In his first enthusiasm Stanhope Hauser had promised to take him to England, but his growing skepticism let him refrain. Nevertheless, he fulfilled his financial obligations and still continued in 1833 Kaspar Hauser an annuity from.
After Kaspar Hauser (probably selbstverschuldetem ) death in December 1833 immediately put an the journalistic debate about Stanhope's role in the tragedy. He tried with brochures and newspaper articles to justify, but in addition to encouragement sat down in particular in Germany in the long term verschwörungsideologische, moral condemnation by Stanhope, in the only German biography with the telling title of Lord Stanhope. 1988 The opponent of Kaspar Hauser culminated.
In the historical- scientific literature on Kaspar Hauser, however, a demonizing took place. So wrote representative Walther Schreibmüller, " Stanhope has certainly not made his argument in the ' materials ' light He was so objectively, give, it remains still the question of whether Kaspar could be mentioned in the proper sense of the word a deceiver; . He hope that the world will judge the unfortunate erratic in this respect with fairness. Overall, in any case convey the ' materials ' of the authors of the impression of a carefully deliberating in order to determine the truth tried man. "
Stanhope's later life until his death on March 2, 1855 continued to be affected by his constant curiosity for more or less scientifically justifiable phenomena. Remaining from an intimate ties to his after death (1828 ) the son of Joseph Georg children Philip Henry ( 1805-1875 ), later 5.Earl Stanhope and British historian, and Catherine Lucy Wilhelmina ( 1806-1901 ), mother of Archibald Philip Primrose, 5th Earl of Rosebery, evidenced by numerous letters from the estate.