Ludwig Wilhelm August von Gerlach

1751 – 1809

President of the Köslin Court of Justice and Higher Regional Court · founder of the Parsow branch

Estate: Schloss Parsow, Gut Schwemmin

Ludwig Wilhelm August von Gerlach, the eldest son of Friedrich Wilhelm, studied at Königsberg, Frankfurt (Oder) and Göttingen and became a Kammergericht councillor in Berlin in 1775. After his father's death in 1780 he inherited Parsow and Schwemmin; in 1781 he and his brother jointly acquired the Schötzow estate as well. In 1797 he became president of the Köslin court and consistory, and in 1808 first president of the newly founded Higher Regional Court at Köslin. By will he established the Parsow-Schwemmin family fideicommiss. His first marriage, to Henriette von Braun (1765–1834), daughter of the Berlin commandant Heinrich Gottlob von Braun, was dissolved in 1788; their daughter Adelheid (1784–1867) married the future provincial governor Friedrich Magnus von Bassewitz in 1801. Ludwig Wilhelm August died in Köslin in 1809, shortly after taking office as president of the Higher Regional Court.

Chronicle

1751
Born in Berlin, eldest son of Friedrich Wilhelm. The family history gives 17 August as his date of birth.
1759
As a pupil of the Royal Realschule in Berlin (Hecker's foundation of 1747) the eight-year-old delivers, at the school examination and oratory exercise of 17–19 October, speech no. 41 of the programme on the reasons "why one is bound to serve the fatherland" – listed in print as "Ludwig August Wilhelm von Gerlach, Eques Meso-Marchicus" (Einem, Glückselige Schulen, Berlin 1759).
1775
Councillor at the Berlin Kammergericht.
1780
Inherits Parsow and Schwemmin; founds the Parsow branch.
1781
Joint acquisition of the Schötzow estate with his brother Carl Friedrich Leopold.
1788
Divorce from Henriette von Braun.
um 1792
In the trial of the "pigtail preacher" Johann Heinrich Schulz he votes for his removal from office. The preacher was accused of having preached on a New Testament miracle in two parts: first, the story is not true; second, if it were true it would be of no interest to us (family history, 1903).
1797
President of the Köslin court and consistory.
1804
The 1804 vassal roll of the principality of Cammin records the 52-year-old court president with Parsow A and B and Schwemmin, valued at 30,000 Taler (Klempin/Kratz 1863); the 1862 register of the Ritterschaft dates the Parsow-Schwemmin entail "since 1806".
1808
First president of the newly founded Higher Regional Court at Köslin.
1809
Dies in Köslin; the Parsow-Schwemmin fideicommiss is established by his will. The family history records that he turned his estates into an entail for his own line and for the Rohrbeck line, and praises him as a capable official and a benevolent, sociable man.

Sources and literature