Children
|98| Christian Rudolf Wilhelm Wiedemann († 31 December 1840) and his wife, Louise Friederike Michaelis, married on 28 March 1796, and had the following children:
1. Conrad Rudolph (born at 10:00 p.m. on 29 February 1797–† 14 March 1798).
2. Emma (born at 9:00 p.m. on 1 October 1798): married to Carl Theodor Welcker, professor emeritus in Giessen, Kiel, Heidelberg, Bonn, Freiburg.
3. August Ferdinand (born between 7–8:00 a.m. on 2 August 1800–† 10 March 1801) (Caroline witnessed his death in Braunschweig).
4. Minna Eleonore Louise Friedericke (born 8–9:00 p.m. on 18 August 1802–†1 November 1821). Married to Pastor Ernst Welcker [brother of Carl Theodor Welcker] in Obernfleiden [Ober-Ofleiden] in the Grand Duchy of Hessia.
Editor’s note: Julius Steinberger brackets Minna’s year of birth as [1801]; but Luise Wiedemann was living with Caroline in Jena during the summer of 1801 while Christian Rudolf Wilhelm Wiedemann was in France. He returned by way of Jena in October 1801, picking her and Emma Wiedemann up and traveling on back to Braunschweig. Nowhere does Caroline mention either that Luise was expecting or, even more significant, that the child was born in Jena, topics on which Caroline is otherwise rarely silent. Luise herself, moreover, remarks the following in her memoirs:
In August of the year 1801 I had my little Minna, and at the same time — I think in this same or perhaps the following year [in fact: late 1803] — Wiedemann was offered an appointment in Würzburg.
That is, Luise is quite correct that it was in the year following Minna’s birth; it is the year of Minna’s birth that she misstates.
5. Maria (3 September 1804–June 1805).
6. Dora Bertha Zoe (born at ca. 3:00 p.m. in January 1807–†12 July 1807).
7. Zoe Anne Caroline (born 4–5:00 p.m. on 3 December 1809). Married to Justus Olshausen, professor of Near Eastern languages in Kiel, on 22 April 1828. On † 12 January 1829, after patient suffering from a heart ailment, she was taken from the arms of love to a higher life without having experienced the grief and troubles of life, lamented and respected by her loved ones. Confirmed on 12 April 1827. Blessed they who when young slumber in the Lord!
8. Rudolph Waldemar Benvenuto (born 5–6:00 a.m. on 1 February 1811). Married to Sophie Mathilde Cornelie Pechmöller on 21 December 1841. Physician in Eckernförde.
9. Theone Isabelle Rosalie Auguste (born at 4:00 a.m. on 31 July 1812). Confirmed on 22 April 1827, married to Pastor Theodor Valentiner on 17 December 1838.
[A list of grandchildren follows (not extant)]
Supplementary material includes all of Wiedemann’s letter from his journeys, and my own letter to my mother and sister during the trip to France, all of which can be found in my letter drawer. [1] Those to whom these letters are of some value and who know my handwriting will be able to read them, e.g., my daughters, and will know what is worth copying. My sister’s letters should especially be read. [2] Unfortunately, only too [many?] are no longer here that [might provide?] more information about her life. I can hardly express how important to me are the letters from my friend Tatter, and my remembrance of this friend, so loyal, will end only with my own life in this world — and every feeling I concealed from him still oppresses me [whereas] had it been expressed, it might have [compensated?] me for so much.
[The right margin of this sheet is torn.]
Notes
[1] Julius Steinberger, Erinnerungen 145, remarks that none of these letters seem to have survived. Back.
[2] Presumably Caroline’s letters, though, as Julius Steinberger, Erinnerungen 145, remarks, not even Erich Schmidt (1913) had access to the originals, being dependent instead on the transcriptions made by Georg Waitz. Steinberger, ibid., does add in 1929 that “the originals have been preserved, however, and are in the possession of Dr. Waldemar von Olshausen [1879–1959] in Berlin.” Back.