The merchant Caspar Voght [1752-1839] – Germany | USA | Haiti | Guyana
Life stories
Meryem Choukri, 2024
The Hamburg merchant Caspar Voght is best known as a reformer of welfare for the poor and a well-connected intellectual who created the Jenischpark in Klein-Flottbek in Hamburg. However, his trading activities as a merchant have received little attention to date. And if it has, then only Voght's almost proverbial quote is referred to: “I was the first Hamburg merchant to bring coffee from Mocha, tobacco from Baltimore, coffee from Surinam and rubber from Africa.”
This tour subjects the "Voght myth" to a critical examination and provides an insight into his colonial business. In particular, it examines the extent to which Voght was involved in the transatlantic enslavement trade. It also shows the interaction of different colonial systems around 1800 and the involvement of the Hamburg and Altona bourgeoisie.
A few key dates: After the death of his father, Senator Caspar Voght senior, Caspar Voght junior took over his father's trading company in 1781, together with his friend Georg Heinrich Sieveking, who was already working there. They officially renamed the trading house Voght & Co. to Voght & Sieveking in 1788. Hamburg's economy experienced a boom in the 1780s, as it was now able to trade directly with the young USA independently of England following the American Revolution. In 1793, Caspar Voght officially retired from the trading house, but continued the profitable business with North America independently. Sieveking died unexpectedly in 1799. The trade crisis at that time and the Napoleonic Continental Blockade between 1806 and 1814 finally caused Voght to give up his business.
Quotes:
Sieveking, Georg Herman: Kleine Studien über Caspar von Voght. VI. Selbstbekenntnisse Caspars von Voght, in: Mitteilungen des Vereins für Hamburgische Geschichte 20, 1901, S. 394-397, hier S. 396.
References:
Ahrens, Gerhard: Caspar Voght und sein Mustergut Flottbek. Englische Landwirtschaft in Deutschland am Ende des 18. Jahrhunderts, 1969.
Czech, Hans-Jörg / Petermann, Kerstin / Tiedemann-Bischop, Nicole (Hrsg.): Caspar Voght (1752–1839). Weltbürger vor den Toren Hamburgs, 2014.
Sieveking, Heinrich: Das Handelshaus Voght & Sieveking. In: Zeitschrift des Vereins für Hamburgische Geschichte 17 (1912), S. 54-128.
Schoell-Glass, Charlotte (Hrsg.): Caspar Voght. Lebensgeschichte, 2001.
von Mallinckrodt, Rebekka / Lentz, Sarah / Köstlbauer, Josef (Hrsg.): Beyond Exceptionalism – Traces of Slavery and the Slave Trade in Early Modern Germany, 1650–1850, 2021.
Woelk, Susanne: Der Fremde unter den Freunden. Biographische Studien zu Caspar Voght, 2000.
zur Lage, Julian: Die Hochphase des deutschen Versklavungshandels. Akteure aus dem Raum Hamburg und ihre globalen Netzwerke um 1800, in: Zeitschrift für Historische Forschung 49, 2022, S. 665-694.
Archives:
The National Archives (UK), Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek Hamburg (Campe Sammlung), Staatsarchiv Hamburg
Weblinks:
Zur Lage, Julian: Verhinderte Versklaver, 2024.
Dieser Beitrag wurde im Rahmen des Projekts „Digitale Kartographierung der Hamburger Kolonialgeschichte“ verfasst. Das Projekt ist eine Kooperation zwischen der Stiftung Historische Museen Hamburg, dem Arbeitskreis HAMBURG POSTKOLONIAL und dem Berliner Verbundprojekt „Dekoloniale Erinnerungskultur in der Stadt“. Es wird gefördert von der Behörde für Kultur und Medien Hamburg und der Kulturstiftung des Bundes.
Koordination und Redaktion: Anke Schwarzer, 2024
Stationen
Trading house Deichstraße
Neutral merchants in Ostend
Plans for the slave trade
Die Vergülde Roos
Trade dependence on St. Domingue?
Business relations with the USA
The Spring Garden File
Plant hype