Hermann Abbestée (29 July 1728 – 29 December 1794) was Danish governor of

Tranquebar Tharangambadi (), formerly Tranquebar (, ), is a town in the Mayiladuthurai district of the Indian state of Tamil Nadu on the Coromandel Coast. It lies north of Karaikal, near the mouth of a distributary named Uppanar of the Kaveri River. It wa ...

from 1762 to 1775 and the first royal governor of

Danish India Danish India () was the name given to the forts and Factory (trading post), factories of Denmark (Denmark–Norway before 1814) in the Indian subcontinent, forming part of the Danish overseas colonies. Denmark–Norway held colonial possessions ...

from 1779 to 1788. He served as one of the seven directors of the

Danish Asiatic Company Danish Asiatic Company (Danish language, Danish: Asiatisk Kompagni) was a Denmark-Norway, Danish trading company established in 1730 to revive Danish-Norwegian trade on the Danish East Indies and China following the closure of the Danish East Ind ...

from 1775 to 1778 and was also active as a trader.

Early life and background

Abbestée was born on 29 July 1728 in

Copenhagen Copenhagen ( ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a population of 1.4 million in the Urban area of Copenhagen, urban area. The city is situated on the islands of Zealand and Amager, separated from Malmö, Sweden, by the ...

, the son of vintner Helvig Abbestée (1697–1742) and Maria Barbara Fabritius (1704–75). His father and motherwho were uncle and niecebelonged to the city's German Reformed congregation. His father went bankrupt for the second time in 1738. His mother was the younger sister of

Michael Fabritius Michael Fabritius (2 May 1697 – 13 November 1746) was a Danish merchant, shipowner and shipbuilder. Early life and education Michael Fabritius was born in Copenhagen on 12 May 1697. His parents, wine merchant Herman Fabritius (1667-1729) an ...

and Just Fabritius. After his father's death, his mother married the director of the

, Peter van Hurk (c. 1697–1775).

Career

In 1752, Abbestée was employed by the Danish Asiatic Company as a trade assistant in

. He arrived in 1753 on board the company's ship '' Sydermanland''. He was in 1755 sent on a mission to

Travancore The kingdom of Travancore (), also known as the kingdom of Thiruvithamkoor () or later as Travancore State, was a kingdom that lasted from until 1949. It was ruled by the Travancore Royal Family from Padmanabhapuram, and later Thiruvanan ...

to negotiate a

factory A factory, manufacturing plant or production plant is an industrial facility, often a complex consisting of several buildings filled with machinery, where workers manufacture items or operate machines which process each item into another. Th ...

Colachel Colachel (Malayalam: Kulachal, ) is a coastal town in the far south of India, located in the Kanyakumari district of Tamil Nadu. It is a natural harbor on the Malabar Coast, located 20 km northwest of Kanyakumari (Cape Comorin), the southe ...

under his own management. He was its first

Opperhoofd is a Dutch word (plural ) that literally translates to "upper-head", meaning "supreme headman". The Danish cognate , which is a calque derived from a Danish pronunciation of the Dutch or Low German word, is also treated here. The standard Ge ...

but was already the following year appointed as Opperhoofd of the factory in

Calicut Kozhikode (), also known as Calicut, is a city along the Malabar Coast in the state of Kerala in India. Known as the City of Spices, Kozhikode is listed among the City of Literature, UNESCO's Cities of Literature. It is the nineteenth large ...

. In 1760, Abbestée returned to Tranquebar and upon H. J. Forch's death, on 29 April 1761, was elected as the colony's acting governor. In 1775, he was succeeded by David Brown. He and his family returned to Copenhagen in the Danish Asiatic Company's frigate ''

Ganges The Ganges ( ; in India: Ganga, ; in Bangladesh: Padma, ). "The Ganges Basin, known in India as the Ganga and in Bangladesh as the Padma, is an international which goes through India, Bangladesh, Nepal and China." is a trans-boundary rive ...

''. The ship set sail from Tranquebar in February 1775, bound for Copenhagen. She reached Copenhagen on 27 August 1775. Abbestée was appointed one of the seven directors of the Danish Asiatic Company. He represented the company in the commission which was set up in connection with the transfer of the East Asiatic colonies to the state in 1777. In the same year, he was appointed the first royal governor of

and was granted the rank of

Brigadier Brigadier ( ) is a military rank, the seniority of which depends on the country. In some countries, it is a senior rank above colonel, equivalent to a brigadier general or commodore (rank), commodore, typically commanding a brigade of several t ...

. He and his family boarded the ship '' Dronning Juliana Maria in December, bound for Tranquebar, but the voyage ran into complications and did not arrive until 16 January 1779. In 1782, he successfully applied for permission to leave his office and return to Copenhagen. It was granted him but due to deaths among his colleagues, he ended up acting as governor until finally being replaced by Peter Anker in 1788. He returned to Copenhagen in 1789. Alongside his office as governor, Abbestée also worked as a trader, partly backed by Anglo-Indian capital.

Personal life and legacy

On 26 December 1768 Abbestée married Françoise Lange (15 January 1749 28 March 1779) in Tranquebar. Their daughter Marie Barbara (1770–1832) was married to Conrad Lensgreve Blücher af Altona (1764–1845). Abbestée also had another daughter, Pauline (1772–1801), by another unidentified slave. Pauline's first marriage was to J. N. Müller (−1793) and the second to Christian Tullin Boalth (1767–1822). She was the mother of admiral Catharina Pauli (1797–1856). Her daughter Fanny (1795–1833) married William Halling. Abbestée purchased Amaliegade 14 in Copenhagen shortly prior to his death in 1794. He had inherited the country house Rustenborg in

Kongens Lyngby Kongens Lyngby (, Danish for "the King's Heather Town"; short form Lyngby) is the seat and commercial centre of Lyngby-Taarbæk Municipality in the northern suburbs of Copenhagen, Denmark. Lyngby Hovedgade is a busy shopping street and the site ...

from his foster father in 1775.

References

External links

Hermann Abbestée
at geni.com
Timeline

Timeline /dather

Source
{{DEFAULTSORT:Abbestee, Hermann Danish civil servants 18th-century Danish businesspeople Directors of the Danish Asiatic Company Governors of Danish India Danish expatriates in India Danish Calvinist and Reformed Christians 1728 births 1794 deaths 1760s in Danish India 1770s in Danish India 1780s in Danish India

Early life and background

Career

Personal life and legacy

References

Further reading

External links