Beatrix von Hammerstein

Beatrix von Hammerstein (née von Faust, 1845 - 1915) was a German suffragette and industrialist and the daughter-in-law of Orlan von Hammerstein. During her lifetime, she shared in Orlan's unpopularity and was often called Germany's most hated woman. Her public life mostly ended after the Beatrix Scandal in 1875.

## Early life

Born to a poor minor noble mathematician, father who worked in the employ of first Karl von Hammerstein and later Orlan von Hammerstein, she grew up in an environment that regularly saw the issues of business and politics mentioned in her presence. She developed a knack for both learning about both, knowing full well her ambitions within both would also be frustrated being a woman. She attended some of the first girl schools in Germany, but in the absence of a higher education system, Orlan von Hammerstein helped her father pay for her to attend Bedford College in London. In London, she ended up following and participating in the Socialist/Communist discussion circles, before returning to Germany in 1867, where she’d end up falling in love with and marrying Reinhard von Hammerstein, son of Orlan. That year, her father had been working with Orlan to develop an economic reform that they hoped would stretch across ideological barriers and rejuvenate Orlan’s political career and therefore carry along his advisers. Instead, owing in large part to the Free Trade Consensus, the reform failed. Beatrix, seeing her distraught father, only further solidified her distrust of liberalism and the “socialists” in the SPD. Though, in Germany she limited her political participation to supporting pro-women’s suffrage groups.

## Years as an activist

With the end of Orlan and by extension her father’s involvement with politics, along with her marriage to Reinhard, she was able to partially settle down, having 3 kids in 1867, 1868 and 1869 respectively and losing her radical edge. In 1870, Orlan von Hammerstein formed Brandenburg Bank AG, but tragedy soon struck. A few weeks after the founding of the bank, Orlan, her father and Reinhard boarded a steam powered yacht off the coast of Pomerania. For unknown reasons, there was an explosion of the steam engine, Orlan and her father died on the ship, however Reinhard was rescued, only to die a few days later of his wounds. The event was both overwhelmingly tragic and angering for Beatrix. However, nowadays some historians claim that Beatrix herself hired a saboteur to rig the boat so that she could inherit Orlan von Hammerstein's possessions, as their deaths meant she was left in charge of the assets of the von Hammerstein family and had to protect the inheritance for her children. Yet at the same time, her simmering anger at the German political system left her feeling that she needed to avenge her father and husband. And so in 1870, she joined Elouise von Märchenlied's ADFV. Immediately, she gained support from younger members of the ADFV and started to cause a rift in the organization between the old guard led by von Märchenlied and the younger members under her own leadership. Beatrix would start her own protests without consulting von Märchenlied. Eventually, this led to the Beatrix Scandal in 1875, where a protest led by von Hammerstein escalated and led to the death of a police officer. In the police investigation that followed, it was discovered that Beatrix' marriage certificate was invalid and that her children had no official birth certificates. This rendered her inheritance of the von Hammerstein estate void and null. As a result, the inheritance she received in 1870 was given to Karl Jürgen Krieger. For the death of a police officer, she was sentenced to 8 years in prison with a parole hearing after 5 years, and her children were sent to a boarding school. After having served 5 years, she was released in 1880. Soon thereafter, she kidnapped her children from their boarding school and migrated to New Brunswick. To this day, there is a family by the name of Hammerstein in the area around Moncton who claim they have a right to shares in the multinational company Volksphantasie.