Johann Hinrich Gossler

Johann Hinrich Gossler (18 August 1738 – 31 August 1790) was a German merchant and banker. He was married to Elisabeth Berenberg (1749–1822) and succeeded his father-in-law Johann Berenberg as head of the Berenberg & Gossler company, that was renamed Joh. Berenberg, Gossler & Co. the year following his death. During Gossler's tenure as the company's main partner it became one of the largest merchant houses of Hamburg. Many of his descendants were prominent in Hamburg society, including his grandson, Hamburg's first mayor Hermann Gossler. Some of his descendants were later ennobled as the barons von Berenberg-Gossler. The Gossler Islands in Antarctica are named in honour of his family.

Background Johann Hinrich Gossler was a son of Johan Eibert Gossler (1700–1776), an accountant and burgher of Hamburg who had bought the office of Herrenschenk for 10,600 mark, making him master of ceremonies of the Hamburg council. The Gossler family had been burghers and velvet makers in Hamburg at least since the 17th century. The name Gossler appears in the city already in the 14th century, although it is unknown if it is the same family. Gossler's maternal grandfather Jürgen Friedrich Boedecker was a Hamburg merchant and grand burgher from 1706, and his great-grandfather Eibert Tiefbrunn was also a prominent Hamburg merchant. A list of his ancestors is included in the Hamburgisches Geschlechterbuch. Johann Hinrich Gossler attended the Johanneum zu Michaelis and started his career at 15 as an apprentice of the merchant Hinrich Mönkhusen. After Mönkhusen went bankrupt he became a Junge with the brothers Johann and Paul Berenberg. Under the leadership of his son-in-law and his son, the company became one of the largest sugar importers on the North European market. Astrid Petersson notes that the company's "extensive sugar imports in the period after 1814, especially from Brazil, the U.S. and East Asia, some of which represented a continuation of their trading relationships dating back to the late 18th century, contributed significantly to the company's wealth."

As was usual even for the largest merchant houses at the time, the company employed a relatively small number of people at the head office (Kontor), two to three accountants and four to six servants assisting the partners, that is, at various times, Johann Hinrich Gossler, his father-in-law, his brother-in-law and his son-in-law. The work at the head office mainly consisted of business correspondence, accounting and decisions about contracts. Gossler acquired Mortzenhaus, one Hamburg's largest city palaces, which was both the Gossler family's city residence (they spent the summers on a property outside the city) and the company's headquarters.

Johann Hinrich Gossler was the father of Hamburg senator and banker Johann Heinrich Gossler II (1772–1842) and the grandfather of Hamburg senator and First Mayor Hermann Gossler (1802–1877) and banker Johann Heinrich Gossler III (1805–1879). Johann Heinrich Gossler III was the father of Johann Berenberg Gossler (1839–1913). In 1880, the Hamburg Senate granted Johann Berenberg Gossler the name of Berenberg-Gossler, and in 1888, the family was ennobled in the Kingdom of Prussia as von Berenberg-Gossler. In 1910, Johann von Berenberg-Gossler was raised to the Baronial rank. Baron Johann von Berenberg-Gossler was the father of John von Berenberg-Gossler (1866–1943), Senator and German Ambassador in Rome. Johann Hinrich Gossler and Elisabeth Berenberg were also the grandparents of Betty Seyler (1789–1837), married to businessman Gerhard von Hosstrup, Louise Seyler (1799–1849), married to ship broker Ernst Friedrich Pinckernelle, and Henriette Seyler (1805–1875), married to Norwegian industrialist Benjamin Wegner.

Ancestry