Luise Hensel

HENSEL, L(o)uise. b. Linum, Brandenburg, 30 March 1798; d. Paderborn, 18 December 1876. Her father was a Lutheran priest at Linum. Her brother Wilhelm is known as a painter. She spent her first twelve years in Linum, where she attended elementary school. In 1810, a year after her father’s death, her family moved to Berlin. There she attended the Realschule (secondary school) at Koch-Street, the finest girls’ school in Berlin, from 1811 to 1812. After the death of her older sister in 1816 Luise brought up her nephew Rudolf Rochs. In 1818 she converted to Catholicism, and in 1820 she swore to remain a virgin, although her plan to enter a monastery could not be realized. She lived in different...