ENGELS TO W. HOLZENHAUER[1]
IN COLOGNE
[Draft]
[Manchester,] 26 November 1868
Following receipt of your letter dated 18 August I inquired at home[2] about the circumstances in which you had left my brothers'[3] business and also sought to find out whether there was any prospect of your obtaining employment there again.
Now I have received the relevant information, and unfortunate- ly it is such that I can offer you no hope whatsoever of obtaining employment there again. I am therefore returning to you enclosed the false, as you say, testimony of my brother-in-law.[4] In view of the information received, I must, it is true, assume this testimony does not wholly correspond to reality, a fact on which you may congratulate yourself, to be sure.
Respectfully yours,
F. E.
- ↑ This letter is the rough draft of Engels' reply TO W. HOLZENHAUER's letter of 18 August 1868. Holzenhauer wrote that he had been employed by the firm of Ermen and Engels in Engelskirchen for 18 years, from the time of its foundation (see Note 238), and had been dismissed after a quarrel with Adolf von Griesheim.
- ↑ The letter in question has not been found.
- ↑ A reference to the German branch of the firm Ermen & Engels—at Engelskirchen (near Cologne) founded c. 1840 by Friedrich Engels Sr., which ran the German side of the enterprise with the assistance of Anthony Ermen. The firm had its offices in Barmen.
After their father's death in March 1860, Engels' brothers Hermann, Rudolf and Emil suggested that Frederick should give his share in the business over to them. One of the reasons they named was that he had been living abroad since 1849. Engels was to receive £10,000 in compensation to consolidate his legal and financial position in the firm of Ermen & Engels in Manchester. He became its co-owner in 1864 (see also Note 158).
- ↑ Adolf von Griesheim 8 983