Johann Cesar VI. Godeffroy

Johann Cesar VI. Godeffroy (7 July 1813 in Kiel – 9 February 1885 in Blankenese) was a German trader and Hanseat.

He was the founder of Museum Godeffroy.

The Godeffroys were French Huguenots of La Rochelle. In 1737 they were forced to flee France to avoid religious persecution after events following the Edict of Fontainebleau in 1685. The family sought asylum in Prussia and finally settled in the port city of Hamburg, founding a trading empire known as J.C. Godeffroy & Sohn. At first the trade was in Western Europe and the West Indies with textiles as export item; the goods returning to Hamburg included copper, coffee, wine, figs, and sugar from Cuba. Under Johann Cesar VI Godeffroy outposts were established in Havana and in Valparaiso. He built a fleet of trading ships that, at its peak, numbered 29 deep water sailing vessels and some 100 smaller ships. Among these ships were the barques Johann Caesar, Peter Godeffroy, La Rochelle, Wandram, Suzanne, Iserbrook, Victoria, and until the economic crisis of 1857, the renowned American-built clipper Sovereign of the Seas. In 1855, trade was expanded into the Pacific following negotiations by Godeffroy’s agent in Valparaiso, August Unselm. He sailed out to the Navigator Islands, The Friendly Islands, Fiji, and finally Tahiti.

The trading business in the Pacific was very profitable and new outposts and plantations were established on many Pacific Islands. The goods were copra, coconut oil and luxuries such as pearl. In 1857, a central outpost, directing Pacific operations was established at Apia. Johann Godeffroy was also able to take advantage of an immigration scheme to Southern Africa and between October 1859 and September 1883 no less than 36 ships sailed for southern Africa, bringing hundreds of German families to the Western Cape, the Eastern Cape, British Kaffraria and Natal. After the financial crash of the late 1850, the firm supplemented its revenue by taking on passengers to the Australian gold rush and the California gold rush. The German imperial government utilized the Godeffroy company as part of its colonial policy in the Pacific Islands. Nevertheless, in 1878, the company went bankrupt due to speculations with German mining stocks and then emerged as Deutsche Handels- und Plantagen Gesellschaft der Südseeinseln zu Hamburg, or DHPG, with continuity and management by Godeffroy personnel.

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