Robert von Puttkamer

Robert von Puttkamer
Robert von Puttkamer in 1879
Born	Robert Viktor von Puttkamer 5 May 1828 Frankfurt (Oder), Brandenburg
Died	15 March 1900 (aged 71) Karzin, Pomerania
Nationality	Prussian
Parent(s)	Heinrich von Puttkamer Luitgarde Agnes von Glasenapp

Robert Viktor von Puttkamer (5 May 1828 – 15 March 1900) was a Prussian statesman, most prominent in his roles as Prussian minister of public education and worship in 1879 and as interior minister in 1881, under his brother-in-law Otto von Bismarck. He also introduced reforms in German orthography.

Puttkamer was born at Frankfurt (Oder) in the Province of Brandenburg. His father, Heinrich von Puttkamer, Oberpräsident of the Province of Posen, belonged to the widely extended noble Puttkamer family, of which Bismarck's wife Johanna von Puttkamer and Puttkamer's own wife were also members. Robert von Puttkamer, after a short course of law, began his official career in 1850 as Auskultator in the courts at Danzig, but in 1852 he entered the civil service, and after his promotion to the rank of Assessor in 1854 he was given a post in the railway department of the ministry for trade and industry. In 1859 he became a member of the presidial council (German: Oberpräsidialrat) at Coblenz, capital of the Prussian Rhine Province, and from 1860 to 1866 was Landrat at Demmin in Pomerania.

During the Austro-Prussian War, Puttkamer acted as civil commissary in Moravia. From 1867 to 1871 he was a councillor in the chancery of the North German Confederation. In 1871 he was appointed president of the government region of Gumbinnen in East Prussia, in 1875 department president (German: Bezirkspräsident/French: président du département) of the Department of Lorraine, and in 1877 Oberpräsident of Silesia. From 1874 onward he was frequently elected to the Reichstag and the Prussian Chamber of Deputies, in which he attached himself to the German Conservative Party.