Her father Baron Friedrich George von Rabenau, a tax officer and a former major in the army, was an impoverished aristocrat, who owned a bankrupted estate in Schwiebus.

She moved with her mother and her older sister Henrietta to Breslau, where they lived very modestly in a small apartment at a monastery.

As an impecunious divorcée Jeanette von Schlichting, who was a close relative of the Lichnowsky princely family, had to take care of herself and her two daughters.

In 1810 Amalia and her mother attended a high society ball at the family von Berge-Herrndorf's house in Breslau.

The Dyhrn family strongly disapproved of this union, because of the bride's trivial background and her low economic status, but Julius was determined to marry the woman he fell in love with.

A few years earlier Amalia, born and married into Protestant families, converted in Catholicism and began a close friendship with a catholic priest from Herzogswaldau, named Franz Gyrdt.

After her husband Julius died in 1841, the priest moved to the new-build mansion of the Dyhrn family in Hermsdorf.

The estate, which Amalia von Dyhrn inherited, was enormous; estimated to be 10 million Prussian thalers (nowadays approx.

Her closest relatives –the Dyhrns from Herzogswaldau, were extremely unpleasantly surprised by the content of Amalia's testament.

200 million US dollars), which at the time was in Amalia's hands, was being inherited by a person who was not even a member of the family and who was actually Catholic.

She also left some of her money to her loyal longtime servants – especially appreciated was her personal maid and companion Clara Jäschke.