[2] He worked initially as a secretary for the Lutheran consistorial government in Hanau, but eventually rose to the rank of senior civil servant (German: Regierungsrat).

[33] Initially, Ledderhose and his colleague Adolf Etienne [de] refused to take up their new positions, but after they were both threatened with deportation to Spandau prison, they accepted.

[37] She was the daughter of Kassel merchant and banker Johann Georg Heinrich Pfeiffer (1781–1859) and his wife Susanna (née Deines; 1787–1844).

[38] Minna's sisters were also married to prominent men in Hesse, most notably the pioneering chemist Friedrich Wöhler and the jurist and parliamentarian Otto Bähr.

[47] During his tenure as District President, Ledderhose was able to take part in many great events of state, including several visits by the Kaiser and the imperial court.

[48] On the occasion of the Kaiser's visit to inaugurate the opening of the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Universität, Ledderhose received much praise, but his wife Minna was also singled out for her charm and the dignity with which she "played Hausfrau" for the Imperial retinue.

[54] After his old rival Manteuffel was named Imperial Lieutenant of Alsace-Lorraine in 1879, Ledderhose was replaced by Otto Back, former mayor of Strasbourg as Bezirkspräsident and given the position of Undersecretary of State (German: Unterstaatssekretär) for Agriculture, Industry, and Public Works.

[55] According to Alberta von Puttkammer, the daughter of Ledderhose's colleague and former Bezirkspräsident of Lorraine Robert von Puttkamer, the decision to put Ledderhose in this position was based not only on Manteuffel's annoyance with him, but also because "...[he] had neither a lively interest nor a pronounced talent, while he was sympathetic to internal political administrative questions and worked effectively on their solution.

Most of the planning was done while he was Bezirkspräsident, but even after he lost that position, the project fell under his purview as a matter of public works, so he remained closely involved.

[58] There are records of Ledderhose's impassioned speeches to the government, in which he defended a wide variety of issues that fell under his purview.

"[60] His speeches before the government also tied into his role as curator of the university, such as one he gave imploring his peers to approve the funding of new greenhouses on campus, to expand the research capabilities of both the departments of botany and medicine.

[61] Due to Ledderhose's support, Heinrich Anton de Bary was able to preside over the opening of what was then one of the premier botanical institutes in Europe.

At the same time, Ledderhose was also made curator of the newly established Kaiser-Wilhelm-Universität, whose construction and development he oversaw; at this phase the university occupied the now-vacant Palais Rohan.

[62] Due to Roggenbach's abrupt resignation, certain crucial aspects of the university's organization were left undone, including the acquisition of faculty, the outlaying of permanent statutes, and construction of new buildings for teaching and research.

[67] Among Ledderhose's achievement ins the early years of the university was his strong conviction that all faculties should remain united, rather than splitting the liberal arts and natural sciences into two separate schools, an idea which was supported by Generalfeldmarschall Edwin Freiherr von Manteuffel himself.

In dealing with the pushback from Roggenbach loyalists at the early days, Ledderhose came into direct conflict with Friedrich Althoff, who, while a competent educator, possessed fewer skills than were desired as an administrator, which often left him at odds with both his faculty and his colleagues.

[69] Ledderhose, it was noted, had a much softer touch when it came to dealing with the faculty, who quickly grew to appreciate his style, and with whom he would enjoy a very close and productive relationship for the years of his curatorship.

[71] In one hiring coup, Ledderhose was able to establish two separate chairs for English and Romance studies, two disciplines which had previously only ever been bundled together as "non-German."

[73] Less successfully, Ledderhose and Bismarck both championed the hiring of Heinrich Julius Holtzmann to the faculty of theology despite having no published work and little teaching experience.