Von der Leyen (family from Krefeld)

In 1656 their Catholic ruler, Philip William, Elector Palatine, introduced high penalty taxes for Anabaptists and Mennonites which made the Mennonite Adolf von der Leyen (c. 1624–1698) seek refuge in the city of Krefeld, at the time ruled by the more tolerant House of Orange-Nassau, and became a brother-in-law of the Op den Graeff family.

Then head of the family Heinrich von der Leyen secured citizenship in 1668 and established his wholesale business.

Krefeld had come under the rule of the King of Prussia in 1702 and kings Frederick William I and Frederick the Great sought to protect and develop domestic silk production and helped the von der Leyen business to expand further by granting them a silk production monopoly for Prussia.

The family built many factory and residential buildings in Krefeld some of which survived World War II bombardments.

[1] In the year of Frederick the Great's death, 1786, brothers Conrad, Friedrich and Johann von der Leyen were raised to the rank of hereditary nobility.

When the French Revolutionary Army occupied Krefeld in 1792, General La Marlière took Conrad von der Leyen, some of his relatives and a few other leading citizen as hostages and forced the town to pay him 300.000 guilders.

In 1795 the Left Bank of the Rhine, including Krefeld, was conquered during the War of the First Coalition and annexed by the First French Republic.

In 1828, the workers at the von der Leyen factories rebelled against their employers and the 11th Hussar Regiment put down the rebellion.

"[4] Gustav Heinrich, Baron von der Leyen zu Bloemersheim, died in 1857 as the family's last silk producer.

His widow sold the factories and moved to her agricultural estates, which the baronial Bloemersheim branch of the family operates to this day.

Friedrich Ludwig von der Leyen zu Bloemersheim (born 1854) was mayor of Büderich and district administrator of Neuss and lived in Haus Meer Castle [de] until his death in 1935.

[6][7][9] He was born in Haus Meer, Büderich (Meerbusch) [de] and is said to have died of gas poisoning after the bombing of Dresden.

[15][nb 2] Joachim's widow, Huberta, would manage the Haus Meer Estate until its inheritance by his son, Friedrich Heinrich von der Leyen II in 1970.

[citation needed] The Q4 2023 CEDMO Fact-checking Summary used Joachim Frieherr's familial ties to Heiko as one of their surveyed disinformation narratives in the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

Dr. Werner Becker was the Kreishauptmann of Kreis Lemberg-Land from March 1942 until early 1943; he was succeeded by Baron Joachim von der Leyen.

There is evidence that they were informed in advance about the Holocaust ("Judenaktion") in the case of the district chiefs Asbach, Becker, Dewitz, Görgens, von der Leyen, Nehring, Wendt and Zinser...""Joachim Freiherr von der Leyen (born 9/28/1897 in Haus-Meer, died 1945), Protestant grammar school.

""[The] democratically minded representative Voß was transferred and replaced by the nationalist-minded government assessor Joachim Freiherr von der Leyen (1897-1945).

At the beginning of March, the first protective custody orders against communists and social democrats were issued at the Krefeld police headquarters.

""Joachim Freiherr von der Leyen (1897-1945); owner of a manor; Oberlandrat; 1938/39 Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia; April 1942 H A I.V./GG; 23.

""The district captain and thus the highest civilian ruler ("oberster ziviler Herrscher") in Lviv was Joachim Freiherr von der Leyen from Krefeld.