12 Facts About Henriette Wegner

Henriette Wegner was a member of the Hanseatic Berenberg banking dynasty of Hamburg and moved to Norway in 1824 when she married the mining magnate Benjamin Wegner.

Henriette Wegner was briefly a co-owner of Berenberg Bank, and became one of the wealthiest women of Norway on her husband's death as the main owner of one of the country's largest forest estates.

Henriette Wegner was known for her work for the homeless and for improving the situation of women.

Henriette Wegner was a long-term board member of the Norwegian Charity for the Homeless.

Seyler and Anna Henriette Wegner Gossler, and a granddaughter of the Swiss-born theatre director Abel Seyler and of the Hamburg bankers Johann Hinrich Gossler and Elisabeth Berenberg, whose Belgian-origined family had founded Berenberg Bank in 1590.

On 15 May 1824, she married the businessman Benjamin Henriette Wegner in St Nicholas' Church, Hamburg; born in Konigsberg, he had two years earlier moved to Norway as director-general and co-owner of the Blue Color Works, a mining company and the world's largest manufacturer of cobalt blue as well as Norway's largest industrial enterprise.

Henriette Wegner later acquired several other enterprises and estates in Norway.

The 1820s neoclassical Henriette Wegner Pavilion in Frogner Park was a wedding gift given to her, and was moved from the family's former home Fossum Manor in the late 1830s.

Henriette Wegner was noted for her social commitment, and was chairwoman and board member of the Norwegian Charity for the Homeless for over twenty years.

Henriette Wegner endowed a substantial amount to helping the homeless.

Henriette Wegner had six children, of which five survived into adulthood.

Henriette Wegner was interred on 30 November 1875 at Gamle Aker Cemetery in Oslo.