Charlotte Führer (1834 – November 5, 1907)[1] was a German author and midwife/"doctress".
She was born in Hanover, Germany in 1834 as Johanne Louise Charlotte Heise, to Evangelical Lutheran parents;[2] her father was a general in the Hanoverian Army.
At the age of 17, she married Ferdinand Adolph Fuhrer, who she refers to by the pseudonym "Gustav Schroeder" in her book.[2] Shortly afterwards, she and Ferdinand moved to New York City, in the United States.[3] They had two daughters there, named Otillia and Maria.[2] Ferdinand started a business selling imported German goods there, but the business failed, and in 1856 they moved back to Germany.[2][3]
There, she enrolled in Hamburg University and became a midwife.[3] During this time she had a third daughter, Louisa.[2] In 1851, her father died.[2] After she graduated, on April 17, 1859,[2] she and her husband sailed to Montreal, where she practiced as a midwife for 30 years.[3] Shortly after their arrival, she had a fourth daughter, Elizabeth.[2] She went on to have another daughter, Laura, in 1860, and a son, Friedrich, in 1866.[2] In the summer of 1873, Ottilia and Maria both died of typhus.[2] During this time in Montreal, she wrote Mysteries of Montreal: Memoirs of a Midwife, a recollection of her experiences as a midwife in Montreal, published in 1881.[3] In 1884 her son Friedrich also died of typhus.[2] Charlotte herself succumbed to cancer on November 5, 1907.[1][2]
References
- 1 2 "Führer, Charlotte (1834–1907)". Encyclopedia.com. Retrieved 16 December 2014.
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 Führer, Cahrlotte; W. Peter Ward (1984). The Mysteries of Montreal: Memoirs of a Midwife. UBC Press. pp. 1–3. ISBN 9780774843355. Retrieved June 15, 2012.
- 1 2 3 4 5 Roland, Charles G. (June 1967). "Mysterious Montrealer: Charlotte Führer". Canadian Medical Association Journal. Canadian Medical Association. 96 (24): 1589–1591. PMC 1922996. PMID 5338172.