The early history of the family is sketched out in
A Short History of the English Branch of the Agassiz Family, by A.R.N. Agassiz and in
Jules Marcou's
Life, Letters, And Works of Louis Agassiz. The family was of the
Protestant faith and many of their early members were ministers in the Church. The Rev. Jean Pierre Moise Agassiz (1705–1784) was Pastor of
Lucens,
Thierrens and
Constantine, all of which were near
Lake Neuchatel. His fourth son, the Rev. Philippe Louis Agassiz was the father of the Rev. Louis Benjamin Rudolph Agassiz, who was the father of the naturalist
Louis Agassiz and Auguste Agassiz. Louis's son,
Alexander, was a geologist like his father but his interests also turned to mining operations. Auguste Agassiz moved to the Swiss town of
Saint-Imier and set up his own watch firm in 1833 in partnership with Florian Morel and Henri Raiguel. In 1847 Agassiz became the firm's sole owner and in 1852 his nephew
Ernest Francillon joined the firm. In 1866 Francillon acquired two plots of land called Les Longines ('long and narrow fields') and he built a factory there, allowing all the staff to be under one roof for the first time. In 1889 he registered the
Longines brand and its famous winged hourglass symbol. The Reverend Jean Pierre Moise Agassiz had another son, David Louis Agassiz (1737–1807). He left
Switzerland with his friend
Jacques Necker, moving to Paris to take a job in finance. Necker went on to become minister of finance to
Louis XVI, while David Louis moved to England and anglicised his name to Lewis Agassiz. He became a City magnate, amassing a fortune that would be worth many millions today. He married Mary Griesdale. His elder son Arthur David Lewis Agassiz (1771–1866) managed the family business and lost a great deal of his father's fortune. He married Jeanne Suzanne Prevost Rouviere (1776–1842). Among their many children, was Mary Ann (1799–1850), who married Joseph Frederick Edlmann (1794–1857), born in Hollenburg,
Austria, and sent with the blessing of his uncle Reyer, of the
Trieste trading company, Reyer und Schlitz, to open an office in
London, after the fall of
Napoleon. They lived in
Peckham and are both buried in
Nunhead Cemetery. Their son Frederick Joseph Edlmann (1829–1890), was a partner of the merchant bank
Brown Shipley in the City of London, and bought the house Hawkwood, near
Bromley,
Kent. Another son, Joseph Ernest Edlmann (1831–1895) was a Major in the King's Dragoon Guards, based in
Coventry, and lived in Kent House,
Leamington Spa. Arthur's daughter Aldine Agassiz married the clergyman
Charles Benjamin Tayler. David Louis's younger son was James John Charles Agassiz (1772–1858) was a Commander in the
Royal Navy and was known for his gallantry in command of
HMS Hound off the coast of
Étaples, when he sent fire ships in amongst the French fleet. He was praised in despatches by
Admiral Lord Nelson. James John Charles Agassiz's elder son Lewis Agassiz (1793–1866) served in the
Royal Marines and was leading one of the firing parties into
Washington D.C. as part of the
burning of Washington during the
War of 1812. The Agassiz family was granted a coat of arms, depicting a torch for this action. He also
fought in the Battle of Fort Peter. After he left the
Royal Marines, Lewis Agassiz wrote
A Journey to Switzerland, a travel book describing his family's travels in Europe back to his ancestral home. He continued to travel widely, becoming a friend of the
King of Prussia who was godfather to one of his children and who bought another a commission in the British Army. Lewis Agassiz lived in the last years of his life at Stour Lodge,
Bradfield, Essex. His eldest surviving son, Lewis Nunn Agassiz, also had a military career, but went on to become a pioneer in
Canada. He and his family founded the town of
Agassiz, British Columbia. Lewis Nunn Agassiz's daughter, Margaret Eliza Florence Askin Agassiz, later wrote an account of pioneer life titled
Memories of a Pioneer Life in British Columbia: A Short History of the Agassiz Family. Lewis Agassiz's other children included the Rev. Rodolph Agassiz (d 1899), Rector of
Radnage, who married Matilda Isabella Shafto, granddaughter of Sir Cuthbert Shafto of
Bavington Hall,
Northumberland, from whom the Canadian mountain biker
Graham Agassiz descends, and Alfred Agassiz, who emigrated to
New Zealand and has many descendants among the
Te Whakatohea tribe of the
Māori. The Agassiz family is now scattered throughout the world, in
Switzerland, the
United Kingdom,
Canada,
United States,
Australia and
New Zealand. However, the name is extremely rare, with only a few dozen Agassiz families existing. ==References==