Education Born in
Göttingen, Forkel-Liebeskind was the first daughter and second surviving child of , a pastor and university professor, and his wife Sophia Magdalena Wedekind (née Morrien). Her older brother was . She received private lectures from her father, who placed particular emphasis on her education. Forkel-Liebeskind showed an early talent for languages, and her father partly tailored her lessons to her interests. This unusual education for women of her time and the work of her father as a professor at the
University of Göttingen gave her access to the intellectual circles of the Enlightenment.
First marriage and early writings After marrying the musicologist
Johann Nikolaus Forkel in 1781 and the birth to their son in 1782 Forkel-Liebeskind moved to
Einbeck, the birth city of her mother. In Einbeck she began writing and published anonymously her
Originalbrief einer Mutter von 18 Jahren (1783), followed by her first novel
Maria (1784). After the publications she moved back to
Göttingen. Because of her good English and French, Forkel-Liebeskind started translating her first works from English to German, such as the first two volumes of
Geschichte der Königin Elisabeth von England and
Skizze der Regierung Georg III. From 1789 until 1792 Forkel-Liebeskind worked as a translator for him especially on historical works and travel literature. While Forkel-Liebeskind was translating the texts, Forster would supervise the work, revise it, add a preface and publish it under his name.
Ludwig Ferdinand Huber, and
Caroline Schelling. After her son (Adalbert) was born (2 October 1792) Forkel-Liebeskind moved back to Mainz (19 October 1792) to live with
Caroline Michaelis-Böhmer. During the
Siege of Mainz (1793) by the Prussian and Austrian armies Forkel-Liebeskind she attempted to flee but got caught and imprisoned at
Königstein Fortress. According to Liebeskind, the women were kept in prison because they were meant to serve as hostages in a planned exchange for the Mainz citizens who had been taken to France by the French authorities. After approximately four months of imprisonment, she was released through the intervention of her husband,
Johann Nikolaus Forkel and the
Frederick William II of Prussia.
Later years and second marriage accompanied Forkel-Liebeskind to
Göttingen before they traveled over
Lübeck to
Riga where Liebeskind started his career as a high-ranking jurist and civil servant in the Prussian and later Bavarian judicial administration. She was divorced from
Johann Nikolaus Forkel on 11 February 1794 and married in August of the same year. After their time in Riga they moved together to
Königsberg (August 1794),
Ansbach (September 1797),
Bamberg (April 1807),
Munich (Dezember 1807),
Landshut (April 1827) and
Eichstätt (1838). During her second marriage, Forkel-Liebeskind largely remained in the traditional role of an official’s wife. The only known exception was her work for
Johann Friedrich Cotta’s cultural journal
Morgenblatt für gebildete Stände between 1812 and 1821, where she headed the section “Korrespondenznachrichten für München” (“Correspondence News from Munich”). In 1837 Forkel-Liebeskind started having serious health problems, after which no further records of her life are known. Although some sources claim that she died in
Eichstätt in 1853 this but cannot be confirmed by sources and both the date and place are considered incorrect. == Sources ==