The story begins on 10 January 1801 in the small town of Crefeld, now spelt Krefeld. This French département of the Roer, a French administrative region, was one of four carved out of the Cisrhenane Republic, created in 1797 by the Directory, the French revolutionary government, and annexed 4 years later. Agnese Kuhnen, from the Rhineland, and Thierry Hermes, a local innkeeper, welcome their sixth child, Dietrich.1
The Protestant family had taken refuge in Prussia after the persecutions, a story I partly told in the issue on the Courtois bank (in French).
When his parents die in 1821, Dietrich Hermes settles in Pont-Audemer, a few kilometres west of Honfleur in Normandy. At the time, the town is famous for its leatherwork. He takes his father’s first name, Thierry, and frenchifies his surname by adding an accent. For more than 15 years, he learns the trade of saddle and harness maker. After marrying Christine Pétronella Pierrat (a Catholic) in 1828, he sets up on his own in Paris in 1837. His business will bear his name: Hermès.
Specialising in horse riding, Hermès makes harnesses and saddles, but also publishes books. Thierry sets up his workshop at 56 rue Basse-du-Rempart, near the Madeleine, a street that no longer exists.
In the meantime, the couple have had their only son, Charles Émile, born in 1831, who gradually takes over the family business. He is the one who starts diversifying the goods, offering items both for riders and for horses.
Two years after Thierry’s death, Charles Émile moves the business to 24 rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré. The shop is still there, and it is still the company’s head office.
Charles Émile’s two sons (Adolphe, 1860, and Émile, 1871) join the firm in turn and run it together, renaming it Hermès Frères. In 1919, Émile buys out his brother and becomes the sole shareholder.
Following in his ancestors’ footsteps, he keeps diversifying and innovating at Hermès, for instance by being the first to import the zip into France. Keen to take the brand beyond horses, he broadens the product range.
Involved in the 1900 World’s Fair in Paris from the start, he holds several posts in its organisation and is made commissioner of the equestrian section. A few weeks before it closes, he marries Julie Hollande, from the bourgeoisie of eastern France.
The couple will have 4 children, and this is where the whole story really begins. Because all 4 children are girls, which means the Hermès name is going to disappear. Above all, except for Simone, who died at 18, the girls will all marry and have lots of children.
That makes 16 heirs, including 5 daughters, who will in turn take the names Bauer, Harth and Momméja for the Puechs, de Seynes for the Dumas daughter, and Siegrist for the Guerrand-Hermès daughter.
Which explains why nearly 140 people with very different surnames are now heirs and shareholders of the group.