Lars Lassen

Lars Lassen
Born	6 June 1761
Died	16 February 1823 (aged 61) Rønnovsholm, Denmark
Nationality	Danish
Spouse	Johanne Kirstine (née Meyer)
Parents	Niels Lassen (father) Karen Lassen (Født Sørensdatter) (mother)
Signature

Lars Lassen^[1] (1761 – 6 June 1823) was a Danish landowner, proprietor, chamber councilor "kammerråd" and agricultural commissioner.^[2] He was the son of Niels Lassen (1729-1811) and Karen Sørensdatter (1726-1810).^[3] Lassen owned the estates Benzonseje (Risbyholm), Rosengård, Adamshøj, Egholm, Krabbesholm and Meilgaard.^[4] He was married to Johanne Kirstine Meyer (1763-1846), who was the daughter of Procurator Peter Simonsen Meyer,^[5] and they had approximately 8 children together.^[6]

Lars Lassen was born at Sprettingegård in Sædder, and baptized on 16 February 1761 in Sædden Church.^[7]

He is the son of Niels Lassen and Karen (born Sørensdatter) of Sprettingegård. Lars Lassen, like his father, had a great interest in agriculture and management on farms, and in 1787 he worked for his sister Kirstine and brother-in-law Jacob Rosted as a "Servant Clerk"^[8] In 1789 he married Johanne Kirstine Meyer, daughter of procurator Peter Simonsen Meyer and Ingeborg Margretha Dørup.

Lars Lassen's father, Niels Lassen, had in 1788 bought first priority from John Brown^[9] and his brother David Brown for Benzonseje's six farms for 2000 Rdl. which may have resulted in Lars becoming the manager of their estate Benzonseje.^[10] The following year, as a result of financial difficulties, David Brown began to auction off and subdivide the land. The main farm itself with the remaining peasant farms as well as Ørsted and Snoldeløv Churches were sold to Lars Lassen for 38,000 Rdl., With which Lars also paid those who had priorities in the Manor house, one to Justice Boertmann of 30,000 Rdl. and one to de Coninck & Reiersen at 8000 Rdl.^[11] In 1804, Lassen sold the estate to the former tenant farmer Jens Olsen. In the Deed and Mortgage Protocol it can be read that Lars Lassen sold a large part of his properties to the former tenants farmers. The background for this can perhaps be sought in the generally poor conditions in agriculture at that time, or that Lassen had seen other possibilities.^[12]

Lassen must have had some experience with agriculture, from his parents andas a estate manager. He was interviewed by the agricultural economist Greger's Otto Bruun Begtrup's for his book on Operation for the state of agriculture in Zealand and Møen, where Lassen talks about his experience with, among other things, feeding cattle with green clover ryegrass, his large and beautiful Dutch (a cattle herd kept for milk production) which he himself administers, and about the successful experiment with a "piil plant" and with the acacia tree.^[13]

In 1796 he bought Rosengård (Kværkebygård), which he sold in 1806. Adamshøj, which Lassen also owned, belonged to this farm.

In 1804 he bought together with Count Christian Conrad Sophus Danneskiold-Samsøe the Egholm castle and Krabbesholm estate for 284,000 Rd. The two companions divided two years later the estates, so that Count Christian Conrad Sophus Danneskiold Samsøe took over Krabbesholm, while Lars Larsen acquired Egholm for 189,333 Rd. He sold Egholm in 1809 for 330,000 Rd.^[14]

Count Adam Christopher Knuth had owned Meilgård in Glesborg parish for a short period between 1804-1810 and then sold it to Lars Lassen, from which the breeding farm Birkelund was established to his son Niels Lassen. In the hard years after the state bankruptcy in 1813, Lassen lost all his wealth and the estate was taken over by the state in 1824 due to tax arrears.^[15]

Lars Lassen lived with his wife Johanne Meyer with their son Niels on the Rønnovsholm estate in Vrejlev, where he died of old age and was buried at Vrejlev church.^[16][17]

Lars Lassen's seal can be found in Meilgård Estate's Accounting Book.^[18] in the seal Lars uses his heraldry Shield containing three haystacks.^[19] On each side of the shield there are Greek columns where above each column there is a sphere with an "L" in each sphere. On top is the goddess Fortuna. The colors are unknown and therefore just a guess.^[20]

Lars Lassen married Johanne Kirstine Meyer on 27 June 1789. Johanne was born on Krogsgård in Kolby and she is the daughter of procurator Peter Simonsen Meyer and his wife Ingeborg Margretha Meyer (Born: Dørup). Johannes' grandfather "Simon Jacobsen Meyer" was as a young lackey for Lisbeth Bille on Sæbygård and became 12 April 1714 birch bailiff to Sæbygårds Birk and 20 Nov. 1727 also judge of Voergårds Birk. Jørgen Bille mentions him as follows in 1730: "he was the most knowledgeable and best "Birkedommer" Birch judges in Vendsyssel". After his appointment as town bailiff in Sæby, he moved there. His seal bears a shield in which a figure standing on a bullet as well as a helmet with two wings. He was married to Kirsten Antonisdatter Bering. The couple had children baptized in Sæby 1733 and 1738; they died young; but before Meyers came to Sæby, they had a son Peter Simonsen Meyer, b. Knaeverhede ".

Lars and Johanne had at least eight children.