Amalie Christine Jencken 1785 to 1878 - From Estonia to Ireland to Australia and Inbetween

Book excerpt: Amalie Christine was born in Estonia in 1785. Her mother died in 1799. In 1800 she married Baron Gustav Andreas von Tiesenhausen (1778-1854), a member of one of the wealthiest families in Estonia. After 18 years of marriage and several children, she ran away with her personal physician Dr. Ferdinand Jencken, who was also married. They went by way of Germany and Denmark, where their son Eduard/Edward was born, to the German émigré colony in London. Dr. Jencken opened a practice. Over the course of her life time, she lived in London, Mainz, St. Petersburg, the Isle of Guernsey, Londonderry, and Dublin near where she and Ferdinand are buried. In 1848, her son Eduard went to Australia with his wife Ellen seeking a livelihood. At age 84 after a severe illness, she wrote her Memoirs and sent them to Edward. From the time of his leaving England until her death, she wrote Edward and his family. Fortunately, the memoirs and these letters have been preserved in Australia. She is a woman who lived for and through her husband and children, who knew life in Europe from serfdom in Estonia to the 1848 revolution in Germany to the Franco-Prussian War and to intensifying russification in Estonia through the letters from her oldest son, Hermann von Tiesenhausen. She truly lived a remarkable life for a woman in nineteenth century Europe.