Louis Pierre Daniel Sellier

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Louis Sellier war ein herausragender Unternehmer seiner Zeit, Mitbegründer der Leipziger Börse, der Allgemeinen Deutschen Kreditanstalt, der Eisenbahn Leipzig-Dresden und Miterbauer des Suez-Kanals.

FROM WEBSITE OF SELLIER AND BELLOT: 1790 In Paris Pierre Daniel Louis, the seventeenth of a total of nineteen children was born to the Sellier family. Two of his brothers were guillotined during the French Revolution" 1809 Louis Sellier emigrated from France in order to avoid having to serve in Napoleon's army. Using the name Dell, he resided in Hamburg and in St. Petersburg. During this sojourn he acquired extensive insight and experience of international trade. 1813 Sellier, together with his relative, Barthelemy Sellier, purchased the Rosenkranz Company in Leipzig and transformed it into Sellier & Comp. The company was engaged in the sale of luxury goods (crystal glass, bronze products) and additionally of hunting weapons and accessories. 1815 Sellier was paying secret visits to Paris, where he met Annette Huré, the daughter of Andrea Huré, the Governor of the French area of St. Martin island in the Lesser Antilles. Sellier asked her father for Annette's hand in marriage, but he was rejected and Annette was sequestered in a monastery from which Sellier kidnapped her and, in October 1815, their son was born. They did not get married, however, until February 1816. Sellier and his wife then moved to Leipzig, where he devoted himself to the full-time management of his company. 1822 Nicolas Bellot together with his associate, Daguien, requested permission to build a workshop in Paris for the production of percussion primers. A permit was granted to them on 20th August 1823. In addition, Bellot worked as a silent partner with the Paris company Tardy & Blancher. The primers from Bellot's workshop had excellent properties and rapidly gained commercial success. Sellier & Comp. in Leipzig also started to become engaged in their sale. Sellier was an astute businessman. He foresaw the emergence of a new cap system for small arms and decided to initiate his own production of percussion caps. In France, England, and Prussia there already existed workshops for their production. Sellier decided to establish the manufacture of percussion caps in the Austrian Empire, in Prague, the capital of the Bohemian Crown. 1825 At the beginning of the year 1825 Sellier & Comp. requested from the Austrian authorities a privilege for making percussion caps. Sellier, however, did not wait for the issuance of the privilege and initiated the first attempt at their production near Prague, in the former Zbraslav monastery, in a chemical factory belonging to A. Richter. Without professional guidance, the manufacturing operation failed however. The Austrian authorities were meanwhile discussing Sellier's request for a privilege. The Austrian Emperor Francis I issued this, however, with the proviso that the production would be supervised by a person familiar with this "art". Sellier, influenced by his own unsuccessful attempts to introduce the production of percussion caps and as a consequence of the requirement defined in the privilege granted by the Emperor, sought Bellot's cooperation. Bellot agreed that he would start production in Prague and train local workers. This agreement was reached in August 1825 and this year is considered as that of the founding of the S & B Company. Bellot came to Prague in autumn 1825 and undertook the establishment of a workshop for the manufacture of percussion caps in a former vineyard estate at "Parukářka", outside the walls of Prague that Sellier had already purchased. On 22nd December 1825 Sellier and Bellot asked the Austrian authorities to either allow them the right to exercise the privileges granted by the Emperor Francis I, or to grant them a concessionary licence for the manufacture of percussion caps. 1826 The authorities informed the applicants that they could not issue a permit because, in any case, under Austrian Law, foreigners were not permitted to acquire land in Austria for establishing a production company. In late March Sellier and Bellot requested the granting of an additional privilege for the percussion cap. In the text of the application it is stated that the primer composition is held very firmly in caps, and that these primers do not cause the corrosion of locks or of gun barrels. It was evident that the primer composition was pressed into the cap and that it contained mercury fulminate in the place of chlorate. The Viennese experts somehow missed these details that were the subject of Bellot's invention and granted this privilege to the applicants without any problem. The business partners asked the authorities in Prague concerning granting rights to the exercising of this second privilege. During that process it became clear that the primer composition in accordance with this new privilege contained mercury fulminate. Prague authorities become nervous about this new, completely unknown explosive, and forwarded the application by the business partners to Vienna with a negative statement, where the industrial production of mercury fulminate in Prague was rejected." 1827 Bellot was a sociable person and was not shy amongst Prague Society. He met the Czech girl, Alžběta Vacková, with whom he became engaged and they were married on 12th July 1827. This Prague marriage obviated Bellot's intention to return to Paris and he decided to remain permanently in Prague. Marriage with an Austrian citizen enabled Bellot to obtain Austrian citizenship. Sellier was granted a dispensation of the need for Austrian citizenship, which then facilitated their business activities in Prague." 1865 180 million primers and bullets were produced with a value of 80,000 guilders. Primers were sold in the Austrian monarchy, in the German states, in the Balkans and the Middle East, in Russia and in North and South America. In the United States they achieved such popularity that the percussion caps were generically referred to as SB's. Sellier renounced his share in the ownership of both factories (he passed it on to his children) and ret 1872 The Consortium issued a "Punktace" (basically a contract on a future contract) concluded between Dr. Kayser (representing the Sellier heirs), Bellot (as the sellers) and Martin Halla, as the representative of the buyers. The purchase price for the factories in Prague and in Schönebeck was set at 800,000 guilders, which was to be repaid in four time-specific instalments.