Wichern, Johann Heinrich

(1808–81)

   Philanthropist.

   Wichern was born in Hamburg, Germany, and he was educated in Göttingen and Berlin, where he came under the influence of schleiermacher. In 1833 he founded the Rauhes Haus, an organisation to help poor children in Hamburg. The institution grew and in 1844 he started the monthly periodical Die Fliegenden Blätter aus dem Rauhen Haus which publicised his activities. Then in 1848 he founded the Innere Mission, a single agency which embraced all voluntary charitable work within the German Protestant Churches. Later he became involved in prison reform. The Innere Mission has continued its work and in the Second World War it took a stand against the Nazi policy of euthanasia.

   ‘Innere Mission’, in F.L. Cross (ed.), The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, 2^nd edn (1974);

   K.S. Latourette, Christianity in a Revolutionary Age, Vol. 2 (1960).