Laura Henriette Katharina was born on June 16, 1839 in Moers and grew up in Moers Castle, which her grandfather, the Duisburg factory owner Friedrich Arnold Wintgens (1770 - 1856), purchased as a ramshackle ruin in 1813 and had restored and converted into a stately home for himself and the families of his two sons. In 1836, he commissioned the Prussian garden architect Maximilian Friedrich Weyhe to lay out what is now the old part of the palace park as an English garden. Laura's father is Heinrich Adolf Wintgens (1809 - 1889), who has lived in the upper part of the palace since his marriage to Alwina née Finnemann (1814 - 1903). Laura is the second born of 7 siblings and lives a carefree childhood in the upper middle class milieu. Together with her beloved cousin Johanna "Hannchen", Laura is sent to Vevey (Switzerland) on Lake Geneva at the age of 18, so that the higher daughters can learn "the good tone" there. The cousin with whom she had been inseparable from an early age dies shortly after her marriage during the birth of her first child, a loss Laura mourns all her life. Returning from Switzerland, she meets Johannes Zahn, whom she marries when she is barely 20. This is how the Zahn family's relationship with Moers Castle comes about. From her enlightened, cosmopolitan home, Laura now comes under the spell of her religiously extremely active father-in-law, Franz Ludwig Zahn, on the Fild estate. Laura and Johannes live there for 8 years, during which they have 6 of their children, but 3 of them die. All this may have led Laura to develop a previously unknown piety. Nevertheless, she does not give up her tolerant lifestyle and self-confident middle-class attitude. Later, the generous house of the Johannes Zahn family is located in what was then an avenue of trees on the edge of the Moers castle grounds. In her quiet, persistent manner, she has great influence in the family. Through her always warm-hearted and understanding support, Laura wins the hearts and trust of her children, and later also of the grandchildren, and becomes an important advisor to them in all situations of life, even into adulthood. She is also able to balance out Johannes' sometimes quick-tempered and restless nature in a pleasant way. Laura is the soul of the family and thus lays the roots for the lifelong bond and sense of togetherness of their 6 adult children and their families. Laura dies on 22. 08. 1916 in her apartment in Düsseldorf.
It is therefore no coincidence that her children founded our Zahn family association in Moers on June 16, 1939, on the occasion of her 100th birthday. The initiator at that time was her son, Carl Zahn (Viersen).
The children of Johannes and Laura Zahn:
Anna Wegener (1860 - 1947); Laura (1861-71); Heinrich (1863-64);
Clara (1864-65); Carl Friedrich Zahn (1866-1942; Franz (1867-67);
Maria Horn (1869 -1956); Sophie Lubowski (1873 -1953);
Hans Zahn (1875 -1963) and Elisabeth (Else) Dorfmüller (1877 -1965).
