Gertrud Schwend-Uexküll (born "Gertrud, Baronesse von Uexküll-Gyllenband": 17 May 1867 - 15 January 1901) was a well-born pioneer of girls' education. In 1899 she founded the "Mädchengymnasium" (secondary school for girls) in Stuttgart. It was the first such institution in the Kingdom of Württemberg and only the second anywhere in Germany.
Life
Provenance and early years
Gertrud Baronesse Uexküll-Gyllenband was born into a well-established family at Fortress Dünamünde, a manor house on the grounds formerly occupied by a stronghold built by the Teutonic Knights, just outside Riga, a multicultural city which at that time found itself positioned on the outer fringes of the Russian empire. She was born, the fifth of her parents' recorded children, into the German-speaking community which for historical reasons constituted the traditional land-owning ruling class in the region. Her father, Georg Reinhold Baron von Uexküll (1825-1890), was an army officer with specialities as an engineer. Gertrud attended a "Töchterschule" (girls' school) in Riga and then completed her schooling at a nearby boys' school where, unusually, she sat and passed the exams necessary to qualify her for work as a secondary school teacher. By that time her mother, born Marie von Boehtlingk (1830-1881), had died. Gertrud had been just 14 at the time, and was able to continue with her education. That was no longer the case in 1890 when her father also died. By this time, however, she was 23. Riga was experiencing rapid shifts in its ethnic population mix, driven by rapid urbanisation and the appearance of migrants from the Russian heartlands, generating potentially disruptive and dangerous inter-ethnic tensions: Gertrud set out on her travels while her elder brothers and sisters appear to have remained in what is now known as Latvia.
Geneva
She ended up in Geneva, then as now a relatively progressive city, and embarked on a course of study in art. She was unable to complete the course, however, due to the poor state of her eye-sight. She then switched to a Swiss girls' high school from where she successfully sat the exams necessary to gain admission to the university. At the University of Geneva she completed degree courses in History, Philosophy and Literature. Across central Europe, and indeed in Russia, Switzerland was regarded, as very advanced when it came to the education of women, but the idea that women might progress to university degrees was still contentious. Nevertheless, Gertrud Uexküll-Gyllenband was able to attend lectures, and she emerged with a form of degree described in sources as a "Licenciée ès Lettres".
She also involved herself in women's rights issues. As student-president of the Geneva Student Sorority, she successfully campaigned for the right of female students to be represented on the university council, and then became the first female student to participate in that committee's deliberations. It was also during her time as a student at Geneva that Gertrud Uexküll-Gyllenband met Friedrich Schwend (1871-1934), the man who a few years later became her husband. Directly after completing her student career in Geneva, however, she transferred to Paris university (La Sorbonne) in order to undertake a major academic project. Unfortunately the heart defect from which she suffered prevented her from staying very long in Paris, however. She transferred to a coastal location where she stayed long enough to recover and convalesce.
Tutoring in Germany
In the winter of 1898 she returned to Germany, now accompanied by the friend of her university days, Friedrich Schwend. They both settled in Stuttgart still, at this stage, unmarried: Gertrud's first job on settling in Stuttgart was as a private tutor, employed by wealthy families to teach their children French. (Under the customs of the time across western Europe, it would have been considered, at best, unconventional for a woman engaged in teaching other people's children to marry a man and give birth to children of her own at the same time.)