Peter Feddersen, born on 18 January 1812 in Altona nearby Hamburg, dead on 5 July 1874 in Basel, is a very interesting figure, originated in Mecklenburg, he married an Italian woman, Esther Daverio Possenti, as his future wife.
He followed his academic studies in jurisprudence at the Universities of Kiel and Heidelberg from 1830 onwards. In 1833, he participated to a republican revolt in Frankfurt am Main and had to emigrate to Switzerland, first to Zurich, then to Berne, where he worked as a journalist. In 1848, he visited Germany and was expelled by the Bernese Government. He, therefore, settled in Basel and became redactor in chief of the local “Tagblatt”. His main and only historical work, “Geschichte der schweizerischen Regeneration” has appeared in 1867.
Peter Feddersen is also renowned as a translator of Thomas Carlyle: Die Französische Revolution, 2 vols., aus dem Englischen von P. Feddersen, umgearbeitet von E. Erman, Leipzig: Brockhaus, 11th ed. 1922.