 He had emigrated to San Francisco after the failure of the March Revolution of 1849 and there made a sizeable fortune speculating in land during the California Gold Rush.Returning to Europe in 1864, in protest against Prussian domination of the German Empire he emigrated once more, this time to Switzerland, and settled in the castle.His 6 children, among them the singer Erika Wedekind and the authors Frank Wedekind and Donald Wedekind, spent their childhoods there.