Ove Ramel

Ove Ramel (1637 – 29 January 1685) was a Danish landowner and administrator.

Biography
Ramel (also written Offue Rommel and Rammel) was the son of Privy Counsellor Henrik Ramel (1601–1653) and Margrethe Skeel (died 1671 or later). He attended Sorø Academy in 1653–1656 and then went abroad to continue his education enrolling at the University of Orléans in 1659. After Denmark's loss of Scania/Skåne to Sweden in 1660, Ramel was naturalized after swearing his loyalty to the Swedish king.

Ramel married Mette Rosenkrantz (12 March 1646 – 25 January 1730), daughter of Erik Rosenkrantz of Rosenholm (1612–1681) and Margrethe Skeel ( 1626–1647). He was the owner of Bäckaskog and Ugerup in Scania and Lergrav in Jutland. As the guardian of Kjeld Kristoffer Barnekow, he was also responsible for the management of his estates Vittskövle and Rosendal.

During the Scanian War 1675-79, he went back into Danish service in 1676, as soon as the war reached Scania. Ramel served first as a commissary at Kristianstad and then became district governor (amtmand) of the county of Helsingborg - a post that he kept until the end of the war. He worked hard to rebuild the city and to introduce sanitary measures that would decrease the diseases that had come with the war. His Scanian estates were confiscated and presented to Field Marshall Conrad Marderfelt. Negotiations for the return of his estates and his appointment to landshøvding of Blekinge and Ramel and four other Danish noblemen were in 1678 executed in effigie in the central square 'Stortorget' in Malmö. The doll that represented Ramel was impaled and exhibited by the city gates so as to warn others from fighting the Swedes. The other three dolls portrayed Knud, Tage and Holger Thott and were 'only' decapitated, but these gentlemen were not known to have taken up arms against the Swedes. Knud Thott, however, was district governor of the county (amt) of Landskrona and worked hard to oppose them so the Swedes must have had evidence that Ramel had taken arms against them, else his image would not have been impaled.

During the war, Ramel served first as General War Commissioner in Kristianstad and from 1677 as county governor of Helsingborg. He played an important role in the small war and in the organisation of resistance groups (snaphaner). He was reported to be popular among the commoners and he also dined with the common soldiers and made friends with lower-ranking officers. Ramel settled in Denmark where he was granted the title of etatsråd.

He was, by marriage, the proprietor of Lergrav. In 1551 he ceded Lergrav to his sister, Anna, the widow of chancellor Peder Reedtz, in exchange for Basnæs on Zealand. In 1682, he also acquired Borreby Castle.

Ramel died on 29 January 1685 at Borreby and was buried at Sorø Abbey Church. Borreby had to be sold as a result of his financial situation. The king granted his widow a pension of 500 daler as compensation for the loss of their Scanian holdings. She sold Basnæs in 1685.