Born Jan. 10, 1803, in Hünshoven; died Dec. 3, 1890, in Cologne. German political figure, bourgeois liberal, and banker. One of the leaders of the big bourgeoisie in the Rhineland.
Camphausen became a deputy of the Rhineland provincial Landtag in 1843 and of the United Landtag in 1847. From Mar. 29, 1848, to June 20, 1848, during the Revolution of 1848–49, he was prime minister of Prussia. Camphausen’s government was sympathetic to reactionary monarchist circles, clothing “counterrevolution in its bourgeois liberal attire” (K. Marx and F. Engels, Soch, 2nd ed., vol. 5, p. 99). Camphausen was a representative of Prussia in the provisional central German government in Frankfurt am Main from June 1848 to April 1849. He became a member of the Prussian House of Lords in 1850.