A distinguished jurist and professor of Roman and civil law, he was dean of Königsberg's law school, later becoming rector of that institution.[1] He was also privy counsel (Geheimer Justizrat) and adviser to the Prussian government. Irmgard was from an established Lutheran family in Swabia, the daughter of Albert Wüst, a professor at the University of Halle-Wittenberg. The family left Halle in 1906 and moved to Königsberg in Prussia.