The Waldegg country estate is a castle in the municipality of Feldbrunnen-St. Niklaus near Solothurn. The building was built between 1682 and 1690 as the summer residence of the mayor Johann Viktor I von Besenval. He was the son of Martin von Besenval, who immigrated from the Aosta Valley in 1628 as a “silver merchant”. He came from the village of Valleil in the municipality of Torgnon.[1] Father Martin rose to the Solothurn upper class within a short time. Since Solothurn housed the French embassy in the Old Confederation from 1530 to 1792, careers in the French kingdom were open to the sons of the Solothurn patricianate. Waldegg was followed by Peter Viktor von Besenval, born in 1721, who during the French Revolution held the post of commander of the armed forces ordered to quell the unrest in Paris under the command of the Minister of War Victor-François de Broglie. His memoirs paint an atmospheric picture of the events.
In 1865 the country estate came to the Solothurn patrician family von Sury-Büssy through marriage and purchase. The castle building underwent a spatial redesign in the late 19th century when two separate apartments were created. From the early 20th century, the castle was inhabited all year round. Due to a lack of descendants, the castle was donated to the canton of Solothurn in 1963. Today the castle serves as a residential museum and a venue for exhibitions, concerts and private events.