Alexander von Pape

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General von Pape

Alexander August Wilhelm von Pape (born February 2, 1813 in Berlin ; † May 7, 1895 ibid) was a Prussian colonel general , governor of Berlin and commander-in-chief in the brands .

Life

origin

Alexander was a son of Wilhelm von Pape (1771-1860), district administrator of the Koenigsberg Nm district. and Herr auf Braunsfelde ( Friedeberg district ), and his wife Wilhelmine, née Freiin von Röppert (1774–1857). His brother Wilhelm von Pape (1808-1885) also struck a military career, which he ended as Lieutenant General.

Military career

After attending the Gray Monastery high school , Pape joined the 7th Company of the 2nd Guards Regiment on April 17, 1830 as a junker , was promoted to captain in 1850 and major in 1856 . From 1856 to 1860 he was director of the Potsdam Cadet House before returning to his regiment as battalion commander .

Mural Sturm auf St. Privat, 1870 in the hall of fame of the Berlin armory by Georg Bleibtreu (1887, destroyed 1945)

In the German War of 1866, as a colonel , he commanded the 2nd Guards Regiment on foot, which he had commanded since 1863, and took part in the Battle of Königgrätz . For his services, Pape earned the order Pour le Mérite , the command of the 2nd Guard Infantry Brigade in Potsdam and on December 31, 1866 promotion to major general .

In the war against France in 1870/71 he commanded the 1st Guard Division at St. Privat (August 18), at Beaumont , in the Battle of Sedan and in the enclosure of Paris . On the occasion of the imperial proclamation in Versailles he was promoted to lieutenant general and received the oak leaves for the Pour le Mérite on March 22, 1872.

On August 26, 1878, King Wilhelm III appointed him . of the Netherlands as Commander of the Military Wilhelms Order . On February 3, 1880 Pape was promoted to General of the Infantry and was appointed Commanding General of the V Army Corps , on October 18, 1881 he took over the III. Army Corps and, on August 21, 1884, the Guard Corps . Since 1885 he was a permanent member of the National Defense Commission and in the same year became canon in Merseburg for the late General Field Marshal Edwin von Manteuffel . On September 19, 1888, Pape was appointed colonel-general with the rank of field marshal , commander-in-chief in the brands and governor of Berlin.

As a result of increasing sickness he had to submit his request for retirement in 1894. Rejecting his farewell request Pape was relieved of his position as commander in chief in the Marche and governor of Berlin on 10 January 1895, leaving à la suite added the 2nd Foot Guards on foot to the officers of the army.

In the hall of fame of the Berlin armory , Georg Bleibtreu erected a memorial to him on the mural Storm on St. Privat, 1870 . It was the moment of the storming of the artillery of the Guard Corps shot on fire French position at St. Privat by the Prussian 1st Guard Infantry Division under Major General von Pape in the Battle of Gravelotte is. Pape is seated on a white horse , the drawn saber in his right hand, driving the storm column.

He was known for humorous, pithy episodes from his boyhood and school days. Even a schoolmaster had judged him: “The boy will either be a robber captain or a general.” Kaiser Wilhelm II later named him the role model of an old Prussian soldier . An obituary gives an impression of his typical reports from the Prussian military in the first half of the century:

“After his appointment to the Guard Corps was approved, he was dressed and ordered to the King's Palace on April 17, 1830, where he was sworn in in the room on the ground floor to the right of the flag. It had been drilled very firmly; his shoulders were sometimes black and blue. But there was no other way, and within a year he was promoted to officer . In the living conditions of the officer corps at that time, everything was very simple. The biggest feast day was the king's birthday, August 3rd. On that day everyone, even the poorest lieutenant, would have spent his ten silver groschen for lunch. The advance was pretty moderate: 20, 22, 24 years to captain, and whoever was a major after 30 years praised himself lucky that he was over the nastiest corner. He cited this particularly when someone complained about slow advancement in later years. He liked to talk about his service in the 2nd Guard Regiment. When he became an officer, the fusilier battalion he was with would have been sent against an evil, insidious enemy, cholera . The battalion should cordon off the cholera on the Oder . The battalion was deployed with 800 men and after two months with 286 men moved into Neuruppin . "

- Colonel General von Pape † , 1895

family

Pape married Anna Charlotte Meyer (1819–1900) on September 4, 1841 in Berlin. The following children were born from the marriage:

  • Hans (1842–1866), Prussian second lieutenant
  • Anna (1843–1881) ⚭ 1868 Anton Wehlmann († 1888), Saxon major
  • Elisabeth (1845–1895)
  • Maria (* 1848)
  • Katharina (1853-1857)

Honors

General-Pape-Strasse was named after Alexander von Pape by imperial decree in Berlin-Tempelhof in 1897 , which was soon popularly known as General-Pappkarton-Strasse . Until 1918 the Landwehr district command was located in the street , to which the recruits who entered by the thousands always appeared with cardboard boxes in order to send the civilian clothes they had stored in them home as a parcel after they were dressed . Until May 27, 2006, the Berlin Südkreuz S-Bahn station was called “Papestrasse”.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Kurt von Priesdorff: Soldatisches Führertum. Volume 7, Hanseatische Verlagsanstalt Hamburg, undated [Hamburg], undated [1939], DNB 367632829 , pp. 346-347, no. 2333.
  2. Colonel General von Pape †. In: From Lübeck's towers. 5th year, No. 2, Saturday, May 18, 1895.
  3. Klaus-Rainer Week: From waking up to tattooing. De history of the Berlin garrison. Kurt Vowinckel Verlag, Berg am Starnberger See / Potsdam 1998, ISBN 3921655870 , p. 89.