August Georg zu Leiningen-Westerburg-Neuleiningen
August Georg Graf zu Leiningen-Westerburg-Neuleiningen (baptized August Georg Gustav ; born February 19, 1770 in Grünstadt , Palatinate , † October 9, 1849 in Vienna ) was an Austro-Hungarian Lieutenant Field Marshal , knight of the Military Order of Maria Theresa ( highest Austrian order of bravery) and vice-governor of the federal fortress of Mainz .
Life
family
August Georg was born as a scion of the Palatine noble family Leiningen in their residence Grünstadt. There both the Altleininger branch and the Neuleininger branch of the Count's House of Leiningen-Westerburg each owned a castle in the immediate vicinity of each other and they also took turns exercising government power in the small country. August Georg was born and raised in the “Oberhof” castle (now Neugasse 2) as a member of the Neuleininger family. His parents were Count Karl II. Gustav zu Leiningen-Westerburg-Neuleiningen (1747–1798) and his wife Philippine Auguste, Wild and Rhine Countess zu Salm, from Grumbach (1737–1792).
Youth and foreign soldier services
As the later son of the ruling Count, Count August Georg was to embark on a military career; his older brother Ferdinand Karl III. succeeded his father, who died in 1798, as ruling count, but could practically no longer exercise the rule, as the county of Leiningen was occupied by the French from 1797 and from 1801 to 1815, as part of the department du Mont-Tonnerre, also formally belonged to France. After that, the small state was not restored and became part of the Palatinate District of the Kingdom of Bavaria .
Count August Georg entered the Dutch military service in 1785 and stayed there until 1787. From 1789 to 1791 he served in the French army, which he finally left because of the increasing revolution in the country .
Austrian officer
Count Leiningen-Westerburg immediately applied for a position in the Austrian army, which he received. In 1792 he began his career there as a cadet with the Le Loup hunters, in November of the same year he was appointed ensign in Clerfaits Infantry Rgt. 9. Soon afterwards he was captured by the French during the fighting for the fortress of Namur and man took him hostage to France. In Paris he met his father, who had been kidnapped from Grünstadt, and his older brother, the Hereditary Count. August Georg resisted and vehemently closed himself to the ideas of revolution. In 1795, after three years, he was able to escape together with his brother. After an adventurous escape, both arrived in Grünstadt, which they found plundered by the French. Hereditary Count Ferdinand Karl went to the family-owned Westerburg on the right bank of the Rhine and ran government business from there; Count August Georg returned to the Austrian army; Although the father was released in 1796 in a prisoner exchange, he died in 1798 in the Westerburg.
August Georg zu Leiningen was now hired as a lieutenant in the infantry regiment "Kallenberg", No. 54 and held up so bravely in the following battles of his troops, with Andel (1797) and Schaffhausen (1799), that he was known for his bravery expressly mentioned in the army report. As a captain, Count August Georg fought in the Battle of Ulm , where he carried out a counterattack on October 15, 1805 without any orders, for which he received the Knight's Cross of the Military Maria Theresa Order on May 28, 1806 , the highest personal award for bravery in the Habsburg Empire. The French had attacked down from Michelsberg and tried to penetrate through the “Frauentor” into Ulm when Count Leiningen and his men carried out a flank attack and unexpectedly forced the enemy to retreat at this point. These suffered heavy losses in men, officers and artillery; Leiningen also personally captured a French staff officer in a duel. In addition to the high order, the Palatinate received his promotion to major in the 11th Infantry Regiment. Also in 1809 in the Battle of Aspern and the Battle of Wagram and especially near Znojmo , where he pushed the enemy across the Thaya with a sharp bayonet attack in the pounding rain that made the use of firearms impossible, Leiningen cemented his reputation as one of the bravest and most daring officers of the Austrian army. The history painter Fritz L'Allemand immortalized Count Leiningen's bayonet attack near Znojmo in a painting in 1845.
When Austria and the other German states rose up against Emperor Napoleon in 1813 , Count August Georg zu Leiningen-Westerburg again actively fought in the Austrian army. As a colonel, he led the 11th Infantry Regiment into the Battle of Dresden , where his unit was surrounded on August 27, 1813 and Count Leiningen escaped imprisonment on a bold ride, which made him an "escaped citizen" from what was now French territory the Palatinate might have cost its life. During the escape he saved both flags of his regiment and a pistol fight broke out between him and his pursuers. The Count also played an honorable part in the other military campaigns of the Wars of Liberation . In 1814 he closed the three forts Château de Joux , St. André and Pierre Chatel in southern France and forced the surrender. After the Peace of Paris, Count Leiningen remained with the occupying army in France, with the main army and in the army camp at Dijon until 1815 , then in Alsace until 1818 .
In the following peacetime the military rise of the Grünstadt officer continued rapidly. In 1821 he advanced to major general and went to Gorizia as brigade commander , in 1829 he became the owner of the Austrian Infantry Regiment No. 31 and in 1830 changed to the same position as brigade commander in Mainz . In 1832 Graf zu Leiningen was promoted to lieutenant field marshal and worked successively as commander of the garrisons of Graz , Ljubljana and Innsbruck , before becoming commander of the Austrian occupation of the Mainz fortress in 1839 , where he also held the post of vice governor of the entire fortress.
Elevated by the emperor to lieutenant of the Acier bodyguard and chamberlain , Count August Georg zu Leiningen-Westerburg died in Vienna in 1849, at the age of 79 and after 58 years of service for the House of Habsburg . “ Paralysis after a short illness” is named as the cause of death . The officer was buried in the Währinger Friedhof, today's “ Währinger Schubertpark ”, where Beethoven's and Schubert's graves were located at that time. He was married to Charlotte Sophie Scholz von Schmettau (1790–1860); the marriage remained childless.
Although the Leininger, like many other German small princes, lost their actual rulers, they nonetheless remained on a par with the ruling princes - without government power - and enjoyed special privileges. Count August Georg had his brother Ferdinand Karl III, who died childless in 1813. inherited and entered into its class rule. However, this only existed in the vicinity of the Westerburg , one of the family headquarters on the right bank of the Rhine. That is why he also called himself “Lord of the County of Westerburg in the Duchy of Nassau” and, as the head of a former imperial count's family, bore the title “ Illustrious ”.
The "Biographical Lexicon of the Austrian Empire" , by Constantin von Wurzbach , Vienna 1865, states that the "bravery and bravery" of Count August Georg zu Leiningen-Westerburg were almost "proverbial" in the Austrian army, and that he was one of them considered the best riflemen in the entire army. In addition to the Maria Theresa Order, Leiningen was also the holder of the Prussian Red Eagle Order (Grand Cross with diamonds), the Imperial Russian Order of St. George IV Class, and the Knight's Cross of the French and the Grand Ducal Hessian Order of Louis .
His regimental adjutant, who later became Lieutenant Field Marshal Florian von Macchio , made him an approx. 4 meters long and 2 meters wide, artistic family tree from canvas in 1830, which is now in the Museum Grünstadt .
August Georg's brother Christian Ludwig zu Leiningen-Westerburg-Neuleiningen was also an Austrian officer and because of his bravery in the Tyrolean uprising in 1809, Maria-Theresien-Knight . He and his wife died young. The left children Christian Franz Seraph (1812-1856) and Seraphine Franziska (1810-1874) came into the care of Count August Georg.
literature
- Constantin von Wurzbach : Leiningen-Westerburg, August Georg Graf . In: Biographisches Lexikon des Kaiserthums Oesterreich . 14th part. Kaiserlich-Königliche Hof- und Staatsdruckerei, Vienna 1865, pp. 326–328 ( digitized version ).
- Adolf Schinzl : Leiningen-Westerburg, August Georg Gustav Graf to . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 18, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1883, pp. 218-220.
- Karl von Blazekovié: Chronicle of the kk 31st Line Infantry Regiment , Imperial-Royal Court and State Printing Office Vienna, 1867, p. 425 u. 426; (Digital view)
- Hans Heiberger: The Counts of Leiningen-Westerburg. Origin - splendor - decline. Kiliandruck, Grünstadt 1983, ISBN 3-924386-00-5
Web links
Individual evidence
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Leiningen-Westerburg-Neuleiningen, August Georg zu |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Leiningen-Westerburg, August Georg Graf zu; Leiningen-Westerburg, August Georg Gustav, Count zu (full name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Austro-Hungarian Lieutenant Field Marshal, Maria-Theresien-Ritter |
| DATE OF BIRTH | February 19, 1770 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Grünstadt |
| DATE OF DEATH | October 9, 1849 |
| Place of death | Vienna |