August Urbański from Ostrymiecz

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August Julius Urbański (from 1908 Urbański von Ostrymiecz ) (born August 26, 1866 in Ragusa ; † March 15, 1950 ) was an Austro-Hungarian officer and, before the First World War, head of military intelligence ( records office ).

Wedding of August Urbański and Louise von Hebra (1908)

family

His father Johann Urbański was a kuk major. The mother Victoria (nee von Vlaichi) was the daughter of the mayor of Ragusa (Dubrovnik). He himself married Margit Mohay in 1896, the daughter of a Romanian member of the Reichstag. The marriage resulted in two girls. His wife died in 1906. In October 1908 he married Louise von Hebra, the granddaughter of Prof. Ferdinand von Hebra . This marriage resulted in two sons and a daughter.

Life

At the age of nine he entered the military lower secondary school in Güns and later graduated from the military academy. After successfully completing the kuk war school , he was accepted into the general staff in 1892. At the war school he was a pupil of Franz Conrad von Hötzendorf , who later became field marshal and chief of staff of the Austro-Hungarian Army, to whom he was later also privately: Conrad von Hötzendorf was the best man at Urbański's second marriage.

Urbański then served in various garrisons of the monarchy, including in Karlsburg , Lemberg , Budapest and Klausenburg . In the spring of 1908 he was raised to the nobility with the title "von Ostrymiecz".

Between 1909 and 1914 he headed the Austrian-Hungarian military intelligence service with the registry office with the rank of colonel.

During Urbański's time as the head of the registry office, the affair about his deputy Colonel Alfred Redl , the secrets etc. a. betrayed to the Russians. After its exposure, the chief of staff of the Austro-Hungarian Army, Franz Conrad von Hötzendorf , without depicting the emperor or the heir to the throne, ordered Colonel Urbański to form a commission to quietly settle the Redl case. In addition to Colonel Urbański himself and Lieutenant Colonel Maximilian Ronge , it also included the Deputy Chief of Staff of the Austro-Hungarian Army, Major General Franz Höfer von Feldsturm , and the military judge Wenzel Vorlicek . The commission went to see Colonel Redl on the evening of May 25, 1913 in his hotel room in Vienna and confronted him with his exposure. Colonel Redl only wanted to make a confession to Lieutenant Colonel Ronge, his successor, and referred to the documents in his Prague apartment. A pistol was then given to Colonel Redl with which he shot himself during the night after the commission had left the room. After the suicide, Colonel Urbański led the search of Redl's apartment in Prague and seized evidence. Heir to the throne, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, was outraged by this approach and blamed Colonel Urbański for it. Although Emperor Franz Josef Urbański had promised a promotion, he was suspended in April 1914 at the instigation of the heir to the throne.

After the assassination of the heir to the throne on June 28 in Sarajevo , Colonel Urbański was reactivated immediately and promoted to major general on August 1, 1914 . However, he did not return to the registry office, but took over as commandant of an infantry brigade in Krakow and in March 1916 the 46th Infantry Rifle Division. On August 1, 1917, he was promoted to Lieutenant Field Marshal . He fought on the Eastern Front against Russia until the peace of Brest-Litovsk in March 1918. Then his division was transferred to the Italian front and took part in the battles of the Piave . Because he spoke out against a futile action by his division, which would have caused many unnecessary sacrifices, he was suspended from duty.

After the end of the war, Urbański retired on January 1, 1919. Although he received offers to join the army of one of the successor states of Austria-Hungary, he retired to Thal near Graz. He worked as a journalist and writer, wrote articles in specialist journals (including military science communications ) and books. In 1944 he fled the approaching Russians to Bavaria because he feared he would be arrested for his functions before and during the First World War. After his return Urbański lived in Thal near Graz until his death on March 15, 1950 .

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Verena Moritz , Hannes Leidinger : Colonel Redl: the espionage case, the scandal, the facts. Residenzverlag, 2012, ISBN 978-3-7017-3169-5 .
  2. ↑ Verena Moritz, Hannes Leidinger, Gerhard Jagschitz : In the center of power. The many faces of the head of the secret service, Maximilian Ronge. Residenzverlag, 2007, ISBN 978-3-7017-3038-4 .
  3. ↑ August v. Urbanski: The knapsack child. Life memories. Unpublished manuscript.
  4. ^ Antonio Schmidt-Brentano: The kk or kuk generals 1816-1918. ( Memento of October 4, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) on the website of the Austrian State Archives , Vienna 2007.
  5. ↑ August von Urbanski: The history of the kuk 46th Rifle Division. Bernard & Graefe, Berlin 1942, DNB 362931771 .
personal data
SURNAME Urbański from Ostrymiecz, August
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Urbański, August Julius; Urbański from Ostrymiecz, August Julius; Urbański, August
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austro-Hungarian officer and, before the First World War, head of military intelligence (Evidenzbüro)
DATE OF BIRTH August 26, 1866
PLACE OF BIRTH Ragusa
DATE OF DEATH March 15, 1950
Place of death Thal near Graz