Eduard Varrentrapp

Eduard Varrentrapp (born March 6, 1869 in Braunschweig , † December 23, 1928 in Frankfurt am Main ) was a German rear admiral .

Life

origin

His parents were the chemist Franz Varrentrapp (1815–1877) and his second wife Dorothea, née Krüger (1832–1899). The historian Conrad Varrentrapp was his half-brother from his father's first marriage.

Military career

After attending elementary school in 1887, Varrentrapp joined the Imperial Navy and completed basic training from October 1, 1887 to March 27, 1888 at the Navy School. This was followed by special training in 1888. After a long period on board, he returned to the naval school in 1890 and completed basic training on September 30, 1891. After graduation, he was used as a naval officer in the same year until 1893 for various on-board missions. He then emigrated to Sydney on March 1, 1893 , where he worked as an officer on the watch on the station ship Bussard . On August 18, 1895, he returned to Germany on the Darmstadt steamer . Further uses followed until he began studying at the Naval Academy in I. Coetus on September 23, 1898. In the following year he continued in the II. Coetus and received his degree on March 25, 1900.

On October 10, 1901, Varrentrapp was transferred to the news office of the Reichsmarinamt in Berlin as a lieutenant captain . His superior was here until 1902 lieutenant captain and historian Erich Marcks (1861-1938). The main goal of this institution was to implement the enacted naval laws and the development of the imperial navy, to advance the organization of intensive propaganda work in order to steer the main focus of politics and the public from the army to the navy. However, with the entry into force of the 2nd Fleet Act on July 1, 1900, the news office (N) was already above the peak of its activity since it was founded in 1897. At the time of Varrentrapp's deployment, the staffing of the news office had already been reduced to three officers and a few auxiliary staff . The greatest expenditure was required by the in-house reading service. This concerned the ongoing screening of publications from 163 newspaper and magazine publishers as well as other news agencies, as well as the analysis of marine-related topics from them. The results of this information research were passed on in the form of marine-related short messages, bulletins and summaries in written form to newspaper publishers, journalists, press offices of companies and occasionally only to Reich ministries. This was difficult because within the ministries, the authority for press releases was held by the Federal Foreign Office during this period. But at the time of Varrentrapp's deployment, the news office had also started issuing its own publications, maritime literature and its own magazine. That was the nauticus . Yearbook for Germany's marine interests , which was still hesitantly compiled, printed and distributed from the 1900 vintage onwards in 1899. He served in the news office for a total of four years.

This was followed from April 1905 for two years as first officer on the ship of the line Brandenburg . After a long layover and extensive modernization, the ship was again at the disposal of the Navy from April 1905. From this point on, the commanding officer was his former superior from the intelligence office, Captain of the Sea of ​​Witzleben, who led the ship until September 1906. After that, Varrentrapp returned to the Reichsmarineamt on April 1, 1907. Here he served until September 6, 1909 in the mobilization section. From September 1909 he was in command of the small cruiser Dresden for two years . He then taught at the Naval Academy and was from July 6, 1914, beyond the beginning of World War I , to January 1, 1916, in command of the Wettin liner . Varrentrapp then took over the Schleswig Holstein liner . After relinquishing command on May 2, 1917, he was at the disposal of the high seas command for a few months, and on September 26, 1917, he became the commander of the modern large liner King Albert for two months . Then briefly made available to the chief of the naval station of the Baltic Sea and the North Sea, he was appointed commander of the fortifications of Wilhelmshaven on December 20, 1917 and in this capacity was promoted to rear admiral on April 28, 1918. On January 30, 1919 Varrentrapp was from the military adopted .

Eduard Varrentrapp died on December 23, 1928, shortly before his 60th birthday, in Frankfurt am Main.

family

Varrentrapp married Anna Mathilde Weydt (* 1879), a granddaughter of the physician Georg Varrentrapp, in Frankfurt on June 22, 1904 . The couple had at least two children:

• Philipp Adolf Eberhard (* 1905)
• Else Marie Hilde (* 1906)

literature

• Wilhelm Deist: Fleet Policy and Fleet Propaganda. Stuttgart 1976.
• Dermot Bradley (eds.), Hans H. Hildebrand, Ernest Henriot: Germany's Admirals 1849-1945. The military careers of naval, engineering, medical, weapons and administrative officers with admiral rank. Volume 3: P-Z. Biblio Verlag, Osnabrück 1988, ISBN 3-7648-1499-3 , pp. 488-489.
• Marcus König: Agitation-Censorship-Propaganda. The submarine war and the German public in the First World War. ibidem Verlag, Munich 2014.
• Werner Arnswaldt: From the history of the Varrentrapp family. Plate VI. Descendants of Franz Varrentrapp.

Individual evidence

1. ^ Wilhelm Deist: Fleet Policy and Naval Propaganda. Stuttgart 1976.
2. ↑ Marcus König: Agitation-Censorship-Propaganda. The submarine war and the German public in the First World War. ibidem Verlag, Munich 2014, p. 46 ff .; Wilhelm Deist: Fleet Policy and Fleet Propaganda. Stuttgart 1976, SA. 81ff.