Felix to Salm-Salm

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Felix zu Salm-Salm with the Dachshund Rosi

Felix Constantin Alexander Johann Nepomuk zu Salm-Salm (born December 25, 1828 at Anholt Castle in the former Principality of Salm , today Borken district ; † (fallen) August 18, 1870 near Saint-Privat-la-Montagne , France ) was a German prince's son and adventurers. He served as an officer in the Prussian, Austrian, US and Mexican military and took part in several wars in America and Europe. He is particularly well known for his position as confidante and adjutant of the Mexican Emperor Maximilian I (RR 1864–1867).

family

Felix zu Salm-Salm, photo 1850

See also: Salm (noble family)

Felix Prinz zu Salm, who got his first name after Félix Baciocchi , his mother's uncle by marriage to Napoleon , was the youngest son of the Florentin Prince zu Salm-Salm (1786-1846) and the Corsican noblewoman Flaminia di Rossi (1795-1840 ). The Salm-Salm family belonged to the imperial ducal houses until 1806 and from 1806 had been closely integrated into Napoleon's European system of rule . Grandfather Constantine co-founded the Confederation of the Rhine , but after the French annexation of his country was no longer one of the ruling princes in Europe. The area of ​​the Principality of Salm in the far west of Westphalia had come under Prussian sovereignty since 1815 as a result of the restoration of Europe regulated at the Congress of Vienna . The princes of Salm-Salm were therefore only noblemen in the Kingdom of Prussia .

Due to his unsteady and unconventional way of life since early years, Felix's life was preceded by the reputation of a “ black sheep ” in the family. Felix did not get along well with his eldest brother Alfred (1814–1886), who succeeded his father as head of the house and 5th Prince of Salm-Salm.

At the age of 34, he married on August 30, 1862 in St. Patrick's Catholic Church in Washington, DC, the twelve years younger Agnes Leclerq Joy (1840-1912), a cousin of the American President Abraham Lincoln and a daughter of the American General William Leclerq Joy (1793-1866). Agnes accompanied the prince on his campaigns and travels and later published the memoirs Ten Years from My Life, 1862–72 . Agnes Leclerq Joy married a second time in Stuttgart in 1876 and married the English nobleman Charles Heneage from Lincolnshire , from whom she divorced twenty years later.

Life

Felix zu Salm-Salm during the American Civil War, photograph by Mathew B. Brady

The prince first became an officer in the royal Prussian army . He was with the 11th Hussar Regiment in Münster when the Schleswig-Holstein War began. In a battle near Aarhus on May 18, 1849, he was seriously injured by a saber cut in the elbow and was taken prisoner. After the war he switched to the Imperial and Royal Army (Uhlan Regiment No. 1) because of gambling debts . He fought for Austria in Italy in 1859. But even in Austria he lost his passion for gambling and finally had to emigrate to North America at the behest of the family in 1861 because of excessive debts, duels and some love affairs . There he hired himself from 1862 to 1865 in the Army of Northern States and served during the Civil War as a colonel and brigade - commander with the brevet brigadier general . At one of the receptions that President Abraham Lincoln gave for his officers, he met his future wife Agnes Leclerq Joy (1840–1912), then living in Washington, DC , who tried to promote her husband's military career through their relationships after their marriage and accompanied him to the battlefields. Salm initially held a position on the staff of the German General Ludwig Blenker , the "waiting room for German officers" in the Willard Hotel ; later - despite limited knowledge of the English language - he was assigned command of regiments, initially through the 8th New York Volunteers of the Army of the Potomac in the Northern States, which outraged the radical - democratic -minded Captain Gustav Struve and prompted him to end his military career and return to Europe. Salm then commanded the 68th New York Regiment . Salm was rarely used in combat during the civil war. It was not until the Battle of Nashville at the end of 1864 that he was able to take part in the hostilities. In the spring of 1865, he commanded a brigade in Etowah District. From July to October 1865, he served as the commander of the Atlanta Military District .

Felix zu Salm-Salm in a Mexican uniform

After the American Civil War ended, Salm was initially unemployed. He turned down a regular position in the US Army . Through recommendations from Prussian and Austrian diplomats in the USA , he succeeded in joining the army of the then Mexican Emperor Maximilian I from 1866 to 1867 in Mexico as a colonel (not a general, as can often be read) , whose wing adjutant he became. He accompanied Maximilian to the end and was captured with him in Santiago de Querétaro . Salm was sentenced to death by shooting by the former leader of the revolution and now President Benito Juárez - together with Maximilian and his generals Tomás Mejía and Miguel Miramón  - after the execution of the aforementioned, however, pardoned to seven years imprisonment in the fortress of San Juan de Ulúa . At the insistent request of his wife, who had followed him to Mexico, Juárez released him prematurely from imprisonment in December 1867 .

After his release, Salm returned to the Prussian military service - here too his family and personal contacts helped him again - and served in the Franco-Prussian War as major and commander of a battalion of the Prussian 4th Guards Grenadier Regiment . In this position he found death in the battle of Gravelotte . Felix zu Salm-Salm died on August 18, 1870 in a field hospital . According to records from casualty lists, he died as a result of being shot in the chest and two shots in the right arm. His wife Agnes, who ran a Prussian hospital as a nurse and had accompanied him to the battlefield, brought the body to Anholt , accompanied by an escort led by Alfred zu Salm-Salm , where Salm was buried in the family crypt . Felix's nephew Florentin zu Salm-Salm (1852-1870) died on the same day as Felix and as a lieutenant in the same unit.

Fonts

  • “ Querétaro. Leaves from my diary in Mexico ” , by Felix Prinz zu Salm-Salm, General, First Wing Adjutant and Chief of the House of Sr. Blessed Majesty of Emperor Maximilian of Mexico. Along with an extract from the diary of Princess Agnes zu Salm-Salm. In two volumes, Verlag A. Kröner, Stuttgart 1868

anecdote

Salm was introduced to President Abraham Lincoln by the envoy of the Kingdom of Prussia as "Prince". Lincoln is said to have patted Salm on the shoulder and said, "Well, that shouldn't harm you with us."

reception

The writer Karl May took up the conflict between Emperor Maximilian and Benito Juárez in his colportage novel Waldröschen . Both Felix zu Salm-Salm and his wife appear in this work. Also in the novel Wilder Lorbeer by the writer Juliana von Stockhausen , which focuses on the life of his wife Agnes zu Salm-Salm, Salm's military career and personality were artistically received.

literature

Web links

Commons : Felix Salm-Salm  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
Wikisource: A German Prince in America  - Sources and full texts

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Stuttgart 1875, 3 volumes.
  2. ↑ Annual Report of the Adjutant-General of the State of New York. Volume 1, Albany 1866, p. 273.
  3. ^ John J. Eicher, David Eicher: Civil War High Commands . Stanford University Press 2001, p. 467 f.
  4. ↑ Gothaischer Genealogischer Hofkalender and diplomatic-statistical yearbook 1871 . 108th year, Justus Perthes, Gotha 1871, p. IX ( digitized ).
personal data
SURNAME Salm-Salm, Felix too
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Salm-Salm, Felix Constantin Alexander Johann Nepomuk Prinz zu (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Prussian major, American and Mexican colonel
DATE OF BIRTH December 25, 1828
PLACE OF BIRTH Anholt Castle , Borken district, North Rhine-Westphalia
DATE OF DEATH August 18, 1870
Place of death Battlefield at Gravelotte , France