Florian von Seydlitz

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Anton Friedrich Florian von Seydlitz

Anton Friedrich Florian von Seydlitz-Kurzbach (born February 20, 1777 in Greußen near Magdeburg , † February 18, 1832 in Cologne ) was a Prussian major general .

Life

family

He is a scion of the Silesian noble family von Seydlitz from the Kurzbach tribe. His father, Florian Boglislav von Seydlitz (1746–1796), was a forester in Aken , his mother, Elisabeth Antonie Friederike (1750–1830), was born in Muscat.

Anton Friedrich Florian married Karoline von Schack (1789–1865), daughter of the Prussian general Wilhelm Georg von Schack , on June 4, 1809 in Berlin . The marriage had two children:

youth

The young page at the Prussian court was accepted into the Berlin Cadet House for training in 1790 . As a Junker , he joined the Feldjäger regiment on foot in 1792 , with which he participated in the battle of Kaiserslautern and the siege of Landau , among other things . In 1794 he was appointed second lieutenant and in 1801 promoted to adjutant of his regiment , which was stationed in Mittenwalde .

Adjutant at Yorck

When the then Colonel Yorck took over the regiment, he chose Seydlitz as his personal adjutant. During the fateful years of the Napoleonic Wars, a long-term close and trusting cooperation developed between the humanly difficult, extremely suspicious Colonel and Seydlitz , which was also based on a private friendship. During the battle of Altenzaun , he fought alongside Yorck. After the battle of Lübeck he was able to make his way through Holstein to East Prussia , where he took part in the battle near Königsberg .

After the Tilsit Peace he took part in the Prussian army reform with an essay on the reorganization of the army, which he wrote to King Friedrich Wilhelm III. submitted.

Promoted to major in 1811 , he took part in the Prussian campaign of 1812 alongside Yorck . For his services in the battles at Olai , Eckau , Graefenthal and Garossenkrug, he was awarded the order Pour le Mérite . In addition to his brother-in-law Wilhelm von Schack , Seydlitz became Yorck's most important confidante during the negotiations on the Tauroggen Convention and the secret negotiations between Russia and Prussia that preceded the Treaty of Kalisch (1813) and prepared for Prussia's transfer to the camp of Napoleon's opponents .

Wars of Liberation

With the beginning of the wars of liberation , Seydlitz was separated from Yorck on the orders of the king and his advisors, which Yorck understood as a personal relegation and deliberate intrigue against himself. As commander of the Guard Jäger Battalion , Seydlitz took part in the Battle of Großgörschen , the Battle of Bautzen , the Battle of Dresden and the Battle of Kulm . The Russian allies paid tribute to him by awarding him the Order of St. Anne II Class.

On December 14, 1813, the king appointed him commander of the 2nd West Prussian Infantry Regiment No. 7 , "in order to give you an expanded sphere of activity and thereby at the same time a new proof of my special confidence in your knowledge of the service and your zeal for it" . For his services in the battles at Ligny and Waterloo , he received the Iron Cross 1st class.

After a favorable assessment of his brigade chief, Seydlitz was promoted to colonel in 1815 and subordinated with his regiment to the mobile army corps in France . There he received the Officer's Cross of the Legion of Honor in 1817 as a thank you for the considerate and gentle treatment of the population of the occupied territories .

After the Napoleonic Wars

Gravesite (Melaten Cemetery) (2015)

After he returned from France, Seydlitz was appointed commander of the 8th Infantry Brigade in Erfurt in 1821 . During this time he began, together with his brother-in-law Wilhelm von Schack, to work through the dramatic events of 1811 and 1812 in Yorck's staff. In 1823 his work was published under the title Diary of the Royal Prussian Army Corps under the command of the Lieutenant General of York in the campaign of 1812 . It became a standard work in military literature.

In the same year he was promoted to major general and in 1825 with the Red Eagle Order III. Class excellent. Already severely physically suffering, he nevertheless moved out with his brigade when the IV Army Corps was ordered to the Rhine . He died in Cologne in 1832 two days before his 55th birthday and was buried in the Melaten cemetery there (lit. C, between HWG and lit. H). His grave monument, a stone cylinder about three meters high, crowned with a helmet and a sword, is one of the oldest preserved tombs in the cemetery and is located right next to a more than 200-year-old plane tree.

Works

  • Diary of the Royal Prussian Army Corps under the command of the Lieutenant General von York in the campaign of 1812. Parts 1 and 2. Mittler, Berlin and Posen 1823.
  • From the files of the Military Reorganization Commission of 1808: a memorandum of the Prime Minister von Seydlitz. Duncker and Humblot, Berlin 1892.

He also kept a diary, which is in the State Archives Prussian Cultural Heritage secret is [1] .

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Reproduction of the Cabinets Ordinance by Gustav von Salisch: History of the Royal Prussian Seventh Infantry Regiment. Glogau 1854 p. 155 books.google
personal data
SURNAME Seydlitz, Florian von
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Seydlitz-Kurzbach, Anton Friedrich Florian von (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Prussian major general
DATE OF BIRTH February 20, 1777
PLACE OF BIRTH Greußen near Magdeburg
DATE OF DEATH February 18, 1832
Place of death Cologne