Franz Albrecht of Saxe-Lauenburg

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Franz Albrecht of Saxe-Lauenburg

Franz Albrecht von Sachsen-Lauenburg (born October 31, 1598 - † June 10, 1642 in Schweidnitz ) was a prince of Sachsen-Lauenburg and first imperial and later electoral field marshal. In the Thirty Years' War he fought and acted alternately on the side of both warring parties, building a special relationship of trust with Wallenstein .

Under the company name The White , he was accepted as a member of the Literary Fruitful Society .

Life

Origin, youth and first military service

Franz Albrecht was a son of Duke Franz II of Saxony-Lauenburg (1547–1619) from his second marriage to Maria (1566–1626), daughter of Duke Julius of Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel . Little is known about Franz Albrecht's first years of life. He served first in the Swedish, then in the Palatinate army in the war in Bohemia.

Franz Albrecht later lived at the court of Duke Friedrich Ulrich von Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel , where a love affair with his wife Anna Sophia arose in 1623 . The relationship was revealed through compromising letters discovered and led to the end of the marriage of the Braunschweig ducal couple.

In the imperial service at Wallenstein

In 1625 Franz Albrecht appeared in imperial service as a cavalry commander under Wallenstein during the conquest of the city of Halle an der Saale . Then he was involved in the conquests of the Mecklenburg duchies . In 1631 Franz Albrecht was appointed sergeant general by the emperor and took part in the war of succession in Mantua as an officer in the imperial army . After his return he quit military service with the emperor.

As a private person between the fronts

With the intention of being able to work as a peace emissary, he worked as a private citizen. First he visited Wallenstein in the army camp near Nuremberg and then also his opponent, the Swedish King Gustav Adolf , in whose army two of his brothers served. Even before the Battle of Lützen (November 1632), Franz Albrecht was even given permission to accompany the Swedish king as a member of his bodyguard during the battle. When Gustavus Adolphus was shot in the back, he was in close proximity to the king. After the king fell from his horse, Franz Albrecht fled the battlefield and was therefore hated and suspected by the Swedes for years to have treacherously shot their king from behind. This suspicion was incorrect. Gustav Adolf was shot by the imperial lieutenant colonel Moritz von Falkenberg, who then attacked Franz Albrecht himself, but who was able to repel the shot. Falkenberg was then shot in combat by Franz Albrecht's stable master, Wolf Sigmund von Lüchau.

In the Saxon service between the fronts and in custody

Due to the suspicion of being guilty of the death of Gustav Adolf, Franz Albrecht entered the Saxon service soon afterwards and was appointed field marshal of the Electorate of Saxony. In this position he negotiated with Count Gallas about a ceasefire in Silesia and an understanding between Electorate Saxony and Wallenstein. When Wallenstein's situation in Pilsen had already become untenable in February 1634, Franz Albrecht was sent by Wallenstein on February 19 as one of the few remaining confidants to the Swedish military leader Bernhard von Weimar in Regensburg to ask him to provide military service to the oppressed Wallenstein in Pilsen to support. Bernhard, however, who had conquered Regensburg in the battle for Regensburg in November 1633, distrusted his old opponent Wallenstein and was not convinced by his cousin Franz Albrecht either, although he emphasized his request by paying a large sum of money to build the altar donated to the newly built, Protestant Trinity Church . The coat of arms of Sachsen-Lauenburg in the upper part of the altar still testifies to the donation. On the way back from Regensburg to Pilsen, Franz Albrecht was captured by the emperor's troops and brought to Eger, where the corpse of the meanwhile murdered Wallenstein was presented to him. Afterwards Franz Albrecht was brought to Vienna , accused of complicity in Wallenstein's conspiracy against Emperor Ferdinand II , and arrested and imprisoned together with his brother, the Imperial Colonel Julius Heinrich . In August 1635 he was released from prison, began to organize his domestic and financial circumstances in his homeland and had arguments with his eldest brother August, the ruling Duke of Saxony-Lauenburg.

Private break with conflicts

During this time a conflict began with Duke Adolf Friedrich von Mecklenburg-Schwerin , to whom he had lent a large sum of money, which he was now demanding back. His claim was settled by transferring the Stintenburg property, but after his marriage on February 21, 1640 to Christine Margarete (1615–1666), daughter of Duke Johann Albrecht of Mecklenburg-Güstrow , Franz Albrecht was involved in a new inner-family conflict with Adolf Friedrich von Mecklenburg-Schwerin was involved, which escalated to mortal hostility and was only settled several years after the death of Franz Albrecht.

After the death of her husband Johann Albrecht von Mecklenburg Güstrow, who died in 1636, the second stepmother of his wife Christine, Eleonore Marie von Anhalt-Bernburg , ran a guardianship case at the Reichshofrat for her son Gustav Adolf, who was legally entitled to inheritance, against her brother-in-law Adolf Friedrich von Mecklenburg-Schwerin, the Brother of her late husband who even kidnapped her son and claimed the inheritance. After his marriage, Franz Albrecht felt obliged to support his wife's stepmother, his step-mother-in-law, and used every opportunity at the Kaiser’s premises in Vienna to accelerate the process and the decision, also because the dowry of his new wife depended on this decision . His threats against Adolf Friedrich von Mecklenburg-Schwerin were sometimes so massive that he was even assigned a guardian.

Again in the service of the emperor and death

In 1641 at the Reichstag in Regensburg , after Arnim's death, Franz Albrecht took over the command of a new imperial army in Upper Lusatia as the imperial field marshal . With this army he was able to recapture almost all Swedish bases in Silesia in the following years, because the Swedes were militarily weakened after the death of General Johan Banér .

After the Swedes regained strength under General Lennart Torstensson , his attack in the spring of 1642 surprised the imperial troops in Silesia under the command of Archduke Leopold Wilhelm , some of which were still in winter quarters. After two Swedish armies under Lennart Torstensson and Torsten Stålhandske had united near Sorau on April 27, 1642 , then had conquered the Saxon fortress of Glogau with the supply depot and then advanced towards Schweidnitz , Franz Albrecht tried to attack the Swedes from Breslau with a cavalry corps to stop before Schweidnitz. When they met, however, his corps was badly beaten with great losses. Franz Albrecht was seriously wounded, was taken prisoner and died on June 10, 1642.

Reviews of the person

The unusual curriculum vitae of Franz Albrecht von Sachsen Lauenburg has prompted several biographers to comment (in excerpts and analogously):

A. Duch: A characterless man; a soldier of fortune; selfish, ambitious, only looking for external advantage, vain but also good-natured. As a general without talent and willpower; a prince without fortitude; always ready and loving.

JSersch: In his weak character, good nature, irascibility and vindictiveness were united. He courted the favor of all parties and spoiled it with all. His virtues, courage, valor and merits as a general were obscured by his bad reputation.

G. Mann: In the field of politics, he was very lively and nimble, following an instinct to play, a cheerful kind of self-realization.

C. V Wedgewood: a princely adventurer.

P. Engerisser (2007): Assessments of Franz Albrecht as simple-minded or self-related in older biographies (ADB, NDB) cannot be sustained.

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Christian Pantle: The Thirty Years' War. Propylaea, 2017, ISBN 978-3-549-07443-5 , p. 146.
  2. ↑ a b Peter Engerisser: From Kronach to Nördlingen. The Thirty Years' War in Franconia Swabia and the Upper Palatinate 1631–1635 . Verlag Späthling, Weißenstadt 2007, ISBN 978-3-926621-56-6 , p. 229, footnote 133.
  3. ↑ Historical original source : Georg Gottlieb Plato called Wild : Regensburgische Chronika 1400–1699. City archive Regensburg MS Ratisb. IAE2, No. 35, Addenda Anno 1637.
  4. ^ Lothar Höbelt: From Nördlingen to Jankau. Imperial strategy and warfare 1634-1645 . In: Republic of Austria, Federal Minister for State Defense (Hrsg.): Writings of the Heeresgeschichtliches Museum Wien . tape 22 . Heeresgeschichtliches Museum, Vienna 2016, ISBN 978-3-902551-73-3 , p. 282 f., 312, 321 .
  5. ^ Lothar Höbelt: From Nördlingen to Jankau. Imperial strategy and warfare 1634-1645 . In: Republic of Austria, Federal Minister for National Defense (Hrsg.): Writings of the Army History Museum Vienna . tape 22 . Heeresgeschichtliches Museum, Vienna 2016, ISBN 978-3-902551-73-3 , p. 324-326 .
  6. ↑ Golo Mann: Wallenstein . Fischer Verlag, Frankfurt 1971, p. 450, 1033.
  7. ↑ CV Wedgewood: The 30 Years War . Cormoran Verlag, Munich 1999, ISBN 3-517-09017-4 , pp. 310-312.
personal data
SURNAME Franz Albrecht of Saxe-Lauenburg
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Imperial General Field Marshal, Electoral Saxon Field Marshal
DATE OF BIRTH October 31, 1598
DATE OF DEATH June 10, 1642
Place of death Schweidnitz