Friedrich August (Braunschweig-Lüneburg-Oels)
Friedrich August von Braunschweig-Lüneburg-Oels (born October 29, 1740 in Wolfenbüttel , † October 8, 1805 in Eisenach ) was Prince of Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel and thus one of the dukes of Braunschweig and Lüneburg as well as a Prussian general. In 1792 he was enfeoffed with the Lower Silesian duchies of Oels and Bernstadt and thus became the ruling Duke of Oels and Bernstadt.
Life
Friedrich August was one of 13 children of Karl I , Duke of Braunschweig and Lüneburg and Prince of Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel-Bevern and his wife Philippine Charlotte of Prussia . One of his sisters was Anna Amalie von Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach , who later became known as a patroness in Weimar . Shortly before his ninth birthday, in October 1749, at the first request of Emperor Franz I Stephan, he became canon in the Lübeck cathedral chapter . He kept the canonical until 1774.
From 1754 Friedrich August was captain of the Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel body regiment and from April 28, 1761 Colonel and chief of the Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel regiment on foot from Zastrow . During the Seven Years' War he took part in battles near Vellinghausen, Wilhelmsthal, Melsungen and Homburg and was involved in the capture of Fritzlar. On August 17, 1761 he was appointed major general, in October of that year he took part in the battle near Ölper and thus in the liberation of the city of Braunschweig from its last siege. Anna Luise Karsch then sang about him in her ode On Relief from Braunschweig (1761) as a hero: Give me fresh laurels for the Leyer / Because I glow from the hero fire / Braunschweig's youngest winner is my song! / Friedrich, his brother's valiant avenger . In 1764 she wrote an ode about the merits of Prince Frederick of Braunschweig .
In 1763 he entered the Prussian service as lieutenant general and head of the regiment on foot from Tettenborn (later No. 19) , became a favorite of his uncle Frederick the Great and from then on always accompanied him on maneuvers. He was governor of the Küstrin Fortress .
On September 6, 1768 he married Friederike Sophie Charlotte Auguste Princess of Württemberg-Oels (August 1, 1751 - November 4, 1789), daughter of Karl Christian Erdmann von Württemberg-Oels (1716–1792). The marriage remained childless.
On May 21, 1787 he was appointed general of the infantry .
Three years after the death of his wife, he was enfeoffed on December 13, 1792 with the Duchy of Oels in Lower Silesia . On December 28th of this year he took over the leadership of a Prussian army corps that was to be deployed in Westphalia, but for health reasons he handed over the leadership to Lieutenant General von Knobelsdorff on March 26th, 1793 . On March 20, 1794, he was finally diminished.
At Sibyllenort Castle in his Lower Silesian duchy, he then devoted himself to writing and translating French plays. He died in October 1805 while visiting his sister Anna Amalia in Eisenach and was buried in Weimar.
The Duchy of Oels fell to his nephew Friedrich Wilhelm von Braunschweig-Lüneburg , the so-called Black Duke .
Honors
On October 1, 1763, Friedrich August was made a Knight of the Black Eagle Order . On December 20, 1764 he became an honorary member of the Prussian Academy of Sciences . In 1774 he was appointed Provost of Brandenburg .
Freemasonry
Like two of his brothers (Wilhelm Adolf and Leopold ) he was a Freemason and from 1771 as Socius, Amicus et Fautor ordinis member of the Strict Observance , where he was declared Superior and Protector ordinis as Prefect of Templin (Berlin) in 1773 . From 1772 to 1799 he was the National Grand Master of the Great National Mother Lodge “To the Three Worlds” , which was under special protection from Frederick the Great .
The Masonic Lexicon of 1932 attributes a strong mystical disposition to him and describes him as an alchemist and Rosicrucian , necromancer and miracle doctor. He was in constant contact with the “great swindlers of the religious order”, namely Gottlieb Franz Xaver Gugomos and the Leipzig café owner and ghost banner Johann Georg Schrepfer . Like his uncle Ferdinand von Braunschweig , despite warnings from Du Bosc and Karl Eberhard von Wächter, he had contacts with the enigmatic Count of Saint Germain , an internationally known alchemist and occultist, but this ended after he checked his knowledge of Freemasonry and found it to be insufficient. At times he promoted alchemical experiments in his lodge, but after a warning from lodge member and chemist Martin Heinrich Klaproth that they were dangerous, he forbade them.
Fonts
- Military history of Prince Friedrich August von Braunschweig-Lüneburg , Oels 1797.
literature
- Hermann Hengst: The Knights of the Black Eagle Order . 1901.
- Benno von Knobelsdorff-Brenkenhoff : The cities of Braunschweig and Wolfenbüttel and the battle near Ölper on October 13/14 , 1761 , In: Braunschweigisches Jahrbuch No. 71, Braunschweig 1990, pp. 7-26.
- Eugen Lennhoff, Oskar Posner: Internationales Freemasonic Lexicon . 1932.
- Ferdinand Spehr : Friedrich August (Duke of Braunschweig) . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 7, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1877, pp. 505-507.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ Wolfgang Prange : Directory of the Canon. In: Ders .: Bishop and cathedral chapter of Lübeck: Hochstift, principality and part of the country 1160-1937. Lübeck: Schmidt-Römhild 2014 ISBN 978-3-7950-5215-7 , p. 412 No. 369
- ↑ Joachim Lehrmann : Goldmakers, Scholars and Crooks - The Search for the Philosopher's Stone in Braunschweig, Hanover, Hildesheim , Lehrte 2008, ISBN 978-3-9803642-7-0 , pp. 271-276.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Friedrich August |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Friedrich August von Braunschweig-Lüneburg-Oels; Friedrich August von Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel; Friedrich August von Braunschweig-Lüneburg; Friedrich August von Braunschweig-Oels; Friedrich August von Oels |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Duke of Braunschweig, Duke of Oels (from 1792) |
| DATE OF BIRTH | October 29, 1740 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Wolfenbüttel |
| DATE OF DEATH | October 8, 1805 |
| Place of death | Eisenach |