Friedrich Georg von Sohr

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Friedrich Georg Ludwig von Sohr (born March 22, 1775 in Berlin , † September 10, 1845 in Stargard in Pomerania ) was a Prussian officer, most recently in the rank of lieutenant general . Since 1794 he was a knight of the order Pour le Mérite , the highest Prussian honor for valor, and was one of the few holders of the crown of this order. Sohr became the first director of the training institute for the Prussian cavalry, which he co-founded and later became the military riding institute, and was the author of a cavalry instruction which remained binding for over half a century.

Life

origin

Friedrich Georg Ludwig von Sohr came from an old, originally Bohemian noble family , from Soor near Trautenau . The family received a renewal of their nobility from Emperor Rudolf II . In the turmoil of the Thirty Years' War , the family emigrated to Poland and Silesia , family members were at times also in Spanish and Danish services. Under the Great Elector , members of the Polish branch came to the Mark Brandenburg , where they acquired property and reputation in the Neumark zu Fürstenwalde near Küstrin. Members of this line served mainly in the Brandenburg-Prussian army , but were also in Saxon military services.

Georg Wilhelm von Sohr (born November 30, 1726 in Wittstock; † March 30, 1800 in Berlin), the father of Friedrich Georg, was most recently a Prussian colonel and commander of the 2nd field artillery regiment in Berlin. He was a loyal companion of King Friedrich II and fought in numerous battles during the Second Silesian War and the Seven Years War . On November 22, 1787, he received a renewal of his nobility in the Kingdom of Prussia. Georg Wilhelm married Marie Dorothea Elisabeth von Briest (1741–1783) from the Nennhausen family in Havelland , the daughter of Captain August Sigismund von Briest on Müncheberg and mother of Friedrich Georg. Both parents are buried in the Alter Garrison Cemetery in Berlin. The couple had seven children, only three sons of whom their parents survived. Friedrich Georg was the eldest son, his younger brother Ludwig von Sohr (1777–1848) became, like himself, a Prussian lieutenant general.

Military background

Beginnings up to the peace of Tilsit

The father initially taught his sons himself, later private tutors took over the education. On February 15, 1789, at the age of 13, Sohr joined the 2nd Leib-Hussar Regiment , the former Zieten Hussars. The decision was made against the will of his father, who wanted Friedrich Georg to join the artillery , where he had served himself.

With the outbreak of the war against France in 1792 he was a cornet . As such, he took part in the autumn campaign in Champagne and the campaigns of 1793 and 1794 on the Rhine. Sohr was wounded during the Valmy cannonade on September 20, 1792. For his courage and bravery, his superiors suggested he be awarded the order Pour le Mérite at an early stage, but on the second day of the Battle of Kaiserslautern , on November 30, 1793, he received a serious gunshot wound. His recovery was doubted, so his regiment proposed two other officers for distinction in his place. Despite a renewed request, he did not succeed in acquiring the medal later in the war, in which he had participated again since the end of June 1794. Sohr received the award only with the departure of his regiment chief, Colonel Anton Wilhelm von L'Estocq , who was allowed to express wishes for his services during his command. L'Estocq asked the Prussian King Friedrich Wilhelm II. For the order Pour le Mérite for two of his officers, who was awarded Second Lieutenant Sohr, who was also his adjutant , on January 16, 1795.

From 1798 to 1800 Sohr attended the veterinary school in Berlin. Afterwards he served for several years in the remont industry . First of all, he had to take delivery of the horses destined for the regiment and bought in the Principality of Moldova in Upper Silesia . Later he was commissioned to supervise and direct the buying business for all Prussian hussar regiments on the spot and to transport the horses safely through Austria to Prussia. His training at the veterinary school was very helpful to him.

Due to his remonted service, he could not take part in the campaigns in the autumn of 1806 . Only on the march back from Tarnowitz in Silesia did Sohr receive news from newspapers of the defeats of the Prussian army in the battles near Jena and Auerstedt on October 14, 1806. He was only able to reach the wreckage of the army, which was gathering in the east of the country, by long detours . With great difficulty, whereby he also had to pass the vanguard of the enemy advancing victoriously, he managed to bring his transport to East Prussia . He was able to save over 200 remote horses and 45 hussars with their own horses to Wehlau . In gratitude, King Friedrich Wilhelm III appointed him . von Prussia , to whom he reported personally and also met Queen Louise in a moving scene, to the staff assistant master . A promotion out of sequence. At the end of February 1807 Sohr received command of a squadron made up of men from various regiments. With this unit he took part in smaller skirmishes. Later he was subordinate to Major Friedrich August Ludwig von der Marwitz . Marwitz was charged with setting up a volunteer corps, which Sohr was reluctant to belong to. He was able to get rid of this command through the mediation of Lieutenant General Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher . He was allowed to lead Blücher the assembled teams of the Leib-Hussar Regiment to Swedish Pomerania . With these troops he was taken over into the 1st Brandenburg Hussar Regiment when the army was reorganized after the Peace of Tilsit .

Wars of Liberation

In 1809 Sohr was promoted to Rittmeister . When his regiment had to send two squadrons to Napoleon's campaign against Russia in 1812 , the squadron chiefs drew lots to see who should go and who should stay behind. Sohr was one of the latter officers. An exchange he proposed to Rittmeister von Zieten, although he was reluctant to take part in the campaign, refused, with reference to his sense of duty.

At the beginning of the Wars of Liberation he fought, major since 1812, during the spring campaign of 1813 at the head of his squadron in the battles near Großgörschen (May 2, 1813), Bautzen (May 20 and 21, 1813), Reichenbach (May 22, 1813) and the battle near Haynau (May 26, 1813). For his behavior in the battle of Bautzen he received the Iron Cross 2nd class. In the autumn campaign of 1813 Sohr and his regiment belonged to the Silesian Army and took part in the Battle of the Katzbach on August 26, 1813, as well as the subsequent pursuit of the defeated troops of Marshal Jacques MacDonald and the Battle of Wartenburg on October 3, 1813. As early as September 1813, as the oldest staff officer, he took command of his regiment, which now belonged to the vanguard of the Silesian Army, commanded by Colonel Andreas Georg Friedrich von Katzler. In the Battle of the Nations near Leipzig (October 16-19, 1813) Sohr was able to stand out in particular. He fought with his regiment in the Leipzig suburb of Möckern , which was occupied by Prussian troops after a long battle on the afternoon of the first day of the battle. Sohr's rider attack played a decisive role in the victory. He asked his commanding General Ludwig Yorck von Wartenburg to let him decide when to start the attack. When he saw the same approach, he advanced with three squadrons under his command. Success could be assured by the reserve cavalry that had meanwhile arrived. Yorck personally thanked the seriously wounded Sohr and said that the victory of the day was due to him alone. Sohr's recovery went faster than expected, and by the end of November 1813 he returned to his regiment outside Mainz . For his behavior with Möckern he was awarded the Russian Order of St. Anna II. Class and promoted to lieutenant colonel in December 1813 . In January 1814 he was appointed real commander of the regiment.

Sohr experienced the campaign of 1814 in France again in the association of General von Yorck. He fought in the battles of Montmirail (February 11, 1814), Château-Thierry (February 12, 1814), Laon (March 10 and 11, 1814) and the Battle of Paris (March 30, 1814). After the battle of retreat from Château-Thierry on February 12th, Sohr was awarded the Iron Cross 1st class. The award was made at the request of Major General Heinrich Wilhelm von Horn and at the instigation of the officers of the fusilier battalion belonging to the brigade of the Leibregiment . With great care Sohr and his hussars had covered the infantry on their retreat that day. In April 1814 Sohr received the Swedish Order of the Sword and in July 1814 the Russian Order of St. George .

During the campaign in Belgium in 1815 he was given interim command of the 2nd Cavalry Brigade formed from his own and the Pomeranian Hussar Regiment. He belonged to the II. Army Corps and its commanding General Georg Dubislav Ludwig von Pirch . After the battle of Ligny on June 16, 1815, he covered the retreat of the corps on Tilly near Villers-la-Ville and faced the advancing French troops under Marshal Emmanuel de Grouchy on the following day . On the evening of June 18, 1815, he was still able to intervene in the battle of Waterloo . Later he received the order to arrive on the road from Paris to Orléans in order to interrupt communication from Paris with the surrounding area. Sohr was attacked by superior forces and had to give way. The city of Versailles lying behind him was not yet occupied by Prussian troops, as he hoped, but by the French National Guard . In the villages of Le Chesnay and Rocquencourt east of Versailles there was a decisive battle. In the battle at Rocquencourt against French units under the command of Rémy-Isidore Exelmans on July 1, 1815, Sohr himself was seriously wounded captured, only a few men of his brigade escaped. Sohr was brought to Paris, but released a few days later due to the events in France. His healing took a long time, he did not return to his regiment until the end of November 1815 but could not take up his service. To make a full recovery he had to go to Berlin.

Time of peace and death

Sohr learned on October 3, 1815 during a large wave of promotions when he was appointed colonel that he was not charged with the unfavorable outcome of the battle at Versailles. Of all those promoted, his officer's license was most dated. After his recovery, he was commissioned to help set up a training institute for the cavalry , which was soon opened as a military riding institute in Berlin, from 1820 a teaching cadron and from 1866 a military riding institute in Hanover . With the cabinet order of December 10, 1816, he was appointed director of the institute and at the same time released from command of his regiment. He ran this institution until the summer of 1827. In addition, Sohr received on March 30, 1820 as major general the command of the 7th Cavalry Brigade, whose regiments were in the province of Saxony .

But even after he was relieved of his position as director of the teaching squadron, he kept his place of residence in Berlin in order to work out riding instructions there, which should be used as the basis for all riding lessons in the army. When his work was finished, an examining committee found the instructions too lengthy to be readily implemented for official use. With the complex work Sohr had also included reasons for the given rules and instructions. With the omission of the same, it was issued in four parts in the years 1825 to 1826 for issue and introduction to the troops and in this form has remained the binding rule for the entire riding training of the Prussian and German cavalry for more than half a century. Even the later revision did not change much of its content.

After finishing his work on June 18, 1825, Sohr was transferred to Stargard in Pomerania as commander of the 4th Cavalry Brigade and remained in this position until his health no longer permitted this. In 1829 he was awarded the Order of the Red Eagle, 2nd Class with Oak Leaves. At the beginning of 1832 he asked for his retirement, the request was granted on January 9, 1832. Sohr received an annual pension of 2,250 thalers from the king and was awarded the character of lieutenant general. On February 12, 1844, he received the Order of the Red Eagle First Class with Oak Leaves. On July 18, 1844, Sohr was awarded the newly established crown to the order Pour le Mérite, an award that knights only received after 50 years of membership in the order. Sohr was awarded the Pour le Mérite on January 18, 1795 at the beginning of his career.

He kept his residence at Stargard and died there shortly after midnight on September 10, 1845, at the age of 70. While still on his deathbed, he received a visit from the Prince of Prussia, who was in Stargard inspecting the cavalry and thanked him for his services. At his own request, Sohr was autopsied after his death . The doctors found that his entire left lung was missing and that his heart and stomach had shifted. Probably as a result of the severe wound he suffered on November 30, 1793 in the battle of Kaiserslautern. Friedrich Georg von Sohr was buried in the Stargarder Kirchhof with great sympathy from the citizens, clergy and his lodge brothers . Over 3000 people attended the funeral. Written estate of his service with a runtime 1802 to 1828 came in the army archive to Potsdam , where he was destroyed in April 1945 a fire following a bomb attack.

Family and environment

Sohr married Friederike Dorothea Philippine von Brünnow (1777-1831) on May 9, 1811 in the Bohemian Church in Berlin . He met his wife as early as 1802 and became engaged to her four years later. She was the daughter of Colonel Friedrich Siegmund von Brünnow . The marriage remained childless. In 1847, just two years after Friedrich Georg's death, his younger brother, the Prussian major a. D. August von Sohr and on March 28, 1848 also the last of the three brothers Ludwig von Sohr, Lieutenant General a. D. With his death, the male line died out .

Friedrich Georg von Sohr belonged to the Berlin Masonic Lodge "To the Three Seraphim", a subsidiary of the Great National Mother Lodge "To the Three World Spheres" .

Works (selection)

  • Instruction for the officer commanded as a military commissarius to inspect the horse-keepers, craftsmen and mobilization horses to be provided. 32 pages. (The work did not appear in bookshops , it was printed by Horning & Comp. in Berlin in 1854)
  • Instruction for riding lessons for the Royal Prussian Cavalry.
    • First part. 136 pages, Berlin 1825.
    • Second part. 185 pages, Berlin 1825.
    • Third part. Exclusively intended for use by the teaching squadron. 96 pages, Berlin 1826.
    • Fourth part. Instructions for treating the remontants. As an appendix to riding lessons for the cavalry. 162 pages, Berlin 1826.
  • Instruction. 96 pages, Berlin 1856. (The work did not appear in bookshops, it is a reprint of Sohr's 4th part of the Istruction )

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Gustaf Lehmann: The knights of the order pour le mérite. Mittler, Berlin 1913, Volume 1, p. 392.
  2. ↑ a b c New General German Adels Lexicon Volume 8, p. 520.
  3. ↑ Hans-Jürgen Mende , Dieter Weigert (Ed.): Old Berlin Garrison Cemetery. A cemetery guide. Edition Luisenstadt, Berlin 2003. ISBN 3-89542-126-X , p. 44.
  4. ↑ Central database of bequests
  5. ↑ Uta Motschmann (Ed.): Handbook of Berlin Associations and Societies 1786–1815 , Walter de Gruyter, Berlin, Munich, Boston 2015, p. 310
personal data
SURNAME Sohr, Friedrich Georg von
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Sohr, Friedrich Georg Ludwig von (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Prussian lieutenant general
DATE OF BIRTH March 22, 1775
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin
DATE OF DEATH September 10, 1845
Place of death Stargard in Pomerania