Friedrich Heinrich Eugen of Anhalt-Dessau

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Friedrich Heinrich Eugen of Anhalt-Dessau

Friedrich Heinrich Eugen Prince of Anhalt-Dessau (* December 27, 1705 in Dessau ; † March 2, 1781 ibid) was the fourth son of Prince Leopold I of Anhalt-Dessau and his wife Countess Anna Luise Föhse .

Life

Eugen joined the Prussian Army in 1717 at the age of twelve and, as a member of a ruling house, received the post of Rittmeister in the regiment of his brother Wilhelm Gustav , the "Ascherslebener Cuirassiers" . Already at the age of 17 he was a major and since 1725 a lieutenant colonel . From 1732 to 1735 he took part as head of the Dragoon Regiment No. 7 , like his brothers, on the Rhine in the War of the Polish Succession in the alliance between Prussia and Austria against France. From 1735 to 1740 Eugen was also head of the Hussar Corps, the later Hussar Regiment No. 1 , and from 1737 head of the Aschersleben cuirassiers. King Friedrich II appointed him major general on September 7, 1740 . At the end of March 1741, Eugene and his regiment entered the First Silesian War against Austria.

On May 20, 1742, Eugen lost the battle at Kranowitz , in which the Austrians also captured the later cavalry general Friedrich Wilhelm von Seydlitz . This prompted Friedrich to harshly criticize Eugen for poor troop leadership. Soon further allegations were added, also because of "oppression of the already completely brought down citizenship" in the Aschersleben garrison . The progressive breakdown of the relationship of trust was accompanied by a permanent conflict between Friedrich and Eugen's father Leopold. This, the "Old Dessauer", enjoyed the highest reputation in the army as a Prussian field marshal , but stuck to his son. After various attempts at an inconspicuous, amicable separation had failed, on January 8, 1744 Moritz von Anhalt-Dessau presented his brother Eugen with the farewell from the Prussian army on behalf of the king .

Eugen first went to the Austrian army under Prince Karl of Lorraine on the Rhine . In June 1746 he entered the service of August III. , the Elector of Saxony and King of Poland, who awarded him the Polish Order of the White Eagle in the same year . As lieutenant general of the Electoral Saxon army , Eugen became governor of Wittenberg in February 1749 , head of the cuirassier regiment "Schwarzburg-Sondershausen" in 1752 and general of the cavalry in 1754 .

At the beginning of the Seven Years' War , Eugene was captured by the Prussians when the Saxon army surrendered in October 1756. In January 1775 he was given the character of an Electoral Saxon field marshal . In the War of the Bavarian Succession he led the Saxons in alliance with Prussia in the corps of the Prussian general Dubislaw von Platen .

He was never involved in the government of the Principality of Anhalt-Dessau.

Eugene died unmarried and without offspring. In memory of him, a pyramid tomb was built in the Dessau palace garden . Eugen's coffin was reburied in the princely burial place in St. Mary's Church in 1934 and the pyramid was redesigned as a memorial for those of the Dessau Infantry Regiment No. 118 who died in World War I. This system was eliminated in 1952.

literature

Web links

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Quotation from a letter from Friedrich to Eugen bei Priesdorff (lit.), p. 221
  2. ↑ See : Rudi Huhn : Dessau und der Alte Dessauer , No. 41, on the website of the europese-bibliotheek
  3. ^ Sascha Winter: Tomb culture and garden art around 1800. In: Tomb culture in Germany. Berlin 2009, ISBN 978-3-496-02824-6 , p. 51
personal data
SURNAME Friedrich Heinrich Eugen of Anhalt-Dessau
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Friedrich Heinrich Eugen Prince of Anhalt-Dessau (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Chiefs of the Corps of the Prussian Hussar Regiment 1
DATE OF BIRTH December 27, 1705
PLACE OF BIRTH Dessau
DATE OF DEATH March 2, 1781
Place of death Dessau