Friedrich Heinrich Karl von Hünerbein

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Friedrich Heinrich Karl Georg Freiherr von Hünerbein (born August 23, 1762 in Harkerode , † February 4, 1819 in Breslau ) was a Prussian lieutenant general .

Origin and youth

He was the son of the royal Polish and Electoral Saxon chamberlain Georg August Christof Freiherr von Hünerbein (1720–1796) and his wife Rahel Luise Karoline, née von Heeringen (1731–1768). His father was also chief forester in the county of Mansfeld and Mr. auf Harkenrode. By 1778 he had attended the St. Afra High School in Meißen and the University of Leipzig . Then Hünerbein joined the Hussar Regiment "von Czettritz" of the Prussian Army as a Junker , where he was promoted to cornet in 1781 and second lieutenant in 1787 .

In the general staff

In 1794, King Friedrich Wilhelm II appointed Lieutenant Hünerbein to be the adjutant of his second-born son, Prince Louis, out of special trust . In this role, Hünerbein acquired the order Pour le Mérite in the campaign against the Kościuszko uprising in June 1794 . After the prince's death, Hünerbein was dissatisfied with being promoted to staff captain and being transferred to the “von Bieberstein” dragoon regiment in 1797. In response to his complaint, the king took him over to his suite , which, insofar as it had a general staff function , also belonged to the heir to the throne, Friedrich Wilhelm III. 1798 was taken over.

In 1799 he was promoted to captain of the army and in 1801 to major , he remained in the general staff service during the campaign of 1806/07 . In March 1807, King Hünerbein sent from his court camp in Königsberg to alliance and arms delivery negotiations with King Gustav IV of Sweden to Malmö . There he bumped into the Freikorpsführer Schill , who had come with the same intention in the interests of the besieged Kolberg Fortress without any authorization. Promoted to lieutenant colonel in May , Hünerbein returned to the general staff. Assigned to the Tauentziens staff in 1808/09 , Hünerbein was privy to the preparations for the anti-Napoleonic uprising, which failed because of the premature Dörnberg revolt .

Colonel since May 1809 , Hünerbein resigned from the General Staff in March 1812 and took over the leadership of the 1st Cavalry Brigade of the Prussian auxiliary corps formed for Napoleon's Russian campaign . Shortly after the start of the war, Hünerbein had a serious conflict with Commander-in-Chief Grawert , which contributed to his resigning from command. Neither his successor Yorck nor the late informed king were interested in punishing Hünerbein, because the consequences of the Tauroggen Convention made other events in the army meaningless.

In the wars of liberation

Hünerbein was promoted to major general in March 1813 and led the 8th Brigade in the 1st Army Corps under Yorck. She took part in the battles near Möckern , where Hünerbein received the Iron Cross II. Class for his successful attack on Dannigkow . Severely wounded in the Battle of Großgörschen , Hünerbein lost his ability to ride. Now he commanded his brigade on foot: in the Battle of the Katzbach , where he was awarded the Iron Cross First Class, the Battle of Wartenburg and in the Battle of Leipzig during the Storming of Möckern , which earned him the Russian Order of Saint Anne 1st class acquired.

Appointed Lieutenant General and Commanding General in the Duchy of Berg in December 1813 , Hünerbein commanded the Bergische Brigade in the German Federal Corps under Duke Ernst von Sachsen-Coburg , which was organized by General Jechner from Stein's Central Administration . It blocked Mainz fortress from the beginning of February 1814 until its surrender on May 4th. Hünerbein then officiated in Düsseldorf, the capital of the Berg Generalgouvernement .

Hünerbein, educated and socially interested, known at court as well as in officer and aristocratic circles for his bubbly wit, supported the Prussian reforms . In the campaigns of 1812/13 he renounced the privileges of accommodation and meals to ordinary soldiers and thus corresponded to Scharnhorst's idea of ​​a “people in arms”. Hünerbein rejected the continuation of the Princes of the Rhine Confederation and the restoration of the Imperial Princes deposed by Napoleon - he said to Prince Elector Wilhelm of Hesse , the son of the Prince Elector of Hesse : "If I have my way, your father won't get as much land back as I am under dirt my nails! "

In the general command in Silesia

When Yorck, the commanding general in Silesia , took over an army command during the mobilization against the returned Napoleon in April 1815, Hünerbein moved into his previous position. After Yorck's departure , the king appointed Hünerbein in October 1815 as governor of Breslau and shortly afterwards as commanding general in Silesia and chief of the VI. Army Corps.

In command of the Silesian Army Corps, he literally implemented Boyens' idea of the army as the “school of the nation” when he ordered the officers to give the recruits lessons in writing and arithmetic and to give entertainment lessons in which they talk to them had to entertain the "field service and the behavior of soldiers on duty and outside of the same" and also non-military topics. In January 1818, King Hünerbein awarded the Order of the Red Eagle First Class with Oak Leaves for his services to raising the level of training, especially for the Silesian Landwehr .

Hünerbein's injury had not healed, so he was allowed to live in Sibyllenort in the summer , but had to be on leave from the end of May 1818. However, in the same year Hünerbein traveled to Berlin to take part in the autumn exercises. After that his suffering worsened, he did not recover and died on February 4, 1819 in Breslau. He was buried in the Breslau military cemetery.

Marriage and offspring

Hünerbein was married to Wilhelmine Ulrike von Knobelsdorff (1774–1831) since March 21, 1798 . She was the daughter of General Kurd Gottlob von Knobelsdorff (1755-1807) and his wife Karoline Helene von Oppen († 1780).

The marriage was made possible by King Friedrich Wilhelm II. In 1797, during a visit to his widowed daughter-in-law, Princess Friederike, he noticed her beautiful lady-in-waiting Ulrike von Knobelsdorff. When he found out that she and her lover Hünerbein, the former adjutant Louis', could not marry "because they both have nothing", he spontaneously decided to give Hünerbein an estate of his own choice in the recently annexed South Prussia . Hünerbein chose Obra Monastery from a list , not far from Kosten , the garrison of his Bieberstein regiment. The incident became public and caused a stir as an example of the squandering of state funds on a whim of the king.

The marriage gave birth to three sons and two daughters:

  • Bertha (* March 20, 1799; † January 24, 1859) ∞ Franz von Waldersee , commander of the Gardes du Corps, parents of Alfred von Waldersee , Prussian field marshal and chief of the general staff
  • Heinrich Curt Georg (born December 14, 1800 in Berlin; † January 3, 1842 in Dessau), Prussian officer ∞ Bertha von Briesen, parents of Thekla von Hünerbein , founder and superior of the deaconess house Stift Salem in Stettin
  • Georg Karl Deodatus (1802-1802)
  • Arthur Julius (1806-1870)
  • Ulrike Eleonore (born February 26, 1804; † August 17, 1832) ∞ Alexander von Knobelsdorff (1788–1848)

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Heinrich von Treitschke : German history in the nineteenth century. Part One: Until the Second Peace of Paris. FW Hendel Verlag, Leipzig 1928, p. 467.
  2. ^ Eduard Vehse : Prussian court stories. Re-edited by Heinrich Conrad. Georg Müller, Munich 1913, pp. 95f., There also the literal quote from Princess Friederike.
personal data
SURNAME Hünerbein, Friedrich Heinrich Karl von
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Hünerbein, Friedrich Heinrich Karl Georg Freiherr von
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Prussian lieutenant general
DATE OF BIRTH August 23, 1762
PLACE OF BIRTH Harkerode
DATE OF DEATH February 4, 1819
Place of death Wroclaw