Gerhard Cornelius from Walrave

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Gerhard Cornelius von Walrave (Walrawe or Walrabe) (* probably 1692 in Warendorf an der Ems , Westphalia ; † January 16, 1773 in Magdeburg ) was a Prussian major general and fortress builder .

Life

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The Berlin Gate in Stettin by Walrave

According to his own account, von Walrave was born in Westphalia in 1692 as the son of an officer in the Dutch service who took part in the 1712 siege of Douai . Walrave, who probably took up military service at a young age, initially served as an engineer in the service of the States General for seven years before joining Prussian service as a major on the recommendation of Prince Leopold von Anhalt-Dessau . Little is known of Walrave's training as an engineer officer; allegedly he was a student of the famous Maximilian von Welsch , "whose completely new thought (he) transplanted into Prussian fortress construction from the Rhine".

Walrave quickly made a career in Prussia. On August 7, 1722 he was promoted to lieutenant colonel, on October 11, 1724, together with his cousin Friedrich Wilhelm, he was given the Prussian nobility, and on March 21, 1729 King Friedrich Wilhelm I gave him the command and special supervision of the Corps of Engineers. An instruction that granted him a great deal of power regulated his sphere of activity. On July 10, 1729, he was promoted to colonel. Walrave's excellent reputation and position were based in particular on his achievements as a fortress builder in Magdeburg , Stettin and Wesel . Outside Prussia, too, he enjoyed a high reputation. So he was used in the construction of the fortress Kehl and the fortress Mainz .

As in 1733, given the tense political situation, the question of the Polish throne after the death of Augustus the Strong had triggered the ruined empire fortress Philippsburg should be in a defensible state displaced had to an imperial and Electoral Mainz appropriate officer and Walrave Proposals submitted. Walrave's proposal was accepted and awarded a fee of 1000 (according to Bonin even 3000) species ducats, and he himself was commissioned to carry out the work, for which King Friedrich Wilhelm granted him leave. In August 1733 he arrived at the fortress, made his orders, for the implementation of which Austrian and Prussian engineering officers were subordinate to him, but behaved in a highly presumptuous manner and left again on October 18, when he was due to the feared arrival of the French feared for his safety. In the meantime, he had made himself extremely unpopular with both the authorities and the citizens of the city. The imperial field marshal lieutenant Gottfried Ernst von Wutgenau , who arrived soon after and valiantly defended the fortress, had a number of complaints about Walrave's plans and some changes.

In the Prussian officer corps, Walrave was considered an upstart and outsider. Although endowed with an undeniably extraordinary talent as an engineer and master builder, it was his bossy and vengeful character as well as an unfounded lifestyle that earned him numerous hostilities. In doing so, he transferred personal dislikes to the ministry and used the opportunities for personal enrichment in a manner that was viewed as indecent. Various complaints against Walrave required the intervention of the king, but Friedrich Wilhelm never withdrew his favor with the ingenious engineer officer. His successor Frederick II also initially expressed his appreciation for Walrave, whose skills he urgently needed for the reinforcement of the fortresses newly acquired during the Silesian Wars . With a patent dated May 4, 1741, Walrave was appointed major general, received the newly founded order Pour le Mérite and set up a pioneer regiment in Neisse that bore his name. After the First Silesian War , he was commissioned by King Friedrich II with the renovation and expansion of the fortress Glatz .

During the Second Silesian War , Walrave was supposed to restore the fortifications of the conquered city of Prague. As the de facto in command of Prague, he obtained permission to rob Count Gallas' palace . To the great annoyance of the Prussian officers, who, unlike the king, did not approve of this behavior, Walrave had the rich household effects, paintings and silverware moved to his estate Liliput near Hohenwarthe on the Elbe.

After the Peace of Dresden , Walrave's star fell very quickly. Although the king entrusted him with the honorable task of drafting a treatise on the defense of fortified places, which Walrave presented to the king on November 19, 1747, and which was enthusiastically received, ruin was soon to fall upon him. Because of his lavish lifestyle, he went bankrupt and had to sell his art treasures. In this connection he got in touch with the Saxon envoy von Bülow and the Russian envoy von Keyserlingk . Furthermore, the Austrian ambassador Bernes is said to have tried to persuade Walrave to transfer to Austrian service. All this aroused the suspicion of the king, and he instructed his adjutant general Hans Karl von Winterfeldt to conduct an investigation into Walrave. The embezzlement of Walrave came to light. As early as January 29, 1748, Winterfeldt reported to the king that Walrave had clearly been convicted of the fraud of 41,612 thalers. On February 10, 1748, Walrave was arrested in Berlin when he was about to leave for Liliput in the company of the Russian and Saxon ambassadors to visit the art objects that were for sale the following day. He was brought to Magdeburg, where he was put into strict solitary confinement in the casemates of the Sternschanze , without direct or written contact with other people outside the prison. His wife was granted permission to visit, but on the condition that she must remain in prison until the end of her husband's life, without any external contact. She refused and moved back to her house in Neisse. Walrave spent the remaining 25 years of his life in custody in Magdeburg, without trial or judgment. There he died at the age of 81 on January 16, 1773.

Afterlife

  • In 1980, Walrave's fall was the subject of the television play Der Fall Walrawe on ZDF with Werner Kreindl in the leading role.
  • The novel Die Südseeinsel (1923) by Hans Franck represents a free design of Walrave's fate .

See also

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Bernard of Poten :  Walrawe, Gerhard Cornelius . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 41, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1896, pp. 2-5.
  2. ↑ This is Infantry Regiment No. 49.
  3. ↑ Grzegorz Podruczny: Frederick the Great and Prussian Military Architecture 1740–1786. In: Olga Kurilo (Ed.): Friedrich II. And Eastern Europe. German-Polish-Russian reflections. Berliner Wissenschaftsverlag, Berlin 2013, ISBN 978-3-8305-3155-5 , pp. 118-137.
personal data
SURNAME Walrave, Gerhard Cornelius from
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Walrawe, Gerhard Cornelius from
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Prussian major general and fortress builder
DATE OF BIRTH 1692
PLACE OF BIRTH Warendorf
DATE OF DEATH January 16, 1773
Place of death Magdeburg