Grand Admiral
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Grand Admiral was the highest rank of the naval officer corps in the navies of various states in the 20th century, but above all in the Imperial Navy and Kriegsmarine of the German Empire . The rank largely corresponded to the naval admiral of Anglo-Saxon fleets and was equal in rank to the (general) field marshal of the land forces . It was introduced into the German Navy in 1900, but was rarely awarded and expired in 1946 when the Wehrmacht was dissolved . The first bearer of the rank was Hans von Koester . The last bearer, Karl Dönitz , died in 1980.
Historical development from offices and titles
The term admiral etymologically comes from Arabic and in the 16th century became a term for a higher military commander in the naval forces. A crown office derived from this in France , the Admiral of France , is sometimes incorrectly referred to in the literature as the Grand Admiral .
The Hamburg convoy captain Berend Jacobsen Karpfanger (1622–1683) was given this title for the first time in the Holy Roman Empire . With the advent of standing fleets in the 17th century from a regular military developed rank , who soon in rear admiral , vice admiral and (full) Admiral divided. The admiral of the fleet corresponded to the general of the army. In connection with the emergence of ever larger fleets, it became necessary to appoint commanders in chief . For this purpose, the office of Lord High Admiral was created in England as early as the 16th century . In addition, a new rank in the Royal Navy emerged around 1690 with the Admiral of the Fleet , which was superior to all other admiral ranks. The fleets of France , the Soviet Union and the USA will also orient themselves to this terminology in the next few centuries . In all cases, the naval admiral was equated in rank with the (field) marshal of the land forces .
In Sweden there was a Reichsadmiral as the highest naval office until 1680 and then until 1828 an Admiral General as the highest naval rank. The subsequent award of the title "Grand Admiral" ( Sw . Storamiral ) to Prince Karl and Crown Prince Oskar , however, remained an exception. It should be noted that between 1827 and 1840 there was a “Grand Admiral's Office” (Schw. Storamiralsämbetet ), headed by Crown Prince Oskar , for the uniform management of the Swedish Navy . In this respect it was an office again.
These terms found their way into the German language via various lexicons. The word "Großadmiral" appeared from 1794 in German-language literature as a description for the English Lord High Admiral.
German Empire
Imperial Navy
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In 1900 the rank of Grand Admiral was created in the Imperial Navy, which was intended as a counterpart to General Field Marshal of the Army. This happened in connection with the second naval law (June 14, 1900), which provided for the massive armament of the navy and the creation of a deep-sea fleet . The first holder of the new rank was on June 28, 1905 Hans von Koester . He was inspector general and from 1903 head of the "command of the active battle fleet", the permanently operational battle fleet, albeit "subject to patenting ". He only received the latter when he was replaced as commander the following year. Koester's successor in this command, Heinrich Prince of Prussia, was promoted to the rank of Grand Admiral when he was immediately patented (September 4, 1909). In 1916 he was also appointed Grand Admiral of the Austro-Hungarian Navy. Henning von Holtzendorff was head of the Admiral's staff when he was appointed (without a patent), but had previously been in command of the ocean-going fleet for four years. He, too, resigned from the service shortly after the appointment. The outward sign of the Grand Admiral's rank was the Grand Admiral's staff and the Grand Admiral's flag.
The rank was tied to the exercise of command. Alfred von Tirpitz is an exception, as he had never been the chief of the fleet, but instead acted as State Secretary in the Reichsmarineamt (RMA) . From 1907 to 1909 he had fought a power struggle with Prince Heinrich and the chief of the admiralty's staff. The emperor and the naval cabinet (which handled the personnel affairs of the senior naval officers) supported Tirpitz and in 1909 elevated him to the position of Grand Admiral over the chiefs of the other departments of the navy - including the new commander of the deep sea fleet. However, he was only endowed with the "rank and title of Grand Admiral", but not with the patent or the rank. He therefore did not receive a Grand Admiral's staff and was only allowed to fly the State Secretary's flag. Reinhard Stumpf pointed out in this context that Tirpitz set the precedent in this regard for the "administrative marshals" of the Wehrmacht , who were not awarded the rank, as is otherwise usual, on the basis of a successful war mission, but in connection with an administrative office. These were Werner von Blomberg in 1936 as Reich Minister of War, Wilhelm Keitel in 1940 as Chief of the High Command of the Wehrmacht and Erhard Milch in 1940 as State Secretary in the Reich Aviation Ministry.
Legend:
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| image | Surname | born | died | appointment | Remarks |
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Hans von Koester | Apr 29, 1844 | Feb 21, 1928 | June 28, 1905 | Koester joined the Prussian Navy in 1859 , served on various ships and made a world tour in 1878/80. At the end of the 1880s he commanded various large ironclad ships and was Chief of Staff of the Admiralty for several years . Since 1897 he was an admiral and from 1903 onwards he commanded the imperial high seas fleet. In addition, he acted as Inspector General of the Navy. He left the service in 1906. From 1908 to 1919 he was President of the German Fleet Association and during the First World War a delegate of the Imperial Navy for nursing. |
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Oscar II of Sweden | Jan. 21, 1829 | Dec 8, 1907 | July 13, 1905 | Even as a prince, Oskar was considered a Germanophile and became king of Sweden and Norway in 1873. He turned Sweden's foreign policy to the German Reich and acted internationally as a mediator (e.g. the Samoa crisis ). During the last years of his reign, Norway split off from Sweden. |
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Heinrich Prince of Prussia | Aug 14, 1862 | April 20, 1929 | 4th Sep 1909 | The brother of Kaiser Wilhelm II joined the Imperial Navy in 1877, made a trip to Japan and passed his naval officer examination in 1880. He then attended the naval academy and school and commanded various ship units until 1895, then ship formations, including the East Asia Squadron . In 1903 he became chief of the Baltic Sea naval station and in 1906 commander of the deep-sea fleet and in 1909 German Grand Admiral. During the First World War he served as Commander in Chief of the Baltic Sea Forces from 1914 to 1917 and retired from service in November 1918. |
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Alfred von Tirpitz | March 19, 1849 | March 6, 1930 | Jan. 27, 1911 | Tirpitz joined the Prussian Navy in 1865 and became a naval officer in 1869. In the late 1870s he worked on the development of the torpedo weapon and in the late 1880s became the commander of various cruisers. In 1890 he became chief of staff of the Baltic Division and in 1892 chief of the admiral's staff. In this function, he designed and developed the principles of the new deep-sea fleet. After briefly commander of the East Asia Squadron in 1896/97 and prepared the takeover of the Kiautschou naval base , he became State Secretary of the Reichsmarineamt in 1897 . In this role he shaped the naval arms race with Great Britain, introduced the naval laws and expanded the risk fleet with which the German Reich went into the First World War. Elevated to the nobility in 1900, he resigned from the service in 1916 because of differences of opinion and then became politically active. |
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Henning von Holtzendorff | Jan. 9, 1853 | June 7, 1919 | July 31, 1918 | Of noble descent, Holtzendorff joined the Prussian Navy in 1869, took part in the war of 1870/71 and then held various on-board commands. He served in the cruiser squadrons of the Imperial Navy, u. a. as the commander of a ship of the line in the Boxer Rebellion . After 1905 he was employed in staff positions, for example in the Baltic Division and from 1906 in the 1st Squadron of the High Seas Fleet, of which he became Commander in Chief in 1909. He resigned from the service in 1913 in a dispute with Tirpitz and worked in the Prussian mansion . At the end of 1915 he was reactivated as chief of the admiralty's staff and was responsible for the unrestricted submarine warfare from 1917. In the summer of 1918 he was dismissed and left the service. |
Imperial Navy
In the Imperial Navy of the Weimar Republic , the rank of Grand Admiral was not awarded and the highest rank for naval officers was that of an admiral. There were also no field marshals in the Reichswehr ; at the head of the army were a few colonels general .
Navy
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On June 1, 1935, the official name of the naval forces of the German Reich was changed to "Kriegsmarine" as part of the armament of the National Socialist Wehrmacht . On April 20, 1936, the Admiral General was created a rank corresponding to the Colonel General , which was intended for the Commander-in-Chief of the Navy . At that time, the commander-in-chief of all branches of the armed forces ( Werner von Fritsch for the army, Hermann Göring for the air force, Erich Raeder for the navy) were of the same rank, while the Reich Minister of War ( Werner von Blomberg ) was the only field marshal above them.
This hierarchy was overturned again after the Blomberg-Fritsch crisis in February 1938. Blomberg was dismissed and the business of the Reich Ministry of War was transferred to the new High Command of the Wehrmacht . Hitler took over the supreme command of the entire armed forces; Goering, who had hoped for the office of Minister of War, received the marshal's baton for consolation . As early as 1935, Hitler had considered appointing the Commander-in-Chief of the Navy as Grand Admiral, as in the imperial era. However, since this would have made the already mentioned ranks of 1936 impossible, he had followed Raeder's suggestion to introduce the General Admiral. After this order no longer existed, Raeder was promoted to Grand Admiral on April 1, 1939. After his discharge, the new Commander in Chief of the Navy, Karl Dönitz , was promoted to Grand Admiral on January 30, 1943, skipping the rank of Admiral General. There were no other promotions.
With the Control Council Act No. 34 of the Allied Control Council of August 20, 1946, the Wehrmacht was officially dissolved. With this, the rank and ranking also lost their official validity. De facto, however, many actors in the post-war Federal Republic adhered to the tradition that a field marshal or grand admiral can never be decommissioned. For example, the former ranks were still often addressed as "Herr Generalfeldmarschall" or "Herr Großadmiral", even if the term "former Grand Admiral" was often mentioned. Karl Dönitz used the phrase "Großadmiral a. " In his memoirs as well as in his letterhead . D. ". In the rank structure of the Bundeswehr , the rank is no longer provided and there is also no corresponding equivalent.
| image | Surname | born | died | appointment | Remarks |
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Erich Raeder | Apr 24, 1876 | Nov 6, 1960 | Apr 1, 1939 | Raeder joined the Imperial Navy in 1894, became a naval officer and attended the Naval Academy. In addition to various on-board commands, he served on the imperial yacht Hohenzollern in 1910/11 . During the First World War he served as First Admiral Staff Officer of the Commander of the Reconnaissance Forces in several skirmishes. After briefly commanding a ship in 1917/18, he became head of the central department in the Reichsmarineamt. By 1924 he rose to the command of the Baltic Sea naval station. From 1928 he acted as chief of naval management. After Hitler came to power in 1933, Raeder advocated arming the fleet and concentrated on building capital ships . He worked out the basic plans for the use of the Kriegsmarine and determined not only the main armaments but also the strategy of the fleet. Discharged after the Battle of the Barents Sea in 1943, he was found guilty in the Nuremberg Trial of Major War Criminals in 1945 . He remained in custody until 1955 and then wrote his memoirs. |
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Karl Doenitz | 16 Sep 1891 | Dec. 24, 1980 | Jan. 30, 1943 | Dönitz joined the Imperial Navy in 1910 and became a naval officer in 1913. On the SMS Breslau he came under Ottoman command and took part in the sea operations around Constantinople in 1914 and came across the submarine weapon in 1915, with which he undertook successful enemy voyages in the Adriatic at the end of the war . After returning from British captivity, he joined the staff of the Baltic Sea Naval Station in 1919 and then commanded various torpedo boats. He was trained as an Admiral Staff Officer and rose to First Admiral Staff Officer of the North Sea Naval Station by 1930 . In the course of the upgrade, he received the order to build the submarine fleet. In 1936 he became the leader of the submarines , devising the armament as well as the strategy and tactics of this weapon. At the end of January 1943 he became Commander in Chief of the Navy. Determined by Hitler in 1945 as Commander in Chief of the Wehrmacht, Minister of War and President of the Reich, he functioned as such (→ Dönitz government ) until his arrest on May 23. He was found guilty in the Nuremberg trial of major war criminals and served a prison term until 1956. |
Austria-Hungary
The rank of Grand Admiral in the Austro-Hungarian Navy was not created until 1916. In the system of the Austro-Hungarian "rank classes" an Austro-Hungarian Grand Admiral belonged to the 2nd class and was thus on an equal footing with an Austro-Hungarian Colonel General ; both were below the 1st class with the rank of kuk field marshal .
There was no separate rank of the 1st class (which would have been equivalent to an Austro-Hungarian field marshal) in the Austro-Hungarian Navy. This circumstance represented a considerable difference to the ranking system of the German Imperial Navy . Below the 2nd class was the 3rd class in Austria-Hungary, whose officers in the Austro-Hungarian Navy had the rank of (full) admiral and in the land forces that of " Generals der Infantrie ”,“ Generals der Kavallerie ”or“ Feldzeugmeisters ” led.
The first and only regular Austro-Hungarian Grand Admiral was Anton Haus as Commander-in-Chief of the Austro-Hungarian Navy. His successors in this office no longer achieved this rank. Only Emperor Karl I, in his capacity as commander in chief of the armed forces of Austria-Hungary a. a. also this rank. The other two appointments to the Austro-Hungarian Grand Admiral were honorary and concerned Heinrich Prince of Prussia and Kaiser Wilhelm II. Prince Heinrich had previously been in command of the German deep-sea fleet from 1906 to 1909. He remained the only officer who achieved the rank of Grand Admiral in two navies.
Legend:
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| image | Surname | born | died | appointment | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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Anton house | June 13, 1851 | Feb 8, 1917 | May 12, 1916 | Haus joined the Austro-Hungarian Navy in 1869 and worked for a long time as a teacher at the Fiume Navy Academy . In 1901 he took command of an armored cruiser and took part in the suppression of the Boxer Rebellion . In 1907 he took part in the Hague Conference . From 1912 he served as a fleet inspector and in the following year as supreme commander of the Austro-Hungarian Navy. In 1915 he operated successfully in the Adriatic against the Italian troops. He died of pneumonia on his flagship in 1917. |
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Heinrich Prince of Prussia | Aug 14, 1862 | April 20, 1929 | Oct 9, 1916 | The brother of Kaiser Wilhelm II joined the Imperial Navy in 1877, made a trip to Japan and passed his naval officer examination in 1880. He then attended the naval academy and school and commanded various ship units until 1895, then ship formations, including the East Asia Squadron . In 1903 he became chief of the Baltic Sea naval station and in 1906 commander of the deep-sea fleet and in 1909 German Grand Admiral. During the First World War he served as Commander-in-Chief of the Baltic Sea Forces from 1914 to 1917 and retired from service in November 1918. |
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Karl Archduke of Austria | 17 Aug 1887 | Apr 1, 1922 | Nov 1, 1916 | Initially trained as an officer, Karl became heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary in 1906 after Franz Ferdinand. In 1916, he was only slightly involved politically and militarily, and then became the new emperor. He took over the supreme command and soon sought a peace treaty. |
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Wilhelm II, German Emperor | Jan. 27, 1859 | June 4, 1941 | Feb. 22, 1917 | Wilhelm entered the military in 1877 and became a captain. He also attended university. In addition to military service, he should continue to train in civil authorities. In 1888 he became the new Kaiser of the German Empire. From 1898/1900 he specifically promoted the construction of a powerful battle fleet, which led to the arms race with Great Britain. |
Exceptional appointments
Based on the German rank, Italy and Peru also introduced a rank that was etymologically related to the German model. In the case of Italy, recourse to the Grande Ammiraglio del Regno di Napoli could also be used.
Italy
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Benito Mussolini ruled as Prime Minister in Italy from 1922 , where the clashes between the fascist movement and anti-fascist forces came to a head in 1924 (→ Matteotti crisis ). In this context it was important for Mussolini to insure himself from the military and thus from the conservative forces. This included, first and foremost, the rehabilitation of the former Chief of the General Staff Luigi Cadorna , who had been stripped of his rank and all salaries in 1919. In addition, with decree nº 1908 of November 4, 1924, Mussolini introduced the Maresciallo d'Italia ( Marshal of Italy ) as the highest new rank of the land forces and appointed Cardona and his successor Armando Diaz as marshals. At the same time, a corresponding counterpart for the naval forces, the Grande Ammiraglio (Grand Admiral) was created with the decree . This was followed on March 26, 1925 by the establishment of own rank badges for this rank. The first and only holder of the rank was Paolo Thaon di Revel .
Thaon di Revel had served in the Italian Navy since the 1870s and had already commanded a naval unit in the 1911 Italo-Turkish War . During the First World War, he initially served as chief of the admiralty's staff and from April 1917 as commander-in-chief of the naval forces, without being able to record any particular success. In 1922 he was like Diaz from the Italian King Victor Emanuel III. ennobled (as Duca del Mare ) and entered Mussolini's first government a short time later as Minister of the Navy. As Grand Admiral, Thaon di Revel stood above all other naval officers in his function as Minister of the Navy. However, he was dismissed in 1925 and Mussolini took over the office himself. Giuseppe Sirianni only led the ministry between 1929 and 1933 , who at that time was only Rear Admiral . There was no further promotion of naval officers to this rank. In 1947, the Grande Ammiraglio was abolished alongside other ranks .
Peru
The Peruvian Congress introduced the rank of Gran Almirante Del Perú (Grand Admiral of Peru) on November 24, 1967 , but only awarded it posthumously to the national hero Miguel Grau Seminario . Grau had already taken part in the Spanish-South American War as a sea captain in the Peruvian Navy , and eventually became a member of parliament and head of the naval school. In the Saltpeter War (1879-1884) he headed the operations of the Peruvian naval forces as admiral and commanded the Huáscar himself . He was victorious in the Battle of Iquique on May 21, 1879 , raided numerous Chilean coastal cities and captured a large number of transport ships. This delayed the Chilean invasion of Peru until a little later on October 8, 1879, in the battle of Angamos , the Huáscar was defeated and conquered by a superior force, whereby all officers including Grau were killed.
Gray was subsequently stylized into an almost mythical Peruvian folk hero and known as " Caballero de los Mares " (Knight of the Seas). On March 21, 1958, the remains of Miguel Grau were returned to Peru from Chile. In addition to streets and schools, the most important football stadiums in Callao and Piura are also named after gray. The flagship of the Peruvian naval forces is the BAP Almirante Grau and in 2000 the former admiral was elected "Peruvian of the Millennium". Gray is also thought of at the beginning of every plenary session of the Peruvian Congress to this day. Before the start of the debate, his name is called and all congressmen respond, “Present!”.
The granting of the rank and title of Grand Admiral in 1967 is an exception in this context, which should posthumously place the national hero above all other officers. In this respect, one cannot speak of a regular rank.
literature
- Reinhard Brühl (among others): Dictionary of German military history . Volume 1, Military Publishing House of the GDR, Berlin 1985. ISBN 3-327-00477-3
- Jörg C. Steiner: The rank and distinction badges of the Austro-Hungarian Army . S and H, Vienna 1992, ISBN 3-901215-02-6
- Reinhard Stumpf: The Wehrmacht Elite - Rank and Origin of German Generals and Admirals 1933-1945 . Boldt-Verlag, Boppard / Rhein 1982, ISBN 3-7646-1815-9
- Georg Zivkovic: Army and Navy Leader of the World. Holders of the higher military dignities and offices of the states of Europe, the USA and Japan . Biblio Verlag, Osnabrück 1971, ISBN 3-7648-0666-4
See also
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ See Lincoln Paine: The Sea and Civilization. A Maritime History of the World . London 2014. Andrew Hilliard Atteridge: Joachim Murat. Marshal of France and King of Naples . London 1912.
- ↑ a b c Reinhard Brühl (u. A.): Dictionary of German military history . Volume 1, Berlin (GDR) 1985, p. 10
- ↑ Grand Admiral . In: Theodor Westrin, Ruben Gustafsson Berg, Eugen Fahlstedt (eds.): Nordisk familjebok konversationslexikon och realencyklopedi . 2nd Edition. tape 27 : Stockholm-Nynäs järnväg – Syrsor . Nordisk familjeboks förlag, Stockholm 1918, Sp. 128 (Swedish, runeberg.org ).
- ↑ Rune Kjellander: Svenska Marinens högre chefer 1700-2005 . Stockholm 2007
- ↑ E.g. Franz Ritter von Rudtorffer: Military geography of Europe . Prague 1838, p. 241
- ↑ a b c Reinhard Stumpf: The Wehrmacht Elite - Rank and Origin Structure of German Generals and Admirals 1933-1945 . Boppard / Rhein 1982, p. 146f.
- ^ Wolfgang Petter: German fleet armor from Wallenstein to Tirpitz . Munich 1983, p. 234
- ↑ Reinhard Stumpf: The Wehrmacht Elite - Rank and Origin of German Generals and Admirals 1933-1945 . Boppard / Rhein 1982, p. 147
- ↑ Erich Raeder: My life . Volume 2, Tübingen 1957, p. 129
- ^ According to the ZDF-heute-journal on January 6, 1981 on the occasion of Karl Dönitz's funeral.
- ↑ Also the note in the official Festschrift of the Bundeswehr Never out of service - On the eightieth birthday of Field Marshal Erich von Manstein . Cologne 1967, p. 85; see. Reinhard Stumpf: The Wehrmacht Elite - Rank and Origin of German Generals and Admirals 1933-1945 . Boppard / Rhein 1982, p. 135 fn. 320
- ↑ Jörg C. Steiner: The rank and distinction badges of the kuk army . Vienna 1992, p. 109
- ↑ John Gooch: Mussolini and His Generals - The Armed Forces and Fascist Foreign Policy 1922-1940 . Cambridge 2007, p. 25 f.
- ↑ Gino Galuppini: Le uniformi della marina militare . Volume 2, Rome 1999, p. 95
- ^ Decreto legislativo del Capo provvisorio dello Stato 18 gennaio 1947, n. 66: Soppressione del grado di maresciallo d'Italia e disposizioni riguardanti il grado di generale d'armata
- ^ Revista del Instituto de Estudios Histórico-Marítimos del Perú . Lima 1997, p. 71
- ^ Antonio Zapata Velasco (among others): Gray . Lima 2012, pp. 194–215 ( online version )
