Heros von Borcke

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Heros von Borcke in the American Civil War (ca.1864)
Tranter revolver, Borcke's gift to Gen. Stuart - inscription: “ LT. GEN JEB STUART CSA CULPEPPER, VA JUNE 1863 / FROM HEROS VON BORCKE. "(Source: National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution )
Plaque
Promotion to Lieutenant Colonel (1864)
(Source: A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation: US Congressional Documents and Debates, 1774 - 1875 , in: Journal of the Confederate Congress, Volume 4, Page 388, 1904/1905)

Johann August Heinrich Heros von Borcke (born July 23, 1835 at the Ehrenbreitstein Fortress near Koblenz , † May 10, 1895 in Berlin ) was a Prussian cavalry captain who served the Confederates up to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel ( lieutenant colonel ) during the Civil War .

family

He came from the old Pomeranian noble family von Borcke , first mentioned there in 1186, and was the son of the landowner Theodor von Borcke (1805-1878), master of the Wangerin , Labes and Unheim estates in the Regenwalde district ( Pomerania ) and Giesenbrügge in the district Soldin ( Province of Brandenburg ), and his first wife Therese Adloff (1815–1847).

Heros von Borcke's first marriage was on September 16, 1867 at Gut Gralow ( Landsberg an der Warthe district ) Madalene Honig (born July 13, 1845 at Gut Gralow; † August 26, 1883 in Heringsdorf ), the daughter of the landowner Edmund Honig, Herr auf Gut Gralow, and Karoline von Klitzing. In his second marriage, he married on July 31, 1885, also at Gut Gralow, their younger sister Tony Honig (born March 12, 1849 at Gut Gralow; † April 18, 1928 in Brandenburg an der Havel ).

Military background

Heros von Borcke became a Prussian cavalry officer in 1855 , served in the Guard Cuirassiers and until 1862 in the 2nd Brandenburg Dragoon Regiment . However, financial difficulties forced him to quit the service, whereupon he emigrated to America in 1862, where he arrived in Charleston (South Carolina) in May and soon joined the Southern Army .

At first he served with the rank of major as chief of staff and right hand man of the famous cavalry commander of the Northern Virginia Army , the equestrian general James Ewell Brown Stuart , with whom he soon became close friends. Under whose command took from Borcke, the " Giant dressed in gray " ( "because of his height of nearly two meters and his gray field uniform gray giant , called") to great battles of Southern -Kavallerie some such. B. in the Battle of Brandy Station (June 9, 1863). Just ten days later, he was at the battle on June 19, 1863 Middleburg ( Virginia severely wounded): A bullet entered his neck one, bounced off the bone and fell through the trachea into his lungs, where they remained and the the following years caused a gradual lead poisoning. A memorial plaque (historical marker) with the following text has stood on the site of the battlefield at that time since 1997:

Here, on June 19, 1863, Maj. Gen. JEB Stuart's cavalry fought Brig. Gen. David M. Gregg's Union cavalry division. Screening the March of Gen. Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia through the Shenandoah Valley to invade Pennsylvania. Stuart formed a line along this ridge facing Gregg, who charged down this road from Middleburg. Stuart counterattacked, then fell back to another defensive position a half-mile west. In this action, Maj. Heros von Borcke, a Prussian officer and aide to Stuart, fell wounded with a bullet in his neck; he recovered and was at Stuart's deathbed on 12 May 1864. - Department of Historic Resources, 1997.

“Here on June 19, 1863, the cavalry Maj. Gen. JEB Stuarts against a Brig. Union Cavalry Division under General David M. Gregg to secure General Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia march through the Shenandoah Valley for the purpose of invading Pennsylvania. Stuart formed a line along these ridges facing Gregg who was attacking from that road from Middleburg. Stuarts counterattacked, then fell back to another defensive position half a mile west. During this action Maj Heros von Borcke, a Prussian officer and aide to Stuart, was wounded with a bullet in the neck; he recovered and was on Stuart's deathbed on May 12, 1864. "

This wounding forced von Borcke to quit active duty. Nevertheless, he was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel in the Adjutant General 's Department in the "Provisional Army of the Confederate States of America" ​​on December 20, 1864 and sent from 1864 to 1865 on a diplomatic mission of the Confederate government to England.

Von Borcke was well known in the Confederate Army and was revered for his bravery and boldness. He is considered the most important German officer in the Confederate army and one of the most brilliant cavalry leaders. He led in battle u. a. a Prussian cuirassier pallasch model 1816 with him, who earned him the nickname Prussian with the long sword . This edged weapon hangs in the Capitol (parliamentary seat) in Richmond (Virginia) . After his departure, the Southern Congress expressly honored him in a resolution: “ ... that the thanks of Congress are due, and the same hereby tendered to Major Heros von Borcke for his self -acrificing service to our Confederacy, and for his distinguished services in support of our cause. "

The name von Borcke continues to enjoy a high reputation in the southern states. His person, played by US actor Matt Lindquist , was still one of the characters in the US film Gods and Generals by Ronald F. Maxwell (screenplay and direction) in 2003 .

Returned to Germany in 1866, he immediately served in the Prussian-Austrian War again in the Prussian army (as a major in the 3rd Dragoons ), where he took part in the Battle of Königgrätz and the advance to Bohemia, but then because of his old wounds quit the service. In the same year he wrote his Memoirs of the American Civil War (English first edition 1866).

Only after his discharge from military service did he get married in 1867 and then lived on his father's estate in Pomerania until 1879. After his death, he moved to his own estate in Giesenbrügge in the district of Soldin, where he is also buried. He is said to have regularly hoisted the Confederate flag on his estate.

In 1884 Borcke traveled again to the USA to visit old war comrades. Back in Germany, he published a few books just a few years before his death.

He is still sometimes in the United States as "regarding the objectivity of its reports of Baron Munchausen Confederate " ( " the Baron Munchhausen of the Confederacy " hereinafter). One of these critics paraphrases this very benevolently: “ Von Borcke's memoirs are set apart from other such documents by their author's unabashed enthusiasm for the art of civilized warfare, and by his uniquely European, and aristocratic, outlook on the American Civil War. " Douglas Southall Freeman indeed exercised a similar criticism, but stressed the usefulness of the memoirs for the interpretation of the campaigns of Jeb Stuart and praised by Borckes history of the cavalry battle of Brandy Station.

Fonts

  • Memoirs of the Confederate War for Independence. English first edition: Edinburgh 1866; Reprint: JS Sanders & Co., 2002, ISBN 1-879941-31-7 .
  • Two years in the saddle and with the enemy. Memory from the Confederate War of Independence. With a portrait of General Stuart and a map of the theater of war. Translated from English by Otto August Johannes Kähler, Verlag Ernst Siegfried Mittler & Sohn, 2 vols. Berlin 1877, 1898 volume 1 , volume 2
  • with Justus Scheibert : The great cavalry battle at Brandy Station June 9, 1863. With 6 portraits, 5 maps and 7 full pictures based on a war sketchbook, drawn by battle painter C. Sellmer . Paul Kittel Verlag, Berlin 1893. Digitized
  • With Prince Friedrich Karl. War and hunting trips and at home. Paul Kittel Publishing House, Berlin 1893.
  • Young blood. Paul Kittel Publishing House, Berlin 1895.
  • On the warpath. Paul Kittel Publishing House, Berlin 1895.
  • At the edge of the grave. Paul Kittel Publishing House, Berlin 1895.
  • A rice from an old tribe. Novel from life. Paul Kittel Publishing House, Berlin 1895–96. Reprint: LTR-Verlag, Buchholz-Sprötze 1993.
  • Stephen W. Sears: The Civil War. A Treasury of Art & Literature. (The Civil War. A Treasury of Art & Literature). With contributions by Heros von Borcke (in English) and others, Beaux Arts Edition, New York 1992.

literature

  • Genealogical manual of the nobility , noble houses A volume XXIII, page 47, volume 106 of the complete series, CA Starke Verlag, Limburg (Lahn) 1994, ISSN  0435-2408 .
  • Edgar Erskine Hume: Colonel Heros von Borcke. A famous prussian volunteer in the Confederate States Army. Hist. Publ. Co., Charlottesville 1935.
  • Bessie L. Taylor Cleneay: A child's recollection of Baron Heros von Borcke. Dissertation.
  • E. von Hagen: History of the New Mark Dragoon Regiment No. 3 . Berlin 1885, p. 515

Web links

Commons : Heros von Borcke  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Remarks

  1. ↑ Von Borcke in the foreword to the English edition of his memoirs on the civil war.
personal data
SURNAME Borcke, Heros of
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Borcke, Johann August Heinrich Heros von (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Prussian major, as a lieutenant colonel on the Confederate side in the Civil War
DATE OF BIRTH July 23, 1835
PLACE OF BIRTH Ehrenbreitstein Fortress
DATE OF DEATH May 10, 1895
Place of death Berlin