Johann von Viermund

This article deals with Johann von Viermund, the Baron of Neersen, for other people with this name see Viermund # Stammliste .

Johann (II.) Von Viermund zu Neersen (* July 7, 1588 ; † May 3, 1632 ) was hereditary bailiff, from 1621 baron, von Neersen and member of the Lower Rhine noble family Virmond-Neersen (1502–1744). Due to special merits in the Thirty Years' War he rose to baron and became imperial general sergeant.

youth

Johann von Viermund-Neersen is a great-grandson of Ambrosius von Viermund . He was the eighth son of the heir bailiff of Neersen, Ambrosius II von Viermund , from his second marriage to Alvara von Quadt . After the death of his seven older brothers, he continued the tribe. During his minority, Georg von Neuendorf took over the reign of the family's fiefs. Johann himself was enfeoffed by Jülich in 1611 and by Kurköln in 1615 with the fiefs of his line. These were in particular the rule of Neersen including the Bailiwick of Anrath .

His first marriage was to Gertrud von Alsteren. On October 2, 1612 he married Johanna Maria († March 18, 1630), daughter of Count Wilhelm von Flodorf zu Leuth and Reichholt in the Duchy of Luxembourg .

Moved by a Jesuit priest , in 1616 he converted from the Reformed to the Catholic Church , which his father Ambrosius II had left during the time of the Truchsessian turmoil . With the convert's own zeal, he promoted the goals of the Catholic Church and the Jesuits with the "pen and sword". He publicly justified his transfer by means of a pamphlet and set up a Jesuit branch in the neighboring city of Neuss .

Military career

Johann had done military service in the Netherlands at an early age . The Thirty Years War opened up another military career for him. In the Electorate of Cologne, both the league and Spaniards , as well as the Electorate of Saxony and other Protestant princes opened their advertising offices.

Emperor Ferdinand II , besieged in his hereditary lands by the apostasy of Bohemia , sought the help of the Catholic League against the rival king Friedrich V of the Palatinate . Field Marshal Tilly recruited several Belgian regiments, in which many nobles from the Lower Rhine also joined. At the end of 1619, Johann also collected a regiment of 300 cuirassiers , which was called "the Neersian" during the Thirty Years' War. In 1620, the Neersian regiment in Deutz was recruited by Colonel Hans Christoph Burhus and, after his arrival at Tilly's headquarters in Dillingen, along with other recruited troops, it was taken over and patterned by Duke Maximilian of Bavaria on June 29, 1620 .

Bohemian War

Johann then took part in the Bohemian War and the Battle of the White Mountain with his cavalry regiment with distinction. He wrested several places from the rebels and secured the passes leading to the Archduchy of Austria above the Enns for the emperor. This therefore raised him to the baron status on September 14, 1621 with the title "Baron von Viermund and Lord of Neersen".

In the period that followed, the Neersian Regiment with 600 men followed Tilly's trains to Westphalia and Hesse as part of the Anhalt Corps. When Kurköln completely gave up his armaments in 1622, all Kurköln officers were hired by Tilly, and Johann now increased his regiment, so that their monthly maintenance required 8,200 Patacons . In 1623 Tilly installed Landgrave Ludwig V of Hesse-Darmstadt in Niederhessen in the parts of the country left behind by Landgrave Ludwig IV of Hesse-Marburg († 1604). At that time Tilly had his headquarters in Hersfeld .

Attempt to regain lost family property

Tilly valued Johann and often used him on diplomatic missions. So Tilly also called for Johann at the governor of the Netherlands about some of his wife's goods in Geldern. Because their father Wilhelm von Flodorf belonged to the Orange Party , these goods had been confiscated by the Spaniards. Tilly testified to Johann that he had shown himself brave in the war, served with great zeal and had behaved courageously and worthy of a nobleman in all previous occasions of the war. Johann received these goods back in 1628.

From February 25, 1623 until New Year 1625, part of the Neersian regiment was quartered in Korbach , in the middle of the old Viermünden-nordenbeck property. The three western Waldeck offices had to raise 83,287 thalers for his maintenance . On November 27, 1624, the male line of the older Waldeck line of those from Viermund zu Bladenhorst died out. Johann was now the closest beneficiary to the lost goods of the Viermünden family in Hesse, Waldeck, Westphalia and Mark and saw the chance to win these goods for himself. On December 13, 1624, Johann himself was in Korbach and had the first neighboring four-mouthed goods notarized, including four hereditary farms in Viermünden . His regiment now numbered 1,000 horses when Johann billeted himself in Nordenbeck Castle on January 28, 1625 , the old ancestral seat of his family. From here he reported to Nassau and the Elector Ferdinand of Cologne and asked for the settled fief to be granted.

But the unrest of the war soon took Johann far away from the estates of his ancestors. In May he was in the camp in Breda , in September in Düsseldorf , and five weeks later in the camp in Papenbruch .

On the Cologne side, its justification was doubted, as the Cologne fiefdoms were usually inheritable in the female line (" feuda promiscua "), and the sisters of the last Viermund zu Bladenhorst appeared more justified. Nassau viewed these Nassau fiefdoms of the Viermund family as a compensation object to buy the peace of the country from Tilly's army, and therefore did not want to "offend" the baron in arms. In fact, on October 20, 1625, the latter gave the promise from the camp in Papenbruch that Tilly had promised to spare Nassau winter quarters and that he, Johann, wanted to prevent or avoid all of Nassau's disadvantages. Johann probably also applied to Ludwig V. for the resurrection with the half of the Hessian court in Viermünden, which was confiscated by Landgrave Ludwig IV .

Diplomatic mission and withdrawal from Lower Saxony

In autumn 1625 Johann von Tilly was sent from the camp in Schulenburg to the Elector Philipp Christoph in Trier . He should ask him to better support Tilly's army in his distressed situation in northern Germany with money and provisions, since the population of the Lower Saxony district clung to the King of Denmark . Otherwise the whole Catholic cause would be damaged and Tilly would be forced to retreat from northern Germany and spend the winter in the Electorate of Trier . The Neersian regiment also felt the truth of this fear when it lost a total of 200 men to a double attack by Danes and peasants on December 28, 1625 near Dransfeld and January 2, 1626 near Nörten . In the spring of 1626 Johann and his regiment had withdrawn to Westphalia.

Coat of arms of Johann von Viermund-Neersen, increased around Nordenbeck (heart shield and middle helmet figure)

Attempt at restitution

In January 1627 he was in Brussels "because of the Viermünden (goods) things" . In 1629, the year of the Edict of Restitution , Elector Ferdinand of Cologne appointed him deputy in the Cologne Council, as well as treasurer and governor of the city of Bonn . Emperor Ferdinand II awarded him on October 3, 1629 a kind of "Viermund'sches Restitution Edict", d. H. a coat of arms increased by Nordenbeck and the privilege of "writing about current and future goods", and the appointment of an imperial commission from Kurköln to examine and restitute the Viermünden original estates based on family contracts. This edict of restitution was just as unsuccessful in the course of the war as the edict of the Reichs Restitution on church property. However, Nordenbeck remained part of his coat of arms and still adorns Neersen's coat of arms today .

In a document from 1630 he writes himself as "Johann Freiherr zu Viermond, Lord of the Free County of Schönau and the Lordship of Neersen, of Nordenbeck and Bladenhorst, Hereditary Bailiff to Anrath and Lender of Hirschbach". Also in 1630 he also became a pawn of the Willich parish .

Siege of Calbe, Magdeburg and Rostock

In 1630 Johann was imperial general sergeant . In September he commanded the successful siege of the castle fortress and town of Calbe , which he stormed and looted by his regiment on September 22nd after eight days of artillery bombardment. He then set up his headquarters in Staßfurt on the border with the principalities of Anhalt . On October 20th he received orders from the Emperor to submit to Count Ernesto Montecuccoli and to protect Silesia . During the siege of Magdeburg in May 1631, he commanded 1,200 infantry and 200 horsemen on the left bank of the Elbe . After the conquest and sacking of Magdeburg he received the order to defend the city of Rostock against the Swedes with 3,000 men . Despite its unfavorable location and poor provisions, he held the city for four and a half months in the hope of relief. Only after Tilly's defeat at Breitenfeld did he negotiate with the besiegers, Duke Albrecht of Mecklenburg and the Swedish General Tott , against surrender of the city, the free withdrawal for him and his men. So on October 6, 1631, he withdrew to Wolfenbüttel with his corps, which was 2,000 infantry, 2 companies of horsemen and 45 Croats , with all officers, all weapons, flying flags, artillery and ammunition . The city population of Rostock had to surrender all firearms and was spared looting.

Siege of Halberstadt and Wansleben

Soon afterwards he received the order from the imperial commander, Count Wolf von Mansfeld in Magdeburg, to attack the city of Halberstadt with Colonel Lothar Dietrich von Bönninghausen . When he had already made a breach , he ran out of ammunition and, on Mansfeld's orders, had to retire to Magdeburg. When he was there with other leaders for three days on a council of war in Magdeburg, the Swedish General Banner attacked and destroyed the Bönninghausen'sche Corps first and included the Viermundische in Wansleben am See . This had to result from a lack of provisions and, according to tradition, was transferred to Swedish services.

Homecoming and death

In 1632 Johann finally returned from the army to Neersen. The next day he rode to Cologne to give thanks in the Jesuit church there. In front of this church he was shot by Colonel Werner Overlacker, who had served in his cavalry regiment.

He was the third of his tribe and name within 70 years to come to a violent end. Strangely enough, there is nothing in the Cologne court hearings about this murder or the murderer. Sometimes there is also speculation that it was a duel . His daughters Alvera and Maria Obilia joined the order of the women choirs of the Holy Sepulcher at St. Leonhard in Aachen in 1633 .

Johann was buried in the Anrath church.

His son Adrian Wilhelm inherited his titles and lands. Two other sons named Ambrosius and Philipp Bernhard were left empty-handed in the inheritance. Ambrosius († 1684) was Commander in the Teutonic Order , Philipp Bernhard († 1639) Canon in Münster . The daughter Katharina Maria Antonia married Jost Edmund von Reuschenberg zu Setterich.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} http://www.heimatverein-calbe.de/Virmondt-Befehl%20Sta%C3%9Ffurt%201630.pdf ;
2. ↑ Cf. Franz Verres, Johann Peter Lentzen: Geschichte der Herrlichkeit Neersen and Anrath. Lentzen, Fischeln 1883, p. 284
3. ^ Franz Winter: Möser's notes on the Thirty Years' War . In: History sheets for town and country. Volume 9, Magdeburg 1874. pp. 11ff, 165ff
4. ^ Gustav Hertel: History of the city of Calbe on the Saale . Berlin / Leipzig 1904. p. 35.
5. ↑ Cf. Carl du Jarrys von La Roche: The Thirty Years War: Illuminated from the military point of view. Volume 1, Hurter'sche Buchhandlung, Schaffhausen 1848, p. 139 f.
6. ^ Otto Grotefend: Meklenburg under Wallenstein. The dukes recapture the land. 1901. Section 3
7. ↑ Cf. Carl du Jarrys von La Roche: The Thirty Years War: Illuminated from the military point of view. Volume 1, Hurter'sche Buchhandlung, Schaffhausen 1848, p. 141.
8. ↑ Cf. General legal orculum, or Des heil. Roman-German Empire Jurists Faculty. Volume 12, Verlag Johann Samuel Heindi, Leipzig 1752, p. 700 ff.

literature

• August Heldmann:  Virmont . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 55, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1910, pp. 332-341. (Family item)

predecessor	Office	successor
Ambrose II of Viermund	Lord von Neersen 1611–1632	Adrian Wilhelm von Viermund