Johann von Götzen

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Johann von Götzen

Johann von Götzen (also: Johann von Götz ; * 1599 near Lüneburg ; † March 6, 1645 near Jankau ) was an imperial general in the Thirty Years' War . In 1633 he was raised to the baron , and in 1635, after the conversion to Catholicism , to the rank of count .

biography

family

His parents were Peter von Götzen auf Zehlendorf and Zülsdorf, Canon of Halberstadt , and Eva, nee. of velvet life. Johann von Götzen was married to Elisabeth von Falcken in his first marriage and to Apollonia von Hoditz in his second marriage. He left two sons from his first marriage: Siegmund Friedrich von Götzen (1622–1662), who founded the Catholic Bohemian and Frankish line of the imperial counts of Götzen , and Johann Georg von Götzen (1623–1679), governor of the County of Glatz , who founded the Catholic Silesian line of the imperial counts of Götzen founded.

Military career

In 1615 he entered the bohemian service and in 1626 as a lieutenant colonel in the imperial service. By Wallenstein he was appointed colonel and governor of Rügen , but in 1630 he was unable to prevent the Swedes from entering . In September 1630 his troops started the " Pasewalker Bloodbath". In 1631 he invaded Lower Lusatia . In 1632 Götzen took part in the battle of Lützen and was then commissioned to lead the troops under Hans Ulrich von Schaffgotsch in Silesia .

For his services, the emperor elevated him to the rank of baron in 1633 and in 1635, after he had decided victory in the battle of Nördlingen with the right wing, to the rank of count . According to the provisions of the Count's diploma, he converted to Catholicism before the elevation .

In 1634 Götzen invaded the Landgraviate of Hesse . After the battle of Wittstock , he combined his troops with those of Hermann von Hatzfeld , but then had to back down before General Johan Banér . In 1636 he was given command of the army previously led by Count Jost Maximilian von Bronckhorst-Gronsfeld , with which he drove Landgrave Wilhelm V of Hesse from Westphalia . In 1637 he horrified Leipzig and, together with Hatzfeld, included General Banér near Torgau , whom he then pursued to Pomerania .

In March 1638 Götzen and Federigo Savelli shared the command of a relief army of 18,500 men for Breisach . The authority of command changed daily. Presumably it was Savelli's mistakes that led to the extensive destruction of the army corps in the battle of Wittenweiher against the troops of Duke Bernhard of Saxe-Weimar . Götzen, who commanded the rear guard that day, moved with the rest of his troops via Offenburg and Tübingen again before Breisach, but failed on October 25, 1638 when attempting to take the ship's bridge. From Breisach he moved to Waldshut , where his army moved into a camp. From Waldshut, Götzen tried to take Laufenburg from Binzgen on the right bank of the Rhine. After his penetration into Kleinlaufenburg he was stopped by the demolition of the Rhine bridge by the Swedish occupation. The unsuccessful and demoralized idol was arrested on November 29, 1638 in Waldshut by the emperor's special commissioner, Count Philipp von Mansfeld , and tried in Vienna before a court martial , but acquitted in 1641. The rest of Götz's army, including the musketeer Hans Jakob Christoffel von Grimmelshausen , escaped misery by moving to safe winter quarters.

After he was placed at the head of the imperial troops again in 1643 and used against the allied French and Swedes, he marched against Prince Sigismund von Rákóczi in Hungary and Transylvania in 1644 .

When Lennart Torstensson broke into Bohemia, Götzen was appointed there. There he fell on March 6, 1645 in the battle of Jankau . His body was buried in the church of the Emmaus monastery in Prague.

literature

  • Richard Plümicke: The curriculum vitae of the Glatzer Provincial Governor Johann Georg Reichsgrafen von Götzen (born 1623, died 1679) written by himself . In: Glatzer Heimatblätter 1943, No. 1, pp. 14-25
  • Richard Plümicke: The large estate of the last imperial count von Götzen from the Silesian line and his heirs in 1771. In: Glatzer Heimatblätter 1942, Issue 2, pp. 49–54
  • Carl von Landmann :  Götzen, Johann Graf von . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 9, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1879, p. 510 f.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ "A memorable report of the cruel, inhuman, unchristian, over-wild Tatar, fiery and murderous deeds and tyrannies, so out of Teuffelic bossiness in the town of Pasewalck in Pomerania, to poor defenseless clusters, spiritual and secular Men, women, virgins and children, by the antichristian idolater with plundering, Sodomitischer fornication, Feur and Schwerdt, the 7th, 8th and 9th of September 1630 was perpetrated and executed in a very miserable way. Printed in the year 1631 "
  2. ↑ Cf. Simplicius Simplicissimus, Grimmelshausen und seine Zeit, exhibition catalog, Landschaftsverband Westfalen-Lippe, Münster, 1976, p. 72
personal data
SURNAME Götzen, Johann von
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Götz, Johann Graf von; Götzen, Johann Graf von
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German Imperial General in the Thirty Years War
DATE OF BIRTH 1599
PLACE OF BIRTH near Lüneburg
DATE OF DEATH March 6, 1645
Place of death at Jankau