Karl Oppermann (engineer, 1766)

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Karl Oppermann (1823–1825, George Dawe , Hermitage (Saint Petersburg) )

Karl Ludwig Wilhelm Oppermann ( Russian Карл Иванович Опперман * 12. November 1766 in Darmstadt , † 2 July . Jul / 14. July  1831 greg. In Vyborg ) was a Hessian - Russian military engineer , cartographer and officer of the Imperial Russian Army .

Life

Oppermann's father was a privy councilor at the Hessian court. The mother was the half-sister of Ludwig Heinrich von Nicolays . The father provided careful training in science and mathematics, as well as in French , Latin and Greek .

In 1779 Oppermann joined the Hessian army and in 1783 became an engineer captain . In the same year he traveled to his uncle Ludwig Heinrich von Nicolay in St. Petersburg and was accepted by Catherine II as a Porutschik of the engineer corps in the Russian army. He eagerly studied Russian , which he then mastered perfectly.

Oppermann took part in the Russo-Swedish War (1788-1790) and was involved in almost all naval battles, especially the naval battle of Vyborg . Rapidly built coastal batteries contributed to the Russian victory in the naval battle of Rotschenssalm (near today's Kotka ) in 1789 . Oppermann distinguished himself in the naval battle of Bjorkesund near Primorsk in July 1790, for which he received the Russian Order of St. George IV Class and was promoted to engineer-captain. For Oppermann, the war ended with wounding and imprisonment. He came back in 1791 and lived in Riga for some time .

In the Russo-Polish War (1792) Oppermann was sent to Poland , where he fought with the Confederates . Then he was involved in the fighting during the Kościuszko uprising in 1794.

In 1795 Oppermann was promoted to major in engineering . He developed a project to fortify the western borders of the Russian Empire . In 1797 it was assigned to the imperial card archive by Paul I. In the same year Oppermann became a member of the engineering expedition of the military college. In 1799 he was given leave of absence as a major general engineer because of a conflict with Alexei Andrejewitsch Araktschejew . At the end of 1800 he was brought back to the engineering corps by Paul I and seconded to the waterways department.

After Alexander I came to power , Oppermann was transferred to the card archive in 1801 and assigned directly to the emperor. In 1803 Oppermann was sent to Finland to improve the defense capabilities of the border fortresses . There he led the work for the creation of the hundred-sheet map of the Russian Empire . For this work and the creation of a complete atlas of Russian fortresses, he was awarded the Russian Order of St. Anne, Class I.

In view of the looming Third Coalition War against Napoleon , Oppermann was sent to Italy to secretly explore the French fortresses. Officially he was Quartermaster General of the Russian, British and Neapolitan troops in Italy. When in 1806 the Russian fleet operated under the command of Dmitri Nikolajewitsch Senjavins in the Adriatic , Oppermann was in Corfu and then returned to Russia via Constantinople . In the Fourth Coalition War Oppermann took part in the Corps of General Pyotr Kirillowitsch Essen 1807 in the battles at Ostrów Wielkopolski and Ostrołęka , for which he was awarded the Order of St. Vladimir III. Class was awarded. Because of the war against Great Britain (1807-1812) Oppermann organized the defense in Kronstadt . In the Russo-Swedish War (1808-1809) he renewed the fortifications in Vyborg, Nyslott and Tavastehus . 1809 he brought the fortresses in the west of the country, including as an inspector of the engineering department of the Ministry of War Kiev Fortress up to date. In 1810 he directed the construction of fortifications Bobruisk and Daugavpils . The Bobruisk Fortress then withstood the siege by the Corps of Jan Henryk Dąbrowskis of the Duchy of Warsaw and the blockade by the French army.

In 1810 Oppermann founded the engineering school on the basis of the school for engineer conductors founded in 1804 by Jan Pieter van Suchtelen in St. Petersburg.

In February 1812 Oppermann became director of the engineering department. In March 1812 he became chief of the engineering services of the 1st Western Army. In view of the looming Franco-Russian war in 1812 , he armored the fortresses from Riga to Kiev. In October 1812 he came to the headquarters of the Russian army and practically controlled the engineering troops and their supplies. He was involved in the battles at Vyazma in October and Krasnoi in November. In March 1813, during the Sixth Coalition War , he led the engineering work on the siege of Thorn Fortress . He then became chief of staff of the Levin August von Bennigsen reserve army established in Poland . Oppermann commanded the troops at the blockade of the Modlin Fortress . In 1813 he was involved in the battles near Dresden in August, Pirna and Leipzig in October and in the sieges of Magdeburg and Hamburg .

After the war, Oppermann devoted himself to building up the engineering department, formed the sappers ' and pioneer troops and managed the construction work in all Russian fortresses. In 1818 he became real assistant to Grand Duke Nicholas I and general inspector of the engineering associations. In 1826 he was appointed to the Supreme Court for the trial of the Decembrists . In the same year he became an honorary member of the Imperial Academy of Sciences . He was also an honorary member of the Russian Mineralogical Society. As a member of the commission for the construction of St. Isaac's Cathedral , he supervised the construction. In 1827 he became chief curator of the Lutheran Peter and Paul Church and reformed the Petri School . In the same year he became head of the Mikhail Artillery School and a member of the State Council . In 1829 he received the title of count . In the same year he worked on a project to rebuild the Brest fortress , which was completed in 1842. In 1830 Oppermann was commissioned to rebuild the Sveaborg fortress . He immediately began planning the project , but died in 1831 on the way to Sveaborg of the spreading cholera in St. Petersburg . He was buried in St. Petersburg in the cholera cemetery on Kulikowo Pole on the Vyborg side .

Oppermann was married to Caroline von Kelchen († May 1841), a daughter of the surgeon Johann Heinrich von Kelchen (1723-1810). His eldest son Alexander became an officer like his father and made a career in the Caucasus War (1817–1864) . The youngest son Leonti also became an officer and distinguished himself in the Crimean War . Her half-brother Justin Karlowitsch Oppermann was a professor at the University of Göttingen .

In 1850 a new tower on the Bobruika River of the Bobruisk Fortress was named after Oppermann.

Honors

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Russian Academy of Sciences: Опперман Карл Иванович, граф (accessed July 9, 2018).
  2. ↑ a b c d e Опперман (Карл Иванович) . In: Brockhaus-Efron . tape XXII , 1897, p. 37-38 ( Wikisource [accessed July 10, 2018]).
  3. ↑ a b c d e А.М.Горшман: Словарь русских генералов, участников боевых действий против армии Наполеова12 . In: Российский архив. История Отечества в свидетельствах и документах XVIII – XX вв . tape VII , 1996, p. 499 ( museum.ru [accessed July 10, 2018]).
  4. ↑ Литвин А. А .: Столистовая карта России . In: Энциклопедия « Отечественная война 1812 года » . 2004, p. 681 .
  5. ↑ С. В. Сергеев, Е. И. Долгов: Военные топографы Русской Армии . ЗАО "СиДиПресс", Moscow 2001, ISBN 5-8443-0006-8 , p. 510 .
  6. ↑ ФОРПОСТ ИМПЕРИИ (accessed July 9, 2018).
  7. ^ Armin von Foelkersam: News about the family v. Quills. In: Yearbook for Genealogy, Heraldry and Sphragistics , Mitau 1903, p. 162.
  8. ↑ И. Д. Сытин: Военная энциклопедия (Репринтное издание) . St. Petersburg 1997, p. 266 .
personal data
SURNAME Oppermann, Karl
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Опперман, Карл Иванович (Russian); Oppermann, Karl Iwanowitsch (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Hessian-Russian military engineer and cartographer
DATE OF BIRTH November 12, 1766
PLACE OF BIRTH Darmstadt
DATE OF DEATH July 14, 1831
Place of death Vyborg