Otto August Rühle von Lilienstern

Johann Jakob Otto August Rühle von Lilienstern (1780–1847) contemporary lithograph

Johann Jakob Otto August Rühle von Lilienstern (born April 16, 1780 in Berlin , †  July 1, 1847 in Salzburg ) was a Prussian lieutenant general and military writer .

Life

origin

Otto August was the son of Jakob Friedrich Rühle von Lilienstern (born May 3, 1749 in Frankfurt am Main ; † November 19, 1817 in Wittstock) and his wife Christiane Sophie Katharina, née von Cronenfels, widowed von Quickmann (born April 20, 1751 in Berlin; † November 7, 1817 in Wittstock). His father was a Second Lieutenant a. D. , most recently in the “von Thüna” infantry regiment as well as knighthood councilor in Wittstock and owner of the Königsberg estate near Prignitz .

Military career

Rühle visited the cadet house in Berlin and on December 6, 1795 became an ensign in the Guard Regiment together with Heinrich von Kleist . Since then he has been close friends with him. His membership in the Military Society shows that he was keenly interested in the military . In contrast to Kleist, he made a career in the military after having attended Scharnhorst's lectures since 1801 . In 1806 he fought in the corps of Prince Hohenlohe as a general staff officer during the campaign in the battle of Jena and Auerstedt and became inactive after the surrender of Prenzlau . After the Peace of Tilsit, Rühle received permission to enter Weimar service . There he rose to major and became chamberlain and governor of Prince Bernhard of Weimar . With him he was involved in the campaign against Austria in 1809 in the Saxon Army . In 1811, Rühle gave up his job and worked in agriculture, since his request for employment as a teacher at the General War School had been rejected due to a lack of positions.

On February 24, 1813, King Friedrich Wilhelm III. reassigned him to the Prussian Army and assigned Rühle to Blucher’s headquarters . After the Battle of Leipzig he was appointed General Commissioner for German National Armaments and promoted to Lieutenant Colonel. Since he fell ill, he was unable to continue participating in the campaign. As General Commissioner, however, he was called to the Congress of Vienna .

After the campaign of 1815 he was entrusted with the management of the War History Department of the Prussian General Staff . In 1816, as a colonel in the Great General Staff, he became the first chief editor of the newly founded military weekly paper with a royal cabinet order . In 1819, Rühle became Chief of the General Staff in Berlin . However, he only retained this position for two years until he was replaced by the senior general Karl von Müffling . In 1835 he rose to lieutenant general and two years later became director of the General War School in Berlin. In addition, from May 23, 1844, Rühle was inspector general for military education and training as well as president of the upper military examination commission.

Writing activity

He was interested in many things. At times (1824-1836) he tried to improve geography and history lessons by publishing atlases and wall maps. In this regard, he worked - not entirely without tension - with the well-known cartographer Heinrich Berghaus . Details on this in the studies by J. Espenhorst (see literature list).

Epitaph for Otto August Rühle von Lilienstern, Sebastiansfriedhof Salzburg

His publications are not always easy to find, because he often only published his work under the abbreviation R. v. L.

The close friendship with Kleist is evidenced by numerous letters. Kleist dedicated the essay to him on finding the safe path to happiness and enjoying it undisturbed, even under the greatest tribulations in life. For his part, Rühle von Lilienstern supported Kleist's literary work, for example by helping to finance the publication of the journal Phöbus .

Art collector

His knowledgeable collection of old German paintings in particular (auctioned in Berlin in 1848) is now as good as forgotten.

family

Rühle married Henriette on June 30, 1808 in Dresden , widowed von Schwedthoff, born von Frankenberg-Ludwigsdorf (* 1789 in Schüttlau; † December 10, 1847 in Berlin). The marriage remained childless. He adopted Jenny von Schwedthoff (* May 25, 1802, † March 10, 1888), who married the politician Julius von Schleinitz (1806-1865).

Honors

On May 6, 1846 he became an honorary member of the Royal Prussian Academy of Sciences .

Rühle von Lilienstern died on the way back from Bad Gastein in Salzburg and was buried in the crypt arcades of the Sebastian cemetery. His epitaph on one of the arcade pillars there has been preserved.

Works

• Report of an eyewitness of the campaign of the Königl, who was under the command of the Prince of Hohenlohe-Ingelfingen during the months of September and October 1806. Prussian and Elector. Saxon troops: together with 4 tarpaulins and enclosures. Tuebingen 1807.
• Journey with the army in 1809. 3 volumes. Rudolstadt 1810/11. (Reprinted in a volume Vienna 1986)
• Apology of war, especially against Kant. In: Deutsches Museum 1813. Volume 3. pp. 158–173 and pp. 177–192.

literature

• Rolf Elble: The Prussian General Rühle von Lilienstern . In: Europäische Wehrkunde , 10, 1980, pp. 510-515.
• Beatrice Heuser: Rühle von Lilienstern . In: Handbook of War Theories. Thomas Jäger, Rasmus Beckmann. Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, Wiesbaden 2011, pp. 206–213.
• Enno Krüger: Early collectors of "old German" panel paintings after the secularization of 1803 . Heidelberg January 21, 2009, p. 325–337 ( uni-heidelberg.de [PDF; 4.5 MB ] at the same time dissertation at the Philosophical Faculty of the Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg / ZEGK - Institute for European Art History).
• Jean-Jacques Langendorf: Rühle von Lilienstern and his apology of war. In: The rebirth of war from the spirit of revolution. Studies on the bellicose discourse of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Johannes Kunisch, Herfried Münkler . Berlin 1999, pp. 211–223 (= contributions to political science, volume 110).
• Kurt von Priesdorff : Soldier leadership . Volume 4, Hanseatische Verlagsanstalt Hamburg, o. O. [Hamburg] o. J. [1937], DNB 367632799 , pp. 389-393, no. 1360.
• Günther Rühle: Otto August Rühle from Lilienstern. A friend of Heinrich von Kleist . In: Kleist Yearbook 1987 . Edited by Hans Joachim Kreutzer, Berlin 1987, p. 76ff.
• Directory of a valuable collection of paintings by older masters from the estate of the late Lieutenant General, Mr. Rühle von Lilienstern. Berlin 1848 online .
• Bernhard von Poten :  Rühle von Lilienstern, August . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 29, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1889, pp. 611-615.

Web links

• Works by and about Otto August Rühle von Lilienstern  in the German Digital Library
• Entry on Otto August Rühle von Lilienstern in Kalliope
• Rühle von Lilienstern, Otto August (1780–1847)

Individual evidence

1. ^ Members of the previous academies. Johann Jakob Otto August Rühle von Lilienstern. Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities , accessed on November 23, 2015 .