Otto Christoph von Sparr
Otto Christoph von Sparr (born November 13, 1599 in Lichterfelde near Eberswalde or 1605 in Prenden near Bernau ; † May 9, 1668 there ) was an officer and came from an old noble family in Brandenburg . He was the first General Field Marshal in Brandenburg-Prussian history.
Life
Sparr owned a castle in Prenden, where he also liked to go hunting. During the Thirty Years War Sparr entered the imperial service. He fought mostly in northwestern Germany and besieged Essen in 1641 as part of an increasingly independent command in the Westphalia area , fought in front of Stargard and was taken prisoner near Warendorf .
After the war, he led the Electoral Cologne operation against Liège in 1649 and then joined the Brandenburg service in December. In 1656 he was on duty on Polish territory, commanded the center of the Brandenburg-Swedish army in the Battle of Warsaw and stormed the Pragaer Holz. In 1657 he was appointed field marshal of Brandenburg .
In 1658 he fought against the Swedes and in 1659 conquered the Demmin fortress . From 1663 to 1664 he successfully led the Brandenburg contingent against the Turks in Hungary . For this he was appointed imperial field marshal . His last service was the submission of the stubborn Magdeburgers in 1666, who did not want to submit to the Brandenburg rule.
Sparr was particularly concerned with the further development of artillery and genius , which the following rather fabulous story makes clear: When the tower of St. Mary's Church in Berlin started to burn after a lightning strike in 1661 , Sparr was busy nearby. He had a cannon brought in from the city wall and shot at the church tower. The precise shot caused the spire to break apart and fall to the ground, where the fire could be quickly extinguished. - However, the elector Friedrich Wilhelm von Brandenburg insisted that the field marshal had to pay for the reconstruction of the spire himself, because the firing command could only be given by the ruler.
Otto Christoph Freiherr von Sparr died on May 9, 1668 in Prenden .
Honors
Sparr's tomb , created by Artus Quellinus the Elder , is located in Berlin's Marienkirche . On January 27, 1889, Wilhelm II honored outstanding warriors by naming regiments accordingly. In his honor, the 3rd Westphalian Infantry Regiment No. 16 was named Infantry Regiment "Freiherr von Sparr" . The 203 tank battalion continues the coat of arms.
1892 Sparrstraße, 1897 Sparrplatz in was Berlin-Wedding named after him, in Cologne , the Von-Sparr-Straße .
literature
- Frank Göse : Otto Christoph Freiherr von Sparr 1605–1668 . ISBN 3-93-687276-7 .
- G. von Marées: The first general field marshal in the Brandenburg-Prussian service: Otto Christoph Freiherr v. Sparr (1599-1668) . In: Mars - Volume 3/4 (1997/98) . ISBN 3-7648-2507-3 .
- Jürgen Hahn-Butry (ed.): Prussian-German field marshals and grand admirals . Safari, Berlin 1937.
- Ernst-Ludwig Richter: Otto Christoph von Sparr's canteen - reminiscences of Brandenburg-Prussian history . in: Weltkunst / Heft 11, 1994, pp. 1480–82.
- Bernhard von Poten : Sparr, Otto Christof Freiherr von . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 35, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1893, pp. 64-67.
Web links
- Project Gutenberg (1)
- Project Gutenberg (2)
- History of the Lyck district
- Memorial plaque in Berlin
- Spahr, Otto Christoph Freiherr from in: The Thirty Years War in personal testimonies, chronicles and reports by Bernd Warlich
- Epitaph in the Marienkirche, Berlin, in: Military persons of the Thirty Years War in Schweinfurt
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Field Marshal Sparr . In: The Stralauer Fischzug. Legends, stories and customs from old Berlin. Verlag Neues Leben Berlin 1987, ISBN 3-355-00326-3 ; Pp. 191/192.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Sparr, Otto Christoph von |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | first Kurbrandenburg and Prussian field marshal |
| DATE OF BIRTH | November 13, 1599 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Prenden near Bernau |
| DATE OF DEATH | May 9, 1668 |
| Place of death | Prenden near Bernau |