Richard Foerster (Admiral)

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Rear Admiral Foerster (r.) Welcoming an American admiral in 1930

Richard Foerster (born March 31, 1879 in Stralsund , † April 9, 1952 in Berlin ) was a German naval officer , fleet commander and, most recently, admiral .

Life

Foerster joined the Imperial Navy as a midshipman on April 12, 1899 and completed basic training on the cruiser frigate SMS Stosch . Then he came to the naval school, where he was appointed ensign at sea on April 10, 1900 .

During the First World War he was at times artillery officer of the battle cruiser Seydlitz .

From October 1923 Foerster was chief of staff of the naval command and then the first commandant of the first large new building of the Reichsmarine , the school cruiser Emden , which he commanded from October 15, 1925 to September 23, 1928. With the Emden he also carried out the first major training trip around the world from November 14, 1926 to March 14, 1928, on the La Coruña , the Canary Islands, St. Helena , Cape Town , Zanzibar , Mombasa , Mahé , Sabang , and Padang on March 15th the Cocos Islands , the sinking place of the first SMS Emden , were visited. Then Foerster ran via Semarang , Bali to Makassar . On the way to Japan was in the Philippines digging the Emden depth with 10400 m than the soldered to 1951 deepest point of the world's oceans. The other stops on the journey were Nagasaki , Itsu Hu Shima, Shimizu, Yokohama , Hakodate in Japan, then Dutch Harbor , Juneau , Skagway on July 8, 1927 as the northernmost point of the journey, Haines , Sitka in Alaska , Seattle , then the Mexican Ports of Mazatlán , La Paz , Manzanillo and Panama , where the Emden arrived on August 31 and stayed for a week. Further stations were Guayaquil in Ecuador , Mollendo in Peru and then the Chilean ports of Valparaíso , Talcahuano , Puerto Montt and Punta Arenas . It continued via Comodoro Rivadavia and Bahía Blanca in Argentina to the Brazilian ports of São Francisco , Santos , and Rio de Janeiro , where it remained from December 22, 1927 to January 2, 1928. On the way home Pernambuco , Santa Barbara / Dominican Republic, Santa Thomas / Puerto Rico, Ponta Delgada and Villagarcía de Arosa were called. In most ports, the stops lasted around a week. On March 14, 1928, the school cruiser was back in Wilhelmshaven. Then Foerster was appointed inspector of the Education Inspectorate and promoted to rear admiral on December 1, 1928 .

In February 1930 he became commander of the ships of the line (BdL) on the Silesia and in September 1932 chief of the naval station in the North Sea . On October 1, 1932, he was promoted to Vice Admiral. From September 1933 to December 1936 he was the commanding admiral of the fleet command, first on the Schleswig-Holstein , then on the Admiral Scheer .

Foerster was promoted to Admiral on December 1, 1935 and then retired from active service on December 21, 1936.

From 1937 Foerster was President of the Japan Institute and the German-Japanese Society in Berlin, which he remained until 1945. Under his leadership, branches of the company were established in Cologne, Vienna, Frankfurt am Main, Hanover, Wroclaw, Munich and Stuttgart.

In January 1939, Foerster gave the baptismal address for the heavy cruiser Seydlitz , which was ultimately not completed , and was made available to the Navy on February 15, 1939 , but was no longer used for active service.

Awards

literature

  • Hans H. Hildebrand, Ernest Henriot: Germany's Admirals 1849–1945. Volume 1: AG. (Ackermann to Gygas). Biblio Verlag, Osnabrück 1988, ISBN 3-7648-2480-8 , pp. 349-350.
  • Ernst Klee : The personal dictionary on the Third Reich - Who was what before and after 1945. June 2007, 2nd edition, p. 158.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ German Naval Archives: Organization of the Fleet Command
  2. ↑ Klaus-Dieter Postupa: German-Japanese Society R 64-IV, 1930-1945. Inventory overview. Introduction. (No longer available online.) 1979, archived from the original on January 23, 2015 ; Retrieved April 14, 2010 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / startext.net-build.de
  3. ↑ a b c d e Ranking list of the German Reichsmarine , Ed .: Reichswehrministerium , Mittler & Sohn , Berlin 1929, p. 39.
personal data
SURNAME Foerster, Richard
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German admiral
DATE OF BIRTH March 31, 1879
PLACE OF BIRTH Stralsund
DATE OF DEATH April 9, 1952
Place of death Berlin