Wilhelm von Scharnhorst

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Heinrich Wilhelm Gerhard Scharnhorst , from 1802 von Scharnhorst (born February 16, 1786 in Hanover , † June 13, 1854 in Bad Ems ) was a Prussian infantry general and most recently governor of Rastatt .

Life

family

He came from a family in Lower Saxony and was the eldest son of the military reformer and Prussian lieutenant general Gerhard von Scharnhorst (1755-1813), who was raised to the Prussian nobility in 1802 with his descendants . Scharnhorst married on August 21, 1818 Agnes Countess Neidhardt von Gneisenau (born April 24, 1800 in Schilda ; † July 5, 1822 in Erdmannsdorf), the daughter of the later Field Marshal August Graf Neidhardt von Gneisenau (1760-1831) and Karolina von Kottwitz (1772-1832). With the death of their son August (1821–1875), the von Scharnhorst family died out in the male line.

Military career

From August 29, 1794, Scharnhorst was initially a cadet in the Hanoverian artillery . In May 1803 his father brought him to Berlin for further training. On August 1, 1809, Scharnhorst joined the Prussian Army as a hussar in the Brandenburg Hussar Regiment . There he became an ensign on January 3, 1810 , but took his leave three months later as a second lieutenant to fight with the King's German Legion in Portugal and Spain until 1813 . In 1812 he rose to be captain and adjutant at Wellington . Since he mastered the Portuguese language, he also translated documents into German there.

On April 26, 1813, employed again in the Prussian service, Scharnhorst came to the General Staff of the Blücher Corps as a second lieutenant . During the Wars of Liberation he took part in the fighting at Großgörschen , Bautzen , Katzbach , Leipzig , Laon , Ligny and Waterloo, as well as a number of other skirmishes. In addition to the Iron Cross II class, Scharnhorst received the Russian Order of St. George and the Order of St. Vladimir IV Class as well as the Order of the Sword .

As a major , he was on the General Staff of the 8th Army Corps. Also as a major he was artillery inspector in Stettin and later in Koblenz . In 1833 he was colonel in command of the 3rd Silesian Artillery Brigade and in 1836 he served in the War Ministry . On May 11, 1849, he commanded the artillery against the mutinous soldiers in the Rastatt fortress and the rebels of the Baden Revolution . After handing over the fortress, he was appointed governor of Rastatt on September 10, 1849. On 2 February 1850, he took on health grounds to the statutory pension and award of the character as General of Infantry his departure. Scharnhorst moved his residence from Koblenz, where he was still garrisoned , to Berlin.

The studied lawyer was an honorary academic member of the Prussian Academy of Sciences .

He died of a stroke in 1854 while taking a spa stay in Bad Ems . He rests in the family grave of the Scharnhorsts in the Invalidenfriedhof in Berlin .

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Gerhard Scharnhorst was raised to the Prussian nobility on September 16, 1802 in Berlin as a Prussian lieutenant colonel in the field artillery corps, but the corresponding diploma was not released. As a Prussian colonel in the War Ministry, his son Wilhelm received the Prussian coat of arms and the award of the diploma on March 5, 1836 in Berlin . Genealogical handbook of the nobility , Adelslexikon Volume XII, Volume 125 of the complete series, CA Starke Verlag, Limburg (Lahn) 2001, ISBN 3-7980-0825-6 .
personal data
SURNAME Scharnhorst, Wilhelm von
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Scharnhorst, Heinrich Wilhelm Gerhard von (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Prussian general of the infantry, governor of Rastatt
DATE OF BIRTH February 16, 1786
PLACE OF BIRTH Hanover
DATE OF DEATH June 13, 1854
Place of death Bad Ems