Friedrich Wilhelm von Seydlitz

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Name inscribed on the equestrian statue of Frederick the Great

Friedrich Wilhelm Freiherr von Seydlitz

War of Austrian Succession (1740–1748) during the First and Second
Silesian wars.

Seydlitz became legendary throughout the Prussian Army both for his leadership and for his reckless courage. During the Seven Years' War, he came into his own as a cavalry general, known for his coup d'œil, his ability to assess at a glance the entire battlefield situation and to understand intuitively what needed to be done: he excelled at converting the King's directives into flexible tactics. At the Battle of Rossbach, his cavalry was instrumental in routing the French and Imperial armies. His cavalry subsequently played an important role in crushing the Habsburg and Imperial left flank at the Battle of Leuthen. Seydlitz was wounded in battle several times. After the Battle of Kunersdorf in August 1759, he semi-retired to recover from his wounds, charged with the protection of the city of Berlin. He was not healthy enough to campaign again until 1761.

Frederick rewarded him with

name on the equestrian statue of Frederick the Great
in Berlin, in a place of honor.

Early life

Seydlitz was born on 3 February 1721, in Kalkar in the Duchy of Cleves, where his father, Daniel Florian von Seydlitz, was a major of Prussian cavalry[2] with the Cuirassier Regiment Markgraf Friedrich Wilhelm of Brandenburg-Schwedt No. 5.[3] In 1726, his father left military service and moved the family to Schwedt, where he became a forestry master in East Prussia; the senior Seydlitz died in 1728, leaving a widow and children in restricted financial circumstances.[Note 2] Limited schooling was available to young Seydlitz; sources differ whether he knew how to speak and write in French, the lingua franca of Frederick the Great's Court. One biographer, Bernhard von Poten, maintained that his German was good, and if he knew French, he preferred German and wrote it with a "fine, firm hand, unusually correct, in well-formed sentences and with apt expression," and he knew enough Latin to express himself well.[3] His future sovereign, Frederick, always addressed him in German.[4]

By Seydlitz's seventh year, he could ride a horse well, raced with older boys, and he was, by most accounts, a wild and high-spirited child.

stag, which he did.[7] Seydlitz became a skilled horseman, and many stories tell of his feats, the best known of which involved riding between the sails of a windmill in full swing.[7] Seydlitz remained in his position as a page to the Margrave until King Frederick William appointed him as cornet in the Margrave's Cuirassier Regiment No. 5 (his father's old regiment) on 13 February 1740.[3]

Military career

Promotions[9]

  • Cornet: 13 February 1740
  • Rittmeister (captain of cavalry): 1743
  • Major: 28 July 1745
  • Lieutenant colonel: 21 September 1752
  • Colonel: 1755
  • Major general: 20 June 1757
  • Lieutenant general: 5 November 1757
  • Inspector General of Cavalry in Silesia: 1763

Seydlitz's first months as a cornet were made difficult by the regimental colonel, who considered him a spy for the Margrave, and abused him by sending him on useless errands and generally making it clear that the cornet was no match for the colonel. Within a year of Seydlitz's commission, the old King Frederick William died and his son,

Frederick II of Prussia, ascended to the throne. Frederick claimed Silesia from the Habsburg's Maria Theresa, and made a broad appeal to arms. The Margrave's regiment played an important role in the ensuing war, during which Seydlitz came to the notice of the King several times. Once, when Frederick asked the caliber of the artillery shelling the Prussian line, opinions were divided and vague. Seydlitz rode in front of the battery, halting in their line of fire. When he saw a ball hit the ground, he picked it up, wrapped it in his handkerchief and presented it to the King.[10]

In May 1742, while stationed with his regiment in

Kranowitz during the First Silesian War, the regimental colonel ordered him to take 30 men and hold a village post until infantry came to his assistance; despite heavy fire, the grudging colonel did not send reinforcements. Realizing what had happened, the brigade's general took three squadrons of heavy cavalry to relieve Seydlitz, but these were turned back by fire from the Austrian line. Subsequently, Seydlitz was forced to surrender his small unit. He entered into Austrian captivity with several of his closest comrades, including Charles de Warnery.[3][11]

Frederick exchanged an Austrian captain for Cornet Seydlitz. Upon his return from captivity, Seydlitz had a choice to wait for the first lieutenancy that became available in a

Hussars. He entirely skipped the rank of lieutenant.[12] With the 4th Hussars, he was stationed in the city of Trebnitz and he brought his squadron to a state of conspicuous efficiency.[3][6]

In August 1744, the King entered Bohemia, took Prague, and then moved south. Lieutenant General Count Nassau led the vanguard, and Seydlitz participated with the Natzmer Hussars, commanded by Major Hans Heinrich Adam Schütz, a violent man of whose conduct of warfare Seydlitz disapproved.[13][Note 3] Seydlitz served through the Second Silesian War. On 22 May, Hans Karl von Winterfeldt, trusted by the King as a good judge of character, reported to Frederick: "Certainly, at Hohenfriedberg, on the 4 June, [Seydlitz] captured the Saxon general [Georg Sigismund] von Schlichting personally, after he had cut the reins from him." Based largely on his conduct at Hohenfriedberg and Winterfeldt's recommendation, Frederick promoted Seydlitz to major on 28 July at the unusually young age of twenty-four.[12]

Seydlitz led his squadron at the Battle of Soor on 30 September, scouting the enemy's position before the battle, and then participating in the action. He was also present in the engagement at Katholisch-Hennersdorf on 23 November, which proved convincingly to Frederick the benefit of close support during a cavalry charge.[3] At the successful action on 27 November, Seydlitz led 15 squadrons in an attack on the Austrian rear guard. The Austrians were dispersed and nearly destroyed.[3]

Development of cavalry tactics

Seydlitz smoked a pipe, and when he tossed it away, it was the sign for his troopers to proceed. Depicted here at the Battle of Rossbach, in a section of a history painting by Richard Knötel (1857–1914)

After Frederick concluded the peace on 25 December 1748, Seydlitz returned with his squadron to Trebnitz. In the subsequent years of peace, Seydlitz developed

warm-blood Trakehners, from Frederick's stud farm in Trakehnen, East Prussia.[16]

On 21 September 1752, after a successful review in which the different cavalry forms demonstrated their competencies, the King promoted Seydlitz to lieutenant colonel and the commander-in-chief of cavalry and, on 13 October of the same year, to the commander of the Dragoon Regiment Württemberg No. 12, whose staff was at Treptow. Frederick was not satisfied with the regiment's performance, and instructed Seydlitz to "put it back into order".[3] In 1753 Frederick appointed Seydlitz to the command of the 8th Cuirassiers. In Seydlitz's hands, this regiment soon became a model for the rest of the Prussian Army's mounted force. In 1755 Frederick promoted him to colonel.[3]

By the start of the

esprit de corps bolstered by Frederick's confidence in its members, and by their confidence in Seydlitz. The King had issued orders that no Prussian cavalryman would allow himself to be attacked without a commensurate response, under penalty of being cashiered; consequently, Prussian cavalrymen were active, impetuous and aggressive. For the King, Seydlitz's cavalry became the dynamic factor in the army of the state, and would be the tool by which Frederick could challenge empires. In 1756, Seydlitz's cavalry became Frederick's weapon of choice.[14][3]

Seven Years' War

Further information: Seven Years' War

In May 1757, in defiance of the custom of holding the heavy cavalry in reserve, Seydlitz brought his regiment forward to join the advance guard at the

Kolin in June 1757, he and a cavalry brigade checked the Austrian pursuit by a brilliant charge. Two days later, the King promoted him to major general and awarded him the Pour le Mérite.[6] Seydlitz felt he had deserved the promotion for a long time, for he responded to Hans Joachim von Zieten's congratulations by saying, "It was high time, Excellency, if they wanted more work out of me. I am already thirty-six."[8][17]

Another example of his leadership and his

siege at Prague. The King's brother, Augustus William, took command of the army and ordered the retreat from Prague. Seydlitz was attached to the advanced corps of Karl Christoph von Schmettau in a brigade of ten squadrons. As Seydlitz's wing entered Lusatia, near the town of Zittau, the Austrians were present in force, and Seydlitz with his squadrons were trapped in the town. Tricking the Austrians into thinking his troop was a foraging party, his cavalry burst on the Austrian cavalry before they could climb into their saddles. Seydlitz led his cavalry in an escape, in close column, and was quickly out of sight.[18]

Battle of Rossbach

On the morning of the Battle of Rossbach, Frederick passed over two senior generals and placed Seydlitz in command of the whole of the cavalry, much to those men's annoyance and to Seydlitz's satisfaction. At Rossbach, Seydlitz's coup d'œil and his understanding of the King's objectives led to battlefield success. After positioning the cavalry in two ranked lines, he watched the French army move for several minutes, while puffing on his pipe; his troopers never took their eyes off him. When he threw his pipe away, this was the signal they had waited for: the first line of massed squadrons surged forward, smashing the unprepared French in the flank. Typically, cavalry action in the mid-eighteenth century meant a single cavalry charge; the cavalry would spend the rest of the action pursuing fleeing troops. At Rossbach, though, not content with this single attack, Seydlitz called his second formation of squadrons in another charge; he then withdrew all 38 squadrons into a copse, where they regrouped under cover of the trees.[Note 4] Without waiting for new orders from the King, Seydlitz deployed the Prussian cavalry a third time; this proved a critical factor in the battle. As trained, Seydlitz's squadrons charged headlong into the French columns: a massive wall of horses galloping flank to flank, their riders flashing swords and maneuvering at full speed. By the end of the battle, only seven infantry battalions of Frederick's army had fired a shot; the rest of the victory had been the work of Seydlitz's 38 squadrons and Karl Friedrich von Moller's artillery.[19]

That day, the Prussians took as trophies 72 cannons (62 percent of the French/Imperial artillery), seven flags, and 21 standards.

Prince Henry's regiment of infantry, the Prussian army had defeated the combined armies of two European powers, France and the Holy Roman Empire. The tactics at Rossbach became a landmark in the history of military art.[21] The same night, on the field, the King awarded Seydlitz the Order of the Black Eagle, and promoted him to lieutenant general. Seydlitz had been wounded during the melée and he remained out of action for four months, nursed by a lady in Leipzig.[19]

Campaign 1758–59

Seydlitz rejoined the King in 1758 and on 25 August, at the

Hochkirch, on 14 October 1758, he covered the Prussian retreat with 108 squadrons, and in the disaster of Kunersdorf, on 12 August 1759, he received another severe wound in a hopeless attempt to storm a hill held by the Russians; his 8th Cuirassiers was one of the few intact regiments at the end of the battle. While recuperating in Berlin, he helped organize a defense of the city during the Austro-Russian raid (October 1760). Although he was unable to prevent the Russians from briefly occupying the city, Frederick later praised Seydlitz for his conduct.[3]

Seydlitz's health frequently kept him off the battlefield,[8] and he did not reappear at the front until 1761. Then, he received command of a wing of Prince Henry's army, composed of troops of all arms, and many of his fellow officers expressed doubts as to his fitness for this command, as his service had been with the cavalry exclusively.[6] Subsequently, though, at Freiberg on 29 October 1762, his direction of both his infantry and his cavalry in turn decided the outcome of the battle.[3]

Later life

Statue of Seydlitz at Wilhelmplatz in Berlin (painting from 1872)

After the Seven Years' War concluded with the Treaty of Hubertusburg (1763), Seydlitz became inspector general of the cavalry in Silesia, where eleven regiments were permanently stationed and where Frederick sent all his most promising officers to be trained.[6] In 1767, Frederick promoted Seydlitz to general of cavalry.[3]

Seydlitz's later years were marred by domestic unhappiness. During his convalescence in Berlin, on 18 April 1761, he had married Susannah Johanna Albertine Hacke, daughter of

Lausitz.[22]

By the end of the decade, some misunderstanding brought an end to his formerly close friendship with the King. Seydlitz's health had been declining for years and he suffered from recurrent bouts of syphilis; in 1772, after an attack of

Ohlau (now Oława, Poland). The King sat beside his sickbed, horrified at Seydlitz's condition, and even persuaded him to take some of his medications, but Seydlitz would not look at him; the illness had already deformed his face.[25] Eventually paralyzed, whether from another stroke or the underlying tertiary syphilis, Seydlitz died at Ohlau in Silesia in November 1773.[23]

Character

Seydlitz was generally admired for the superb coup d'œil that allowed him to utilize the cavalry to its full potential. His 19th-century biographer,

rake, and a savage, but another of his biographers, Bernhard von Poten, cited conflicting descriptions offered by Seydlitz's contemporaries, particularly Warnery, as more accurate.[3] Nevertheless, there is some evidence to support König's assertion, at least of Seydlitz's excesses: Seydlitz was no doubt dependent upon his tobacco and had been since his teenage years, although he smoked a pipe rather than using snuff, as many officers did; he was indeed reckless, as his career testified; he enjoyed the company of women; and Seydlitz indeed suffered from recurring illness.[14]

Memorials

Statue of Seydlitz at Wilhelmplatz in Berlin in 2018

In 1851,

name on the Equestrian statue of Frederick the Great in Berlin, honoring those who had helped to build the Prussian state. Seydlitz holds a position of honor as one of the four full-sized mounted figures, sharing the first tier of the plinth with the King's brother, his cousin, and Hans Joachim von Zieten.[26] A bronze sculpture installed at Wilhelmplatz, in Berlin, was created by Anton Lulvès, a copper worker from Hamburg.[27] SMS Seydlitz, representing the first generation of battlecruisers, was ordered in 1910 and commissioned in May 1913, the fourth such vessel built for the Imperial German Navy's High Seas Fleet.[28] The heavy cruiser Seydlitz, of the Admiral Hipper class, was launched in 1939, but never completed.[29]


Notes

  1. ^ Regarding personal names: Freiherr is a former title (translated as 'Baron'). In Germany since 1919, it forms part of family names. The feminine forms are Freifrau and Freiin.
  2. ^ Sources differ on the number of siblings Seydlitz had. Lawley (1852, p. 10) reports two sisters and a brother; Poten (1892, pp. 94–101) simply says three children total.
  3. ^ Schütz reportedly dragooned peasants to serve as his guides, and then executed them when he was finished with them; he burned villages, including churches, and generally waged war on Silesian peasants.Lawley (1852, pp. 10–14)
  4. ^ The K2169 (a county roadway) passing through Reichertswerben is named von Seydlitz Strasse. Google Maps. Seydlitz Strasse in Reichertswerben. Accessed 17 April 2017. Today, this is the site of the Rossbach battle diorama. Reichertswerben village. 03. – 05. November 2017, Biwak in Reichardtswerben, anlässlich des 260. Jahrestages der Schlacht bei Roßbach, Diorama. 8 November 2017.

Citations

  1. ^ Poten, Bernhard von (1892). "Seydlitz-Kurtzbach, Friedrich Wilhelm Freiherr von". Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (in German). Vol. 34. Leipzig: Duncker & Humblot. pp. 94–101.
  2. ^ König 1791, p. 2.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Poten 1892, pp. 94–101.
  4. ^ a b Lawley 1852, p. 2.
  5. ^ Duffy 1986, p. 5.
  6. ^ a b c d e Chisholm 1911.
  7. ^ a b c Lawley 1852, p. 3.
  8. ^ a b c Duffy 1986, p. 136.
  9. ^ König 1791, pp. 2–7.
  10. ^ Lawley 1852, pp. 5–7.
  11. ^ Lawley 1852, pp. 8–10.
  12. ^ a b Lawley 1852, pp. 10–14.
  13. ^ Poten 1891, pp. 124–125.
  14. ^ a b c d e f Jarymowycz 2009.
  15. ^ Van der Aa 1862, p. 496-497.
  16. ^ Lippe-Weißenfeld 1877, pp. 325–326.
  17. ^ Lawley 1852, p. 41.
  18. ^ Lawley 1852, pp. 43–44.
  19. ^ a b Duffy 1986, p. 144.
  20. ^ Bodart 1908.
  21. ^ Weigley 2004, p. 185.
  22. ^ a b Lawley 1852, p. 186.
  23. ^ a b König 1791, p. 7.
  24. ^ Lawley 1852, p. 179.
  25. ^ Lawley 1852, pp. 179–178.
  26. ^ Denkmal 1851.
  27. ^ René & Peter van der Krogt. "Statues Hither and Thither: Berlin – Friedrich Wilhelm von Seydlitz". Retrieved 19 October 2016.
  28. ^ Staff 2006, p. 22.
  29. ^ Gröner 1990, p. 65.

Bibliographie

Further reading

  • Bismarck, Otto von (1837). Die kgl. preussische Reiterei unter Friedrich dem Grossen. Karlsruhe.
  • Richter, Klaus Christian (1996). Friedrich Wilhelm von Seydlitz, ein preußischer Reitergeneral und seine Zeit. Osnabrück: Biblio-Verlag.
    ISBN 978-3-7648-2449-5
    .
  • Varnhagen von Ense, K. A. (1834). Das Leben des Generals von Seydlitz. Berlin.
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