The commanding Prussian generals in Münster.

The General Command in the Duchy of Westphalia, founded in 1815, was called from 1816 General Command of Westphalia.

From 1820 it bore the designation General Command of the 7th Army Corps.

At the head of an army corps there was always a commanding general. He resided in Münster in the castle.

The individual commanding generals of the VII Army Corps are presented below.

The commanding generals in Münster over time were as follows:

Lieutenant General Levin Karl v. Heister (from 1815)

Lieutenant General Johann Adolf v. Tielmann (from 1815)

Lieutenant General Heinrich Wilhelm v. Horn (from 1820)

Lieutenant General Friedrich Karl Ferdinand Frhr. V. Müffling (from 1829)

General Ernst Adolph Heinrich v. Pfuel (from 1838)

Lieutenant General Karl Graf v. d. Gröben (from 1848)

General of the Cavalry Ludwig Frhr. Roth v. Schreckenstein (from 1853)

General of the Infantry Karl Anton Fürst v. Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen (from 1858)

Lieutenant General   Eduard v. Bonin (from 1858)

Lieutenant General Henrich Georg Eduard v. Schlegell (from 1858)

General of the Infantry Eberhard Herwarth v. Bittenfeld (from 1860)

General of the Infantry Eduard Vogel v. Falkenstein (from 1865)

General Heinrich Adolf v. Zastrow (from 1866)

General of the Cavalry Wilhelm Graf zu Stolberg-Wernigerode (from 1871)

General of the Cavalry Karl Friedrich Wilhelm v. Witzendorf (from 1882)

General of the Cavalry Emil Heinrich Ludwig v. Albedyll (from 1888)

General of the Infantry Max Robert v. Goetze (from 1893)

General of the Infantry Kajetan Viktor Hugo v. Mikusch-Buchberg (from 1897)

Lieutenant General Frhr. Ernst Friedrich Wilhelm v. Bülow (from 1900)

General of the Cavalry Frhr. Moritz Ferdinand v. Bissing (from 1901)

General of the Cavalry Friedrich v. Bernhardi (from 1907)              

General of the Cavalry Karl v. Einem gen. v. Rothmaler (from 1909)

General of the Infantry v. Claer (from 1914)

General of the Infantry v. Francois (from 1915)

Lieutenant General v. Woyna (from 1918)

The later Lieutenant General Levin Karl von Heister was born on 22.05.1757 in Homberg.

He belonged to the Hessian branch of the noble family von Heister.

In 1798 he entered Prussian service as a squadron commander in the Dragoon Regiment von Voß.

Previously, v. Heister had served in the Hessian cavalry.

In 1810 he was appointed military governor for the Rhine and Weser region. In that year Heister had also been promoted to major general.

In 1815 he was promoted to the first commanding general in Westphalia, but had to hand over his official duties to his successor the following year due to illness.

He died on 02.07.1816 in Karlsbad.

In 1815 Lieutenant General Johann Adolf v. Tielmann succeeded as commanding general.

He had been born in April 1765 in Dresden and served initially (from 1780) in the Saxon and then (from 1813) in the Russian army.

On 09.04.1815 v. Tielmann entered Prussian service and fought successfully at Ligny (16.06.1815) and Wavre (18.06. to 19.06.1815) against the French Northern Army.

On 30.10.1815 he was appointed Commanding General of the VII Army Corps (seat in Münster).

Lieutenant General v. Tielmann (ultimately General of the Cavalry) died on 10.10.1824 in Koblenz.

As early as 1820 Lieutenant General Heinrich Wilhelm v. Horn assumed the position of Commanding General in Münster.

Heinrich Wilhelm von Horn was born on 31.10.762 in Warmbrunn (Principality of Schweidnitz).

He joined the Old Prussian infantry regiment “von Luck” (No. 53) on 25.03.1778 as a lance corporal. Previously he had attended the cadet institute in Berlin. This was followed by participation in the so-called Bavarian Succession War (1778–79). In the campaign against Poland (1794–95) he was assigned as adjutant to General Franz Andreas von Favrat (* 04.09.1733 in Bellevaux/Savoy; † 05.09.1804 in Glatz). Horn distinguished himself in the Battle of Rawka and during the siege of Warsaw.

In the new Prussian army he commanded a brigade within the Prussian auxiliary corps under General Yorck von Wartenburg in the ill-fated campaign against Russia (1812). In the same capacity v. Horn fought in 1813 at Möckern, Königswartha/Weißig and Bautzen and proved himself an outstanding troop commander.

Because of his distinctive manner he also became a popular military celebrity. For his merits in the aforementioned battles he was awarded the oak leaves to the Pour le Mérite on 08.12.1813.

From 03.10.1815 v. Horn was Commandant of Magdeburg, and from 23.11.1815 also Inspector of the Landwehr in his administrative district.

Having in the meantime been promoted to Lieutenant General, v. Horn was finally appointed Commanding General of the VII Army Corps in 1820.

Here he criticized the widespread child labor because of the poor health condition of many recruits. As a result of this criticism, state measures restricting child labor followed in 1839. With the Prussian regulation of 09.03.839 (= Regulation on the employment of young workers in factories) provisions for occupational safety were issued for the first time in Germany.

Lieutenant General Heinrich Wilhelm v. Horn died in 1829 (31.10.) in Münster.

Friedrich Karl Ferdinand Baron v. Müffling was born on 12.06.1775 in Halle (Saale) and died on 16.01.1851 in Erfurt.

The later Prussian Field Marshal (1847) also worked as a military writer as well as a surveyor and cartographer.

In 1820 he became Chief of the General Staff and from 1832 Commanding General of the VII Army Corps.

In 1837 v. Müffling was appointed Governor of Berlin. From 1838 to 1844 he also served as President of the Prussian State Council.

The later Prussian General of Infantry Ernst Adolph Heinrich v. Pfuel was born on (03.11.1779 at the Jahnsfelde estate in the Märkische Schweiz and died on 03.12.1866 in Berlin.

Already at 13 he entered the Prussian cadet institute and in 1797 became an ensign in a Prussian infantry regiment.

After the disintegration of the Old Prussian army he was — like many other dismissed Prussian officers — temporarily in Austrian and Russian service. Thus he served as commander of the 1st Infantry Regiment in the Russo-German Legion.

Having returned to the Prussian army, v. Pfuel served in the Prussian General Staff and in 1818 became Chief of the General Staff of the VIII Army Corps in Koblenz.

From 1837 he became Commanding General of the VII Army Corps.

In 1848 v. Pfuel became Prussian Prime Minister and (for 48 days) War Minister. Previously he had been Governor of Berlin.

However, his liberal political stance in the so-called pre‑March (March Revolution) was held against him, and so he resigned on 01.11.1848. In 1858 v. Pfuel was, however, called to the House of Lords.

General Ernst Adolph Heinrich v. Pfuel was particularly meritorious in the field of military sports and introduced, for example, swimming instruction for the soldiers.

Lieutenant General (General of the Cavalry) Karl Count v. d. Gröben was born on 17.09.1788 in Schrengen in the Rastenburg district and died on 13.07.1876 at the Neudörfchen estate near Marienwerder.

Count v. d. Gröben entered the Prussian army at the age of 18 and distinguished himself in the campaign against the French army in 1806.

From 1812 he was in Russian service and took part in the battles of Lützen (02.05.1813) and Bautzen (20./21.05.1813).

Back in Prussian service, v. d. Gröben served in the General Staff and in 1817 became Chief of the General Staff of the II Army Corps.

From 1829 he was Adjutant to the Crown Prince.

From 1852 v. d. Gröben became Commanding General of the VII Army Corps and in 1853 of the Guard Corps. From 1854 he was called to the House of Lords.

Having left active service on 01.06.1858, he nevertheless remained the King's General Adjutant.

The Prussian general and briefly War Minister Ludwig Johann Karl Gregor Eusebius Baron Roth von Schreckenstein was born on 16.11.1789 in Immendingen. He died on 30.05.1858 in Münster.

Initially as a page in Saxon service, v. Schreckenstein became an officer in 1809 in the Saxon cuirassier regiment von Zastrow and fought in the Russian campaign in 1812, among others in the Battle of Borodino.

On 15.05.1815 v. Schreckenstein transferred as a Rittmeister to the Prussian army and fought in the battles of Ligny and Wavre in the summer campaign of 1815 in Prussian service.

In 1834 v. Schreckenstein became a colonel and in 1837 was appointed commander of the 13th Cavalry Brigade in Münster.

In 1841 he was promoted to major general. Subsequently v. Schreckenstein commanded in succession the 5th and the 15th Division.

In the revolutionary year 1848 he was briefly War Minister, but had to resign shortly thereafter.

From 1849 v. Schreckenstein took command of the Guard Corps and fulfilled this function

On 02.06.1853 v. Schreckenstein was appointed General of the Cavalry and Commanding General of the VII Army Corps.

In 1858 he accompanied the Prussian Prince Friedrich Wilhelm of Prussia to London for his wedding in January with Princess Victoria of Great Britain and Ireland.

Married to the Countess von Hatzfeldt (1800–1835), he had several children.

Eduard Wilhelm Ludwig von Bonin is among the most remarkable Prussian officers who commanded the VII Army Corps in the mid-19th century. His time in Münster was short, but he had already made a name for himself as a troop leader in the war against Denmark and as Prussian Minister of War. After his service in Münster he was appointed head of the War Ministry a second time. The LWL portal explicitly lists him as Commanding General of the VII Army Corps.

Eduard von Bonin was born in March 1793 in Stolp in Pomerania. Even the standard biographical works disagree on the exact birthdate: the Neue Deutsche Biographie gives 12 March, while the older Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie lists 7 March and the LWL portal 3 March. His death, however, on 13 March 1865 in Koblenz is certain. His father, Ernst Friedrich Otto von Bonin, was also a Prussian lieutenant general. Bonin thus came from an old Pomeranian officer family.

His military career began exceptionally early. Already at thirteen he took part in the 1806 war against Napoleon. As a Junker he fought at the Battle of Jena and was taken prisoner after the storming of Lübeck. After the Prussian catastrophe he initially continued his schooling before joining the Prussian Guard as an ensign. In 1810 he became a lieutenant.

During the Wars of Liberation from 1813 to 1815 Bonin proved himself as a young officer. After the Battle of Großgörschen in 1813 he received the Iron Cross, 2nd Class. For his role in the storming of Montmartre during the capture of Paris in 1814 he was even awarded the Iron Cross, 1st Class.

Thus Bonin belonged to that generation of Prussian officers whose military self-understanding was decisively shaped by the defeat of 1806, the subsequent Prussian reforms and finally the Wars of Liberation.

After the end of the Napoleonic wars he continued his career in the peacetime army. In 1817 he became a captain, in 1829 battalion commander in the Kaiser-Alexander-Garde-Grenadier-Regiment and in 1841 its regimental commander. In 1842 he was promoted to colonel. Even at that time Bonin was intensely engaged with tactical questions. His 1839 work "Grundzüge für das zerstreute Gefecht" shows his particular interest in a more mobile infantry tactic.

Bonin’s real prominence as a troop leader was achieved during the Schleswig-Holstein uprising and the war against Denmark.

In 1848 he received command of a Prussian corps. Under the supreme command of General Friedrich von Wrangel, Bonin intervened decisively in the fighting at the Battle of Schleswig on 23 April 1848. He also took part in the engagements at Fredericia and Düppel.

After the Malmö armistice Bonin received an even more demanding task: he was made Commanding General of the Schleswig-Holstein army. This involved not only commanding existing troops. Bonin had to reorganize, expand and prepare the duchies’ army for a renewed war. The Neue Deutsche Biographie explicitly judges this organizational work as successful.

Fighting resumed in 1849. Bonin’s troops advanced into North Schleswig and captured Kolding. He then concentrated, however, on the siege of the fortress of Fredericia. Here his career suffered a noticeable setback. Since the fortress could still be supplied and reinforced from the sea, the Danes on 6 July 1849 succeeded in a successful sortie and drove back Bonin’s troops. Later military-historical assessments saw this as a considerable error in his operational conduct. D

Bonin nevertheless declined the offer to transfer permanently into Schleswig-Holstein service and returned to the Prussian army in 1850.

After his return Bonin was first commandant of Berlin and subsequently commander of the 16th Division in Trier. Already during the political and military tensions of 1850 he also led a corps assembled at Wetzlar.

From 1852 to 1854 he served for the first time as Prussian Minister of War. This period is of particular interest for his later role in the Prussian army reform. Bonin was already at that time intensively engaged with a reorganization of the army. In particular he wanted to change the role of the Landwehr and create a more developed reserve system.

His first ministerial term ended against the backdrop of foreign policy disputes during the Crimean War. He was then reassigned to military duties and on 20 March 1856 became Vice Governor of the Federal Fortress of Mainz.

The particularly interesting section for Münster’s garrison history begins thereafter. Bonin took command of the VII Army Corps headquartered in Münster. The LWL portal explicitly records his function as "General, Commanding" of the VII Army Corps.

His activity in Münster fell into an important phase of Prussian military history. The VII Army Corps was of considerable significance for the western territories of the monarchy. As the seat of the general command, Münster was therefore not merely the garrison of several troop units but one of the military leadership centers of the Prussian state.

Bonin brought exceptionally extensive experience to this task: he had commanded regiments and divisions as well as larger troop formations, had reorganized an army, gained wartime experience as a senior troop commander and had already led the Prussian War Ministry.

His time in Münster, however, remained short. Political change at the head of Prussia led him back to Berlin.

In October 1858 Prince William of Prussia – the later King William I – assumed the regency for his ailing brother Frederick William IV. This began the so-called New Era.

Bonin was now appointed Prussian Minister of War a second time. He therefore relinquished the general command in Münster. His successor as Commanding General of the VII Army Corps was Karl Anton, Prince of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, who was appointed Commanding General on 22 November 1858.

This yields an interesting personal constellation for your garrison history: the former Commanding General in Münster, Eduard von Bonin, moved to Berlin as Minister of War, while the new Prussian Minister-President, Karl Anton of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, assumed the general command of the VII Army Corps.

Bonin’s second term as Minister of War was determined by the question of how the Prussian army should be expanded and reorganized.

There is a certain irony: Bonin himself had already worked intensively on reform plans during his first ministerial term. His ideas, however, did not fully align with the plans pursued by the Prince Regent. In particular the future status of the Landwehr and the reserves were points of contention.

The Neue Deutsche Biographie emphasizes that Bonin worked intensively on a reorganization of the army during both of his ministerial terms and developed a reserve system in place of the previous Landwehr concept. The older ADB, by contrast, reports that he ultimately could not support the Prince Regent’s reorganization plan of 1858/59.

This placed Bonin between his own reform ideas and William’s military-political goals.

His second ministerial term ended already in 1859. The army reform was then continued under other responsibilities and a few years later became the core of the Prussian constitutional conflict.

After leaving the War Ministry Bonin returned to active troop service. He received command of the VIII Army Corps headquartered in Koblenz. There he spent the final phase of his military career.

Bonin died on 13 March 1865 in Koblenz.

The older Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie paints a vivid picture of his personality. It describes him as a physically agile and mentally lively officer whose strengths lay especially in tactical insight, calm under fire and direct troop leadership. At the same time it notes weaknesses in longer-term and systematic staff work. Highlighted, however, is his ability to quickly gain the trust and affection of his soldiers. This contemporaneous characterization should nevertheless be understood as a historical assessment rather than an objective psychological judgment.

Eduard von Bonin’s significance for Münster lies less in the duration of his service than in his prominent position within Prussian military history. When he commanded the VII Army Corps he already had more than five decades of military experience behind him – from Jena in 1806 through the Wars of Liberation in 1813/14 and Schleswig-Holstein 1848/49 to the office of Prussian Minister of War.

His time in Münster also stands directly at the beginning of the development that led to the major Prussian army reform in the following years. Bonin left Münster to become Minister of War again; his successor Karl Anton von Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen was at the same time Prussian Minister-President. Münster was thus closely linked personnel-wise, via the general command of the VII Army Corps, to the military-political decisions in Berlin.

From 1858 General of Infantry Karl Anton, Prince of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen served as Commanding General of the VII Army Corps.

He was Commanding General of the VII Army Corps from 22 November 1858 until 28 June 1860; he was, however, only promoted to General of Infantry on 31 May 1859.

Karl Anton Joachim Zephyrin Friedrich Meinrad, Prince of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, was born on 7 September 1811 at Krauchenwies Castle near Sigmaringen. He came from the Swabian-Catholic line of the House of Hohenzollern. His father was Prince Karl of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, his mother Antoinette Princess Murat, a niece of the Napoleonic marshal and King of Naples Joachim Murat. In 1834 Karl Anton married Princess Josephine of Baden. The marriage produced six children, among them Leopold of Hohenzollern, whose candidacy for the Spanish throne in 1870 played an important role in the prehistory of the Franco-Prussian War, and Karl, the future King Carol I of Romania.

Karl Anton received an unusually comprehensive education. After attending schools in Regensburg and Rastatt, he studied in, among other places, Geneva, Tübingen and Göttingen. During a stay in Berlin he received additional instruction in military sciences and constitutional law. There he also came into contact with Prince William of Prussia, the later King William I. Already as heir apparent he engaged intensively with military affairs of his small home state. The two Hohenzollern principalities together with Liechtenstein provided a single infantry battalion.

The Revolution of 1848 led to a decisive turning point in his life. On 28 August 1848 Karl Anton took over the government of the Principality of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen from his father. The political and social upheavals of the revolutionary period, however, made a lasting independent rule seem unlikely. By treaty of 7 December 1849 he ceded the principality to the King of Prussia. Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen thus became part of the Prussian state.

This also marked the beginning of Karl Anton’s real career in Prussian state and military service. From 1852 to 1858 he was a Prussian lieutenant general commanding a division in Düsseldorf. During the Crimean War he was also entrusted with a diplomatic mission to Paris. His activity therefore by no means remained confined to strictly military matters. Due to his background, family ties and close relationship with the later King William I, he also moved in the center of Prussian politics.

For Münster’s garrison history the year 1858 is of particular importance. On 22 November 1858 Karl Anton was appointed Commanding General of the VII Army Corps. The corps’ general command was located in Münster. He succeeded Eduard von Bonin in this position. Karl Anton led the VII Army Corps until 28 June 1860; Eberhard Herwarth von Bittenfeld then assumed command.

There is, however, a particularity about his command in Münster: Karl Anton was at the same time one of the most important politicians of Prussia. Prince William had assumed the regency in October 1858 for his ailing brother King Frederick William IV and ushered in the so-called „New Era“. On 5 November 1858 William appointed Karl Anton as Prussian Minister-President. Only a few weeks later he was also named Commanding General of the VII Army Corps. Karl Anton thus temporarily combined the office of Prussian head of government with one of the most significant military commands in the west of the monarchy.

For Münster his appointment therefore meant that the person at the head of the local general command was a figure who belonged directly to the regent’s closest political circle. However, due to his duties as Minister-President Karl Anton probably spent a significant portion of his time in Berlin. His relationship to Westphalia and the western military district nevertheless remained close. On 31 May 1859 he was promoted to General of Infantry, and on 14 July 1859 he was additionally appointed Military Governor of Westphalia.

The year 1859 was militarily significant. The war of France and Sardinia-Piedmont against Austria also caused considerable tensions and mobilization measures in Germany. For a Commanding General in western Prussia ensuring the security and readiness of the troops was therefore of heightened importance. At the same time Prussian leadership was already deeply engaged with the reorganization and strengthening of the army.

Karl Anton was fundamentally positive toward the planned army reforms. Remarkably, however, he did not merely defend the traditional social structures of the Prussian officer corps. The Neue Deutsche Biographie emphasizes that he sought greater participation of the bourgeoisie in higher officer positions and a rejuvenation of the military leadership. In this respect he differed in part from more conservatively minded views within the army.

On 28 June 1860 Karl Anton was relieved of command of the VII Army Corps at his own request. His direct service as Commanding General in Münster thus lasted only about one and a half years. His successor was General of Infantry Eberhard Herwarth von Bittenfeld.

Karl Anton’s military connection to Westphalia did not end with this, however. He remained Military Governor of Westphalia and on 17 March 1863 additionally received the function of Military Governor for the Rhine Province. In the same year he became a member of the engineering commission. During the Danish War of 1864 he was temporarily at Wrangel’s headquarters and took part with the Crown Prince in a reconnaissance near Fredericia. Increasing illness and paralysis of the legs, however, increasingly limited his active military role.

At the same time his political career remained of great importance. As Prussian Minister-President Karl Anton tried to mediate between liberal reform forces and conservative representatives of the monarchy. The planned army reform in particular increasingly brought this policy into difficulty. After the electoral success of the Progressive Party in 1861 the conflict over the military budget intensified. On 12 March 1862 Karl Anton’s premiership ultimately ended. A few months later William I appointed Otto von Bismarck as Minister-President.

Karl Anton returned to the center of European politics once more in 1870. His eldest son Leopold had been offered the Spanish crown. France regarded the possible election of a Hohenzollern to the Spanish throne as a threat. Karl Anton withdrew his son’s candidacy on 12 July 1870; the diplomatic crisis was by then, however, no longer avoidable and finally led to the Franco-Prussian War. During that war Karl Anton, due to his health restrictions, did not take a field command.

After the extinction of the Hohenzollern-Hechingen line in 1869 Karl Anton became head of the entire princely House of Hohenzollern. He spent his last years increasingly withdrawn in Sigmaringen, where he died on 2 June 1885 at the age of 73.

For Münster’s garrison history Karl Anton occupies a remarkable position. His term at the head of the VII Army Corps was comparatively short, but fell into a decisive transitional phase of Prussian military history. The "New Era" starting in 1858, the mobilization crisis of 1859 and the beginning army reform formed the background of his activity in Münster. At the same time he was probably the most politically prominent Commanding General to lead the VII Army Corps in the 19th century: Commanding General in Münster, Military Governor of Westphalia and concurrently Prussian Minister-President. It is precisely this combination that makes his biography particularly interesting for the history of Münster as a Prussian garrison.

For Münster’s garrison history Eduard Adolf Georg Heinrich von Schlegell – often also spelled von Schlegel – holds particular importance. He was not nominally Commanding General of the VII Army Corps, but from November 1858 led it on behalf of Prince Karl Anton of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen. A contemporary order-of-knighthood list explicitly describes him in 1859 as "General-Lieutenant, entrusted with the command of the General-Command 7th Army-Corps."

Schlegell was born on 24 August 1793 in Zeitz. His father Heinrich von Schlegel was a first lieutenant in the Electoral Saxon infantry regiment “Kurfürstin,” and his mother Auguste Emilie Eleonore Katharina was née von Troyff. He thus grew up in a military household and from 1805 attended the Ritterakademie in Dresden.

His military career began during the Napoleonic era. On 16 April 1809 he entered the infantry regiment “König” of the Saxon army as an ensign. He initially fought on the side of the Kingdom of Saxony allied to Napoleon. Already that year he took part in the war against Austria and was wounded at the Battle of Wagram. After his recovery he fought near Linz. In 1810 he was promoted to second lieutenant.

In 1812 Schlegell marched with the Saxon army as part of Napoleon’s forces against Russia. There too he was wounded and took part in several engagements. In 1813 he was promoted to first lieutenant in the Saxon grenadier regiment.

His military biography thus vividly reflects the shifting alliances of the Napoleonic period: initially he fought on the French side, including at Großbeeren and Dennewitz and in connection with Torgau. After Saxony switched to the Allies he fought against France in 1814.

On 4 May 1815 Schlegell transferred to the Prussian army. As a first lieutenant he was assigned to the 27th Infantry Regiment.

Only a few weeks later he was involved in the final campaign against Napoleon. As leader of the 12th company Schlegell took part in the Battle of Ligny on 16 June 1815, where he was wounded twice. For his action he received the Iron Cross, 2nd Class.

Schlegell thus belonged to that generation of officers whose active careers began in the Napoleonic wars and who decades later still occupied important leadership positions in the Prussian army.

Schlegell’s connection to Münster did not begin only in 1858.

On 18 March 1824 he was attached to the 13th Infantry Regiment and transferred for duty as adjutant to the VII Army Corps. Thus more than three decades before his later leadership of the corps he came into the orbit of the Münster general command.

Münster also became important for him privately: on 6 September 1824 he married in Münster Henriette Ludowike Adolfine von Horn, a daughter of Lieutenant General von Horn. The marriage was dissolved in 1832. The following year Schlegell married Friederike Ottilie Wilhelmine von der Lehe.

Thus the later leader of the VII Army Corps already had personal and service ties to the Westphalian garrison in the 1820s.

After his assignment at the general command Schlegell led a company in the 24th Infantry Regiment from 1829 to 1833. He was then made major and commander of the II Battalion in the 12th Landwehr Regiment.

In 1836 he returned to the 24th Infantry Regiment, rose further and became lieutenant colonel in 1843. On 31 March 1846 he was temporarily given command of the 15th Infantry Regiment with simultaneous promotion to colonel and in October of the same year was appointed regimental commander.

Schlegell was also actively employed during the Revolution of 1848/49. In 1849 he took part in the campaign to suppress the Baden revolution. In July 1849 he was appointed commander of the 10th Infantry Brigade.

For his services in that campaign he received the Order of the Red Eagle, 2nd Class with Oak Leaves and Swords.

By that time his military experience thus already included the Napoleonic wars, the Russian campaign, the Wars of Liberation including the 1815 campaign and finally the internal German revolutionary fights of 1849.

On 22 September 1851 Schlegell was promoted to major general and appointed commandant of the significant fortress and garrison city of Magdeburg.

His service there was apparently highly valued. When he left Magdeburg in 1854 the city conferred honorary citizenship on him. Magdeburg still lists him in its official overview of honorary citizens.

On 6 April 1854 Schlegell took over the 8th Division in Erfurt. On 13 July of the same year he was promoted to lieutenant general.

In the summer of 1858 he additionally received a commission from the German Confederation to inspect troop contingents of several smaller federal states – including Saxe-Weimar, Anhalt, Hesse-Homburg, Schaumburg-Lippe, Lippe and Waldeck. This shows that by then he was regarded as an experienced senior troop commander.

The decisive chapter for Münster’s garrison history began on 22 November 1858.

Karl Anton, Prince of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, had been appointed Commanding General of the VII Army Corps. At the same time Karl Anton was since November 1858 Prussian Minister-President and therefore had to devote himself mainly to his political duties in Berlin.

For this reason Lieutenant General von Schlegell was entrusted with the actual command of the VII Army Corps. The contemporary designation accordingly read "entrusted with the command of the General-Command 7th Army-Corps."

Karl Anton was the appointed Commanding General; Lieutenant General von Schlegell, however, actually led the general command in Münster during his absence.

Schlegell’s position was by no means merely a short-term stand-in. For the duration of his commission he received an annual service allowance of 5,000 thalers. In addition he was explicitly assigned a residence in Schloss Münster.

These two facts alone show that for the practical garrison history of Münster in 1858/59 Schlegell was far more important than a mere list of officially appointed Commanding Generals might suggest.

Schlegell’s leadership of the VII Army Corps also fell into a militarily tense period. The Sardinian War of 1859, in which France and Sardinia-Piedmont fought Austria, led to military preparations and mobilization measures in the German Confederation and in Prussia as well.

This gave the general command in Münster added significance. An experienced lieutenant general like Schlegell, who had already seen several campaigns and led regiments, brigades and a division, was well suited for such a task.

His fiftieth service anniversary fell right in the middle of this Münster period. On 12 April 1859 he was awarded the Order of the Red Eagle, 1st Class with Oak Leaves and Swords and with the ring set in diamonds.

Schlegell’s active career ended at the beginning of 1860. On 20 January 1860 he received the character of General of Infantry upon his retirement.

At that time he had more than fifty years of military service behind him – a career that began in 1809 in the Saxon army and led through the Napoleonic wars to the command of a Prussian army corps.

He spent his retirement in Erfurt and died there at the end of 1869. Exact dates of death vary in the available accounts: 23 December 1869 is frequently cited, other genealogical sources give 28 December; even the city of Magdeburg points to differing reports about the month and day of death. For a final printed edition of your garrison history I would therefore verify this point using a contemporary church or civil register.

Why he matters for Münster’s garrison history:

First, Münster was by no means merely a final station in his career. As early as 1824 he had been assigned to the VII Army Corps as an adjutant and married in Münster the same year. More than three decades later he returned as a lieutenant general.

Second, in 1858/59 he practically exercised the military command of the VII Army Corps. The assignment of a residence in Schloss Münster and the substantial service allowance underline the independent character of this function.

Third, his service provides an important explanation for the initially somewhat confusing command situation of the VII Army Corps: Bonin left Münster in 1858 to become Minister of War; Karl Anton von Hohenzollern was nominally Commanding General but was at the same time Prussian Minister-President; Schlegell therefore assumed the local command of the corps.

Eberhard Herwarth von Bittenfeld is one of the most militarily significant generals who commanded the VII Army Corps in Münster in the 19th century. His service in Münster from 1860 to 1864 fell directly into the period of the Prussian army reform. He subsequently commanded in the Danish War of 1864 and belonged to the highest Prussian and later German army leadership in the wars of 1866 and 1870/71. The Deutsche Biographie lists him for 1860 as Commanding General of the VII Army Corps and from 1864 as leader of the VIII Army Corps.

Karl Eberhard Herwarth von Bittenfeld was born on 4 September 1796 in Großwerther near Nordhausen. He came from an old officer family. His father, Eberhard Herwarth von Bittenfeld, was a Prussian major general; his brothers Hans and Friedrich also pursued military careers. The family’s military tradition thus shaped his youth.

Herwarth entered the army at a dramatic time for Prussia. On 15 October 1811 he was first employed as a musketeer with the Normal Infantry Battalion. In 1813, when Prussia rose against Napoleon, he was still a very young officer.

Herwarth took part in the Wars of Liberation against Napoleon and fought, among others, at Großgörschen and Dresden. He was wounded at the Battle of Kulm on 30 August 1813. For his service he received the Iron Cross, 2nd Class.

He also participated in the 1815 campaign. Like Eduard von Bonin and Eduard von Schlegell, Herwarth thus belonged to the generation of Prussian generals whose military socialization traced back to the Wars of Liberation.

After the Napoleonic wars Herwarth remained in the army and rose through the ranks over the following decades. The long peacetime after 1815, however, meant that promotions were relatively slow at first.

Herwarth developed into an experienced infantry officer. After various assignments he became colonel and commander of the 1st Guard Regiment to Foot in 1848 – one of the most respected regiments of the Prussian army.

In 1852 he was promoted to major general and took over the 16th Infantry Brigade. In 1854 he became commandant of the Federal Fortress of Mainz. In 1856 he was promoted to lieutenant general and assumed command of the 7th Division.

Thus before his appointment to Münster Herwarth had already gained extensive experience as a regimental, brigade and division commander as well as fortress commandant.

On 29 June 1860 Herwarth von Bittenfeld was appointed Commanding General of the VII Army Corps. This ended the special command arrangement of the previous years: Karl Anton, Prince of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, withdrew as nominal Commanding General, while Lieutenant General von Schlegell, who had actually led the corps, had retired from active service at the beginning of 1860.

With Herwarth the VII Army Corps again received a Commanding General who could devote himself fully to the military leadership of the corps.

His term in Münster is especially interesting for the garrison history because it coincided exactly with the years of the Prussian army reform. Under King William I and War Minister Albrecht von Roon the peacetime strength of the army was increased, the number of line regiments raised, and the relationship between line, reserve and Landwehr fundamentally changed.

Münster was directly affected. As the seat of the general command of the VII Army Corps the city was an important center for the organizational implementation of the reform in the Westphalian corps district. Herwarth thus stood at the head of a corps whose formations underwent significant organizational changes during his tenure.

During his Münster service Herwarth reached the next rank in his career. On 18 October 1861 he was promoted to General of Infantry.

The promotion underscores his standing within the higher Prussian generality. As Commanding General he now belonged to the relatively small group of officers who in wartime were to lead full army corps.

His Münster tenure ended in connection with the Danish War of 1864.

In May 1864 Herwarth was entrusted with the leadership of a combined Prussian army corps. His troops were assigned the task of crossing to the island of Als. After the Prussian-Austrian forces had already captured the Düppel entrenchments, the capture of Als was intended to finally break the Danish position in this area.

The crossing took place on the night of 28–29 June 1864. Prussian troops crossed the Als Sound in boats and overcame Danish resistance. The capture of the island became one of the campaign’s most important Prussian successes.

Herwarth was awarded the Order Pour le Mérite for his achievements. The success at Als established his reputation as a successful senior troop commander and placed him firmly among the front rank of the Prussian generality.

After the 1864 campaign Herwarth took command of the VIII Army Corps headquartered in Koblenz.

Thus he moved from Westphalia to the Rhine Province. His military career, however, reached its true pinnacle only two years later.

In Prussia’s war against Austria and its allies in 1866 Herwarth received an independent army command. He led the so-called Elbe Army, one of the three major Prussian army groups that invaded Bohemia from the north.

The Elbe Army operated on the western wing of the Prussian forces and finally joined the 1st Army of Prince Frederick Charles.

On 3 July 1866 Herwarth with his troops took part in the decisive Battle of Königgrätz. The Elbe Army engaged on the left Prussian flank and contributed to the defeat of the Austrian Northern Army.

For his services in the campaign Herwarth received high decorations; on 16 September 1866 he was in particular awarded the Oak Leaves to the Pour le Mérite.

At the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War in 1870 Herwarth was already 73 years old. He therefore did not receive an active field command. He was appointed General Governor for the VII, VIII and XI Army Corps areas. Thus he was responsible for large parts of western Prussia while the active corps marched against France.

Westphalia and thus Münster also fell within this area of responsibility. During the war Herwarth was therefore again – now on a superior level – connected with the military organization of western Prussia.

After the victorious war and the founding of the German Empire Herwarth received the highest military recognition of his career. On 8 April 1871 he was promoted to General Field Marshal.

Thus the former Commanding General in Münster rose to the highest rank of the Prussian-German army.

Herwarth von Bittenfeld died on 2 September 1884 in Bonn, two days before his 88th birthday. His military career had spanned more than six decades – from the Wars of Liberation against Napoleon to the era of the German Empire.

Herwarth von Bittenfeld merits special attention among the Commanding Generals of Münster. His tenure links two epochs of Prussian military history.

When he came to Münster in 1860 the Prussian army was still strongly shaped by the organizational forms of the post-Wars-of-Liberation period. During his Münster service the great army reform of William I and Roon was implemented. When Herwarth left Münster in 1864 the series of wars in which the reformed army was employed – 1864, 1866 and 1870/71 – had begun.

Herwarth himself exemplifies this development:

In 1813 he fought as a young officer against Napoleon; 1860–1864 he commanded the VII Army Corps from Münster during the army reform; in 1864 he led the Prussian troops in the crossing to Als; in 1866 he commanded the Elbe Army at Königgrätz; in 1870/71 he was General Governor for large parts of western Germany; in 1871 he was promoted to General Field Marshal.

Thus Herwarth von Bittenfeld undoubtedly belongs to the most prominent officers who held the general command of the VII Army Corps in Münster.

Eduard Vogel von Falckenstein is one of the outstanding Prussian generals of the German wars of unification. For the garrison history of Münster his biography is particularly interesting: He took over the VII Army Corps immediately before the German War of 1866 and commanded in that war as supreme commander of the Prussian Main Army an independent campaign against the states of western and southern Germany allied with Austria. Later he was Military Governor in Hanover and during the war of 1870/71 Military Governor of the German coastal regions.

Eduard Ernst Friedrich Hannibal Vogel von Falckenstein was born on 5 January 1797 in Breslau. His father Hannibal Vogel von Falckenstein was a Prussian major, his mother Charlotte Helene née Graetz. Thus Falckenstein also came from a home strongly shaped by the military.

Like Herwarth von Bittenfeld, he belonged to the generation that entered the Prussian army during the Napoleonic era. On 9 April 1813, a few months after his 16th birthday, he began his military career as a volunteer rifleman in the 1st West Prussian Grenadier Battalion.

Falckenstein’s entry into the army coincided directly with the beginning of the Wars of Liberation. The young volunteer took part in the fights against Napoleon and proved himself already during the 1813 campaign.

At Montmirail he was wounded in 1814. For his services he received the Iron Cross II Class. He also took part in the 1815 campaign.

Thus began a military career that would span almost six decades. Like Herwarth von Bittenfeld, Falckenstein was profoundly shaped by the experiences of the Wars of Liberation.

After the end of the Napoleonic wars Falckenstein remained a professional officer. During the long peacetime he rose gradually through the ranks of the Prussian infantry.

In 1841 he became a major. In 1848 he was promoted to lieutenant colonel, in 1850 to colonel. In the same year he took command of the Guard Rifle Battalion.

In 1851 he became commander of the 4th Guard Regiment of Foot. Higher command positions followed: in 1855 Falckenstein became major general and commander of a Guard Infantry Brigade, in 1858 lieutenant general and commander of the 5th Division in Frankfurt an der Oder.

His career thus progressed initially less spectacularly than those of Bonin or Herwarth. That was to change fundamentally in the 1860s.

In the war against Denmark in 1864 Falckenstein first distinguished himself as a senior troop leader. He was made Chief of the General Staff of the allied Prussian-Austrian army under the supreme command of Field Marshal Friedrich von Wrangel.

Thus he was placed directly at the center of operational planning.

However, significant tensions arose between the old Field Marshal Wrangel and his chief of staff. Differing views on the conduct of the war eventually led to Falckenstein being relieved of his position as Chief of the General Staff.

His military career suffered no lasting damage from this. Later in the war he was given command of the 14th Infantry Division.

He particularly distinguished himself in the crossing to the island of Als on 29 June 1864. For his services he received the Pour le Mérite.

This also provides an interesting connection to his predecessor in Münster: the crossing to Als was led by Herwarth von Bittenfeld as supreme commander; Falckenstein, as a division commander, led a substantial portion of the troops employed.

On 30 October 1865 Falckenstein was appointed Commanding General of the VII Army Corps, based in Münster. At the same time he was promoted to General of Infantry.

Thus yet again a highly experienced officer took military leadership in Westphalia.

However, his peacetime tenure in Münster was to last only a few months. Already the following year the conflict between Prussia and Austria led to war.

For Münster and the VII Army Corps this meant the transition from the garrison and training organization of peacetime to mobilization and field deployment.

In June 1866 Falckenstein received an independent command. He was given leadership of the Prussian troops that were to operate against the states in northern and western Germany allied with Austria.

His task differed significantly from the operations of the major Prussian armies in Bohemia. While Moltke planned the decisive campaign against Austria, Falckenstein had to act first in western and northwestern Germany.

A first objective was the elimination of the Hanoverian army.

The Prussian troops advanced rapidly into the Kingdom of Hanover. King George V withdrew southward with his army. On 27 June 1866 a skirmish took place at Langensalza, in which a numerically inferior Prussian detachment suffered a setback.

Strategically this changed little. The Hanoverian army was by then surrounded by Prussian units. On 29 June 1866 it capitulated at Langensalza.

Thus Hanover was eliminated as a military opponent.

Falckenstein then turned against the southern German federal troops.

Under his supreme command the so-called Main Army was formed. It included in particular units that had previously been employed against Hanover. Among them were Westphalian troops from the area of the VII Army Corps.

Falckenstein led his troops against the federal army, in particular against Bavarian and Hessian units.

On 10 July 1866 Prussian troops defeated the Bavarians at Kissingen. A few days later further federal troops were beaten at Laufach and Aschaffenburg.

On 16 July 1866 Falckenstein’s troops occupied Frankfurt am Main.

Thus within a few weeks the Main Army brought a significant portion of the western theater of war under Prussian control.

Despite his military successes Falckenstein was replaced as supreme commander of the Main Army already in July 1866.

His successor was General Edwin von Manteuffel.

The replacement was less the result of a military defeat than an expression of differing views about further operational conduct and about the handling of the occupied territories. Falckenstein’s approach to Frankfurt – in particular the high demands for contributions – provoked considerable criticism. Contemporary and later accounts assess his measures differently; therefore, in a more detailed account one should distinguish between his military success and the political controversies of his occupation policy.

After his replacement Falckenstein received a new important assignment. He became Military Governor of the occupied Kingdom of Hanover.

This function was politically extraordinarily significant. After the Prussian victory the Kingdom of Hanover was annexed and incorporated into the Prussian state as a province.

Falckenstein thus had to help organize the transition from military occupation to the integration of the former kingdom into the Prussian monarchy.

For his services in the 1866 campaign he received high decorations and a grant.

His connection with Münster remained. Falckenstein continued to be, or was again listed as, Commanding General of the VII Army Corps and remained among the highest-ranking Prussian generals.

Thus his Münster period is especially closely linked to the war of 1866.

Where Herwarth von Bittenfeld’s Münster tenure can mainly be associated with the army reform, Falckenstein stands for the first major wartime employment of Westphalian troops after that reform.

At the outbreak of the war against France in 1870 Falckenstein was already 73 years old. He was therefore no longer intended for an operational field command on the French front.

Instead he received a strategically important task in the homeland.

He was appointed Military Governor of the German coastal regions with seat in Hanover. His task was mainly to secure the German North and Baltic Sea coasts against a possible French attack.

A French landing operation ultimately did not take place. Nevertheless, substantial troop forces had to be kept ready, coastal fortifications secured and potential landing areas monitored.

This assignment too demonstrates the trust the Prussian leadership continued to place in the now very elderly general.

After the war of 1870/71 Falckenstein’s active military career ended.

On 8 April 1873 he was placed on the retired list with the award of the Order of the Black Eagle. Thus he left active military service after around sixty years.

He spent his retirement on his estate Dolzig in Lower Lusatia.

Eduard Vogel von Falckenstein died there on 6 April 1885 at the age of 88.

Falckenstein’s importance for your garrison history is particularly great because his term of office marks the immediate transition from the peacetime garrison to the 1866 war deployment.

He took over the VII Army Corps on 30 October 1865. Only a few months later mobilization began. Westphalian regiments left their garrisons and marched to the field.

In the process the Commanding General in Münster himself rose to become the supreme commander of an independent army.

His biography can therefore be very well linked to the history of the Münster garrison:

In 1813 Falckenstein entered the war against Napoleon as a sixteen-year-old volunteer. In 1864 he was Wrangel’s chief of staff and later a division commander in the crossing to Als. In 1865 he took over the VII Army Corps in Münster. In 1866 he led Prussian troops against Hanover and afterwards the Main Army against the southern German federal troops. In 1870/71 he was responsible for securing the German coasts.

Thus Eduard Vogel von Falckenstein also belongs to the important personalities among the Commanding Generals of Münster.

Heinrich Adolf von Zastrow is one of the particularly interesting Commanding Generals of the VII Army Corps. Unlike many of his predecessors, he did not begin his career exclusively as a classic line officer. He was regarded as an acknowledged expert in fortification, engineering and military technology, was an instructor at the General War School and published military-scientific works. His Münster tenure also fell into a decisive epoch: after the war of 1866 he led the VII Army Corps into the Franco-Prussian War of 1870/71, where it was employed, among other places, at Spicheren, Metz and in the Loire campaign.

Heinrich Adolf von Zastrow was born on 11 August 1801 in Danzig. He came from the old Pomeranian noble family von Zastrow. His father Alexander Heinrich Gebhard von Zastrow was a Prussian colonel and commander of an infantry brigade.

Thus Zastrow also grew up in a distinctly military environment. His education, however, differed in one important point from that of many older generals in our series: he was too young to have participated as a soldier in the Wars of Liberation of 1813–1815. His military formation took place instead in the post-Napoleonic Prussian army.

In 1815 he first joined the cadet corps. In 1819 he was transferred as a second lieutenant to the 1st Guard Regiment of Foot.

Zastrow’s interest in military-scientific and technical questions became apparent early on.

From 1823 to 1825 he attended the General War School in Berlin, the later War Academy. There he received comprehensive instruction in tactics, strategy, military history, mathematics and fortification theory.

Fortification in particular developed into his special field.

In 1826 Zastrow was assigned to the topographical department of the Great General Staff. Later he himself served as an instructor at the General War School.

Thus he belonged to that new generation of Prussian officers in whom scientific education and practical troop command were increasingly combined.

Zastrow also made a name early on as a military author.

He became particularly known for his work on the history of fortification systems:

"Geschichte der beständigen Befestigung oder Handbuch der vorzüglichsten Systeme und Manieren der Befestigungskunst".

The work first appeared in the 1830s and was reissued and expanded several times.

Zastrow dealt with the development of European fortress construction and systematically addressed different fortification systems. The book attracted attention beyond Prussia and was translated into other languages.

For his further career this scientific activity was by no means incidental. It established his reputation as one of the Prussian army’s specialists on fortification and siege matters.

In 1834 Zastrow was transferred to the Great General Staff.

Various General Staff assignments followed. This combination of General Staff service, military-scientific work and practical troop command shaped his entire career.

In 1848 he became lieutenant colonel, in 1850 colonel.

In the following years he received increasingly higher troop commands. In 1856 he was promoted to major general and later to lieutenant general.

By the 1860s Zastrow thus already belonged to the leadership stratum of the Prussian army.

During the German War of 1866 Zastrow commanded the 11th Infantry Division.

With it he belonged to the 1st Army of Prince Friedrich Karl of Prussia and took part in the campaign in Bohemia.

His division fought, among others, at Münchengrätz and Königgrätz. Especially the battle of Königgrätz on 3 July 1866 decided the war in favor of Prussia.

Zastrow thereby proved himself as a division commander in a major European war.

After the victory over Austria a comprehensive reorganization of the Prussian forces began. Through the annexation of Hanover, Kurhessen, Nassau and Frankfurt and the founding of the North German Confederation, the organization of the army corps also changed.

In this situation Zastrow received one of the most important leadership posts of the western Prussian army.

On 20 September 1866 Heinrich Adolf von Zastrow was appointed Commanding General of the VII Army Corps.

Thus he took over the General Command in Münster from Eduard Vogel von Falckenstein.

His appointment came immediately after the German War. A phase of reorganization and of evaluating the war experiences of 1866 now began for the VII Army Corps.

Zastrow’s task was initially to return the Westphalian units to the peacetime organization, compensate for losses, further develop training and equipment, and realign the troops on the basis of the campaign’s experiences.

For Münster this also meant a further consolidation of its position as one of the most important military administration and command centers in western Prussia.

The peacetime after 1866 lasted only four years.

During these years the forces of the North German Confederation were further unified. Prussia formed the organizational core of the new federal army.

The VII Army Corps remained essentially the Westphalian army corps. Its regiments garrisoned numerous locations across Westphalia; the general command remained in Münster.

Thus Zastrow stood at the head of a large military organizational area.

On 22 March 1868 he was promoted to General of Infantry.

When war with France broke out in 1870, Zastrow was almost 69 years old. Nevertheless he received – unlike some other generals of his generation – an active field command.

And not a small one: he led his VII Army Corps into the field himself.

At the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War the VII Army Corps was mobilized.

For Münster this was a decisive event. The general command switched from the peacetime to the wartime organization; units were supplemented, reservists called up, horses requisitioned and extensive transports prepared.

Zastrow’s VII Army Corps was subordinated to the 1st Army under General Karl Friedrich von Steinmetz.

Thus the Commanding General left Münster and marched with the Westphalian troops to the French border.

Already on 6 August 1870 the VII Army Corps was involved in the heavy battle at Spicheren.

The fighting initially developed in an unplanned manner. Prussian units encountered French troops under General Frossard, who had occupied strong positions on the heights south of Saarbrücken.

As the day progressed, ever more German units were drawn into the battle.

Zastrow’s VII Army Corps played a significant role. The fights for the heights of Spicheren were among the bloodiest engagements of the first weeks of the war.

The French withdrawal ultimately brought the Germans victory, but the battle was later criticized for its partly improvised course and the high losses.

For the history of the VII Army Corps Spicheren was nonetheless one of the most important days of the war.

After Spicheren Zastrow’s corps advanced further into France.

The major fights around Metz followed. The VII Army Corps was involved in the operations that eventually encircled the French Army of the Rhine under Marshal Bazaine in Metz.

After the battles of Mars-la-Tour and Gravelotte/St. Privat the French army was trapped in the fortress.

The VII Army Corps then took part in the siege of Metz.

Here Zastrow’s long-standing knowledge of fortifications proved useful, even though the siege itself was decided less by classical formal siege attacks than by the complete encirclement and starvation of the French army.

On 27 October 1870 Metz capitulated. More than 100,000 French soldiers fell into German captivity.

After the fall of Metz the German troops tied up there were freed for other theaters of war.

Zastrow’s VII Army Corps was then assigned to the 2nd Army under Prince Friedrich Karl and moved westward and southwestward.

There German troops fought the newly formed French armies on the Loire.

The VII Army Corps took part in the operations around Orléans and Le Mans.

The winter fighting of 1870/71 in particular placed high demands on the soldiers. Cold, poor roads, long marches and supply problems burdened the troops in addition to the actual engagements.

In January 1871 the French Loire army under General Chanzy was decisively defeated at Le Mans.

Thus Zastrow’s VII Army Corps had participated in almost all important phases of the western campaign: from the initial advance at Spicheren and Metz to the winter operations on the Loire.

For his services during the war Zastrow received high decorations.

Particularly significant was the award of the Pour le Mérite. Later he also received the oak leaves to this order.

After the war he was also granted an endowment.

The awards reflect the high assessment of his activity as a corps commander.

After the Peace of Frankfurt the VII Army Corps returned to its Westphalian garrisons.

Zastrow also initially resumed his seat as Commanding General in Münster.

For the city the return of the troops in 1871 must have been a major event. The soldiers now returned not only as victors of a war; during the campaign the German Empire had also been founded.

The Münster garrison thus became part of the army of the new German Empire – although the VII Army Corps remained organizationally part of the Prussian army.

Zastrow remained at the head of the VII Army Corps for a short time after the war.

On 5 October 1871 he was placed on the retired list with pension and the award of the Order of the Black Eagle.

Thus ended a military career of more than five decades.

Zastrow then retired from active service.

He died on 12 August 1875 in Schöneberg near Berlin, one day after his 74th birthday.

Heinrich Adolf von Zastrow occupies a particularly important place among the Commanding Generals of Münster.

His term from 1866 to 1871 encompasses one of the decisive epochs of German and Prussian military history.

He took over the VII Army Corps immediately after the war of 1866 and four years later led it personally into the war against France.

Thus his activity in Münster can be directly connected with the history of the Westphalian regiments.

Under Zastrow the VII Army Corps was mobilized in Westphalia in 1870. He then led his troops over the French border, fought with them at Spicheren, took part in the operations around Metz and finally led them in the winter campaign against the French Loire army.

In 1871 the corps returned to Westphalia.

Thus Zastrow is the first of the Commanding Generals treated so far for whom the Münster garrison history and the concrete campaign history of the VII Army Corps can be almost completely linked.

Wilhelm Count zu Stolberg-Wernigerode was born on 13 May 1807 in Wernigerode and died on 6 March 1898 in Jannowitz in Silesia. He came from the extensively branched high-noble house of Stolberg-Wernigerode. His father was Count Constantin zu Stolberg-Wernigerode. After his early death Wilhelm already inherited the Silesian estates Jannowitz and Kupferberg as a child.

Remarkable about his career is that it did not proceed in a straight line. Stolberg was at times a professional officer, left active service again, devoted himself to his estates and took on civil duties before re-entering the army.

On 3 August 1825 Stolberg joined the Prussian Guard Dragoon Regiment. On 17 April 1827 he became an officer. In 1835 he became adjutant to Prince Wilhelm of Prussia, a brother of King Frederick William III.

Two years later, however, he interrupted his military career. In 1837 he resigned as first lieutenant to look after his properties in Silesia.

This phase of his life distinguishes him from many other Commanding Generals of the VII Army Corps, who spent almost their entire adult life in active military service.

Stolberg was for a time district administrator (Landrat) of the Hirschberg district and thus also served in the Prussian civil administration. During the revolutionary unrest of 1848 he participated in measures to maintain public order. The town of Hirschberg awarded him honorary citizenship for this.

On 7 July 1849 Stolberg returned to the standing army as a Rittmeister with the Regiment of the Gardes du Corps.

Now his true higher military career began.

He served among other posts as adjutant of the Guard Cavalry Division and staff officer in the Guard Cuirassier Regiment. From 1856 to 1859 he commanded the Silesian Hussar Regiment No. 4 in Oels.

Stolberg’s military focus was thus clearly on the cavalry.

This is quite interesting for our series of Münster Commanding Generals: after infantrymen like Zastrow, a pronounced cavalry officer now took command of the Westphalian army corps.

The war of 1866

The German War of 1866 acquired particular significance for his further career.

Stolberg took command as a major general of the 6th Landwehr Cavalry Brigade. His task was initially on the Silesian–Galician border. This also involved fighting in the area of Oświęcim/Auschwitz.

After the war he was promoted to lieutenant general. On 18 May 1867 he took command of the 12th Division in Neisse.

Thus Stolberg by now belonged to the circle of higher Prussian troop leaders.

1870/71 – Commander of the 2nd Cavalry Division

Stolberg’s most important field posting came in the war against France.

In July 1870 he was given the 2nd Cavalry Division.

This division belonged to the 3rd Army of Crown Prince Friedrich Wilhelm of Prussia. Due to Austria’s initially uncertain position, parts of the division were however held back in Silesia. Only on 7 August 1870 was it fully assembled in the Mainz area and able to join the army.

The task of a cavalry division was by no means limited to spectacular mounted charges. Of great importance were reconnaissance, flank security, pursuit of the enemy and screening of one’s own troop movements.

Stolberg’s division took on precisely these tasks.

It covered the left flank of the 3rd Army during the advance and was with the army during the operations that led to the Battle of Sedan on 1 September 1870. However, older biographical accounts explicitly emphasize that the division attended the battle without itself intervening decisively in the fighting.

This caveat is important. Stolberg should therefore not – as is occasionally done in shortened accounts – be ascribed a "decisive role at Sedan."

From Paris to Orléans

After Sedan Stolberg’s cavalry again covered the left flank of the 3rd Army advancing on Paris.

On 7 October 1870 the division left the encirclement army in front of Paris and moved south under General von der Tann. There it took part in the fights that initially led to the capture of Orléans.

After the Battle of Coulmiers the division was subordinated to the newly formed army detachment of Grand Duke Friedrich Franz II of Mecklenburg-Schwerin.

What followed was an extremely mobile winter campaign.

According to the ADB the cavalry operated in the Orléans area and, until the armistice, remained almost continuously in contact with the enemy. Later Stolberg’s division came under the supreme command of the 2nd Army of Prince Friedrich Karl and in early 1871 took part in the pursuit of French forces toward Le Mans.

Stolberg therefore arrived in Münster as an experienced wartime division commander.

After the war the decisive step of his career occurred.

On 5 September 1871 Lieutenant General Wilhelm Count zu Stolberg-Wernigerode was appointed Commanding General of the VII Army Corps in Münster. He thus succeeded Heinrich Adolf von Zastrow.

A small clarification is useful for our headline:

Stolberg arrived in 1871 in Münster still as a lieutenant general.

Only on 22 March 1873 was he promoted to General of the Cavalry during his Münster tenure.

His term differs significantly from those of his immediate predecessors.

Falckenstein and Zastrow led the VII Army Corps in a time of major wars.

Stolberg took it over immediately after the founding of the Reich.

Thus a long period of peace began for the corps and the Münster garrison.

The task was now to evaluate the war経験 of 1870/71, restore the troops to peacetime strength and at the same time continue to develop the army of the newly founded German Empire organizationally.

For Münster this long tenure is likely to have been particularly significant. Stolberg was not only temporarily in the city for a few years. From September 1871 to April 1882 he stood at the head of the VII Army Corps for more than a decade. The appointment of his successor Karl Friedrich von Witzendorff is recorded from 15 April 1882.

Thus Stolberg became a fixed figure of military Münster in the 1870s.

His term also offers a direct connection to the commemorative culture we have just addressed.

The Mourning Germania for the fallen of Infantry Regiment No. 13 was inaugurated on 1 September 1872 – that is, during Stolberg’s first years as Commanding General in Münster.

The monument thus belonged to the phase in which, under his leadership, the troops returned from the war were again organized into a peacetime garrison and at the same time the memory of 1870/71 was institutionalized.

We can later examine whether Stolberg personally took part in the inauguration. The commemorative speech was, as already noted, delivered by his earlier predecessor in the general command, Field Marshal Herwarth von Bittenfeld.

During his Münster tenure Stolberg received high decorations.

On 22 March 1873 not only was he promoted to General of the Cavalry. In the same year he was appointed, with the award of the Grand Cross of the Red Eagle Order with Oak Leaves and Swords, as chief of the 1st Silesian Dragoon Regiment No. 4.

On 22 March 1880 he finally received the Order of the Black Eagle, the highest Prussian decoration.

In addition to his military position, Stolberg had been a member of the Prussian House of Lords since 1866.

He thus embodied in a special way the link between old Prussian nobility, large landownership, the higher officer corps and the political elite of the Empire.

On 15 April 1882 Stolberg’s service as Commanding General of the VII Army Corps ended. His successor was Lieutenant General Karl Friedrich von Witzendorff.

There is even a remarkable pictorial source for Stolberg’s farewell: the military painter Emil Hünten created in 1882 a painting in which Major General Friedrich Wilhelm von Rauch reports to the departing Commanding General Wilhelm Count zu Stolberg-Wernigerode. Stolberg is seated on a gray horse.

Stolberg retired from active service to his Silesian estate after his departure. He died at a great age on 6 March 1898 in Jannowitz.

Significance for the Münster garrison history

Wilhelm Count zu Stolberg-Wernigerode occupies a special position among the Commanding Generals of the VII Army Corps.

He was not a general whose Münster tenure was primarily defined by a war.

His significance rather lies in consolidation after the wars of unification.

When he arrived in Münster in September 1871, the troops had just returned from France. The fallen were mourned, monuments erected and the experiences of the war were evaluated. When he left the city in 1882, the VII Army Corps had long since been integrated into the new army organization of the German Empire.

Thus his more than ten-year tenure forms an important bridge from the Prussian VII Army Corps of the wars of unification to the Westphalian army corps of the German Empire.

Karl Friedrich Wilhelm von Witzendorff was born on 28 April 1824 in Scharnebeck near Lüneburg and died on 23 March 1891 in Göttingen. He came from a Hanoverian civil servant and noble family. His father Peter von Witzendorff was Hanoverian chief steward and lord of Wiebendorf, his mother Charlotte came from the family von Spörcken. Karl was the sixth of eleven children.

His military career combined three areas that do not always meet in one person among senior Prussian officers: General Staff service, practical cavalry command and intensive engagement with equestrian training.

After his schooling in Salzwedel and at the Pädagogium in Putbus, Witzendorff entered the 8th Uhlan Regiment, garrisoned in Trier, on 1 June 1841. Already in October 1842 he was promoted to second lieutenant.

His aptitude soon took him beyond ordinary regimental service. Between 1846 and 1851 he attended the General War School in Berlin with interruptions. In 1855 he joined the General Staff of the I Army Corps as a captain and subsequently worked in the Topographical Department of the Great General Staff.

Thus he obtained the combination of practical troop experience and General Staff education that was to characterize his later career.

In 1859 Witzendorff became personal adjutant to Prince Friedrich Karl of Prussia, one of the most important Prussian commanders of the wars of unification.

This position brought Witzendorff into close proximity to the higher military leadership of Prussia. It was to be particularly significant in the 1864 war.

In the Danish War Witzendorff served on Friedrich Karl’s staff in the operations in Schleswig. He was present at Missunde, at further actions and at the storming of the Düppel entrenchments on 18 April 1864.

Particularly notable is his involvement in the planning for the crossing to Als.

According to biographical tradition, the planning of this operation was largely due to Witzendorff and found the approval of Helmuth von Moltke. The successful crossing of Prussian troops to Als on the night of 28–29 June 1864 became one of the most important military successes of the campaign.

Thus Witzendorff appears in 1864 not merely as an executing staff officer, but as an officer with considerable operational talent.

Even before the end of the war he was appointed director of the Military Riding School in Schwedt on the Oder.

Reformer of cavalry training

This assignment is at least as important for evaluating Witzendorff as his wartime service.

In the 19th century the Prussian cavalry was caught between traditional riding-school training and the demands of modern field service. Witzendorff tried to reconcile both approaches.

The older Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie later explicitly credits him with mediating between the two directions and thereby creating a foundation for modern campaign riding, i.e., an equestrian training more oriented to field service.

The horse should not only be mastered in the riding school.

Officer and soldier had to handle it just as securely in the field, on long marches and under combat conditions.

This view was to shape Witzendorff’s further career profoundly.

At the outbreak of the war with Austria Witzendorff became Chief of Staff of the Cavalry Corps of the 1st Army under Prince Albrecht of Prussia.

He took part in the battles at Münchengrätz and Gitschin as well as in the decisive battle of Königgrätz on 3 July 1866. For his services he received the Pour le Mérite.

However, the campaign also gave him negative experiences.

The large cavalry masses were criticized at the time as not always being used appropriately. It was precisely these experiences that influenced Witzendorff’s later ideas on the training and employment of cavalry. The ADB emphasizes explicitly that he wanted to draw consequences from the mistakes of 1866 for a more purposeful use of the arm.

First direct connection to a Westphalian regiment

After the war Witzendorff took command of the 2nd Westphalian Hussar Regiment No. 11, which was then garrisoned in Lüneburg, on 17 September 1866.

This posting is particularly interesting for our Münster series.

Already sixteen years before he took over the VII Army Corps, Witzendorff thus commanded a regiment that belonged to the Westphalian military tradition. At the end of 1866 he was promoted to colonel.

At the end of 1869 Witzendorff was appointed Chief of Staff of the VIII Army Corps in Koblenz.

Thus at the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War he again held a key position.

The VIII Army Corps was under General August von Goeben.

Witzendorff as Goeben’s Chief of Staff took part in an unusually extensive portion of the campaign: the Battle of Spicheren, the fights around Metz, the encirclement of the fortress and later operations in northern France. These included Amiens, the Hallue, Bapaume and Saint-Quentin and the siege of Péronne.

Thus by 1871 Witzendorff had gained experience in all three wars of unification.

His services were honored with both classes of the Iron Cross; he also received the oak leaves to the Pour le Mérite.

Back at the head of cavalry training

After the conclusion of peace Witzendorff returned to a field that particularly suited him.

On 24 June 1871 he became head of the Military Riding Institute, now located in Hanover; in August he was promoted to major general.

Under his leadership the institution was divided into an officer riding school and a cavalry non-commissioned officer school. At the same time Witzendorff served on a commission that, based on the experiences of the war of 1870/71, developed new regulations for the training and employment of the cavalry.

In 1872 he attended troop exercises in Salisbury at the invitation of the British government. In 1874 he led large cavalry maneuvers near Müncheberg. Contemporary recognition sees in these activities a substantial contribution by Witzendorff to the modernization of the Prussian-German cavalry.

In 1876 Witzendorff first took over and subsequently commanded the cavalry division of the XV Army Corps. At the same time he was promoted to lieutenant general.

On 17 April 1879 he became commander of the 14th Division in Düsseldorf.

Thus he was already operating within the sphere of the VII Army Corps.

Three years later came the move to Münster.

On 15 April 1882 Lieutenant General von Witzendorff was initially charged with the leadership of the VII Army Corps. He succeeded Wilhelm Count zu Stolberg-Wernigerode, whose more than ten-year tenure had ended the day before.

Here, as with some of his predecessors, a precise distinction is worthwhile:

From 15 April to 22 November 1882 Witzendorff was entrusted with the leadership of the corps.

Only on 23 November 1882 was he formally appointed Commanding General of the VII Army Corps.

Witzendorff arrived in Münster as a lieutenant general in 1882.

On 20 September 1884 he was promoted to General of the Cavalry.

Witzendorff’s tenure fell entirely within the peaceful period of the Empire. Unlike Falckenstein or Zastrow, he did not have to lead the VII Army Corps into war.

This did not mean inactivity.

The army of the 1880s was characterized by intensive training, annual maneuvers and the evaluation of the experiences of 1870/71. For an officer like Witzendorff, whose particular interest had for decades been training, fieldwork and cavalry service, practical combat training likely held high importance.

A contemporary biographical appraisal paints a remarkably differentiated picture of Witzendorff. Bernhard von Poten described him in 1898 as a "striking figure, of rich military talent and much knowledge, clear and decisive, a soft core in a hard shell."

This characterization fits his career: Witzendorff was not a mere ceremonial general, but an officer who intensely engaged with the training, tactics and practical employment of his arm.

His last years in Münster were increasingly overshadowed by health problems. As early as 1886 Witzendorff had to take an eight-week leave.

In January 1887 he received the Grand Cross of the Red Eagle Order with Oak Leaves and Swords on the ring.

After the accession of Kaiser Wilhelm II in the summer of 1888 his health further deteriorated. The cause was a kidney disease initially not recognized.

Witzendorff eventually requested his retirement.

On 7 August 1888 he was placed on the retired list with pension and at the same time à la suite of the 2nd Westphalian Hussar Regiment No. 11 – that is, the regiment he had already commanded after the war of 1866.

Thus after more than six years his service in Münster ended.

His successor as Commanding General of the VII Army Corps was General of the Cavalry Emil von Albedyll.

Karl von Witzendorff died on 23 March 1891 in Göttingen after an operation.

Witzendorff is one of the Commanding Generals of the VII Army Corps who are of particular professional interest. His career exemplarily connects the development of the Prussian army in the second half of the 19th century:

General Staff training – war experience 1864 – cavalry reform – Königgrätz 1866 – regimental command – General Staff leadership 1870/71 – reform of cavalry training – divisional command – finally command of an army corps.

Emil Heinrich Ludwig von Albedyll was born on 1 April 1824 in the Neumark and died on 13 June 1897 in Potsdam. He came from an old officer family. His father August Friedrich Ludwig von Albedyll was a former Prussian lieutenant and manor owner; his mother Ernestine Ulrike came from the old noble family von Wedel. His younger brother Georg also pursued a significant military career and later became a General of the Cavalry.

On 10 April 1841, just seventeen years old, Albedyll joined the 2nd Cuirassier Regiment of the Prussian Army. Two years later he became a second lieutenant.

He gained his first combat experience already during the Schleswig-Holstein uprising. In the 1848 campaign against Denmark he served as an orderly officer and took part in the battles at Schleswig, Düppel and before Fredericia.

Unlike Witzendorff, little initially indicated that Albedyll would one day belong to the most influential men of the Prussian army. His promotions proceeded comparatively slowly: only in 1854 was he promoted to first lieutenant and in 1858 to Rittmeister.

The decisive turning point did not occur on the parade ground but in Berlin.

In 1862 Albedyll was assigned to the department for personal affairs of the War Ministry.

This office was of great importance. Personnel matters of the Prussian officer corps were handled here – appointments, transfers, promotions and other decisions that could determine an officer’s career.

The head of the department was initially General Edwin von Manteuffel.

Albedyll apparently proved extraordinarily suitable for this work. Contemporary and later biographical accounts emphasize his insight into human character, his exceptional memory and his intimate knowledge of the officer corps.

These qualities were to determine his further career.

Back again in the Danish War

Albedyll was not completely removed from field service, however.

During the 1864 war he was in Manteuffel’s retinue and took part, among other things, in the action at Missunde.

Thus Albedyll, like several of his predecessors in the Münster general command, had personal experience of the Danish War.

His real significance, however, now lay unmistakably close to the highest military leadership.

In the war against Austria in 1866 Albedyll belonged to the Great Headquarters.

On 29 October 1866 he was promoted to lieutenant colonel and at the same time became aide-de-camp to King William I. He was also given command of the Life Guards.

Thus Albedyll belonged to the immediate military circle of the king.

In the years after 1866 he was entrusted with a task whose importance can hardly be overstated: he played a major role in the personnel reorganization of those troop units that had to be newly formed or integrated into the Prussian army due to the Prussian annexations and territorial changes.

This concerned in particular Schleswig-Holstein, Hanover and Hesse-Nassau.

Here Albedyll’s ability already became apparent – the ability that would later become his main life’s work: the integration of different military traditions into a common army organization.

1870 – personnel decisions for the mobilized army

At the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War Albedyll was given an extraordinarily responsible task.

During mobilization the leadership positions of the field army had to be filled within the shortest possible time.

According to the Neue Deutsche Biographie, Albedyll assembled the staffing of the army’s leader posts in a single night.

This is a remarkable detail. While other later Münster Commanding Generals proved their abilities in 1870 on the battlefields of Spicheren, Gravelotte or Sedan, Albedyll sat in the Great Headquarters and helped decide which officers would lead those troops in the first place.

He also experienced the 1870/71 war in the royal headquarters.

Albedyll was furthermore involved in preparations for one of the war’s most symbolic events.

He participated in the arrangements for the celebrations of William I’s proclamation as Emperor in Versailles on 18 January 1871.

Thus Albedyll appears at a point that connects directly to our previous section on Münster.

While the news of the proclamation of the Empire was received rather reservedly in Münster – as the city chronicle shows – the future Commanding General of the VII Army Corps was among the men involved in preparing this event in the royal headquarters.

After the war the most important phase of his professional life began.

In 1871 Albedyll became head of the department responsible for personnel matters. In 1872 he took over the leadership of the Military Cabinet and retained this position until 1888.

The Military Cabinet was a key office in the Prussian-German military constitution.

Its head had direct access to the Kaiser and dealt in particular with personnel matters of the officer corps.

Promotions, appointments and transfers of senior officers were thus determined to a large extent through Albedyll’s desk.

His influence on the Prussian-German officer corps was correspondingly great.

Later biographical tradition summed up his position with a catchphrase: “As God wills and as Albedyll.”

The phrase was certainly exaggerated. But it conveys an impression of how his contemporaries perceived his influence.

Albedyll enjoyed the special trust of William I for many years.

In 1873 he was promoted to major general and made General à la suite of the Emperor. On 1 April 1876 William appointed him General Adjutant; a few months later Albedyll was promoted to lieutenant general.

On 18 September 1886 he was finally promoted to General of the Cavalry.

Thus he had already reached his highest regular rank before coming to Münster.

The year 1883 was institutionally particularly significant.

Until then there had been close organizational links between the Military Cabinet and the War Ministry. When General Paul Bronsart von Schellendorff became War Minister, a rank problem arose: Albedyll was senior in service and could not easily be subordinated to him.

The Military Cabinet was therefore detached from its previous attachment to the War Ministry and placed directly under the Kaiser.

The authority thereby gained considerable independence.

Albedyll now headed an institution that reported directly to the supreme warlord.

His significance was therefore not only personal but also institutional.

One of his most important achievements was the further unification of the different German military contingents after 1871.

The new German Reich did not simply possess a completely uniform army. Bavaria, Saxony and Württemberg retained substantial military privileges; other contingents had to be integrated more closely into the Prussian-dominated army.

Albedyll was involved in the integration and closer alignment of the various officer corps. The Neue Deutsche Biographie explicitly emphasizes his role in the merger or rapprochement of the contingents.

Thus the future Münster Commanding General played a major part in the personnel consolidation of the German Empire’s army.

The year 1888 brought a profound change for Albedyll.

On 9 March Emperor William I died, to whom he had been closely attached for decades.

Under his son Frederick III Albedyll initially remained Chief of the Military Cabinet and General Adjutant. But Frederick III died already on 15 June.

With the accession of the young Wilhelm II the circumstances changed.

Albedyll was now 64 years old and belonged to the old leadership layer from William I’s time. He also wished, as later biography notes, to conclude his career once more with a large troop command.

On 7 August 1888 Wilhelm II appointed him Commanding General of the VII Army Corps in Münster.

He thus succeeded Karl von Witzendorff. Albedyll differed from many of his predecessors. Although he was a cavalry officer and had wartime experience, he had for decades hardly commanded large troop formations. His career had been mainly at court and in military personnel administration. Even the ADB points out that – apart from a brief command of the Halberstadt Cuirassier Regiment in 1869 – he had for a long time not been employed in actual troop service.

Assuming command of an entire army corps was therefore a remarkable return to practical troop service for the 64-year-old general.

From 7 August 1888 to 2 June 1893 Albedyll stood at the head of the VII Army Corps.

His Münster tenure fell into the early years of Wilhelm II’s reign.

This makes one event particularly interesting.

During the autumn maneuvers of 1889 Albedyll personally presented his VII Army Corps to Kaiser Wilhelm II. The near-contemporary ADB mentions this explicitly.

For our garrison history this is an especially interesting starting point. Here we should later examine where these maneuvers took place, whether Wilhelm II visited Münster and which units of the VII Army Corps were involved.

A second event of his Münster years deserves special attention.

On 10 April 1891 Albedyll celebrated his 50th anniversary of service.

On that day he received the Order of the Black Eagle, the highest Prussian decoration.

Since Albedyll was Commanding General in Münster at that time, it is likely that the jubilee was also celebrated within the VII Army Corps.

After almost five years commanding the corps Albedyll requested his retirement in 1893.

On 2 June 1893 he handed over the VII Army Corps to Lieutenant General Robert von Goetze.

The following day he officially entered retirement. He nevertheless remained General Adjutant to Kaiser Wilhelm II and remained à la suite of his cuirassier regiment.

He moved to Potsdam, where he spent his retirement.

On 13 June 1897 Emil von Albedyll died at the age of 73. He was buried in the Bornstedt Cemetery near Potsdam.

Older biographical appreciations highlight qualities that explain why Albedyll was so successful as Chief of the Military Cabinet.

Mentioned are great insight into people and great industry, a pronounced sense of justice, impartiality, friendly manners and above all an extraordinary knowledge of the officer corps based on his remarkable memory. He was thus a very different type from the operational General Staff and cavalry specialist Witzendorff. Witzendorff’s strength lay in training, tactics and troop command. Albedyll’s special talent lay in people, personnel decisions and military organization.

He did not come to Münster as an unknown general. Rather, for almost two decades previously he had sat in a position from which the careers of numerous officers of the Prussian-German army had been influenced.

Many a general and regimental commander of the VII Army Corps who stood opposite Albedyll in Münster in 1888 probably already knew him personally from his time in the Military Cabinet or at least from their personnel files.

His tenure also marks the transition to a new epoch.

With 1888 the reign of Wilhelm II began. The generation of the wars of unification still stood at the head of the army, but a younger officer generation was increasingly coming forward.

Albedyll himself embodied like few others the military leadership layer of the old imperial era of Wilhelm I.

That precisely he concluded his career in Münster from 1888 to 1893 makes him a particularly remarkable personality for the garrison history of the city.

Max Robert von Goetze, usually simply called Robert von Goetze, was born on 30 December 1829 in Nakel on the Netze in the then Province of Posen and died on 17 November 1904 in Hanover. His father Adolf von Goetze also rose to the rank of Prussian major general; his mother Emilie was born a Netzer. Robert thus grew up in a distinctly military environment.

A small clarification is important for our series: when Goetze took command of the VII Army Corps on 3 June 1893, he was still a lieutenant general. He was not promoted to General of the Infantry until 27 January 1894. The appropriate heading would therefore be:

Goetze first attended the Bürgerschule in Paderborn. Thus, a connection to Westphalia already existed in his youth, long before he later returned to Münster as Commanding General.

He was then trained militarily at the cadet institutions in Bensberg and Berlin.

On 1 April 1848 he entered the 40th Infantry Regiment in Mainz as a characterized ensign with portepee. On 15 December of the same year he received the patent for his rank.

Goetze’s entry into the army therefore fell precisely in the revolutionary year 1848. His further career did not initially proceed extraordinarily quickly. He was not made captain until mid-September 1861 and a few weeks later became a company commander.

This is quite characteristic for his biography: Goetze did not make a spectacular meteoric rise. His advancement proceeded step by step through practical troop service.

In the German War of 1866 Goetze led his regiment’s replacement battalion.

This distinguishes his war experience from that of some predecessors in the Münster General Command. While, for example, Zastrow led a division on the Bohemian battlefields or Witzendorff served on the staff of a cavalry corps, Goetze in 1866 was employed in the replacement service.

After the peace treaty he was transferred on 30 October 1866 to the 2nd Nassau Infantry Regiment No. 88.

This transfer is historically interesting. The regiment belonged to the formations that had been incorporated into the Prussian army after the annexation of the Duchy of Nassau. Goetze thus belonged to that generation of Prussian officers who after 1866 were directly involved in the integration of the newly added troop units.

Goetze gained his true war experience four years later.

In the war against France he commanded a company of the 2nd Nassau Infantry Regiment No. 88.

With this unit he took part in several of the decisive operations of the war. Mentioned in particular are Weißenburg, Wörth and Sedan and later the siege of Paris.

Thus Goetze experienced the campaign not from a headquarters but as a company commander directly with the fighting infantry.

This is quite significant for his later role as Commanding General. He knew from personal experience what combat service meant for the individual infantryman.

For his services he received both classes of the Iron Cross.

After the war Goetze consistently continued his career in troop service.

He initially took over a battalion of Infantry Regiment No. 116 in Gießen and was promoted to major. Later he commanded the Rhenish Jaeger Battalion No. 8 in Zabern.

On 1 April 1881 he was tasked with leading the newly formed Infantry Regiment No. 130 in Trier. On 14 May he was formally appointed regimental commander; on 16 September 1881 he became a colonel.

This regiment would later gain particular significance for him again. Goetze led it until 1886.

On 4 December 1886 he was promoted to major general and appointed commander of the 60th Infantry Brigade in Metz.

With that, Goetze now finally belonged to the higher generality.

On 17 June 1889 he was appointed commander of the 33rd Division in Strasbourg with promotion to lieutenant general. Already on 13 November 1890 he moved to the head of the 21st Division in Frankfurt am Main.

His higher commands were thus several years located in the western imperial territories that were particularly important after 1871.

In 1891 he received the Order of the Crown, 1st Class.

On 3 June 1893 Emperor Wilhelm II appointed Lieutenant General von Goetze Commanding General of the VII Army Corps in Münster.

He succeeded Emil von Albedyll.

Only a few months later, on 27 January 1894, the birthday of Emperor Wilhelm II, he was promoted to General of the Infantry.

Thus the former company commander of 1870, after more than 45 years of service, had reached one of the highest military leadership positions in the Prussian army.

Goetze’s tenure in Münster falls into a period interesting for garrison history.

The German army was further expanded in the 1890s. New formations were created, garrisons were expanded, and the training of large troop bodies gained increasing importance.

Immediately before Goetze’s assumption of office, in 1892 the Senne training area near Paderborn had been acquired. It served in particular for realistic shooting exercises and the drilling of larger formations of the VII Army Corps.

Thus Goetze had the task of incorporating this new training area into the corps’ training during its first years of use.

Until then, larger exercises of the VII Army Corps had necessarily had to take place at changing locations. With the Senne a permanent military training area was now created, whose importance would steadily grow in the following decades.

For Goetze’s term in office, therefore, a separate study of the corps exercises in the Senne between 1893 and 1898 would later be useful.

Under Goetze, Münster remained not only the seat of the General Command.

Here was also the command of the 13th Division, while the 14th Division was based in Düsseldorf. In addition, infantry, cavalry, artillery, jaeger, pioneer and train formations belonging to the corps were stationed at numerous Westphalian and Rhenish garrison locations.

The Commanding General was therefore by no means merely the “garrison commander of Münster.”

From Münster Goetze led and inspected a large military formation whose troops were spread over a considerable part of Westphalia and adjacent areas.

Inspection tours and maneuvers were therefore among his most important tasks.

A special highlight of his Münster years was the year 1898.

On 1 April 1898 Goetze could look back on exactly 50 years of military service.

Emperor Wilhelm II honored the now 68-year-old general by appointing him chief of Infantry Regiment No. 130 – the very regiment that Goetze had commanded from 1881 to 1886.

The appointment as regimental chief was a high personal distinction.

Already in January 1897 Goetze had received the Grand Cross of the Red Eagle Order.

Only a few days after his 50th anniversary of service his active career ended.

On 4 April 1898 Goetze was placed on the retired list at his own request with a pension. He retained his position as chief of Infantry Regiment No. 130.

Thus his nearly five-year tenure in Münster came to an end.

The list of Commanding Generals shows his period from 3 June 1893 to 4 April 1898.

His successor was Lieutenant General Viktor von Mikusch-Buchberg, who took command of the VII Army Corps on 5 April 1898.

Robert von Goetze then lived for several more years in retirement.

He died on 17 November 1904 in Hanover at the age of 74.

Goetze had been married to Antonie von Lobenthal since 26 November 1859. Several children were born of the marriage. His wife died as early as 1879, so that Goetze had been a widower for many years when he was appointed to Münster.

His family also remained connected to the Prussian military. Several of his sons pursued officer careers; the military tradition thus continued into the next generation.

Goetze embodies a different type of Commanding General than Albedyll.

Albedyll had worked for decades in the immediate vicinity of the emperor and in the military cabinet.

Goetze, by contrast, was above all a troop officer.

His career led from company commander via battalion and regiment to brigade, division and finally to army corps. Even in the war of 1870/71 he had still stood directly at the head of an infantry company.

His Münster tenure also falls into a phase in which the empire’s army increasingly prepared for a possible future large war. The experiences of 1870/71 were by then more than twenty years in the past. A new generation of soldiers had to be trained under as realistic conditions as possible.

The Senne training area, established shortly before Goetze’s assumption of office, thus gained growing importance for the VII Army Corps.

Kajetan Viktor Hugo Eduard Melzer, from 1869 von Mikusch-Buchberg, was born on 18 October 1842 in Rawitsch. He died on 15 August 1911. His life path differs significantly from that of his predecessor Goetze. While Goetze rose mainly as a long-serving troop officer, Mikusch-Buchberg was more connected to the general staff school of the Prussian army. However, he combined general staff service and troop leadership in a remarkable way.

Viktor was initially born under the family name Melzer. His father was the retired Prussian major Eduard Melzer, his mother Emilie, née von Mellenthin.

After his parents’ divorce his mother married Wilhelm Franz Mikusch von Buchberg in 1857.

On 27 February 1869 Viktor and his brothers were ennobled by King Wilhelm I under the name “von Mikusch-Buchberg” and raised to the hereditary Prussian nobility.

For a detailed biography one should therefore not get the impression that Mikusch-Buchberg had been born into an old Prussian officer family under this name. The ennoblement took place only during his own military career.

Mikusch-Buchberg received his military education at the cadet houses Wahlstatt and Berlin.

On 6 March 1860 he was transferred as a second lieutenant to the Westphalian Jaeger Battalion No. 7.

Here a first connection to Westphalia already appears.

He thus did not begin his officer career only decades later in the area of the VII Army Corps, but as a young lieutenant already belonged to a Westphalian unit.

With the Westphalian Jaeger Battalion No. 7 Mikusch-Buchberg took part in the war against Denmark in 1864.

Thus he too belonged to that generation of officers whose military careers were shaped by the three wars of unification.

For the young officer this campaign was his first direct wartime experience. His further career, however, soon turned more toward general staff service.

Mikusch-Buchberg also took part in the German War of 1866.

It was precisely in these years that he developed from an ordinary troop officer into one increasingly suited for general staff service.

Thus he belonged to that generation which, under the influence of the campaigns of 1864 and 1866, grew into the general staff system shaped by Moltke.

This is where his biography becomes particularly interesting for our Münster garrison history.

At the outbreak of the war against France Mikusch-Buchberg was assigned as a general staff officer to the General Command of the VII Army Corps for the duration of the mobile service.

That was precisely the corps whose Commanding General he would become almost three decades later.

The VII Army Corps in 1870 was under General von Zastrow.

In his general staff role Mikusch-Buchberg took part in the battles at Spichern, Colombey and Gravelotte as well as in the sieges of Metz and Diedenhofen/Thionville. For his services he received the Iron Cross, 2nd Class.

On 26 February 1871 he was promoted to captain and company commander, but remained in his appointment as a general staff officer.

Thus his connection to the VII Army Corps is unusually close:

1870/71 young general staff officer of the corps – 1898 Commanding General of the same corps.

This bracket should definitely be emphasized in our garrison history.

In May 1871 Mikusch-Buchberg was attached to the General Staff. On 3 October 1871 he was transferred to the Army General Staff, initially remaining with the General Staff of the VII Army Corps.

Thus his relation to Münster or to the Westphalian corps area probably continued even after the campaign.

In 1874 he joined the General Staff of the 17th Division in Schwerin.

Later he served in the General Staff of the X Army Corps in Hanover. In between he again gained practical troop experience, among others with the Hanoverian Fusilier Regiment No. 73.

These changes were quite characteristic for general staff officers: a senior staff officer should not work exclusively at the desk, but repeatedly acquire practical command experience with the troops.

On 30 April 1885 Mikusch-Buchberg was transferred to Karlsruhe and appointed Chief of the General Staff of the XIV Army Corps.

Thus he reached one of the important general staff positions below the Great General Staff.

During this appointment he was promoted to colonel on 21 July 1888.

His career was now clearly aimed at higher command posts.

Commander of the Kaiser Franz Garde-Grenadier Regiment No. 2

Despite his pronounced general staff career, Mikusch-Buchberg subsequently received a significant troop command.

From 1 April 1889 to 19 September 1890 he led the renowned Kaiser Franz Garde-Grenadier Regiment No. 2.

Thus he now also had practical experience as regimental commander of one of the most respected infantry regiments of the Prussian army.

After the regimental command Mikusch-Buchberg returned to the General Staff.

He became Chief of the General Staff of the XI Army Corps in Kassel and was promoted to major general on 18 November 1890.

His career thus shows a remarkable pattern:

This combination was regarded as an important prerequisite for higher command positions.

On 22 December 1891 Mikusch-Buchberg was assigned to Württemberg.

There he took over the 54th Infantry Brigade (4th Royal Württemberg) stationed in Ulm and commanded it until 16 November 1892.

This appointment is also interesting. A Prussian general was thus employed in one of the other contingents that within the Imperial Army still retained a distinct military identity. Mikusch-Buchberg thus gained practical experience of cooperation within the federal army structure of the empire.

At the end of 1892 he returned to Berlin and became Quartermaster General in the Great General Staff.

At the same time, from December 1892 he was a member of the study commission of the War Academy. In mid-March 1894 he was promoted to lieutenant general.

Mikusch-Buchberg had thus reached a position that directly connected him with the training of the military leadership cadre and the work of the Great General Staff.

He was therefore not only a user of the Prussian general staff system – he now took part himself in its further development and in the training of future general staff officers.

On 18 April 1895 Mikusch-Buchberg took over the 8th Division.

Thus he finally returned to major troop leadership. Records confirm his command of the division from 18 April 1895 to 4 April 1898.

In January 1898 he received the Order of the Crown, 1st Class.

A few months later followed the highlight of his military career.

On 5 April 1898 Lieutenant General von Mikusch-Buchberg was appointed Commanding General of the VII Army Corps in Münster.

He succeeded Robert von Goetze, whose term had ended on 4 April.

For our series this day must therefore be recorded clearly:

5 April 1898 – assumption of command of the VII Army Corps. Not 1897.

On 10 September 1898 Mikusch-Buchberg was promoted to General of the Infantry.

His appointment had a remarkable biographical dimension. As a young officer Mikusch-Buchberg had served in 1870/71 on the general staff of the VII Army Corps. At that time Heinrich von Zastrow had been his Commanding General. Now, almost three decades later, Mikusch-Buchberg himself sat at the head of this corps. From the young general staff officer of the 1870 campaign he had become the Commanding General in Münster.

Ernst Freiherr von Bülow is a special case: his time at the head of the VII Army Corps was extraordinarily short. He only arrived in Münster at the beginning of 1900 and died already in May 1901. At the same time he was the first Commanding General in our series who had begun his military career not in the Prussian but in the Hanoverian army.

Ernst Friedrich Wilhelm Freiherr von Bülow was born on 1 May 1842 in Stade and died on 9 May 1901 in Bad Ems. His father, also Ernst Friedrich Wilhelm Freiherr von Bülow, was a Hanoverian administrative official and finally Landdrost of the Principality of Calenberg. His mother Ernestine came from the von Frese family. Bülow belonged to the widespread Lower Saxon noble family von Bülow.

For our series the precise official appointment is important: on 27 January 1900 Bülow was initially only entrusted with the leadership of the VII Army Corps. His formal appointment as Commanding General did not take place until 22 July 1900. He remained in office until his death on 9 May 1901.

Bülow first attended the gymnasium in his hometown Stade and then the cadet corps of the Kingdom of Hanover.

On 21 September 1859 he was transferred as a second lieutenant to the Guard Regiment of the Hanoverian army. From October 1864 he attended the military academy in Hanover with interruptions.

This distinguishes him from almost all the Commanding Generals treated so far.

Bülow was initially not a Prussian officer.

He served an independent German state whose army in 1866 would still fight against Prussia.

Thus the German War had a completely different significance for Bülow than for Goetze, Mikusch-Buchberg or Witzendorff. Bülow stood on the Hanoverian side.

The Hanoverian army fell into an extremely difficult strategic situation after the outbreak of the war. After the engagement or battle of Langensalza on 27 June 1866, in which the Hanoverians achieved a tactical success, their operational situation was hopeless. On 29 June the army capitulated. The Kingdom of Hanover was subsequently annexed by Prussia.

For officers like Bülow this posed a fundamental question: should they end their military careers or enter the army of the former opponent?

Bülow decided in favor of Prussia.

From Hanoverian to Prussian officer

After the dissolution of the Hanoverian army Bülow was absorbed into the Prussian army.

This process is of considerable significance for the history of the Prussian-German army. After 1866 numerous officers from Hanover, Hesse-Kassel, Nassau and other annexed territories had to be integrated into the Prussian military organization.

Bülow is among those former Hanoverian officers for whom this integration not only succeeded but who later rose into the highest generality.

His biography thus almost embodies the development from the German states before 1866 to the Imperial Army after 1871. With the Hanoverian army Bülow now as a Prussian officer entered the war against France.

Thus he stood in the field together with officers and soldiers whose army he had fought against in 1866.

This experience was by no means unusual. Especially in the provinces newly integrated after 1866 – Hanover, Hesse-Nassau and Schleswig-Holstein – former members of the earlier armies became part of the Prussian forces.

This was of great importance for the military integration of the significantly enlarged Prussia after 1866.

Bülow’s further career shows that his Hanoverian origin ultimately did not stand in the way of his career in the Prussian army.

Rise in the Prussian army

After the war of 1870/71 Bülow continued his career in the Prussian infantry.

He went through the sequence of troop and command appointments typical for a future general. Eventually he joined the 2nd Foot Guard Regiment, one of the most respected units of the Prussian army.

His later appointments in the Guard Corps are particularly notable. A former Hanoverian officer had thus been fully integrated into the innermost circle of Prussian military tradition.

His career finally led him to higher command positions.

On 17 June 1893 Bülow was promoted to major general and appointed brigade commander. At the same time he was entrusted with the duties of the Potsdam commandant’s office.

Potsdam was not just any garrison.

The city was, alongside Berlin, the true center of the Prussian guard troops and closely associated with the court. A leadership position there therefore brought Bülow into the immediate proximity of the empire’s military elite.

On 27 January 1897 Bülow was initially assigned as deputy commander of the 29th Division in Freiburg im Breisgau.

On 22 March 1897 he was promoted to lieutenant general. From 17 April to 31 August 1897 he commanded the 29th Division regularly.

Subsequently he received an even more prestigious appointment:

Bülow became commander of the 1st Guard Division.

Thus he stood at the head of one of the most important large formations of the Prussian army. The division belonged to the Guard Corps and comprised particularly traditional regiments.

That a man who had begun his career in 1859 as a Hanoverian lieutenant now commanded Prussia’s 1st Guard Division demonstrates his professional rise in a particularly striking way.

After Viktor von Mikusch-Buchberg’s departure the leadership of the VII Army Corps initially remained vacant for a short time.

On 27 January 1900 Bülow was transferred to Münster and entrusted with the leadership of the VII Army Corps.

The date is remarkable: 27 January was the birthday of Emperor Wilhelm II and traditionally a day of numerous military appointments and promotions. Bülow was then 57 years old.

After almost six months of provisional command his regular appointment as Commanding General followed on 22 July 1900.

Bülow took command of a large troop formation distributed over Westphalia and adjacent areas. The peacetime organization of 1900 lists among others the 13th Division in Münster and the 14th Division in Düsseldorf. Added to these were jaeger, foot artillery, pioneers, cavalry and train. The Westphalian Train Battalion No. 7 was also stationed in Münster.

Thus Münster was not merely the seat of the General Command but remained an important military location.

Bülow’s task mainly consisted in supervising training, inspecting the formations and preparing and conducting larger exercises and maneuvers.

However, a detailed account of his activities in Münster faces a problem: Bülow remained in the city for only a little more than a year and was only about ten months officially Commanding General. Therefore he could not shape the VII Army Corps in a comparable way to Stolberg-Wernigerode, Witzendorff or Albedyll. Nevertheless, his tenure falls into a particularly interesting period.

In the summer of 1900 the so-called Boxer Uprising began in China, whereupon the German Reich provided troops for the East Asian expedition corps. The Prussian army also had to release officers and men for this and organize replacements.

On the occasion of the order festival in January 1901 Bülow received the Red Eagle Order, 1st Class with Oak Leaves. The Military Weekly published the corresponding announcement.

At that time no one could foresee that Bülow would die only a few months later. In spring 1901 Bülow stayed in Bad Ems. There he died on 9 May 1901, only a few days after his 59th birthday. His death apparently came unexpectedly.

This created an unusual situation for the VII Army Corps: the serving Commanding General died while in office. Emperor Wilhelm II reacted immediately.

On 11 May 1901 the Emperor ordered that all officers of the VII Army Corps should wear mourning for three days. This decree was published in the Military Weekly. It shows that Bülow’s death was not treated merely as the private passing of a general but was to be made visible throughout the corps. One can imagine how this was manifested in Münster’s military appearance – but we should only describe details of mourning ceremonies, flagging or involvement of Münster troops when we have confirmed them in the local press.

A few days after Bülow’s death the succession was arranged.

On 18 May 1901 Moritz Freiherr von Bissing took over the VII Army Corps. He would remain in Münster significantly longer and lead it until December 1907. With Bissing then begins a phase that clearly leads into the military development of the early 20th century.

Bülow had married Hedwig von Frese at Burg Hinta on 5 May 1869. Several children were born of the marriage. Family life was overshadowed by heavy losses: two sons, Cuno and Leopold, died in childhood already in 1879; another son, Ernst, died in his birth year 1872. Three daughters reached adulthood. His widow Hedwig survived him until 1918.

Ernst von Bülow is not remarkable among the Münster Commanding Generals because of the length of his tenure. His significance lies rather in his biography. In 1859 he began as an officer of the Kingdom of Hanover. In 1866 his army faced Prussia. After the annexation of Hanover he entered Prussian service. Finally, his career led him through the Guard Corps to the head of the VII Army Corps in Münster. In this way Bülow almost epitomizes the military integration of Germany in the second half of the 19th century.

General of the Cavalry Baron Moritz Ferdinand v. Bissing was Commanding General of the VII Army Corps (Münster) from 18 May 1901 to 11 December 1907.

Moritz Ferdinand Freiherr von Bissing was born on 30 January 1844 in Ober Bellmannsdorf. His father Moritz von Bissing (1802–1860) was an estate owner; his mother Dorothea (1800–1847) was born Freiin von Gall.

In 1858 v. Bissing was elevated to the Prussian baronial rank.

He became a second lieutenant in 1865 and served from 1862 as a Rittmeister in the King’s Hussar Regiment (1st Rhine) No. 7 in Bonn. From 1883 v. Bissing belonged to the General Staff.

As personal adjutant to Prince Wilhelm he entered into closer relations with the future German Emperor (Wilhelm II). In 1888/89 he also served as his wing adjutant.

From 20 May 1893 (until 31 August 1894) v. Bissing commanded the 4th Guard Cavalry Brigade. As a major general he commanded the 29th Division (from 1 September 1897). On 27 January 1902 v. Bissing rose to General of the Cavalry. He had already been appointed Commanding General in Münster on 18 May 1901.

Retired since 1898, v. Bissing was reactivated at the outbreak of the First World War and appointed as Colonel General to Commanding General of the Deputy General Command of the VII Army Corps. On 24 November 1914 v. Bissing was appointed Governor-General for the German General Government of Belgium. He thus effectively assumed the role of head of government of occupied Belgium and exercised it with a heavy hand, for example confirming various death sentences (e.g., that of the British nurse Edith Cavell) and organizing forced labor and the partial deportation of a large number of Belgians to Germany.

On 18 April 1917 v. Bissing died in Vilvoorde (Belgium).

Now. With Friedrich von Bernhardi we come to one of the best-known – and because of his later military-political writings also controversially discussed – Commanding Generals of the VII Army Corps. For our chronology a small clarification is initially important: he took over command of the corps in December 1907, but was not regularly appointed Commanding General until 27 January 1908, simultaneously with his promotion to General of the Cavalry.

Friedrich Adam Julius von Bernhardi was born on 22 November 1849 in Saint Petersburg. His family returned to Germany in 1851; Bernhardi then grew up in Kunnersdorf in Silesia. His father was the historian and diplomat Theodor von Bernhardi; his mother Charlotte was a daughter of the Russian admiral Adam Johann von Krusenstern.

Bernhardi belongs to a younger generation than the generals treated so far. He did not experience the war of 1866 as an officer. His military formation rather took place in the war of 1870/71 and subsequently in the army of the newly founded empire.

In 1869 Bernhardi entered active service as an officer in the 2nd Hessian Hussar Regiment No. 14 in Kassel. Thus began a career that was from the start closely connected with the cavalry.

Already a year later the young lieutenant had to prove himself in war.

As a second lieutenant Bernhardi marched with his regiment against France. For his services he received the Iron Cross, 2nd Class. A frequently highlighted episode of his biography is his participation in the German entry into Paris: Bernhardi was among the horsemen at the head of the march through the Arc de Triomphe.

Thus he belonged to that generation of officers whose self-image was decisively shaped by the victory of 1870/71 and the founding of the Reich.

This would be of considerable importance for his later mindset.

After some years in troop service Bernhardi attended the War Academy in Berlin from 1875 to 1878. He then served in the Topographical Department of the Great General Staff. From 1882 to 1886 he was assigned to extensive topographical work in Greece.

This activity was by no means militarily marginal. Good maps were an essential prerequisite for modern operational planning. Bernhardi thus gained particular experience in terrain surveying, cartography and military geography.

After his return he became First General Staff Officer of the 15th Division.

In 1888 Bernhardi became a company commander in the Westphalian Uhlan Regiment No. 5 in Düsseldorf. Thus he had been active in the area of the VII Army Corps almost twenty years before his appointment to Münster.

As with several of his predecessors, Münster was therefore not a completely unfamiliar military area to him in 1907.

From 21 February 1891 to 13 May 1894 Bernhardi was German military attaché in Bern.

Such a post required different skills than ordinary troop service. The military attaché observed the military development of the host country, maintained contacts with its officer corps and reported back to Berlin.

Bernhardi thus gained experience in international military relations and military-political observation.

After his return he again received a practical troop command. In 1894 Bernhardi became commander of the traditional 1st Baden Leib-Dragoon Regiment No. 20.

In 1897 he was promoted to colonel. In September of the same year he was appointed Chief of the General Staff of the XVI Army Corps in Metz.

There he worked under one of the best-known German generals of his time, Gottlieb Graf von Haeseler.

A particularly important task for Bernhardi followed in 1898.

He became head of the Historical War Department of the Great General Staff and was also employed as a teacher at the War Academy.

Bernhardi devoted himself intensively to the campaigns of Frederick the Great, to Clausewitz and to the experiences of the wars of 1866 and 1870/71. Already at that time he increasingly emerged as a military writer. Among his publications in 1899 was the pamphlet “Our Cavalry in the Next War.”

This work shows that Bernhardi did not only look back historically. He was above all interested in what conclusions should be drawn from the past for a future war.

In 1900 Bernhardi became major general.

On 18 April 1901 he took over the 31st Cavalry Brigade in Strasbourg. Three years later, on 24 April 1904, he was promoted to lieutenant general and appointed commander of the 7th Division in Magdeburg.

It is noteworthy that the cavalryman Bernhardi thus commanded a mixed large formation for several years. This was an important prerequisite for the later assumption of an army corps.

After Moritz Freiherr von Bissing’s departure Bernhardi was entrusted with the command of the VII Army Corps in Münster in December 1907. A detailed career overview gives the date 14 December 1907 for this.

On 27 January 1908 the regular appointment as Commanding General took place. At the same time Bernhardi was promoted to General of the Cavalry.

Thus our heading for the final garrison history should read precisely:

Bernhardi’s Münster tenure was surprisingly short.

He left active service already in 1909. The Neue Deutsche Biographie names 1909 as the year of his retirement; detailed career records show his transfer to the retired list in late summer 1909.

Thus Bernhardi stood at the head of the VII Army Corps for scarcely two years.

Nevertheless, this short time is interesting for our garrison history. Münster was led in these years by a general who engaged intensively with the question how a future European war would look.

We should, however, clearly separate his tenure in Münster from the political writings he published only later. His best-known and most controversial work appeared only after his retirement from active service.

After his retirement Bernhardi devoted himself more intensively to writing. In 1910 he published works on cavalry service as well as tactics and training of the infantry. In 1911 his two-volume work “On Modern War” appeared.

In 1911/12 he also undertook an extensive world tour via England and Egypt to East Asia and back to Germany via the United States. According to the NDB he gained the impression that contemporary German world policy overstretched the resources of the Reich. In 1912 Bernhardi published the book that made his name known internationally: “Germany and the Next War.”

In it he advocated a strongly social-Darwinist and power-politics-shaped view of international relations and argued for comprehensive military preparation for a European great war he considered likely or inevitable. The work received considerable attention abroad and was widely read as an expression of aggressive currents in Wilhelmine Germany. The NDB describes Bernhardi in this context as an exponent of nationalist and pan-German tendencies and at the same time emphasizes the considerable international impact of the book.

The then almost 65-year-old general was again called to active service.

During the war he commanded larger formations, especially on the Eastern Front, later also on the Western Front. For his services he received the Pour le Mérite in 1916. The NDB lastly names him as the leader of an army group. Thus the military theorist once more became a practical troop leader.

After the war Bernhardi again devoted himself to literary work. In 1927 he published his “Memoirs from My Life,” which could still be of interest for our further work: personal recollections of his time as Commanding General in Münster might be found there.

Bernhardi died in 1930 in Kunnersdorf near Hirschberg in Silesia. Because reference works give slightly differing dates, for a final book edition we should rely on the archivally or biographically best-attested date; the NDB gives 10 July 1930.

Friedrich von Bernhardi differs markedly from his immediate predecessors. He was a cavalryman, general staff officer, military attaché, military historian, teacher at the War Academy, division commander and finally Commanding General. His biography also leads directly into the military debates of the years before 1914. For Münster, however, the temporal separation is important. When Bernhardi took over the VII Army Corps in 1907/08, Germany was still in the long peace period since 1871. When his later famous book Germany and the Next War appeared in 1912, he had already been out of the Münster General Command for several years.

General of the Cavalry Karl v. Einem, called v. Rothmaler, was appointed Commanding General in Münster in 1909. His family came from the urban nobility of Einbeck.

He entered the 2nd Hanoverian Uhlan Regiment No. 14 as an ensign on 03.08.1870 and took part in the Franco-Prussian War (1860/71). v. Einem received his officer’s commission in 1870 and was promoted to second lieutenant.

From 1873 to 1876 v. Einem served as an adjutant and later as the commander of a squadron. Afterwards he served in the Great General Staff. From 1893 to 1895 he was commander of the Cuirassier Regiment “von Driesen” (Westphalian) No. 4, which was mainly stationed in Münster. On 18 October 1895 v. Einem was appointed Chief of Staff of the VII Army Corps and in 1900 was involved in organizing the German expeditionary corps during the events in China (1900/1901).

The person of Colonel General Karl Wilhelm Georg August Gottfried von Einem, called von Rothmaler (* 01.01.1853 in Herzberg am Harz; † 07.04.1934 in Mülheim an der Ruhr) is especially connected with the garrison in Münster.

He was not only — as mentioned — until 1895 commander of the Cuirassier Regiment von Driesen (Westphalian) No. 4 in Münster, but also Chief of Staff of the VII Army Corps (from 1896) and later (from 1909) Commanding General of the VII Army Corps.

In 1914 he was appointed Supreme Commander of the 3rd Army and in 1915 was finally promoted to Colonel General. From 1903 to 1909 he had served as Minister of War.

He was already close to the young Emperor Wilhelm II, who also always protected him. In the preface to the personal records of Colonel General v. Einem about his time as an army commander in World War I, the editor describes his five years as Commanding General of the VII Army Corps as “all in all the happiest time of his life” (Junius Alter/ed., An Army Commander Experiences the World War. Personal Records of Colonel General v. Einem, Leipzig 1938, p. 22).

On 07 April 1934 at around 4 a.m. von Einem died at the age of 81 in his then place of residence Mülheim an der Ruhr. His grave is located in the central cemetery, namely in the Protestant Field West I. The burial was also attended by Oskar, the son of Emperor Wilhelm II, who lived in exile in the Netherlands.

After 1945 v. Einem was criticized for his publicly expressed rejection of homosexuality and for his intellectual proximity to National Socialism.

A street named after him in Berlin was renamed in 2012/2013.

With Eberhard von Claer a completely new chapter begins. His predecessors led the VII Army Corps mostly as a peacetime unit from Münster. Claer, by contrast, took it over in the middle of the First World War, when the Westphalian corps had already endured heavy fighting. His official seat was therefore no longer Münster in practice, but the respective corps headquarters in the field.

Eberhard Gabriel Laurenz von Claer was born on 9 August 1856 in Lüben in Silesia. He came from a military family. His father Otto de Claer also rose to the rank of Prussian lieutenant general. The family originally bore the name de Claer; in 1882 they were authorized to henceforth use the form von Claer.

After his education in the cadet corps, Claer entered the Guard Fusilier Regiment as a second lieutenant on 19 April 1873. He thus already belonged to a generation that had not itself experienced the wars of unification as active officers. When he entered the army, the war against France was only two years past, but the German Reich had already been founded.

His military training and his professional understanding were therefore shaped by the experiences of 1866 and 1870/71, even though he himself had not taken part in those wars.

Claer’s career went through numerous troop and staff appointments. He belonged to the General Staff for a long time and was also employed in the War Ministry. A contemporary press report from 1914 therefore described him as a “highly educated and versatile officer.”

Unlike his later predecessor Bernhardi, Claer was not an outright cavalryman. His career was closely connected with the infantry, but at the same time also with staff work and later particularly with engineering and fortress affairs.

His troop assignments included, among others, Infantry Regiment No. 76, the newly formed Infantry Regiment No. 162 and the Lauenburg Jäger Battalion No. 9, of which he became commander. Afterwards he served with the Queen Elisabeth Guard Grenadier Regiment No. 3.

On 18 October 1902 Claer became a colonel.

On 27 January 1903 he assumed command of Guard Grenadier Regiment No. 5 in Spandau. With that he led one of the respected regiments of the Prussian Guard.

Advancement into the general officer ranks

In 1907 Claer became commander of the 11th Infantry Brigade in Brandenburg an der Havel and on 22 March of the same year was promoted to major general.

On 22 March 1910 he was promoted to lieutenant general. A few weeks later he took command of the 22nd Division in Kassel.

Already the following year he changed again: on 13 June 1911 Claer became commander of the 11th Division in Breslau.

Thus, before the First World War he had commanded regiment, brigade and division.

The next step in his career is particularly important for his later deployment.

In 1913 Claer was appointed Chief of the Engineer and Pioneer Corps and General Inspector of the Fortresses. In doing so, he assumed one of the most important technical leadership positions in the Prussian army. Sources give early 1913 for this; detailed career records state 1 April, other accounts 4 January. For a final chronological table we should fix this detail using the official rank lists.

On 22 March 1914 Claer was promoted to General of the Infantry.

Thus, at the outbreak of war he belonged to the highest Prussian generality.

With the mobilization in August 1914 Claer was employed as General of Engineers and Pioneers at the Great Headquarters.

His special expertise in fortress, engineering and pioneer affairs was of considerable importance in view of the expected attacks on Belgian and French fortifications.

On 25 August 1914 he was initially charged with leading the newly to be formed XXIV Reserve Corps.

But only a few weeks later he received another command.

At the outbreak of war the VII Army Corps was under General der Kavallerie Karl von Einem. The corps had left Münster and the Westphalian garrisons and moved to the Western Front. Its peacetime organization included in particular the 13th Division in Münster and the 14th Division in Düsseldorf as well as other corps units.

In September 1914, however, there was a change in the German army leadership.

The Saxon Colonel General Max von Hausen had to relinquish command of the 3rd Army for health reasons. Karl von Einem was designated his successor as army commander.

This freed up the leadership of the VII Army Corps.

On 12 September 1914 Eberhard von Claer was appointed the new Commanding General of the VII Army Corps. Contemporary newspapers explicitly reported this change.

Claer thus took over the “Westphalian Corps.”

Not a Commanding General in Münster

For our garrison history an important distinction is required here.

Claer was formally Commanding General of that army corps whose general command had its peacetime seat in Münster.

However, he did not command this corps from Münster.

The mobile general command was in the field. In Münster, meanwhile, the deputy general command of the VII Army Corps existed, which carried out the military tasks in the home territory.

Claer received his new command in an extraordinarily difficult situation.

The German advance through Belgium and northern France had come to a halt after the Battle of the Marne. The German armies withdrew behind the Aisne.

When Claer took over the VII Army Corps on 12 September, it was fighting on the right flank of the 2nd Army. The corps defended the heights east of the Aisne–Marne Canal.

Until 20 September his units held or fought their way to a line in the area Orainville–Merlet–Aguilcourt–Guignicourt.

Thus Claer’s assumption of office fell directly into the transition from a war of movement to positional warfare.

In early October the VII Army Corps was subordinated to the 6th Army of the Bavarian Crown Prince Rupprecht.

The corps was then transferred north.

This was followed by the heavy fighting during the so‑called race to the sea and in the Arras area. Parts of the 13th Division initially supported the fighting at Souchez, while the 14th Division was shifted further north.

In October 1914 the Westphalian units then fought, among other places, in the Neuve-Chapelle and Givenchy areas.

For the soldiers of the VII Army Corps, the positional warfare began that would characterize the image of the Western Front in the following years.

In the winter of 1914/15 the corps was in the northern French–Flanders front sector.

A British account of the winter operations explicitly names the VII Army Corps under General von Claer with its two divisions: the 13th Division under Lieutenant General Kurt von dem Borne and the 14th Division under Lieutenant General Paul Fleck. The corps held sectors opposite British and Indian units in the Neuve-Chapelle area.

The Westphalian regiments that a few months earlier had been stationed in Münster, Paderborn, Minden, Detmold or other garrisons now stood permanently in trenches.

In March 1915 the corps was drawn into the Battle of Neuve-Chapelle. Further heavy fighting followed in spring and early summer 1915 in the La Bassée and Arras areas.

Thus Claer led the VII Army Corps during a phase in which the improvised positional warfare of autumn 1914 increasingly became a technically and materially more demanding trench warfare.

His previous experience as Chief of the Engineer and Pioneer Corps likely proved quite useful to him here. How far this can be concretely demonstrated in the leadership of the VII Army Corps would have to be investigated on the basis of the corps files and war diaries.

On 29 June 1915 Claer’s leadership of the VII Army Corps ended.

On the same day Emperor Wilhelm II awarded him the Pour le Mérite, the highest Prussian military decoration for officers for bravery or merit.

His successor as Commanding General was General of the Infantry Hermann von François.

Thus Claer had commanded the Westphalian corps for a little more than nine months.

Claer then returned as General of Engineers and Pioneers to the Great Headquarters.

This renewed assignment corresponded to his particular professional qualification.

However, Claer was apparently not satisfied with the position or task assigned to him there. The biographical tradition reports that this posting ultimately prompted him to request his retirement.

On 3 July 1916 he was placed at disposition à la suite of Guard Grenadier Regiment No. 5.

Thus ended his active military career after more than 43 years of service.

Claer outlived the First World War by almost three decades.

His wife Magdalena, née von Heyden, died in 1944. Eberhard von Claer himself experienced the last weeks of the Second World War.

He died on 28 April 1945 in Bad Langensalza, a few days before the end of the war in Europe. The Berlin Invalids’ Cemetery is named as his place of burial.

Claer was Commanding General of the VII Army Corps, but no longer Commanding General in Münster in the true peacetime sense. When he took command on 12 September 1914, the Münster and Westphalian troops were already at war. The mobile general command was at the front. Münster itself was militarily shaped by the deputy general command.

Hermann Karl Bruno von François was born on 31 January 1856 in Luxembourg and died on 15 May 1933 in Berlin‑Lichterfelde. He came from a pronounced Prussian officer family. His father Bruno von François was a Prussian major general and fell in 1870 in the war against France. His brothers Curt and Hugo also pursued military or colonial careers.

François is among the best‑known German field commanders of the First World War. His name is especially associated with Stallupönen, Tannenberg, Gorlice‑Tarnów and Verdun. At the same time he was regarded as an extremely self‑confident and headstrong commander who repeatedly carried out orders from his superiors only to a limited extent or with delay. This trait contributed both to his military reputation and to conflicts within the higher command.

François attended the cadet institutions in Wahlstatt and Berlin and was for a time a page to Kaiser Wilhelm I. On 15 April 1875 he entered the venerable 1st Guard Regiment Foot in Potsdam as a second lieutenant.

Unlike many older Commanding Generals of the VII Army Corps, François had not himself participated in the wars of unification. His military career began only after the founding of the Reich.

From 1884 to 1887 he attended the War Academy. Afterwards he was assigned to the Great General Staff and in 1889 was accepted as a captain into the Army General Staff. Various General Staff and troop assignments followed.

François thus belonged to that younger General Staff generation that developed its ideas about war from the analysis of 1866 and 1870/71, but itself was only confronted with a European large‑scale war in 1914.

His further career repeatedly led François back and forth between the General Staff and the troops. In 1903 he became a colonel. From August 1904 he commanded the Queen Elisabeth Guard Grenadier Regiment No. 3 in Charlottenburg. In 1907 he received command of the 49th Infantry Brigade (1st Grand Ducal Hessian) and on 27 January 1908 was promoted to major general.

Then followed an assignment that is of immediate relevance for our garrison history.

On 20 March 1911 François was promoted to lieutenant general and at the same time appointed commander of the 13th Division in Münster.

Thus François lived and served in Münster for more than two years.

The 13th Division, together with the 14th Division stationed in Düsseldorf, formed the core of the VII Army Corps. François therefore already became familiar in peacetime with the Westphalian troops, their officers and the training conditions of the corps.

This distinguishes him clearly from Claer, who only took over the VII Army Corps during the war.

For our later in‑depth study François’s activity as divisional commander in Münster from 1911 to 1913 is therefore almost as interesting as his later command of the corps. The Münster press is likely to contain numerous references to maneuvers, parades, imperial birthdays and social events.

On 1 October 1913 François left Münster. He was appointed Commanding General of the I Army Corps in Königsberg. Already on 19 August 1914 he was promoted to General of the Infantry.

With the I Army Corps François stood at the center of the fighting in East Prussia at the outbreak of the First World War.

Already in the first days of the war a trait became apparent that would determine François’ military career in the world war: his pronounced readiness to act independently on the basis of his on‑site assessment of the situation — even when this collided with the intentions of his superiors.

At Stallupönen he used his corps offensively contrary to the more cautious operational approach of the 8th Army. A few days later the I Army Corps also played an important role in the Battle of Gumbinnen. Contemporary and later accounts assess François’ unauthorised decisions differently; indisputable, however, is that they led to tensions with the army leadership.

His behavior became even better known during the Battle of Tannenberg at the end of August 1914.

François repeatedly resisted or delayed orders from Hindenburg and Ludendorff because he in particular wanted to wait for the deployment of his artillery. Once his attack finally began, the I Army Corps contributed materially to the encirclement of the Russian 2nd Army.

Thus François was among the important field commanders of the German victory at Tannenberg.

His relationship with Hindenburg and especially Ludendorff remained strained, however.

In October 1914 François was even temporarily given command of the 8th Army. The LWL biography names 9 October as the start of this assignment. It was, however, only of short duration. Already in early November François was relieved.

Thus a recurring pattern in his career became apparent:

François could achieve great successes as an energetic field commander, but apparently had difficulty fitting into a superior command structure.

On 24 December 1914 François received command of the newly formed XXXXI Reserve Corps.

After service in the west the corps was transferred to Galicia in spring 1915. There it took part, as part of the 11th Army under Mackensen, in the major German offensive at Gorlice‑Tarnów.

The operation began in early May 1915 and led to a far‑reaching break in the Russian front.

For the performance of his corps François received the Pour le Mérite on 14 May 1915.

After the recapture of Lemberg this assignment ended.

His path then led him again to the corps he already knew well from his time in Münster.

On 29 June 1915 General of the Infantry Hermann von François assumed command of the VII Army Corps from Eberhard von Claer. The LWL database lists François as Commanding General of the corps from June 1915 until 6 July 1918.

Thus François in a sense returned to his former Westphalian troops.

However, the same applied again:

He was now Commanding General of the VII Army Corps, but no longer Commanding General in Münster in the peacetime sense.

The mobile general command was at the front. In Münster the deputy general command continued to carry out the military tasks of the home territory.

The probably most important phase of his activity as Commanding General of the VII Army Corps began in 1916.

The corps was involved, as part of the 5th Army, in the fighting for Verdun. In mid‑July 1916 François was additionally given command of the western assault group on the Meuse.

Thus the former Münster divisional commander bore responsibility in one of the most costly battles of the First World War.

For our garrison history this offers a particularly important approach: we should later not only consider François’ command, but specifically investigate which Westphalian and in particular Münster‑connected units of the VII Army Corps were deployed under him at Verdun and what losses they suffered.

This would make the connection between the home garrison and the front much clearer.

In 1917 François and his corps remained on the Western Front.

In the Second Battle of the Aisne in spring 1917 his units again stood in heavy defensive fighting. His services at Verdun and on the Aisne were finally honored with another high award.

On 27 July 1917 François received the Oak Leaves to the Pour le Mérite.

Thus he belonged to the relatively small circle of German generals to whom this enhancement of the order was awarded during the world war.

François led the VII Army Corps also during the German spring offensives of 1918.

At the end of May the corps, as part of the 7th Army, took part in the offensive between Soissons and Reims. After the initially far‑reaching German advance, allied countermeasures, however, forced the German units to withdraw or shorten their front.

Thus François had led his Westphalian corps for more than three years through some of the heaviest fights of the world war.

On 6 July 1918 François relinquished command of the VII Army Corps.

His successor was Lieutenant General Wilhelm von Woyna, who would lead the corps until the end of the war.

François did not receive another significant front command. On 14 October 1918 he was placed at disposition with the award of the Grand Cross of the Order of the Red Eagle with Oak Leaves and Swords.

Thus ended his active military career of more than four decades.

After the war François emerged as a military‑historical author.

He published several works on the campaigns and battles of the world war. These included in particular “The Battle of the Marne and Tannenberg” from 1920. He also dealt with the military activities of the German Crown Prince Wilhelm, under whose army group the VII Army Corps had at times fought.

In 1925 François received an honorary doctorate for his military‑historical works and in memory of his achievements in the 1915 campaign.

He died on 15 May 1933 in Berlin‑Lichterfelde.

François holds a special position among the Commanding Generals of the VII Army Corps because his relationship to Münster falls into two clearly separated phases:

1911–1913 he was commander of the 13th Division in Münster. Here he experienced the VII Army Corps as a peacetime unit of the Empire.

1915–1918 he led the same corps as Commanding General in the world war.

Between them lay Königsberg, Stallupönen, Gumbinnen, Tannenberg, the temporary command of the 8th Army and Gorlice‑Tarnów.

Wilhelm Friedrich Karl von Woyna was born on 7 May 1863 in Königsberg. He came from a Prussian officer family. His father was the later General of the Infantry Wilhelm von Woyna, his mother Antonia, née von Bismarck. The son thus also followed a military career typical for his background.

He was considerably younger than François or Claer. When the war against France began in 1870, Woyna was only seven years old. He therefore fully belonged to the generation of officers who grew up in the German Empire and whose first major war experience came only in 1914.

After his education in the cadet corps, Woyna entered the Kaiser Alexander Guard Grenadier Regiment No. 1 as a second lieutenant on 15 April 1882. Thus he began his career in one of the most respected regiments of the Prussian Guard.

His aptitude for higher staff appointments became apparent early. He attended the War Academy and was afterwards assigned to the Great General Staff.

As with many later generals, staff and troop assignments alternated in his career.

Woyna increasingly developed into a General Staff officer. He served in various staffs while at the same time gaining practical leadership experience with troops.

His career eventually led him into higher command positions. Before the First World War he already belonged to the leadership layer of the Prussian army. On 22 March 1912 he was promoted to major general.

At the outbreak of war in 1914, therefore, an experienced staff and troop officer was available.

During the world war Woyna commanded various larger units.

Particularly important was his role as a divisional commander. In June 1915 he took command of the 3rd Guard Division, which was deployed on the Western Front.

Thus Woyna commanded one of the German army’s most respected large units.

Under his command the division was involved in heavy fighting, including actions during the great material battles of the world war. His wartime experience therefore differed fundamentally from that of 19th‑century generals: Woyna was a field commander of the industrialized mass war with machine guns, heavy artillery, developed trench systems and ever larger concentrations of materiel.

During the war he was promoted to lieutenant general.

Woyna thus belonged in 1918 to the experienced German divisional commanders. This was likely an important reason why he was entrusted with an army corps in the final year of the war.

And this corps was the VII Army Corps.

On 6/7 July 1918 there was a change of command. General of the Infantry Hermann von François left the command of the VII Army Corps. Lieutenant General Wilhelm von Woyna was charged with the leadership of the corps and took it over at the beginning of July 1918. Appointment lists regularly give 7 July 1918 as the start of his command.

Woyna was therefore the last commander of the VII Army Corps in the First World War.

The designation should therefore read as precisely as possible for our garrison history:

Woyna took over the VII Army Corps at an extremely unfavorable moment. The major German spring offensives of 1918 had not achieved their goals. Although the German armies had advanced far, the losses had been enormous. Reserves were becoming scarce while more and more American soldiers arrived on the Allied side. When Woyna took command of the VII Army Corps, the strategic initiative of the German army was already in the process of being finally lost. Only a few days later, on 15 July 1918, the last great German offensive on the Marne began.

On 18 July the Allied counterattack followed. This began the phase that ultimately led to the German retreat. The last battles of the VII Army Corps

Woyna’s task thus fundamentally differed from François’ in the years 1915 to 1917.

It was now hardly any longer about long‑term German offensive operations. Increasingly the focus was on defense, retreat and maintaining combat capability.

After the Allied offensive at Amiens on 8 August 1918 the German Western Front came under increasing pressure.

The German armies had to gradually abandon positions that had been held for years.

The VII Army Corps was also drawn into these retreat battles. Woyna was now to command units that after four years of war had suffered considerable losses and whose replacements were increasingly less well trained.

In September and October 1918 the situation became ever more difficult.

The Allies attacked simultaneously on numerous front sectors. The German army had to abandon the Hindenburg Line and withdraw toward the Belgian and German borders.

At the same time the political crisis in the German Reich intensified.

Thus the VII Army Corps was no longer confronted only with a military opponent. The soldiers learned of peace negotiations, political changes and finally of the revolution in Germany.

The army in which Woyna had served for almost four decades began to change fundamentally under the conditions of defeat.

With the Armistice of Compiègne on 11 November 1918 the fighting ended.

For Woyna and the VII Army Corps, however, the war was by no means over organizationally. Now began a militarily demanding task: the orderly march back to Germany.

Millions of German soldiers had to evacuate the occupied territories within the deadlines set by the armistice. Materiel, guns, vehicles and supply facilities had to be returned or surrendered according to the armistice conditions.

At the same time Germany was in the midst of revolution. The VII Army Corps had marched to war from its Westphalian peacetime area in August 1914.

More than four years later its units returned.

But the Germany to which they returned was no longer the empire they had left in 1914. The Kaiser had abdicated. The monarchy had collapsed. Workers’ and soldiers’ councils had arisen. The old Prussian army was dissolving.

Demobilization finally also meant the end of the old VII Army Corps.

With the formation of the transitional army and subsequently the Reichswehr, the previous Prussian corps organization disappeared.

Thus ended an institution whose general command had been closely linked with Münster since the early 19th century.

Woyna was its last military leader.

In 1919 he also left active military service.

After his retirement Woyna lived as a retired lieutenant general. Unlike François or Bernhardi, he did not emerge after the war as a widely known military‑political author. For that reason he is today considerably less well known than his two immediate predecessors.