Karl Von Clausewitz

He first met Countess Marie von Bruhl, who was a member of the noble German von Br�hl family originating in Thuringia, in 1803.

In December 1810, he went into the wedlock with the Countess. The marriage gave him an opportunity to socialize with Berlin’s literary and intellectual elite class.

He breathed his last on November 16, 1831 in Breslau, Prussia after commanding the Prussian army to construct a cordon sanitaire to restrict the outbreak of cholera in 1831.

Carl Von Clausewitz was born as Carl Philipp Gottfriedvon Clausewitz in a middle-class family in Burg bei Magdeburg, Prussia. He was the youngest child of the family and had three elder siblings.

His father served as the Lieutenant in the Prussian Army and later on took to working at the Prussian internal revenue service.

He began his military career at the age of 12. He started off by serving as the Lanco-Corporal and soon moved up the ladder to serve as a Major General in the army.

From 1793 to 1794, he served in the Rhine Campaigns, including the Siege of Mainz at the time when the Prussian army invaded France in the French Revolution.

In 1801, he enrolled at the Kriegsakademie or German War School. Thereafter, he studied at the Military Academy in Berlin and the Brussian Military Academy. It was there that he studied the works of philosopher Immanuel Kant.

His deep acumen and intelligence won him the regard of General Gerhard von Scharnhorst. Along with Hermann von Boyen and Karl von Grolman, he became a close associate of Scharnhorst and helped the latter in the reform of the Prussian army from 1807 to 1814.

Meanwhile, from 1806, he took to serving in the Napoleonic Wars which he continued until 1815. In the Jena Campaign, he served as an aide-de-camp to Prince August. During the battle, Napolean invaded Prussia and defeated the Prussian-Saxon army commanded by Karl Wilhelm Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick.

This German soldier and military theorist authored the famous work, ‘On War’, which presents a theory on warfare and strategy.