Helmuth von Moltke the Elder
Graf Helmuth Karl Bernhard von Moltke was a Prussian Generalfeldmarschall. The chief of staff of the Prussian Army for thirty years, he is regarded as the creator of a new, more modern method of directing armies in the field and one of the finest military minds of his generation. He commanded troops in Europe and the Middle East, in the Second Schleswig War, Austro-Prussian War, and Franco-Prussian War. He is described as embodying "Prussian military organization and tactical genius". He was fascinated with railways and pioneered their military use. He is often referred to as Moltke the Elder to distinguish him from his nephew Helmuth von Moltke the Younger, who commanded the German army at the outbreak of the First World War. He is notably the earliest-born human whose recorded voice is preserved, being born in the last year of the 18th century. He made four recordings; two that were recorded in October 1889 are preserved to this day.
Early life
Moltke was born in Parchim, Mecklenburg-Schwerin, son of Generalleutnant Friedrich Philipp Victor von Moltke, a German in Danish service. In 1805, his father settled in Holstein. But the next year he was left impoverished when during the War of the Fourth Coalition of 1806–1807 French troops burned his country house and plundered his townhouse in Lübeck, where his wife and children were. At nine the younger Moltke was sent as a boarder to Hohenfelde in Holstein, and at age twelve went to the Royal Danish Military Academy at Copenhagen, being destined for the Danish army and court. In 1818 he became a page to King Frederick VI of Denmark and a second lieutenant in the Oldenburg Infantry Regiment. At twenty-one, Moltke decided to leave Denmark and enter the Prussian army, despite the loss of seniority. In 1822 he became a second lieutenant in the 8th Infantry Regiment stationed at Frankfurt an der Oder. At twenty-three he was allowed to enter the general war school, where he studied the full three years, graduating in 1826.Military career
Early career
As a young officer
For a year Moltke had charge of a cadet school at Frankfurt an der Oder, then he was for three years employed on the military survey in Silesia and Posen. In 1832 he was seconded for service on the general staff at Berlin, to which he was transferred in 1833 on promotion to first lieutenant. He was at this time regarded as a brilliant officer by his superiors, including Prince William, then a lieutenant-general.Moltke was well received at court and in the best society of Berlin. His tastes inclined him to literature, to historical study, and to travel. In 1827 he published a short romance, The Two Friends. In 1831 he wrote an essay entitled Holland and Belgium in their Mutual Relations, from their Separation under Philip II to their Reunion under William I. A year later he wrote An Account of the Internal Circumstances and Social Conditions of Poland, a study based both on reading and on personal observation of Polish life and character.
He was fluent in English and a talented writer in German; in 1832 he was contracted to translate Gibbon's The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire into German, for which he was to receive 75 marks, his object being to earn the money to buy a horse. In eighteen months he had finished nine volumes out of twelve but the publisher failed to produce the book and Moltke never received more than 25 marks.
Service with the Ottoman Empire
In 1835, on his promotion to captain, Moltke obtained six months' leave to travel in southeast Europe. After a short stay in Constantinople, he was asked by the Sultan Mahmud II to help modernize the Ottoman Empire's army and with permission from Berlin he accepted the offer. He remained for two years at Constantinople, learned Turkish, and surveyed the city of Constantinople, the Bosporus and the Dardanelles. He travelled through Wallachia, Bulgaria and Rumelia, making many other journeys on both sides of the Straits.In 1838, Moltke was sent as an adviser to the Ottoman general commanding the troops in Anatolia, who was to carry on the Egyptian–Ottoman War against Muhammad Ali of Egypt. During the summer Moltke made extensive reconnaissances and surveys, riding several thousand miles in the course of his journey. He navigated the rapids of the Euphrates and visited and mapped many parts of the Ottoman Empire. In 1839 the army moved south to fight the Egyptians but upon their approach, the general refused to listen to Moltke's advice. Moltke resigned his post of staff officer and took charge of the artillery. In the Battle of Nezib on 24 June 1839, the Ottoman Army was beaten, but Moltke's actions were well-regarded.
Thus on 7 November 1839, he received the Pour le Mérite from Prussia. With great difficulty, Moltke made his way back to the Black Sea, and thence to Constantinople. His patron, Sultan Mahmud II, was dead, so he returned to Berlin, broken in health, in December 1839.
Once home Moltke published some of the letters he had written as Letters on Conditions and Events in Turkey in the Years 1835 to 1839. This book was well received at the time. Early the next year he married a young English woman, Maria Bertha Helena Burt, whose father John Heyliger Burt had married Moltke's sister Augusta. It was a happy union, though there were no children.
In 1840, Moltke had been appointed to the staff of the IV Corps, which was under the command of Prince Charles of Prussia, stationed at Berlin. He published his maps of Constantinople, and, jointly with other German travellers, a new map of Asia Minor and a memoir on the geography of that region.
He became interested in railroads and he was one of the first directors of the Hamburg–Berlin railway. Moltke also paid close attention to the tactical and operational implications of rifled weapons. In 1843 he published the article "What Considerations should determine the Choice of the Course of Railways?" Even before Germany began constructing its first railroad he had noticed their military potential and he urged the general staff to support railway construction for mobilisation and supply. He spent all of his savings on investments into Prussian railroad ventures which made him a considerable amount of wealth. During his later years in the great general staff he would add a Railways Department, which did not have the task of planning military campaigns like many of the other departments, but managed the military use of railways.
In 1845, Moltke published The Russo-Turkish Campaign in Europe, 1828–1829, which was well received in military circles. In the same year, he served in Rome as personal adjutant to Prince Henry of Prussia, which allowed him to create another map of the Eternal City. In 1848, after a brief return to the General Staff in Berlin, he became Chief of the Staff of the 4th Corps, of which the headquarters was then at Magdeburg. There he remained for seven years, during which he rose to Lieutenant Colonel and Colonel. In 1855, Moltke served as a personal aide and mentor to Prince Frederick William as Generalmajor. He accompanied the prince to England for the prince's marriage, as well as to Paris and Saint Petersburg for the coronation of Alexander II of Russia.
In Prussia
Chief of the Prussian General Staff and Great General staff
On the suggestion of Edwin von Manteuffel, the new king appointed Moltke as Chief of the Prussian General Staff on 29 October 1857. He would hold the position for the next 30 years As soon as he gained the position he went to work making changes to the strategic and tactical methods of the Prussian army: changes in armament and means of communication; changes in the training of staff officers ; and changes in the method for the mobilization of the army. He also instituted a formal study of European politics in connection with the plans for campaigns which might become necessary. In short, he rapidly put into place the features of a modern general staff. By 1860, his reforms were completed.In 1859, the Austro-Sardinian War in Italy caused the mobilization of the Prussian army, though it did not fight. After the mobilization, the army was reorganized and its strength was nearly doubled. The reorganization was the work not of Moltke but of the Prince Regent, William, and the Minister of War, Albrecht von Roon. Moltke watched the Italian campaign closely and wrote a history of it in 1862. In an act that was yet another first in military affairs, this history was attributed on the title page to the historical division of the Prussian staff.
In 1860, " added a Railway Section to the military council. A contemporary would write that von Moltke never made an important decision without consulting the German railway timetables." Moltke had been following developments relating to the railroad ever since his return from Egypt, at which time he wrote that: “Every new railway development is a military benefit, and for national defence, it is far more profitable to spend a few million on completing our railways than on new fortresses.”
In December 1862, Moltke was asked for an opinion on the military aspect of the quarrel with Denmark. He thought the difficulty would be to bring the war to an end, as the Danish army would, if possible, retire to the islands, where, as the Danes had the command of the sea, it could not be attacked. He sketched a plan for turning the flank of the Danish army before the attack upon its position in front of Schleswig. He suggested that by this means its retreat might be cut off.
War with Denmark
When the Second Schleswig War began in February 1864, Moltke was not sent with the Prussian forces but kept at Berlin. His war plan was mismanaged, and the Danish army escaped to the fortresses of Dybbøl and Fredericia, each of which commanded a retreat across a strait to an island. Dybbøl and Fredericia were besieged, Dybbøl taken by storm, and Fredericia abandoned by the Danes without assault – but the war showed no signs of ending. The Danish army was safe on the islands of Als and Funen.On 30 April 1864, Moltke was sent to be chief of the staff for the allied forces. He and Friedrich Graf von Wrangel planned landing on Als or Funen. On June 29, battalions crossed to Als in boats, landed while under fire from the Danish batteries, and quickly seized the whole island as far as the Kekenis peninsula. Days later, Eduard Vogel von Falckenstein's corps crossed the Limfjord and occupied the remaining parts of Jutland while the Austrians seized the various islands. The Danish government, dejected by the course of the war, ended the war in defeat by signing the Treaty of Vienna.