The Incredible Fighting Genius of August Willich

Some people live their life and never accomplish anything. This can not be said for August Willich.

August was born to German nobility, became a rebel and then a communist. From here, he supported democracy and was a philosopher and a war hero in the American Civil War.

To him, it was not about winning the Civil War but about keeping the union together. He saw it as a war of social equality and an opportunity to stop slavery. To help this, he designed a fighting strategy, an idea he worked on while held captive which helped win the war

Early Life

Johann August Ernest Von Willich was born to a noble Prussian family in 1810 in Braunsberg, East Prussia. Today East Prussia is in Poland.

His father, Johann George, was a captain in the hussars, a light cavalry unit that fought in the Napoleonic War. Unfortunately, when August was three, his father passed away, leaving him to be raised by a distant relative, Friedrich Schleiermacher, a theologian and philosopher.

August received the best education before he was sent to Berlin military school.

Army Career

August's career in the army lasted nineteen years when he became captain. He resigned in 1847 when he was posted at remote outposts due to his radical political views.

The same year he decided to discard his noble title and shorten his name to August Willich. He was not finished with his military career as he became commander in the German Revolution of 1848, fighting for the revolutionaries.

When the war was lost, August had no choice but to flee his homeland. He fled to Switzerland, where he was again part of a failed uprising, and he fled to England.

Challenging Marx

In England, he was introduced to Karl Marx. August commented that he found Marx too conservative; he wanted democratic communism.

It was during this debate that he challenged Marx to a duel. The duel never happened, especially as duels were illegal in the United Kingdom.

Instead, he challenged Marxist Konrad Schramm to a duel in Belgium. August's bullet grazed Schramm's head but didn't kill him. He did, however, die eight years later of tuberculosis.

United States

August then moved to the United States, arriving in 1853. He was broke and started a job as a carpenter at Brooklyn Navy Yard. His next job was as a mathematician in the U.S. Coastal Survey.

In 1858, he moved to Cincinnati, where he became the editor of a German-language newspaper. Here, he earned the nickname Ohio Hegelian and became part of the German Ohioans who followed philosopher George Wilhelmina Friedrich Hegel.

When the Civil War began, August was one of many Germans that volunteered in the Union Army. Many of these German soldiers had fled Germany during the failed revolution. They were liberal-minded and deeply against slavery.

I fought for liberty in the old country, I fight for liberty in this country. - Willich to Warfare History Network.

The Civil War

August became a first lieutenant in the army and was sent to Virginia, where he fought in various historical battles, including the Battle of Rich Mountain. He then resigned from his German unit and became a colonel in another.

He was then sent to Tennessee to fight. His soldiers were under constant fire, and then the enemy was at their back. August stood before his soldiers and drilled them in the manual use of arms. The lesson worked as the 32nd launched a bayonet attack.

General Lew Wallace called it an act of the most audacious thing he had seen. After the bottle, August was promoted to commander of the Horn Brigade.

During one battle, he was struck by a spent ball which hit him directly in the chest. He, however, only sustained some broken ribs as his wallet stopped the pellet going any further.

During the battle of Stones River, August was captured after his horse was shot out from under him. He was taken to Libby Prison in Richmond. During his four months of captivity, he developed a system called advance rapid-fire.

Advance firing was a system where the first rank opened fire and then stopped to reload whilst the other ranks advanced a few paces, firing their rounds and allowing the next rank to advance.

An exchange freed him, allowing him to implement this strategy. During the Tullahoma Campaign, one soldier commented he had never seen a firing system like it. It was responsible for winning this battle and several others.

Life After the War

After the war, August worked in government service as an auditor of Hamilton County, Ohio. In 1870, he returned to his homeland, where he offered his services again to the army but was turned down.

He stayed in Germany long enough to complete his degree in philosophy from the University of Berlin. He was sixty years old.

He moved back to Ohio in the last years of his life, passing away in 1878 in St. Marys, where he is buried. His troops knew him as Papa Willich, he was well respected, and all who knew him talked favourably of the kindness he showed them.