August, Count Neidhardt von Gneisenau

August, Count Neidhardt von Gneisenau (born Oct. 27, 1760, Schildau, near Torgau, Saxony [Germany]—died Aug. 23, 1831, Posen, Prussia [now Poznań, Poland]) was a Prussian field marshal and reformer, one of the key figures in rebuilding and reorganizing the Prussian army shattered by Napoleon in 1806 and the architect of its victory during the wars of liberation (1813–15).

Of impoverished noble parentage, Gneisenau served in the Austrian army and with an Ansbach regiment under the British in Canada. Though he did not see action in Canada, he became familiar with the concepts of skirmish warfare and the civilian militia employed on the North American continent. Entering Prussian service in 1786, he was assigned to garrison duty until war broke out between Napoleon and Prussia in 1806. At the Battle of Jena he was still a company commander, but his successful defense of the fortress of Kolberg against the French in 1807 laid the foundation for his advancement. By 1808 his functions included membership in the important rivers and development commissions, and he had become chief of fortifications and the engineer corps. Gneisenau, along with G.J.D. von Scharnhorst and H. von Boyen, remolded the Prussian army from a force based on limited conscription of natives and voluntary enlistment of foreigners into an instrument of modern mass warfare. He advocated the abolition of corporal punishment and of special privileges for the higher classes, the concentration on field manoeuvres rather than parade-ground drill, the promotion of officers according to merit, and the creation of military academies. The key to Gneisenau’s philosophy was the transformation from a force of subjects into a citizen’s army. The practical results for Prussia were the introduction of universal military service, the Landwehr (first line reserve), and the Landsturm (second line reserve), which met the manpower requirements of modern warfare.

In 1808 Napoleon forced the dismissal of the Prussian reform party, and from 1811 to 1812 Gneisenau travelled to Austria, Russia, Sweden, and England on secret missions negotiating a new war against Napoleon. When the conflict was renewed in 1813, Gneisenau and Scharnhorst served with Field Marshal G.L. von Blücher’s army as staff officers. After Scharnhorst’s death (June 28, 1813), Gneisenau became Blücher’s chief of staff, a position in which he was largely responsible for planning Prussian, and sometimes Russian, strategy. His insistence on the decisive battle and a relentless pursuit proved successful at Waterloo. These principles were elevated into the key to military success by his friend and colleague Carl von Clausewitz in his manual of modern warfare, On War.

Gneisenau resigned in 1816, a liberal victim of the government policy of reaction. Not until 1825 was he made a field marshal. He died campaigning against insurgent Poland.