Maximilian von Versen

Maximilian Felix Christoph Wilhelm Leopold Reinhold Albert Fürchtegott von Versen (Wurchow, November 30, 1833 – Berlin, October 7, 1893) was a German Military and Nobleman, son of Johann Georg Leopold von Versen and first wife Hulda Wilhelmine Luise Henriette Leopoldine Ottilie von Glasenapp.

Career

He was a General of Cavalry, Helper at the Orders of the King of Prussia and Commander-General of the III Army Corpss.^[1]

In 1866, while he had the rank of Major of Cavalry, he requested to visit the battlefields of Paraguay because of the ferocious resistance presented by the paraguayans and the "admirable strategy" of Francisco Solano López during the Paraguayan War.^[2] The King of Prussia approved his request, and he went to South America, where he was made prisoner of both the allied forces of Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay (they thought he was hired by Lopez to command his armies), and by the paraguayans (López thought Von Versen was a spy hired by the allied forces to murder him). He survived the conflict and wrote these episodes and his impressions in the book "Travels in South America and the Great South American War".^[3]

Marriage and children

He married in Wiesbaden on May 16, 1871 Alice Bryan Clemens (St. Louis, Independent City, Missouri, May 12, 1850 – Burzlaff, August 19, 1912), Lady of Burzlaff and Mandelatz, daughter of James Clemens, Jr. and wife Elizabeth "Eliza" Brown Mullanphy, and had issue, among whom a daughter Hulda Elisabeth Anna von Versen (Merseburg, March 18, 1872 – West Berlin, May 4, 1954), married in Berlin on September 9, 1893 with Georg Gustav von Arnim.^[4]

References