Anatol Theophil August Friedrich Albrecht Graf von Bredow
(07.01.1859 - 22.03.1941)
place of birth:  Potsdam, Brandenburg
Königreich Preußen:  KG,  Generalleutnant ch. z.D.


Prussian count and reactivated cavalry officer Anatol von Bredow oversaw during the early stages of World War One those divisional troops charged with defending Fortress Posen on the Eastern Front. He later headed up a Landwehr division and spent the last year of the War in command of a reserve corps. Graf von Bredow descended from a long line of Prussian military nobility. After schooling with the Kadettenkorps, he joined the Dragoon regiment at Lüneburg in 1877. Although not a graduate of the War Academy, he spent over ten years of his pre-War career as a general staff officer. This included a two-year tour at the embassy in London as German military attaché. Von Bredow was eventually selected to command the cavalry brigade in Metz and later retired from active duty at the rank of Generalmajor. 

German mobilization in August 1914 saw Graf von Bredow reactivated as the acting commander at 8. Infanterie-Brigade headquarters. He was soon thereafter transferred to Fortress Posen to oversee the Hauptreserve, and his troops first first marched into battle during the Masurian Lakes conflict. They then turned southward into Poland as part of Korps-Frommel and distinguished themselves in confronting the Russian invasion. Graf von Bredow was brevetted as a Generalleutnant on New Year's Day 1915 and a few months later, he led his formation into battle during the Gorlice-Tarnów Offensive, pushing the enemy deep back into Russian territory and resulting in over one million Russian casualties. For his distinguished leadership during this campaign, Graf von Bredow was decorated by the Kaiser himself with the highest Royal Prussian order of bravery, the Pour le Mérite.

In Fall of 1917, Generalleutnant von Bredow had to leave his beloved Landwehr Division and was assigned with replacing Alfred von Böckmann as commanding general of III. Reserve-Korps headquarters by Lake Narach in Belarus. The corps remained active in Belarus and Lithuania during the remainder of the War, with Bredow himself not returning to German soil until late February 1919. General von Bredow's eldest son served as a battery commander and was killed in action during the Somme Offensive. The youngest of his three sons flew for Germany's field air service and was killed over the skies of Baranowitschi. Graf von Bredow received the brevet rank of General der Kavallerie on 27 August 1939 for Tannenberg Remembrance Day.

	Generalleutnant	01.01.1915  (charakter)
	Pour le Mérite	23.07.1915