WALLENSTEIN, ALBRECHT WENZEL EUSEBIUS. - General, b. 24 Sept. 1583 at Hermaniè near Arnau (eastern Bohemia), d. 25 Feb. 1634 at Eger.
Orphaned at thirteen, he studied at the Lutheran Latin school in Goldberg (Silesia) and then at the Academy of Altdorf in Nuremberg. During a trip to Italy in 1606 he converted to Catholicism. In 1609 he married a wealthy widow from Moravia, who died in 1614, and in 1617 placed a contingent of troops at the disposal of Ferdinand, Archduke of Styria (later Emperor Ferdinand II) for the war against Venice. He provided financial support to the emperor against the Bohemian rebels but did not take part in the Battle of the White Mountain. He purchased, at great advantage, the lands confiscated from the rebel nobles, becoming the owner of a large part of Bohemia. In 1624 he was created Duke of Friedland by Ferdinand II, after having married Isabella of Harrach the previous year, further strengthening his ties with the imperial court. Following Denmark’s intervention in the Thirty Years’ War, he raised an army of 24,000 men from scratch for the emperor and became its supreme commander. He contained and repelled the enemy in Silesia, then turned against Christian IV, occupied Jutland, and forced Denmark to make peace. The emperor granted him the Duchy of Sagan in Silesia and Mecklenburg as fiefs. In 1630 he was stripped of his rank due to the hostility of the imperial princes and retired to Bohemia, where he lived in princely fashion. Desiring ever greater power and to become one of the electors of the Empire, he did not hesitate to conduct secret negotiations with the King of Sweden and with the exiled Bohemians. After Gustavus Adolphus’s victories in Germany, however, he accepted once more the supreme command of the imperial forces. Defeated at Lützen (16 Nov. 1632), he withdrew to Bohemia and maintained an ambiguous stance. The emperor, influenced by his enemies, deprived him of command, and under the accusation of having betrayed the imperial cause, Wallenstein fell victim to a conspiracy among his officers, fomented by the court of Vienna.