This is the autobiography of Paul Ludwig Hans Anton von Beneckendorf und von Hindenburg, to give him his full name, who was born on 2 October 1847 in Posen in what was then East Prussia. He was commissioned into the 3rd Regiment of Foot Guards on 7 April 1865. He first saw action in the Austro-Prussian War of 1866 (the Seven Weeks' War) and fought at Konnigratz (Sadowa), the battle that decided that Prussia and not Austro-Hungary would be the dominant power in central Europe. . He fought in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870/71 which saw the birth of the German Empire with the King of Prussia,...