Robert Alexander Bürkner
(6.12.1870 - 19.3.1925)
place of birth:  Berlin-Charlottenburg


Imperial German career officer who served during the Great War in corps and field army level general staffs on both fronts. At mobilization, Major Bürkner saw action on the Western Front serving on a divisional staff subordinate to the XXI. Army Corps (6th Field Army). He was wounded at Nancy-Epinal and spent the next three months on convalescent leave. Upon returning to action in December 1914, he was transferred to the staff of Korps Zastrow in the East, where they won a bloody, hard-fought victory against the Russians at Soldau.

After a few months in Antwerp, Bürkner was sent back East to function as XXI. Army Corps Chief of Staff under General von Hutier (later under von Oven). The corps was directed back to Upper Alsace area on the Western Front in 1917, and in 1918 Bürkner was promoted to lieutenant colonel and asked to head up the staff of General Ludwig Sieger's XVIII. Reserve Corps. It was during the Battle of Kemmel that Bürkner was recommended for the Pour le Merite. He was then back together with von Hutier by August, serving as his Chief of Staff in the 18th Field Army.

After the War, Bürkner continued his military service in the Reichswehr, ultimately earning promotion to Generalmajor in 1925. The staff officer had been born and raised in Berlin to the family of Robert Heinrich Bürkner and Alexandrine Knerk. He was later married to the former Ella Kröhnke, with whom he had four daughters. General Bürkner died in an apparent training accident on 19 March 1925 in Königsberg.