Frederick Augustus, Duke of Oels

Frederick Augustus of Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel (29 October 1740, Wolfenbüttel – 8 October 1805, Eisenach) was a German nobleman and Prussian general. A prince of Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel and thus one of the Dukes of Brunswick-Lüneburg, in 1792 he was granted the Duchy of Oels and the Duchy of Bernstadt and thus also became the ruling duke of these duchies.

One of thirteen children of Charles I, Duke of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel and his wife Princess Philippine Charlotte of Prussia, in 1754 he became a captain in the Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel Lifeguard regiment and on 28 April 1761 became an oberst and commander of the Zastrow Foot Regiment. During the Seven Years' War he fought at Vellinghausen, Wilhelmsthal, Melsungen, Homburg and Fritzlar. On 17 August 1761 he was made a major general and in October that year fought at Ölper and thus in the liberation of the city of Brunswick from its last siege. In her ode Über den Entsatz von Braunschweig (1761), Anna Luise Karsch wrote:

In 1764 she followed it with an Ode über die Vorzüge des Prinzen Friedrichs von Braunschweig.

He and two of his brothers (Wilhelm Adolf and Leopold) were freemasons and from 1771 he was a Socius, Amicus et Fautor ordinis member of the Rite of Strict Observance, in which he was made Prefect of the Temple (Berlin) in 1773 as Superior und Protector ordinis. From 1772 to 1799 he was made National Grand Master of the Grand National Mother Lodge 'Zu den drei Weltkugeln', another of whose members was Frederick II of Prussia. The Freimaurerlexikon of 1932 states he had a strong mystical predisposition and called him an alchemist, Rosicrucian, exorcist and miracle-working doctor, in constant contact with the "great swindlers of the order" (namely Gottlieb Franz Xaver Gugomos and the Leipzig cafe owner Schröpfer). With his uncle Duke Ferdinand of Brunswick and despite warnings from Du Bosc and Karl Eberhard von Wächter, he kept in contact with the Count of Saint Germain, an internationally-famous alchemist and occultist.

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