Karl Eduard Heusner

Who was Karl Eduard Heusner?

Karl Eduard Heusner was a Vice-Admiral of the German Imperial Navy.

Heusner entered the Prussian Navy in 1857 and 1859–1862, was on an expedition to the Far East on the frigate Thetis. In 1864 during the Second Schleswig War he commanded the Prussian gunboat the Wespe, and then was in the following years stationed in the Mediterranean and the West Indies. In 1872 he did survey work in the Baltic Sea and in 1873 and was chairman of the Torpedo Examination Board or Torpedo Depot at Kiel-Friedrichsort where he and Otto von Diederichs worked on the Whitehead torpedo.

In 1877 he left the Torpedo Depot and was sent with Tirpitz to the Whitehead Torpedo works at Fiume to further study the torpedo.

In 1878 to 1880 he was posted to South America to protect the interests of Germany during the War of the Pacific. Here he also supervised the observance of the neutrality laws. In 1882 Heusner was Chief of Section A1 of the Admiralty's Military Department, which was headed by Eduard von Knorr. In March, von Knorr put him to develop 'Plan-O' for naval operations against Russia in case of war.