Alexander Siemens

Who was Alexander Siemens?

Alexander Siemens was a German electrical engineer.

Siemens was born in Hanover, then a kingdom within the German Confederation, to Gustav and Sophie Siemens. His father was a judge and a cousin of William Siemens the famous electrical engineer. He was educated in Hanover and moved to Woolwich, London in 1867 to work with at the Siemens Brothers factory. He returned to the German Confederation in 1868 to study at the University of Berlin, interrupting his studies there to lay telegraph cables in the Middle East. These cables were to form part of the Indo-European Telegraph and much of the work was undertaken by Siemens Brothers.

Upon the annexation of Hanover by Prussia in 1866 following the Austro-Prussian War Siemens became a Prussian citizen and liable to conscription. He was conscripted in 1870 as a private to fight in the Franco-Prussian War where he was wounded at the Battle of Beaune-la-Rolande. It was for his actions in this battle where Prussian forces won a decisive victory over the numerically superior French army that he was awarded the Iron Cross.