 His family moved to Arad in the Transylvanian region of Hungary (now part of Romania) in 1867.He was a qualified general staff officer and certainly by his appointment at the cadet school at Kraków in 1901 was already a member of the general staff.He was involved with the German attacks that were repulsed by the Russians on the Dvina and at Cebrow in Galicia on 9 March 1916.