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Franz Ritter von Hipper (13 September 1863 – 25 May 1932) was an admiral in the German Imperial Navy (''Kaiserliche Marine''). Franz von Hipper joined the German Navy in 1881 as an officer cadet. He commanded several torpedo boat units and served as watch officer aboard several warships, as well as Kaiser Wilhelm II's yacht . Hipper commanded several cruisers in the reconnaissance forces before being appointed commander of the I Scouting Group in October 1913. He held this position until 1918, when he succeeded Admiral Reinhard Scheer as commander of the High Seas Fleet. He is most famous for commanding the German battlecruisers of the I Scouting Group during World War I, particularly at the Battle of Jutland on 31 May – 1 June 1916. During the war, Hipper led the German battlecruisers on several raids of the English coast, for which he was vilified in the English press as a "baby killer." His squadron clashed with the British battlecruiser squadron at the Battle of Dogger Bank in January 1915, where the armored cruiser was lost. At the Battle of Jutland, Hipper's flagship was sunk, though his ships succeeded in sinking three British battlecruisers. After the end of the war in 1918, Franz von Hipper retired from the Imperial Navy with a full pension. He initially lived under an alias and moved frequently to avoid radical revolutionaries during the German Revolution of 1918–1919. After the revolution settled, he moved to Altona outside Hamburg. Unlike his superior, Reinhard Scheer, he never published a memoir of his service during the war. Hipper died on 25 May 1932. The ''Kriegsmarine'' commemorated Hipper with the launching of the heavy cruiser in 1938. ==Early life== Franz Hipper was born to Anton and Anna Hipper in Weilheim in Oberbayern, some south of Munich, on 13 September 1863. His father, a shop-keeper, died when Franz was three. When Franz turned five, he began his education at a Catholic grammar school in Munich.〔Philbin, p. 1〕 At the age of ten, Franz attended the ''Gymnasium'' in Munich. Hipper graduated from the ''Gymnasium'' in 1879 with an ''Obersekunda''—the equivalent of a high school diploma.〔Philbin, p. 2〕 After completing his education, Hipper signed up as a volunteer reserve officer (''Einjährig-Freiwilliger''), a one-year volunteer position in the German military. After basic officer training in 1879, Hipper decided to join the navy. He went to Kiel, where he took the ''Pressen'', courses designed to prepare officers for the naval entrance examination, which he successfully passed. On 12 April 1881, at the age of 18, Franz Hipper became an officer of the Imperial German Navy.〔 Among the fellow cadets of the 1881 class was Wilhelm Souchon, who went on to command the Mediterranean Division at the outbreak of World War I.〔Waldeyer-Hartz, p. 12〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Franz von Hipper」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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