Ferdinand Baptista von Schill was a Prussian officer who revolted unsuccessfully against French domination in May 1809.
Schill was born at Wilmsdorf and entered the Prussian Armys cavalry at the age of twelve or fourteen . His father, JohannGeorg Schill, had been an ambitious commoner from Bohemia, who attained the aristocratic von for his services to Austria and Saxony during the Seven Years War. J.G. von Schill had raised a Freikorps, a small raiding party of cavalry and mounted infantry, operating behind enemy lines, and acquired some measure of fame and success. Many of Ferdinand von Schills later biographers assumed that his fathers example was an important influence on his subsequent career.
Source: Wikipedia