He was born at Dresden in 1791, the son of the consistorial councillor Christian Gottfried Körner and his wife Minna Stock Körner. He was raised by his parents and by his aunt, the artist Dora Stock, who lived in the home.

After his education, he chose mining as an occupation. He moved to Vienna, where he befriended Wilhelm von Humboldt, the Prussian ambassador, Karl Wilhelm Friedrich von Schlegel, and other eminent literary and scientific men. Here, within the short space of fifteen months, he produced a succession of dramas, operas, and farces, as well as several small poems. The success of his works obtained him the appointment of poet to the court.

He left Vienna in March 1813, and joined the Lützow Free Corps (a voluntary association) which Major von Lützow was then forming. In the midst of the most active campaigns, Körner continued to write poetry and other works. He wrote a singspiel, Der vierjährige Posten, which was set to music by Franz Schubert in 1815, but the piece was not performed until 1869, when it was staged at the Hofoper, Dresden. It was later adapted in English as The Outpost.

On 28 May, Major von Lützow had determined on setting out on an expedition towards Thuringia, with four squadrons of his cavalry, and fifty cossacks. Korner earnestly entreated permission to accompany him, and his desire was fulfilled by his being appointed adjutant by Major von Lützow, who highly esteemed him, and wished to have him near his person.

The expedition passed in ten days through Halberstadt, Eisleben, Buttstadt, and Schlaitz, to Plauen, though not without encountering the enemy, who were dispersed throughout these districts, but, also, not without effecting some important results. Intelligence and information were procured, ammunition was captured, and prisoners were taken. As a result, the French emperor planned to destroy the corps, and the 1813 armistice provided an opportunity for putting it in practice.

Major von Lützow had received official information of the armistice at Plauen. Without expecting to meet with any opposition, he chose the shortest route to rejoin the infantry of his corps, having received assurance of safety from the enemy's commanding officers, and proceeded, without interruption, to Kitzen, near Leipzig; but here he found himself surrounded and menaced by a very superior force. Körner was despatched to demand an explanation; but, instead of replying, the commander of the enemy struck at him with his sword, and ordered a general attack be made on the three squadrons of the Lützow cavalry. Several were wounded and taken, and others dispersed in the surrounding country; but Major von Lützow himself was saved by the assistance of a squadron of Uhlans, who had been in advance with the Cossacks. He reached, with a considerable number of his troops, the right bank of the Elbe, where the infantry of his corps, and a squadron of its cavalry, were already assembled.

Körner received the first blow, which he was not prepared to parry, as he approached the enemy's commanding officer to deliver his message, and was severely wounded in the head. He managed to escape on his horse to a nearby forest. After he had assisted a wounded comrade, he noticed an enemy troop that was in pursuit of him, and called with a loud voice, "Fourth squadron, — Advance!" His ruse succeeded — the enemy drew back, and he was able to retreat farther into the forest. The pain of his head wound had become very severe. It was in this position that he composed the sonnet Abschied vom Leben (Farewell to Life), of which the following is a translation:

Farewell to Life

(Written in the night of the 17th and 18 June, as I lay, severely wounded and helpless in a wood, expecting to die.)

"My deep wound burns; — my pale lips quake in death, —

I feel my fainting heart resign its strife,

And reaching now the limit of my life,

Lord, to thy will I yield my parting breath!

Yet many a dream hath charm'd my youthful eye;

And must life's fairy visions all depart;

Oh surely no! for all that fired my heart

To rapture here, shall live with me on high.

And that fair form that won my earliest vow,

That my young spirit prized all else above,

And now adored as freedom, now as love,

Stands in seraphic guise, before me now.

And as my fading senses fade away,

It beckons me, on high, to realms of endless day!"

During the night he heard the enemy searching the forest near him, but afterwards fell asleep, and was saved in the morning by two peasants. He was conveyed secretly into Leipzig, which was then under French control, and where the concealment of any of the Lützow Free Corps was prohibited, under severe punishment. He subsequently travelled to Berlin, and having recovered from his wound, rejoined the corps of Lützow on the right bank of the Elbe.

Hostilities recommenced on 17 August; and on the 28th an engagement took place near Rosenberg, in which Körner fell. He had been in pursuit of a group of the enemy, when the riflemen, who had found a rallying place in some under-wood, sent forth a shower of balls upon their pursuers. By one of these Korner was wounded in the abdomen, the liver and spine were injured, and he was immediately deprived of speech and consciousness. He was carried to a neighbouring wood, but could not be revived. He was buried under an oak in the village of Wobbelin, about a mile from Ludwigslust. A tomb has since been placed over his remains, and enclosed by a wall. He died at the age of twenty - one. His Poetischer Nachlass were edited by his father and published at Leipzig in 1815.

According to J.R. Miller in "Homemaking" (now published as "The Family"), Körner had a very close friendship with his sister, and when he died, "she survived him only long enough to complete his portrait and to draw with the pencil of love a sketch of his last resting place." Miller quotes a poem by "Mrs. Hemans" about their mutual devotion.

Of his light comedies, Die Braut (The Bride, 1812) and Der grüne Domino (The Green Mask, 1812) were very successful, and Der Nachtwächter (The Night Watch, 1812) was notable. The drama Zriny, an historical tragedy, is the most ambitious of his works.