Born in the village of Heilsdorf, in the Saxon Vogtland, 3 August 1749, Nauendorf came from a family of minor Saxon aristocracy and Prussian state administrators. His grandfather was a states' attorney in Jena. His father, Freiherr (Baron) Carl Georg Christian Nauendorf, was a cavalry officer in Habsburg military service in the Seven Years' War, and was present at the Battle of Kolín. He was also part of Baron Ernst Gideon von Laudon's army on 30 September – 1 October 1761, when Laudon led the force in the storming of Schweidnitz.