Hitler's Commanders (58 page)

14. Christopher Chant, Richard Humble, William Fowler, and Jenny Shaw,
Hitler’s Generals and Their Battles
(New York: Chartwell Books, 1976), p. 98.

15. Brett-Smith,
Hitler’s Generals
, p. 53.

16. Harold C. Deutsch,
The
Conspiracy against Hitler in the Twilight War
(Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1978), p. 210.

17.
www.lexikon-der-wehrmacht.de/Personenregister/K/KuechlerGu.htm
.

18. Two divisions went to Army Group Center. The third division, the Spanish 250th (Blue) Infantry Division, was sent home at the demand of the Spanish dictator, Franco.

19. The 36th Infantry Division was later destroyed at Bobruisk in June 1944, during Operation Bagration, which the Germans called the Battle of White Russia.

20. James D. Carnes, “A Study in Courage: German General Walter von Seydlitz’ Opposition to Hitler” (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Tallahassee: Florida State University, 1976), p. 317 (hereafter cited as Carnes, “Seydlitz’ Opposition”).

21. Irving,
Hitler’s War
, volume 1, p. 77.

22.
Kriegstagebuch des Oberkommando des Wehrmacht (Wehrmachtfuehrungstab
) (Frankfurt-am-Main: Bernard and Graefe Verlag fuer Wehrwesen, 1961), January 1, 1943 (hereafter cited as KTB OKW).

23. Georg Tessin,
Verbaende und Truppen der deutschen Wehrmacht und Waffen-SS in Zweiten Weltkrieg, 1939–1945
(Frankfurt/Main: Verlag E. S. Mittler und Sohn, 1976), volume 3, pp. 5–6 (hereafter cited as Tessin,
Verbaende
); Keilig,
Die Generale
, p. 227.

24. Iron Rations were a concoction of chocolate laced with caffeine.

25. Lieutenant General Friedrich-August Weinknecht was born in Breslau in 1895 and entered the service as a war volunteer in 1914. Originally an engineer officer (he was commissioned in late 1915), he later joined the General Staff and commanded the 596th Infantry Regiment (1942–1943) and the 82nd Infantry Division (1943) on the Eastern Front. He assumed command of the 79th Infantry on October 25, 1943, and surrendered to the Russians on August 29, 1944. Released in October 1955, he retired to Goettinger, where he died on October 26, 1964.

26. For the story of the last days of the IV Corps and more detailed descriptions of the encirclement of the 6th Army, see Seaton,
Russo-German War
, pp. 467–86, and Walter Rehm,
Jassy
(Neckargem: K. Vowinckel, 1959).

27. AEF,
Divisions of the German Army
, p. 655.

28. Heinrici had served as acting commander of the VII Corps from January 31 to February 12, 1940, while General of Infantry Ritter Eugen von Schobert was on leave.

29. Ludwig Kuebler (born 1889) previously commanded the XXXX Mountain Corps. He returned to duty as commander of Security Troops and Rear Area Center in the summer of 1943. He commanded LXXXVII Mountain Corps in the Balkans from the fall of 1944 until the end of the war. The Yugoslavians hanged him after a show trial in 1947.

30. Kurt von Tippelskirch (1891–1957) previously commanded the 30th Infantry Division (1941–1942) and the XII Corps (1943–1944). After serving as deputy commander of the 1st Army in France (1944) and the 14th Army in Italy (1944–45), he was named commander of the 25th Army in April 1945.

31. Island Farm Prisoner of War Camp website,
www.islandfarm.fsnet.co.uk
(accessed 2011).

Chapter 3: The Generals of Stalingrad

1. “Friedrich Paulus” in German Army Personnel Records, World War II Records Division, National Archives, Washington, D.C. (hereafter cited as Paulus personnel file).

2. Paulus personnel file.

3. Walter Goerlitz,
Paulus and Stalingrad
(Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1974), pp. 10–12 (hereafter cited as Goerlitz,
Stalingrad
).

4. Shaw et al.,
Red Army
, p. 136.

5. William Craig,
Enemy at the Gates: The Battle of Stalingrad
(New York: E. P. Dutton, 1973), p. 11 (hereafter cited as Craig,
Enemy
).

6. When the war broke out, there were 18 Wehrkreise, numbered I through XVIII. All had territorial responsibilities except Wehrkreise XIV, XV, and XVI, which controlled Germany’s motorized infantry, light, and panzer divisions, respectively. These had no deputy components and ceased to be Wehrkreise when the war began.

7. Victor von Schwedler personnel file. Married in 1910, Schwedler had a daughter (Ruth), born in 1914, and a son, Detlof, born in 1922.

8. Irving,
Hitler’s War
, volume 1, p. 16.

9. Uli Haller,
Lieutenant General Karl Strecker
(Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 1994), pp. 2–3. This book is the source of much of the information on Strecker (hereafter cited as Haller,
Strecker
).

10. The Prussian police totaled men in 1920. There were 150,000 policemen in all of Germany (including Prussia).

11. Haller,
Strecker
, p. 25.

12. Haller,
Strecker
, pp. 41–42.

13. The permanent corps commander, General of Infantry Karl Hollidt, was on leave.

14. Carnes, “Seydlitz’ Opposition,” p. 3.

15. Carnes, “Seydlitz’ Opposition,” pp. 1–8.

16. Seydlitz joined the service as a Fahnenjunker on September 18, 1908. Service record of Walter von Seydlitz-Kurzbach, Air University Archives.

17. Keilig,
Die Generale
, p. 323.

18. Seydlitz personnel file, Air University Archives.

19. The fact that his death sentence was commuted did Count Sponeck little good. He was executed by the SS in 1944 (see chapter 2).

20. Carnes, “Seydlitz’ Opposition,” pp. 92–93.

21. Carell,
Hitler Moves East
, pp. 490–97.

22. Wolfgang Pickert was born on February 3, 1897, and entered the military service on August 2, 1914, as a member of the 73rd Field Artillery Regiment during the first “rush to the colors” on the eve of World War I. He served on both the Eastern and Western fronts. He apparently received his commission during the war; in any event, he was retained in the 100,000-man army. From 1921 to 1935 he was primarily associated with the 1st Artillery Regiment in East Prussia. During this period he underwent General Staff training, was detailed to the Soviet Army during their maneuvers and became interested in anti-aircraft artillery. After that he was a tactics instructor at the AA school (1934–1935), on the staff of the AA inspectorate at the Air Ministry (1935–1937), and commander of the I Battalion, 49th Anti-Aircraft Regiment at Mannheim (1937–1938). He was chief of staff of the XIII Luftwaffe Administrative Command (1938–1939), during which he underwent pilot training. He was a General Staff officer on the staff of the Rhine-Ruhr Air Defense District when the war broke out. In May, 1940, Pickert became chief of staff of the I Flak Corps and a few months later rose to chief of staff of Air Fleet Reich. He held this post until May 1942, when he assumed command of the 9th Flak Division. General Pickert was married and had three children (Pickert personnel file).

23. Carell,
Hitler Moves East
, p. 634.

24. Carnes, “Seydlitz’ Opposition,” pp. 151–52.

25. Carnes, “Seydlitz’ Opposition,” pp. 158, 166–67.

26. Plocher, MS 1942.

27. Plocher, MS 1942, citing Schroeter,
Stalingrad
, pp. 92–94.

28. F. W. von Mellenthin,
German Generals of World War II
(Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1977), p. 115 (hereafter cited as Mellenthin,
German Generals
).

29. Plocher, MS 1942.

30. Paulus personnel file; Keilig,
Die Generale
, p. 303.

31. V. I. Chuikov,
The Battle for Stalingrad
(New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1964; reprint ed., New York: Ballantine Books, 1969), p. 254.

32. Erich von Manstein,
Lost Victories
, Anthony G. Powell, trans. and ed. (Novato, Calif.: Presidio Press, 1982), pp. 332–34 (hereafter cited as Manstein,
Lost Victories
). Eismann later served on the staff of the rebuilt 6th Army. Promoted to full colonel, he was Ia of Army Group Vistula.

33. Craig,
Enemy
, p. 363.

34. Haller,
Strecker
, p. 50.

35. Haller,
Strecker
, p. 52.

36. Haller,
Strecker
, p. 54.

37. Stermmermann, the commander of XI Corps, was killed on February 18, 1944, during the breakout attempt.

38. Speer,
Inside the Third Reich
, p. 394n.

39. Axis Biographical Research, “Wolfgang Pickert,”
www.geocities.com
/~orion47 (accessed 2011). Rudolf Absolon, comp.,
Rangliste der Generale der deutschen Luftwaffe Nach dem Stand vom 20. April 1945
(Friedberg: Podzun-Pallas Verlag, 1984), p. 30 (hereafter cited as Absolon,
Rangliste
).

40. Craig,
Enemy
, p. 335.

41. Friedrich von Stauffenberg, personal communication, 1985.

42. According to General Plocher (MS 1943). Keilig (
Die Generale
, p. 156) says it was LXXXII Corps.

43. Ziemke,
Stalingrad to Berlin
, pp. 293–94.

44. Josef Folttmann and Hanns Moeller-Witten,
Opfergang der Generale
(Berlin: Verlag Bernard & Graefe, 1952), p. 133.

45. Haller,
Strecker.

46. Haller,
Strecker.

47. Haller,
Strecker.

48. For a detailed account of this incident from one of the officers who accompanied Hube, see Samuel W. Mitcham, Jr., and Friedrich von Stauffenberg,
The Battle of Sicily
(New York: Crown Publishers, 1991).

Chapter 4: The Commanders in the West

1. E. H. Stevens, ed.,
The Trial of Nikolaus von Falkenhorst
(London: William Hodge and Company, 1949), p. xxxv.

2. Erich Dethleffsen was born in Kiel in 1904 and entered the Reichsheer as a Fahnenjunker in 1923. Commissioned in the 8th Infantry Regiment in 1927, he transferred to the East Prussian 1st Infantry Regiment, where he became a battalion adjutant. Later he was adjutant to the fortress commander in Koenigsberg. He attended General Staff training at the War Academy (1935–1937) and occupied a variety of General Staff positions, including group leader in the Army Training Department (1939–1941), Ia of the LVI Corps (1941), and Ia of the 330th Infantry Division on the Eastern Front, where he was seriously wounded in February 1942. He returned to duty in August as an instructor at the War Academy, where he was promoted to colonel in the spring of 1943. He was then named chief of staff of the XXXIX Panzer Corps (June 1943), chief of staff of 4th Army (May 1944), and chief of operations of OKW’s operations staff (March 1945). He briefly commanded an ad hoc division and became chief of staff of Army Group Vistula the day Hitler committed suicide. Promoted to major general on November 9, 1944, he surrendered to the British in May 1945, and was released from the POW camps in the spring of 1948. He died in Munich in 1980.

3. Harry R. Fletcher, “Legion Condor: Hitler’s Military Aid to Franco, 1936–1939 (unpublished M.A. thesis, Madison: University of Wisconsin, 1961), pp. 143–47 (hereafter cited as Fletcher, “Legion Condor”); Karl Drum,
The German Air Force in the Spanish Civil War
, United States Air Force Historical Studies Number 150, United States Air Force Historical Division, Aerospace Studies Institute, Maxwell Air Force Base (Montgomery, Ala.: The Air University, 1965).

4. Fletcher, “Legion Condor,” pp. 147–48.

5. After a career as an army engineer, Helmuth von Volkmann transferred to the Luftwaffe in 1934 and, after commanding the Condor Legion, directed the Air War Academy and rose to the rank of general of fliers. He fell out with Hermann Goering and transferred back to the army as a general of infantry in early 1940. Despite his rank, Volkmann commanded the 94th Infantry Division in France. He died in a hospital in Berlin on August 21, 1940, as a result of injuries sustained in an automobile accident. He was born in 1889.

6. Brett-Smith,
Hitler’s Generals
, p. 124.

7. Cajus Bekker,
The Luftwaffe War Diaries
, Frank Ziegler, trans. and ed. (New York: Macdonald and Company, 1966; reprint ed., New York: Ballantine Books, 1969), pp. 156–59.

8.
Jagdfliegerfuehrer
1—literally “Fighter Leader 1”—is translated here as 1st Fighter Command, to conform to the English language.

9. Winston S. Churchill,
Their Finest Hour
(Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1949), p. 331.

10. Robert Wistrich,
Who’s Who in Nazi Germany
(New York: Macmillan, 1982), pp. 294–95 (hereafter cited as Wistrich,
Who’s Who
).

11. Interrogation of Lieutenant General Karl Veith, Air University Archives. Veith (1894–1979) commanded Air Defense Command Black Forest (1940), 5th Flak Brigade (1940–1942), and 17th Flak Division (1942–1944). He ended the war as commander, Flak Schools Division, Brunswick (1944–1945). He briefly commanded all flak artillery schools in 1944.

12. Wistrich,
Who’s Who
, pp. 294–95.

13. Paul Joseph Goebbels,
The Goebbels Diaries
, Louis P. Lochner, ed. (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1948; reprint ed., New York: Universal-Award House, 1971), March 9, 1943.

14. Hans Speidel,
Invasion 1944
(New York: Henry Regnery, 1950; reprint ed., New York: Paperback Library, 1968), p. 46 (hereafter cited as Speidel,
Invasion
).

15. Charles B. MacDonald and Martin Blumenson, “Recovery of France,” in Vincent J. Esposito, ed.,
A Concise History of World War II
(New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1964), p. 80.

16. Lionel F. Ellis,
Victory in the West
, Volume I,
The Battle of Normandy
(London: HMSO, 1962), p. 111 (hereafter cited as Ellis,
Victory
).