10th SS Panzer Division "Frundsberg"
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10th SS Panzer Grenadier Division |
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|---|---|
 Troop registration |
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| active | February 1, 1943 to May 8, 1945 |
| Country |
.svg){kind=small} German Empire
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| Armed forces |
 Armed SS
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| Type | Armored Division |
| structure | See outline |
| Second World War | Western front |
| commander | |
| list of | Commanders |
The 10th SS Panzer Division “Frundsberg” was a tank division of the Waffen SS during the Second World War .
history
The division was established on February 1, 1943 as the 10th SS Panzer Grenadier Division in occupied southern France . On June 1, 1943, while it was still in operation, it was converted into a Panzer Division. On October 3, 1943, she was given the honorary name "Frundsberg" .
The division was originally supposed to be named " Charlemagne ", but was eventually named after Georg von Frundsberg , a mercenary leader from the 16th century. Similar to the names of other SS divisions e.g. For example, the 9th SS Panzer Division “Hohenstaufen” or the 7th SS Volunteer Mountain Division “Prinz Eugen” should remind the name Frundsberg of outstanding events or personalities in German history. The name also reflects a dispute taking place within the SS about the military models of the Waffen SS. While Heinrich Himmler elevated the German knights to the role model, other SS leaders, including Gottlob Berger , Felix Steiner and Oskar Dirlewanger , preferred the mercenaries. The naming of units with Götz von Berlichingen and Florian Geyer should also be seen against this background. The Landsknechte Grimmelshausen were only nominally godparents . The actual model was based on the ideal of the Landsknecht, newly coined by Ernst Jünger after the First World War .
Lineup
After the Battle of Stalingrad , the SS Panzer Corps with the first three Panzer Divisions of the Waffen SS was relocated from France to the Eastern Front. In order to ward off the expected invasion of the Western Allies, the Waffen-SS was to set up two new tank divisions (No. 9 and 10). These reorganizations began in January 1943. At that time, the number of war volunteers was no longer sufficient, so that for the first time a large number of conscripted recruits were forcibly conscripted into the Waffen SS. The division was used as a reserve after training in southern France and Normandy . Many French and Danube Swabians with Hungarian citizenship served in their ranks . The Danube Swabians of Hungarian nationality were drafted into the Waffen-SS on April 14, 1944 due to the German-Hungarian agreement on the conscription of ethnic Germans of all ages in the Waffen-SS.
Deployment areas in France
The first stationing area, from February 1, 1943, comprised an 80 × 80 km installation area in the area between Bordeaux , Limoges and La Rochelle . The division headquarters were in Angoulême .
The second stationing area for the period July to August 1943 was an accommodation area, also about 80 × 80 km in size, in the area east of the city of Biarritz in southern France. The divisional headquarters were in Salies-de-Béarn around 20 km east of Biarritz.
The third stationing area, from August 11, 1943, was an approximately 50 × 60 km large accommodation area in the area north of Marseille . The division headquarters was in Richebois . The reason for the new relocation was the looming change of sides in Italy. The division was supposed to take part in the Siegfried operation , i.e. the takeover of the territory occupied by the Italian 4th Army in southern France. From October 11, 1943, the division was fully equipped in this station area, in particular with motor vehicles from the captured stock of the Italian army. Up to this point the division had almost no vehicles and insufficient armament.
The fourth stationing area, from the beginning of November 1943, was an accommodation area near the canal coast between the rivers Dives and Seine in the area around the city of Lisieux . This was also where the division staff was located.
commitment
In March 1944, the 10th SS Division and its sister division ( 9th SS Panzer Division "Hohenstaufen" ) were relocated to Tarnopol in Galicia to attack the 1st Panzer Army trapped in the Kamenez-Podolski pocket from the outside to support the boiler flank in its breakout to the northwest.
Five days after the start of Operation Overlord , on June 11, 1944, both divisions were forced to move back to France. It was first used in Normandy on June 29, 1944 at Avrecy on the Odon river , around 12 km southwest of Caen . The aim of the II. SS Panzer Corps and thus also the subordinate division "Frundsberg" was to prevent the Allies from breaking out of the landing area to the east. Fights followed near Vire, around 20 km southwest . After the Allies broke out of the landing bridgehead as part of Operation Cobra , the division was trapped in the Falaise pocket. After the eruption, remnants fought their way back across the Seine and were in the Netherlands in September to refresh .
Together with the 9th SS Panzer Division "Hohenstaufen" in September 1944, rapidly assembled alarm units of the two divisions thwarted the Allies' attempt to occupy the Rhine bridge in Arnhem ( Operation Market Garden ) after heavy fighting . The focus of the fighting in the Frundsberg division was in Arnhem and later in the area around the town of Elst . After the abandonment of the town of Elst, the division withdrew to the defensive position Arnheim-Millingen to the east.
On October 27th, parts of the Frundsberg Panzer Division were moved to a bridgehead position in Heusden on the Maas north of 's-Hertogenbosch in order to secure the retreat of the German 15th Army across the Maas. The mission ended after the Heusden bridgehead had been cleared and the two Maas bridges had been blown up.
From November 22nd to December 6th, 1944, fighting followed on the Rurfront near Linnich north of Aachen .
On December 6, 1944, the division was relocated to the Kerpen / Blatzheim-Euskirchen area to refresh and served as a reserve for the German 6th Panzer Army during the Ardennes offensive . Only smaller parts of the division (SS Panzer Flak Department 10, SS Panzer Artillery Regiment 10) were used during the Battle of the Bulge in the Sankt Vith area. From January 14, 1945 to February 3, 1945 the Frundsberg division was deployed as part of the Nordwind company in northern Alsace . The operational area was around the Gambsheim bridgehead .
From February 16 to March 20, 1945, after a transfer to the Eastern Front to Army Group Vistula, combat missions followed near Stettin , Stargard and Reetz in Pomerania as part of the Sonnenwende company . This was followed by another relocation to the Fürstenwalde area .
In April 1945 the division was encircled near Spremberg , but was able to break out to the west and was repeatedly involved in fighting with the advancing units of the 1st Ukrainian Front . There were larger skirmishes in the area of Kausche and Plessa , where the division was encircled again in the Kausche pocket and ultimately wiped out when it broke out again towards the west. Scattered remnants of the 10th SS Panzer Division, pushed south by the advancing Soviet forces, surrendered to the Americans at the end of the war in northern Bohemia near Teplitz-Schönau and in Bad Schandau on the Elbe.
structure
- SS Panzer Regiment 10
- SS-Panzer-Grenadier-Regiment 21 (previously SS-Pz. Gren. Rgt. 1 "Frundsberg")
- SS-Panzer-Grenadier-Regiment 22 (previously SS-Pz. Gren. Rgt. 2 "Frundsberg")
- SS motorcyclists - regiment 10
- SS Panzer Artillery Regiment 10
- SS Flak Artillery - Division 10
- SS assault gun division 10
- SS Panzerjäger detachment 10
- SS Panzer pioneer - Battalion 10
- SS Panzer News Department 10
- SS supply units 10
Commanders
- January 8 to February 15, 1943 SS-Standartenführer Michael Lippert
- February 15 to November 15, 1943 SS brigade leader and major general of the Waffen SS Lothar Debes
- November 15, 1943 to April 27, 1944 SS-Gruppenführer and Lieutenant General of the Waffen-SS Karl von Fischer-Treuenfeld
- April 27, 1944 to April 28, 1945 SS-Brigadführer and Major General of the Waffen-SS Heinz Harmel
- April 28 to May 8, 1945 SS-Obersturmbannführer Franz Roestel
Lieutenant General Fischer von Treuenfeld - Commander 1943–1944
Major General Harmel - Commander 1944–1945
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Known relatives
- Günter Grass
The Nobel Prize for Literature Günter Grass served - according to his own statements and as evidenced by his prisoner-of-war files - after completing his basic military training from November 10, 1944 until he was wounded on April 20, 1945 as a loader in the Division's 10th SS Panzer Regiment.
- Konrad Meyer
The German agricultural scientist Konrad Meyer , the founder of scientific spatial planning in Germany and co-author of a partial plan of the General Plan East , was transferred to the division as SS-Oberjunker in April 1945 .
Captured tanks
From the beginning of 1943 until the surrender in 1945, the Wehrmacht and the Waffen-SS used captured Sherman tanks of various versions under the designation Panzerkampfwagen (PzKpfw.) M4 748 (a) at the front. Shermans were captured in fighting in North Africa and Italy as well as on the Western and Eastern Fronts. The Shermans were used as battle tanks, armored recovery vehicles and ammunition tugs. The turret was dismantled on the Shermans not used as main battle tanks . In the 10th SS Panzer Division "Frundsberg" ten Shermans were temporarily in action. In all other German associations fewer Shermans were in use, mostly only one-offs.
literature
- Jean-Luc Leleu: 10th SS Panzer Division "Frundsberg", Normandy 1944. Editions Heimdal, Bayeux : 1999, ISBN 2-84048-125-1 . (in French - Album historique series . )
- Rolf Michaelis: The 10th SS Panzer Division "Frundsberg" . Dörfler Verlag (licensed edition), Eggolsheim 2004, ISBN 978-3-89555-594-7 .
- Stephan Cazenave: Chronicle of the SS-Pz-Aufklärungsabteilung 10 “Frundsberg” . Leonidas, Barsinghausen 2008, ISBN 978-3-940504-13-5 (original edition: Editions Heimdal).
- Jean Mabire: Panzers SS in l'enfer normand. Les divisions "Hohenstaufen" et "Frundsberg" pendant l'été 1944. (Collection Témoignages pour l'histoire) Grancher, Paris 2001, ISBN 2-7339-0734-4 .
- Georg Tessin : Associations and troops of the German Wehrmacht and Waffen SS in World War II 1939–1945. Volume 3: The Land Forces 6-14 . 2nd Edition. Biblio-Verlag, Bissendorf 1974, ISBN 3-7648-0942-6 .
- Knut Stang: Knight, Landsknecht, Legionnaire: military-mythical models in the ideology of the SS . Peter Lang, Frankfurt, M. 2008, ISBN 978-3-631-58022-6 .
Web links
- Federal Archives, Military Archives Department, holdings RS 3–10, 10th SS Panzer Division Frundsberg The troops in the military archives.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Cf. Knut, Stang: Ritter, Landsknecht, Legionnaire, Military-Mythical Models in the Ideology of the SS, Peter Lang, Frankfurt 2008.