15th Panzer Division (Wehrmacht)

15th Panzer Division
Troop registration 1941–1943
active	November 1, 1940 to May 1943 (extermination) / 30. June 1943 (official dissolution)
Country	German Empire
Armed forces	Wehrmacht
Armed forces	army
Branch of service	Armored force
Type	Panzer Division
structure	structure
Insinuation	German Africa Corps
Installation site	Landau / Heidelberg
Second World War	Africa campaign Company Theseus Operation Crusader El Alamein 1 El Alamein 2 Battle for Tunisia Battle of the Kasserin Pass
Commanders
list of	Commanders

The 15th Panzer Division was a major unit of the German Wehrmacht in World War II .

history

The Panzer Division was formed on November 1, 1940 in Landau and Heidelberg through reclassification and dissolution of the 33rd Infantry and Levies of the 10th Panzer Division . She was shipped to Tripoli in April and May 1941 and placed under the command of the German Africa Corps. She initially remained in defensive positions around Tripoli until Rommel's unauthorized attack on Tobruk . There she was involved in a positional war near Sollum and the Halfaya Pass .

Operation Crusader began in November 1941 and the division had to withdraw via Mechilli , Bir Hacheim and Benghazi to Marsa el Brega . Then the division was transferred to the reserve in order to proceed again to Tobruk from February 1942 in the Theseus company . The first and second battles of El Alamein followed , in which the division suffered heavy losses. From the end of November she was involved in retreat fights on the Fuka Pass, through the Cyrenaica to Tripoli and on via Buerat to the Mareth Line in southern Tunisia .

In February and March 1943, the division began counter-attacks from the Mareth Line in the Gafsa / Thelepte area as far as the Kasserin Pass . After the end of this battle, the division withdrew via Medjez el Bab to the south of Tunis. The 15th Panzer Division was destroyed south of Tunis in May 1943.

people

Commanders

• Lieutenant General Friedrich Kühn - Listed by March 21, 1941
• Major General Max Eichstädt - April 10 to April 16, 1941 (fallen)
• Major General Heinrich von Prittwitz and Gaffron - March 22 to April 10, 1941 (fallen)
• Major General Hans-Karl Freiherr von Esebeck - April 13 to May 13, 1941 (wounded)
• Lieutenant Colonel Maximilian von Herff - 13. – 26. May 1941 (entrusted with the management)
• Major General Walter Neumann-Silkow - May 26 to December 6, 1941 (wounded, † December 9, 1941 in the hospital)
• Colonel Erwin Menny - 6-8 . December 1941
• Major General Gustav von Vaerst - December 9, 1941 to May 26, 1942 (wounded)
• Colonel Eduard Crasemann - May 26 to July 15, 1942 (in charge of the tour)
• Major General Heinz von Randow - July 15 to August 25, 1942
• Major General Gustav von Vaerst - August 25 to August 31, 1942
• Major General Heinz von Randow - August 31 to September 17, 1942
• Major General Gustav von Vaerst - September 17 to November 18, 1942 (ill)
• Major General Willibald Borowietz - November 18, 1942 to May 10, 1943 (taken prisoner with the division)

Well-known members of the division

• Maximilian von Herff (1893–1945), SS-Obergruppenführer and General of the Waffen-SS as well as during the Second World War from 1942 head of the SS Personnel Office, was from November 11, 1940 in command of the Rifle Regiment 115.

structure

1941 Libya	1943 Tunisia
8th Panzer Regiment
Rifle Brigade 15th Rifle Regiment 104 (until August 1941, then handed over to the 21st Panzer Division ) 115th Rifle Regiment Motorbike Rifle Battalion 15th	155th Panzer Grenadier Regiment
Artillery Regiment, later 33rd Panzer Artillery Regiment
Reconnaissance Department 33
Panzerjäger detachment 33
Tank Engineer Battalion 33
Panzer Divisions News Department 78
Field Replacement Battalion 33
Supply troops, later tank supply troops 33

Replacement troops for the staff: Infantry Replacement Battalion 104 in Darmstadt and later in Posen

literature

• 15th Panzer Division. In: Veit Scherzer (Ed.): German troops in the Second World War. Volume 5. Scherzers Militaer-Verlag, Ranis / Jena 2009, ISBN 978-3-938845-22-6 , pp. 46-66.
• Samuel W. Mitcham : German Order of Battle.Panzer, Panzer Grenadier, and Waffen SS Divisions in World War II. Stackpole Books, 2007, ISBN 978-0-8117-3438-7 .
• Georg Tessin : Associations and troops of the German Wehrmacht and Waffen SS in World War II 1939–1945. Volume 4. The Land Forces 15–30 . 2nd Edition. Biblio-Verlag, Osnabrück 1976, ISBN 3-7648-1083-1 .

Web links

• Organizational History of the German Armored Forces 1939 - 1945. (PDF; 292 kB) Retrieved September 15, 2011 (English). 

Individual evidence

1. ↑ See Scherzer 2009; P. 46 f.
2. ↑ See Scherzer 2009; P. 47 f.
3. ↑ See Scherzer 2009; P. 48 f.
4. ↑ See Scherzer 2009; P. 49; Dates differ there.
5. ↑ See Scherzer 2009; P. 46