18th Infantry Division (Wehrmacht)

18th Infantry Division, 18th Motorized Infantry Division, 18th Panzer Grenadier Division
Troop registration
active	October 1934 as Infantry Leader III until July 28, 1944 (dissolution), later reduced reassignments until May 2, 1945
Country	German Empire
Armed forces	Wehrmacht
Armed forces	army
Branch of service	Infantry / Panzer Grenadiers
Type	Infantry Division
structure	structure
garrison	Liegnitz
Second World War	attack on Poland Battle of the Bzura French campaign Battle for Dunkirk German-Soviet War Battle of the cauldron near Białystok and Minsk Kettle battle near Smolensk Leningrad blockade Battle of Demyansk Repel Operation Iskra Defense against Operation Bagration Battle for East Prussia Battle for Berlin
Commanders
list of	Commanders
insignia
Troop registration number 2

The 18th Infantry - Division was a major unit of the Army of the Wehrmacht . In November 1940 it was motorized and has since been called the 18th Infantry Division (motorized) . In 1943 the association was renamed the 18th  Panzer Grenadier Division .

history

The division took part in the attack on Poland , in the western campaign and in the war against the Soviet Union . In 1944 it was destroyed during the Soviet major offensive Operation Bagration east of Minsk and set up again in the same year. At the beginning of 1945 it was wiped out again in the battle for East Prussia . In Eberswalde , the 18th Infantry Division was set up a third time, and only on the Oder, then to the defense of Berlin used.

Lineup

After the defeat of the German Reich in World War I, the German armed forces were subject to the restrictions of the Versailles Treaty . The imperial armed forces were disbanded and a Reichswehr was set up. The Reichsheer was divided into two group commands (Berlin and Kassel), three cavalry divisions and seven infantry divisions.

After Hindenburg's death and the swearing-in of the armed forces on Adolf Hitler (“ Führereid ”), the Reichswehr's A-Plan drawn up in 1932 was implemented and the number of divisions increased to 21. The leaders of the old divisions continued to be used. The Wehrgauleitungen led for camouflage purposes their designation according to the military district . That was the name of the division commander of the 3rd Division in Wehrkreiskommando III (Berlin), Infantry Leader III. The open term was only used from October 15, 1934.

On October 1, 1934, Major General Hermann Hoth took over the formation of the 18th Infantry Division from parts of the 3rd and 4th Divisions as Infantry Leader III in Liegnitz / Silesia . The establishment was made for the military district VIII .

First of all, it is composed as follows:

• Infantry Regiment 30 from Görlitz (from the III.Bataillon Görlitz of the 8th Prussian Infantry Regiment ), commanders: Colonel Hermann Boettcher , later Colonel Werner von Erdmannsdorff (later commander of the division)
• 51st Infantry Regiment from Liegnitz (from the Liegnitz training battalion), Commander: Lieutenant Colonel Wilhelm Bohnstedt
• Infantry Regiment 54 from Glogau (from the 2nd Battalion Glogau and parts of the Infantry Regiment 12 from Halberstadt), from May 1941 in parts to the 100th Infantry Division , I./Infanterie-Regiment 54 becomes III./Infanterie- Regiment 51 and III / Artillery Regiment 18, Commander: Lieutenant Colonel Otto-Ernst Ottenbacher , later Colonel Hermann Recknagel
• Artillery Regiment 18 from Glogau (from the batteries of the I. and V. (r) Artillery Regiment 3 and later the I. / Artillery Regiment 54), Commander: Colonel Richard Pellengahr , later Colonel Hans Berger
• I. / Artillery Regiment 54 from Glogau
• Anti-tank department 18 from Sagan (from 3rd / Motor vehicle department 3), Commander: Lieutenant Colonel / Colonel Walter Gleiniger
• Pioneer Battalion 18 from Glogau (from Pioneer Battalion 3)
• Infantry Division Intelligence Department 18 from Liegnitz (from the teaching and experimental command of Intelligence Department 3), Commander: Major Halder
• Medical Department 18 , Commander: Senior Field Physician Dr. Spar

The infantry regiments consisted of three battalions, the artillery regiments of four divisions, each with two batteries.

Further troops were incorporated until mobilization:

• At the beginning of August 1939 the reconnaissance department 18 in Oels (from the 1st, 5th and 7th squadrons of the 8th Cavalry Regiment ), commander: Lieutenant Colonel Carl-Hans Lungershausen
• on August 24, 1939, Infantry Division Supply Leader 18 in Sprottau
• on August 26, 1939 the field replacement battalion 18
• on April 1, 1943 the Panzer Reconnaissance Division 118 in Russia

attack on Poland

In preparation for the attack on Poland , the 18th Infantry Division was mobilized on August 26, 1939. It was subordinated to the 10th Army in Army Group South and deployed on the left flank in the Kreuzburg area. On September 1, 1939, the attack on Poland and with it the Second World War began . The Polish lines were quickly broken and the 18th Infantry Division advanced towards Warsaw . On the way she crossed the Widawka , a tributary of the Warta , at Szczerców on September 10th .

From September 9 to 19, 1939, the 18th Infantry Division fought in the Battle of the Bzura , the decisive battle for Poland. As early as the 19th, the artillery of the 18th Infantry Division took up position against Warsaw. On September 26, the 1st, 2nd and 10th Companies of Infantry Regiment 51 took Fort II ( Fort Wawrzyszew ) on the western edge of Warsaw.

First lieutenant , later posthumously Major Dietrich Steinhardt (Führer 2nd, fallen 1942) and Lieutenant, later posthumously Captain Josef Stolz (Führer 10th, fallen 1941) were the first in the German army to receive the Knight's Cross for the decisive capture of the fort .

During the attack on Poland, over 10% of the nominal strength of 17,734 men were killed (717 men), wounded (1278) or missing (10).

Western campaign

After the attack on Poland was over, the 18th Infantry Division moved to West Germany and was subordinated to the 6th Army in Army Group B. The divisional headquarters were in Rurich Castle . On May 10, 1940, the 6th Army marched into South Holland. The Julianakanal and the Meuse were crossed near Elsloo on the first day. On the 11th the Albert Canal was crossed. The division advanced via Bilzen towards the Demer section near Tienen . The Dyle Position , an Allied line of defense in Belgium, was attacked on May 13, 1940 and breached on May 16. The further advance took place in the direction of Lille and then over the battlefields of the First World War near Ypres . On May 24th, the German units were only 15 km from Dunkirk . Here, due to a controversy between Hitler and the High Command of the Army (OKH), the attack movement of the Germans on the British expeditionary corps, which was enclosed near Dunkirk , came to a standstill . The allies used this stop, which lasted more than three days, to set up a defensive ring around Dunkirk, which enabled the evacuation of 338,682 soldiers by June 4, 1940.

On June 4, 1940, an OKW special report reported the capture of Dunkirk by the 54th Infantry Regiment of the division under Colonel Hermann Recknagel, who received the Knight's Cross for taking Dunkirk.

1940/1941

After Dunkirk was taken, the 18th Infantry Division in France in the Le Mans area was placed under the reserve of the OKH. In July, the Division was 2nd Army in Army Group C allocated. During this period the 30th Infantry Regiment of the division was used as a guard regiment in Paris. In October the division moved back home and was subordinated there to the replacement army in the original military group VIII.

From November 1940 the motorization of the 18th Infantry Division began, which was completed in May 41, and the renaming of the 18th Infantry Division (mot). During the motorization, it was subordinate to the 11th Army , still in Army Group C.

On March 24, 1941, the division commander, Lieutenant General Friedrich-Carl Cranz, died in a shooting accident (short artillery shot) at the Neuhammer military training area . Major General Friedrich Herrlein took command of the division.

Eastern campaign

When the motorization ended in May 1941, the 18th Infantry Division (motorized) was placed under Panzer Group 3 , which belonged to Army Group Center from the start of the Eastern campaign . The unit fought in the Kesselschlacht near Białystok and Minsk (now subordinated to the 16th Army ), the subsequent Kesselschlacht near Smolensk , took part in the advance on Leningrad and at the end of the year in the battles for Volkhov .

On August 26, the division took Lyuban and then moved towards Tikhvin . With this movement Leningrad was to be cut off from the east. On August 30, the 5th Company of Infantry Regiment 30 (Oberleutnant Buchner) and the 2nd battery of Artillery Regiment 18 (Oberleutnant Galette) captured the contested Volkhov Bridge from Kirishi. Meanwhile the XXXIX. Subordinated to the Army Corps , Tichwin was captured on November 8, 1941 by the 51st Infantry Regiment under Lieutenant Colonel Hans-Georg Leyser (→  Battle of Tichwin ).

The Kradschützen Battalion 38 was assigned to various other infantry divisions in the course of the Eastern campaign, but remained assigned to the 18th Infantry Division for service purposes. During the winter offensive of 1941/42 the unit lost 9,000 men and was withdrawn behind the front with the remaining approx. 700 men.

In March 1942 the task force was back at the front and was able to achieve an opening of the Demyansk pocket, which enabled the rescue of the approximately 100,000 soldiers trapped in it (→  Bridge Building ). In 1942 and 1943 the division was involved in defensive battles in the Tikhvin area , around Demyansk and Lake Ilmen .

On June 23, 1943, the division was renamed the 18th Panzer Grenadier Division standing at Jelnja and was assigned to Panzer Division 118 , which was equipped with assault guns . In September she was subordinated to the 4th Army in Army Group Center and fought at Orsha until the end of 1943 .

During the offensive in the course of Operation Bagration in early 1944, Army Group Center was overrun by Russian forces. The 18th Panzer Grenadier Division was enclosed in the Bobruisk pocket. The division commander, Lieutenant General Karl Zutavern, committed suicide on July 6, 1944 in order to avoid capture. On July 28, 1944, the 18th Panzer Grenadier Division was officially disbanded. From the remnants of the division (971 men) the 105th Panzer Brigade was formed in Silesia .

Battle for East Prussia

On September 7, 1944, the 105th Panzer Brigade was to be reorganized as Combat Group 18th Panzer Grenadier Division on the Neuhammer military training area for Military District VIII. This was not carried out, but was ordered to be set up in Defense District I in December 1944 , with the 103rd Panzer Brigade also being integrated. The equipment of the tank department consisted of Panzerkampfwagen IV . Once again sent to the Eastern Front, the division of the 4th Army was placed under the newly established Army Group Center.

In January 1945 the division was strengthened again by the formation of three new battalions and ordered to Gumbinnen , ultimately deployed at Mielau in the Battle of East Prussia . On January 14, 1945, the 2nd Byelorussian Front advanced via Allenstein to the Fresh Lagoon and cut off the way to the west for the 4th Army. Parts of the division were able to evacuate across the Baltic Sea.

As a result, the 18th Panzer Grenadier Division was disbanded again in March and the division staff was used to set up the Hutten Infantry Division .

End of war

Almost three weeks later, the 18th Panzer Grenadier Division was reorganized for the second time on March 21, 1945 from parts of the Holstein and Silesia armored divisions . It was assigned to the Vistula Army Group and initially stood in the Eberswalde area. From here the division was pushed back in the battle for the Seelow Heights and was used for the defense of Berlin from April . The division command post was in the Tiergarten flak tower . The last part of the fight until the end of the fighting in Berlin on May 2nd was in the Charlottenburg district .

The Panzer Regiment 118 was at the Olympic Stadium , the Pioneer Battalion 18 in Berlin-Pichelsdorf . With the end of the fighting in Berlin, the 18th Infantry Division was finally dissolved.

structure

Breakdowns after the restructuring

18th Infantry Division August 24, 1939	18th Motorized Infantry Division May 1, 1941	18th Panzer Grenadier Division June 18, 1943	18th Panzer Grenadier Division September 7, 1944	18th Panzer Grenadier Division December 2, 1944
		Panzer Division 118	Panzer Division 118	Panzer Division 118
Infantry Regiment 30 (Görlitz) Infantry Regiment 51 (Liegnitz) Infantry Regiment 54 (Glogau)	Motorized Infantry Regiment 30 Motorized Infantry Regiment 51	Motorized Grenadier Regiment 30 Motorized Grenadier Regiment 51	30th Panzer Grenadier Regiment	30th Panzer Grenadier Regiment Panzer Grenadier Regiment 51
	Kradschützen-Bataillon 38, in May 1941 from III./Infanterie-Regiment 51	Panzer Reconnaissance Division 118		Panzer Reconnaissance Division 118
Artillery Regiment 18 (Liegnitz)	Artillery Regiment 18th	Artillery Regiment 18th	Artillery Department 18	Artillery Department 18
				Army Flaka Division 300
Division units 18	Division units 18	Division units 18	Division units 18	Insert paragraph Division units 18

Commanders

18th Infantry Division

• Lieutenant General Hermann Hoth - October 1, 1934 to April 1, 1938
• Lieutenant General Erich von Manstein - April 1, 1938 to August 26, 1939
• Major General / Lieutenant General Friedrich-Carl Cranz - August 26, 1939 to November 1, 1940

18th Infantry Division (mot)

• Lieutenant General Friedrich-Carl Cranz - November 1, 1940 to March 24, 1941 (fatally injured)
• Major General / Lieutenant General Friedrich Herrlein - March 28 to December 15, 1941
• Colonel / Major General / Lieutenant General Werner von Erdmannsdorff - December 15, 1941 to June 23, 1943

18th Panzer Grenadier Division

• Lieutenant General Werner von Erdmannsdorff - June 23 to August 9, 1943
• Major General / Lieutenant General Karl Zutavern - August 9, 1943 to April 14, 1944
• Lieutenant General Curt Jahn - April 14 to May 24, 1944
• Lieutenant General Karl Zutavern - May 24th to July 6th 1944 (suicide)
• Major General Hans Boelsen - July 6, 1944 to January 1, 1945
• Colonel / Major General Josef Rauch - January 1 to May 8, 1945

Well-known members of the division

• Ralph von Oriola : Commander of the III. Department of Artillery Regiment 18 from October 1934 to August 1939
• Hans Piekenbrock : First General Staff Officer of Infantry Leader III and the Division until October 1936
• Rudolf Schmundt : on the general staff of the division from October 1936 to January 1938
• Hans-Heinrich Jescheck : from 1937 until the war ended in division, became the leader of the Panzer Reconnaissance Battalion 118, in March 1945, Knight's Cross awarded
• Hans Rüdiger : in the division from 1939 to approx. 1942
• Hans von Altenstadt : First General Staff Officer from November 1939 to July 1940
• Ulrich de Maizière : from January 1941 to January 1942 second general staff officer of the division
• Karl von Graffen : Artillery commander of the division from November 1941 to March 1942

Web links

• 18th Infantry Division / 18th Infantry Division (motorized) / 18th Panzer Grenadier Division on EHRI portal from the Federal Archives

literature

• 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 , p. 88-90 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Military District Command VIII .  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Bundesarchiv.de (accessed October 12, 2008).  
2. ^ Joachim Engelmann: The 18th Infantry and Panzer Grenadier Division 1934–1945 . Ed. Dörfler im Nebel-Verlag, Eggolsheim 2004, ISBN 3-89555-176-7 , p. 5 .
3. ^ Gregory Liedtke: Enduring the Whirlwind: The German Army and the Russo-German War 1941-1943 . Helion and Company, 2016, ISBN 978-1-911096-87-0 , pp. 67 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
4. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g h i} 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 ( limited preview in Google Book Search).
5. ^ Gregory Liedtke: Enduring the Whirlwind: The German Army and the Russo-German War 1941-1943 . Helion and Company, 2016, ISBN 978-1-911096-87-0 , pp. 78 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
6. ^ Gregory Liedtke: Enduring the Whirlwind: The German Army and the Russo-German War 1941-1943 . Helion and Company, 2016, ISBN 978-1-911096-87-0 , pp. 92 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
7. ^ Robert J. Edwards: Tip of the Spear: German Armored Reconnaissance in Action in World War II . Stackpole Books, 2015, ISBN 978-0-8117-6330-1 , pp. 210 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
8. ^ Robert J. Edwards: Tip of the Spear: German Armored Reconnaissance in Action in World War II . Stackpole Books, 2015, ISBN 978-0-8117-6330-1 , pp. 275 ( limited preview in Google Book Search).
9. ^ Robert J. Edwards: Tip of the Spear: German Armored Reconnaissance in Action in World War II . Stackpole Books, 2015, ISBN 978-0-8117-6330-1 , pp. 277 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
10. ^ Joachim Engelmann: The 18th Infantry and Panzer Grenadier Division 1934–1945 . Ed. Dörfler im Nebel-Verlag, Eggolsheim 2004, ISBN 3-89555-176-7 , p. 146 .
11. ^ Timm Haasler: Hold the Westwall: The History of Panzer Brigade 105, September 1944 . Stackpole Books, 2011, ISBN 978-0-8117-4494-2 , pp. 10 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
12. ^ 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 , p. 88 f .