206th Infantry Division (Wehrmacht)
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206th Infantry Division |
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| active | August 17, 1939 to July 18, 1944 (dissolution) |
| Country |
.svg){kind=small} German Empire
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| Armed forces | Wehrmacht |
| Armed forces | army |
| Branch of service | infantry |
| Type | Infantry Division |
| structure | structure |
| Strength | 15,000 debit |
| Nickname | Ace of Spades |
| Commanders | |
| list of | Commanders |
The 206th Infantry Division (206th ID) was a major military unit of the Wehrmacht and was completely destroyed between June 24 and 28, 1944 near Vitebsk in Belarus during the collapse of Army Group Center .
Division history
The division was on 17 August 1939 as part of the third statement wave in Insterburg / East Prussia in military district I installed. The first war deployment took place on the Western Front in France , after which the division was given leave of absence for several months.
On June 22nd, 1941, the 206th Infantry Division was set off from Gumbinnen as part of Operation Barbarossa as part of Army Group North and reached Vilna , Polatsk , Newel and Velikiye Luki . In August 1941 the advance led the division to the western Daugava . From there it came via Olenino to the area of the upper Volga near Rzhev. The large unit was mainly used there in the battles around Rzhev (winter battle of 1941/42) and at the Tudowka Arch.
In December 1943 the 206th ID was deployed in northern Belarus and the LIII. Army corps assigned to defend the " permanent place " Vitebsk. Hitler had previously ordered Vitebsk to be kept as a permanent place. Three divisions of the LIII Army Corps were to be relocated to the Belarusian city in order to tie up Soviet forces. In April 1944 the division was converted into a new type 44 division. Already on June 20, 1944, there were signs that the Red Army was gathering to form a focus area near Vitebsk. Vitebsk was circumvented with two pincer attacks and thereby the LIII. Corps completely enclosed. In the course of the Soviet summer offensive Operation Bagration , which began on June 22, 1944, the German frontline north and south of Vitebsk quickly collapsed due to the overwhelming strength of the Red Army. When on June 24, 1944, Army Group Center had to give up its front section on a large scale in view of the tenfold superiority of the Red Army and retreated, Hitler ordered General Gollwitzer from LVIII. Corps that the breakout from the last "permanent place" Vitebsk in the east has been approved. Colonel-General Georg-Hans Reinhardt had already repeatedly called for the front arch of Vitebsk to be tactically withdrawn in favor of the rear, developed tendon position, the "tiger position". The defense of Vitebsk was to be maintained and a division would have to remain in the city, the name of the commander being reported immediately. Gollwitzer selected the 206th Infantry Division under Lieutenant General Hitter for this suicide mission . On June 26, 1944, Generals Gollwitzer and Hitter received the order to hold out from Field Marshal Busch, not to evacuate Vitebsk under any circumstances. There was “ no freedom in making up your mind ”. On the same day Vitebsk was conquered. 8,000 Wehrmacht soldiers managed to break out of the city; according to Soviet sources, over 20,000 soldiers fell. The infantry general Friedrich Gollwitzer and his chief of staff, Colonel Schmidt, were captured by the Soviets. Hitter had given the order to break out on June 26, 1944 on his own initiative for the last surviving soldiers, after no further resistance was possible. 15 kilometers from Vitebsk, the remains of the GR 301, 312 and 413 were encircled in a forest and destroyed. On June 29, 1944, the division no longer existed. Only a few survived the Battle of Vitebsk and made their way west. Since East Prussia was already occupied by the Red Army, a settlement center was set up in Rudolstadt, Thuringia , to determine the names of the 12,000 fallen members of the 206th Infantry Division and to inform their families, since all the documents of the division in Vitebsk were lost. On July 18, 1944, the 206th ID was declared disbanded and was given field post number 18744 to commemorate that day.
| date | Army Corps | army | Army Group | place |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| September 1939 | to disposal | - | North | Poland |
| October 1939 | in the border protection section | |||
| January 1940 | ||||
| June 1940 | to disposal | OKH | - | Eifel |
| July 1940 | BdE | - | ||
| August 1940 | on leave | - | ||
| May 1941 | XXVIII | 16th Army | C. | East Prussia |
| June 1941 | XXIII | North | ||
| July 1941 | to disposal | OKH | Dünaburg | |
| August 1941 | XXIII | 9th Army | center | Velikiye Luki |
| September 1941 | VI | |||
| October 1941 | XXIII | Kalinin | ||
| January 1942 | Rzhev | |||
| March 15, 1942 | XXXXVI | |||
| April 28, 1942 | XXVII | |||
| July 15, 1942 | VI | |||
| October 14, 1942 | XXIII | |||
| January 1943 | ||||
| January 9, 1943 | Burdach group | |||
| February 6, 1943 | XXIII | |||
| March 12, 1943 | XXVII | |||
| March 18, 1943 | XXXIX. Panzer Corps | |||
| March 22, 1943 | VI | 3rd Panzer Army | Demidov , retreat to Vitebsk | |
| January 1944 | LIII. Army Corps | Vitebsk |
structure
- Grenadier Regiment 301
- Grenadier Regiment 312
- Grenadier Regiment 413
- Artillery Regiment 206
- I.–IV. Department
- Fusilier Battalion 206
- Engineer Battalion 206
- News Department 206
- Resupply Troops 206
people
Commanders
| period of service | Rank | Surname |
|---|---|---|
| August 26, 1939 to April 1942 | Major General / Lieutenant General | Hugo Höfl |
| April 1942 to May 3, 1942 | Colonel | Albrecht Baron Digeon of Monteton |
| May 3, 1942 to July 13, 1943 | Colonel / Major General / Lieutenant General | Alfons Hitter |
| July 13 to July 15, 1943 | Colonel | Carl André |
| September 14, 1943 to June 28, 1944 | Lieutenant General | Alfons Hitter |
First General Staff Officer (Ia)
| period of service | Rank | Surname |
|---|---|---|
| August 26 to December 28, 1939 | major | Walter Nagel |
| August 10, 1940 to March 1, 1942 | Lieutenant colonel | Walter von Bogen and Schönstedt |
| July 12, 1942 to May 10, 1944 | Lieutenant colonel | Moritz love |
| May to June 1944 | major | Axel Ribbentrop |
Division doctor (IVa)
| period of service | Rank | Surname |
|---|---|---|
| August 26, 1939 to January 10, 1941 | Chief physician | Hermann Kayser |
literature
- Ernst Payk: The history of the 206th Infantry Division 1939–1944. Podzun Bad Nauheim 1952.
Web links
- 200th through 370th German Infantry, Security, and Panzer Grenadier Divisions. Organizations and Histories 1939–1945 ( Memento from February 10, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF; 450 kB), Nafziger Collection, Combined Armed Research Library.
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d e Maparchive.ru/ 206th Infantry Division
- ^ Defensive battles on the Volga-Tudowka Line.
- ↑ Michael Salewski, Guntram Schulze-Wegener : War year 1944: In the large and in the small. (Historical communications - supplements). Franz Steiner Verlag, 1994, ISBN 3-515-06674-8 , p. 78.
- ↑ Michael Salewski, Guntram Schulze-Wegener: War year 1944: In the large and in the small. (Historical communications - supplements). Franz Steiner Verlag, 1994, ISBN 3-515-06674-8 , p. 80.
- ↑ a b Michael Salewski, Guntram Schulze-Wegener: War year 1944: in the big and in the small. (Historical communications - supplements). Franz Steiner Verlag, 1994, ISBN 3-515-06674-8 , p. 85.
- ↑ a b Cf. Georg Tessin : Associations and troops of the German Wehrmacht and Waffen SS in World War II 1939–1945 . Volume 8: The Land Forces 201–280 . 2nd Edition. Biblio-Verlag, Bissendorf 1979, ISBN 3-7648-1174-9 . , P. 23 f. as well as information from the lexicon of the armed forces
