94th Infantry Division (Wehrmacht)

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94th Infantry Division

Troop registration number of the 94th Infantry Division

1. Troop registration number of 94th ID
active American captivity September 18, 1939-1945
Country German Reich NSGerman Reich (Nazi era) German Empire
Armed forces Wehrmacht
Armed forces army
Branch of service infantry
Type Infantry Division
structure structure
Insinuation 6th Army
Installation site Meissen
Nickname "Saxon Swords"
Second World War German-Soviet War
Battle of Stalingrad

Italian campaign

Battle for Monte Cassino
Commanders
list of Commanders
insignia
2. Troop registration number 2. Troop registration number
3. Troop registration numbers 3. Troop registration numbers

The 94th Infantry Division was a major unit of the Wehrmacht during the Second World War .

Division history

Areas of application:

  • Germany: September 1939 to May 1940
  • Western Front France : May 1940 to June 1941
  • Eastern Front Southern Section: June 1941 to September 1942
  • Stalingrad: September 1942 to January 1943
  • Western Front France: March to August 1943
  • Italy: August 1943 to April 1945

The 94th Infantry Division (ID) was set up on September 18, 1939 at the Saxon military training areas Zeithain and Königsbrück with Czech equipment. The division was set up as part of the 5th wave of formation . In terms of personnel, the division consisted of military district VIII and units of Army Group North from the attack on Poland . The combat training and field use of the 94th Infantry Division should be completed on November 1, 1939. The infantry regiments were each reinforced by a 13th heavy grenade launcher company .

Between 1940 and 1941 the reservists of the 94th Infantry Division were given leave of absence, only the permanent staff remained in the barracks . Shortly thereafter, the division was called up again and on March 30, the 13th grenade launcher companies were replaced by three infantry companies of the 223rd Infantry Division.

In 1942 the Turkestan 1st Battalion was integrated into the division.

In mid-September 1942, the 94th Infantry Division was deployed to conquer the grain silo in the south of Stalingrad and was one of the first Wehrmacht units to experience the hardship of house-to-house fighting in the Battle of Stalingrad . After a few skirmishes at the station, the division was relocated to the northern industrial districts of the city in October 1942, where it fought mainly in the Spartakowka workers' settlement and in the "Barricades" gun factory. In January 1943, the division, which was almost completely wiped out, was taken prisoner in the Stalingrad pocket.

On March 1, 1943, the 94th Infantry Division in Lorient in Brittany was reorganized and integrated into the 7th Army . The Grenadier Regiments 878 and 875 were reinforced. On October 31, 1943, the 94th Infantry Division was reorganized to the new regulations of 1944.

On May 20, 1944, the 94th Infantry Division west of Monte Cassino was wiped out again. With the remaining units and surviving soldiers, the 305th Infantry Division was then refreshed. The division was effectively reorganized on August 13, 1944 near Udine by the Silesian Shadow Division and sent to the last battles in northern Italy.

In 1945 the 94th Infantry Division in the South Tyrolean region was taken prisoner by the Americans.

Grenadier Regiment 274

On October 15, 1942, the 274 Infantry Regiment was renamed Grenadier Regiment 274 in order, as with many other units deployed in Stalingrad, to hide the great losses. The renaming of the Infantry Regiment to Grenadier Regiment was also intended to express the house-to-house combat experience of these units. The 274 Infantry Regiment or later Grenadier Regiment 274 reached Stalingrad in the summer of 1942 and was later enclosed in the city by the Red Army. During the Kesselschlacht from the end of November 1942 the Grenadier Regiment 274 lay north of the Stalingrad tractor factory in front of the Olowka Gorge. In the following battles, the regiment defended the northeast edge of the pocket and was completely destroyed.

Battle of Stalingrad

The 94th Infantry Division from Hoth's IV Army Corps was deployed relatively early in the fighting for the Stalingrad suburbs and belonged to the 71st, 295th and 389th Infantry Divisions, the 29th Motorized Infantry Division and the 14th Infantry Division and 24th Panzer Division to the main force of 80,000 men, which was to conquer Stalingrad like a lightning war. Gruppe Hoth with 29th Motorized Infantry Division, 94th Infantry Division and 24th Infantry Division were supposed to take the southern city south of the Tsaritza. Greater resistance from the Red Army was not expected. The first target was east of Sadovaia station with the direction of the suburb of Minnina against the defensive lines of the 131st Rifle Division, all heights and the station Stalingrad 2 should be conquered. The advance slowed considerably on September 13, 1942 when it reached the suburb of Minnina, as the opponent's resistance along the railroad tracks steadily increased and the house-to-house fighting began.

On September 14, 1942, Army Group B reported:

“ The battle for the fortress Stalingrad is characterized by the extraordinary tenacity and bitterness of the enemy. By attacking the railway line from the south, the 94th Infantry Division fought its way through the southern suburbs and pushed the enemy back towards the Volga. To the north of the road, he succeeded one of our tank divisions. PD] to penetrate the waterworks on the western Volga. To the north of the waterworks, forces from another division [71. ID] invade the city center after stubborn resistance had to be put down. The counterattack [Krylov Group] from the north on the sector between the railway line and the Volga was repulsed after heavy losses by the enemy. "

- KTB OKW, September 14, 1942
Stalingrad Südstadt Advance on the grain silo on November 15, 1942

On September 15, 1942, the 94th ID had the order to secure the right flank of the 24th PD and met two regiments of the 244th Rifle Division, the 10th Rifle Brigade, on the banks of the Elschanka River in Minnina 6th Panzer Brigade. From this a heavy battle developed under difficult terrain conditions. Infantrymen and tank grenadiers combed warehouses, barracks, wooden houses and buildings over a length of 2 kilometers in order to eliminate threats from anti-tank guns . In the course of the day, IR 274 was able to take the railway bridge over the Elschanka river, which flows south of the Stalingrad 2 station into the Volga. There Pfeiffer's infantry united with the Lenskis tank grenadiers and fought against the hedgehog positions of the 10th SB and NKVD troops. The rapid success of the tank units in the southern station of Stalingrad could not be sustained by the 94th Infantry Division due to the lack of infantry forces. It was not possible for them to enclose the fragmented forces of the Red Army and permanently occupy some key buildings in the southern part of the city. Some Red Army soldiers deserted and fled, others broke into building complexes in the vicinity of the Südbahnhof, e.g. B. Grain silo, wood factory and canning factory and expanded them to massive house fortresses. In Sectors Minnina, Elschanka and Kupurosnoe, which were already considered to be secure, new defensive nodes were created, which were fanatically defended.

On September 16, 1942, the intensity of the fighting increased dramatically. On a 4 km wide area south of the Tsaritza, crossed by deep Balkas, splinter formations from the 35th Guards Rifle Division (Dubyanski), 42nd SB (Batrakow), 244th SD (Afanasiew), 10th SB (Driakhlow), which had already been defeated, added and the 133rd PB (Bubnow), which meanwhile no longer had any tanks, inflicted ever greater losses on the German attackers. The 94th Infantry Division continued its cleansing operations in Minnina and was supposed to reach the Tsaritza in the evening. When crossing the Elschanka River, they encountered increasing enemy resistance in the Balkas and in the bunkers around the railway embankment. When the 94th Infantry Division penetrated the canning factory, the losses of the 94th Infantry Division rose rapidly, but the German advance only came to a standstill at the grain silo.

The following newspaper report describes the severity of the fighting:

“ The Soviets did not give up the fight. Every day the German Stukas and bombers rushed to their positions, smashed tanks and preparations for attack, but again and again they sent their riflemen and tanks into battle. The German infantry and artillery now disappeared into the ground, as it were, and the foxhole and the earth bunker, the folds of a ravine, a 'Balka', as the men say, became accommodation, bed and command post of even the highest staff. Because there are only a few settlements on the huge battlefield of Stalingrad, with a few wooden and clay booths that occasionally show brightly painted shutters and wood-carved borders. "

- Look into the world from September 16, 1942

On September 17, 1942, IR 267 and 274 fanned out for further attacks on the railway line and the grain silo, while IR 276 fought down the last pockets of resistance in the canning factory. At the end of the day, Pfeiffer had to reorganize his regiments into new organized combat groups made up of infantrymen, engineers and units with heavy weapons. The fact that the grain silo was not already taken during the rapid tank advances on September 13, 1942 turned out to be a serious mistake, as concentrated resistance could be organized here. The fight for the grain silo could only be started after artillery support by the 24th PD. On September 18, 1942, the 24th PD was withdrawn from the southern part of the city to be deployed in northern Stalingrad. Thus, only the 94th Infantry Division and 29th Infantry Division (motorized) remained in this zone, in which they engaged in locally limited, protracted and grueling battles over isolated isolated buildings, e.g. Sometimes only defended by Red Army soldiers in platoon strength or even in small groups of 2 to 5 soldiers from the most varied of associations and nationalities. Despite artillery support, it was only possible to penetrate the interior of the grain silo after fighting with many losses and the building in an extremely bitter close combat on 21/22, which was carried out from floor to floor. September 1942. On September 18, 1942, the 94th ID was transferred to the LI. Army corps incorporated. While IR 267 and 274 were still fighting in the grain silo, IR 276 advanced further on the Tsaritza, and the fighting against the guards in the canning factory flared up again. Dubyanski's guardsmen were trapped in the southern part of the city and destroyed, presumably 9,000 Soviet soldiers were killed. On September 22nd, 1942, 94th Infantry Division, as the left border of 71st Infantry Division, was involved in the fighting over Stalingrad-Center in the area of ​​the Tsaritza estuary.

“ One of the hotly contested properties is the mighty grain silo near the Tsaritza, not far from the south station. The Germans tried to storm this concrete and iron building that towers over the suburbs like a fortress. The Soviet defenders, not quite 50 soldiers, do not give up despite all the German attacks. Neither artillery fire nor bombs can force them to surrender. The silos, bursting with grain, now set on fire by the Germans, smoke from every corner, but the Soviets knock down any attempt by the attackers to take possession of the building, even with knife in hand. "

On September 28, 1942, all three regiments of the 94th Infantry Division were withdrawn from downtown Paulus and used for the offensive on the Orlowka promontory in northern Stalingrad. The combat strength of the 94th Infantry Division was numbered as follows from September 14th to 26th, 1942: 7 infantry battalions of medium strength (500 to 700 men), 1 engineer battalion of average strength (300–400)

The operation to reduce the Orlovka front ledge was carried out from September 27 to October 3, 1942. After a short resting phase, the exhausted 94th Infantry Division was transported to the northern edge of Stalingrad. First, IR 276 formed the right border of the 71st Infantry Division in the southern sector of the workers' settlement "Red Barricades" and supported the 24th PD from September 30, 1942, while IR 267 and 274 were brought to Orlowka. The front section of the 71st Infantry Division thus extended to the south of Stalingrad. In the course of the tank advances of the 24th PD in the workers' settlements, IR 276 supported the conquest of height 107.5. The fighting technique was adapted to the difficult terrain: instead of rapid advances through armored wedges, the tanks now followed the advancing infantry, often at a snail's pace, to destroy earth bunkers and fortified positions and, in conjunction with assault guns and anti-tank guns, offer the advancing infantry direct fire protection. On the Orlowka front ledge, weakly defended by the Red Army, IR 267 and 274 south of the Stahel group and north of the 389 ID west of Orlowka in the area of ​​hills 108.8, 124.9 and 129.1, where they were deployed during the night arrived from September 28th to 29th, 1942. The combat strength of the 4 infantry battalions of the two 94 regiments was already classified as weak (300 to 400 men). The attack on the train station and the railway bridge around the Orlovka River split a motorized Red Army brigade into two parts. On October 1, 1942, the Orlowka cemetery, 300 meters from the outskirts, was taken; in the following two days, bitter fighting developed over the town when, on October 2, the OKW announced that the Orlowka promontory was already being attacked . On October 4, 94th Infantry Division and 16th PD reached the confluence of the Orlowka and Mokraia Metschetka rivers and locked the defenders in two isolated pockets. The short but very bloody operation in Orlowka put all 7 infantry battalions of 94th Infantry Division into a very exhausted and exhausted state with fewer than 300 soldiers each.

In the industrial complexes of Stalingrad, IR 276 formed the right border of the 24th PD in the vicinity of IR 54 ( 100th Jäger Division ) in the south and Group Edelsheim in the north. Opposite it on the southern edge of the “Barricades” gun factory were the lines of defense of the 308th and 193rd SD. The IR 267 and 274 deployed in Orlowka were also supposed to support the decimated 24th PD and marched into the lower reaches of the Mokraia Mechetka north-western sector of the tractor factory, where they were involved in battles with the 112th SD over tactically important railway bridges.

On October 14, 1942, during the major attack on the tractor factory, IR 267 and 274 were subordinated to the XIV Panzer Corps and fought together with the 16th PD against Soviet positions north of the Mokraia Mechetka River. In the meantime, the combat strength of the 193rd Engineer Battalion was in a badly worn and exhausted state with fewer than 200 soldiers. The overall condition of the 94th ID was in critical condition. The total number of personnel was only 4500 soldiers. Despite this situation, IR 267 and 274 positions had to fight Soviet forces of the Gorokhow group in the Rynok-Spartanowka region around hill 135.4. The fighting intensified from October 15 to 17, 1942 in the heavily fortified bunkers and trenches of the Red Army northwest of Spartanowka, which the Germans called " Small and Large Mushroom ".

Since no further progress could be made in the Spartanowka area, Paulus ordered the IR 276 back under the divisional command of the 94th ID north of the Mokraia Metschetka River on October 20, 1942. According to official reports, the last Soviet resistance in Spartanowka was broken on October 25, 1942, although hundreds of Red Army soldiers were still hiding in the Balkas between Spartanowka and Rynok. The 94th ID belonged to the 5 Stalingrad divisions (79th ID, 305th ID, 389th ID and 100th JD), which suffered the highest losses with 75% (a total of 12,000 dead) during the Stalingrad Battle in October 1942.

War crimes

Members of the 94th Infantry Division were involved in several war crimes in Italy between September 1943 and April 1945. Most of the victims were the massacre of San Polo near Arezzo in Tuscany on July 14, 1944 triggered by members of the Grenadier Regiment 274, in which 63 people, including women and children, were killed and then attempts were made to cover up the traces of the massacre.

According to the Atlante degli Stragi Naziste e Fasciste in Italia (Atlas of Nazi and Fascist massacres in Italy) project, financed by the German Federal Government and led by a historians' commission, over 100 people were killed in massacres and executions in Italy between September 1943 and April 1945 killed by members of the division.

structure

  • Infantry Regiment 267 (renamed Grenadier Regiment 267)
    • I. Btl.
    • II. Btl.
    • III. Btl.
  • Infantry Regiment 274 (renamed Grenadier Regiment 274)
    • I. Btl.
    • II. Btl.
    • III. Btl.
  • Infantry Regiment 276 (renamed Grenadier Regiment 276)
    • I. Btl.
    • II. Btl.
    • III. Btl.
  • Artillery Regiment 194
  • Engineer Battalion 194
  • Anti-tank department 194
  • Infantry Division News Department 194
  • Infantry Division Supply Leader 194

Changes in the structure of the 94th ID from 1942 to 1944

1942 1944
GR 267 GR 267
GR 274 GR 274
GR 276 GR 276
AR 194 AR 194
Fast division 194 Reconnaissance Department 194
- Field Replacement Battalion 194
- Panzerjäger Dept. 194
Engineer Battalion 194 Engineer Battalion 194
News Dept. 194 News Dept. 194
Supply units 194 Supply units 194

people

Commanders of the 94th ID
period of service Rank Surname
September 25, 1939 to August 21, 1940 General of the Infantry Hellmuth Volkmann
August 21, 1940 to January 29, 1943 Lieutenant General Georg Pfeiffer
March 1, 1943 to January 2, 1944 Lieutenant General Georg Pfeiffer
January 2, 1944 to April 22, 1945 Lieutenant General Bernhard Steinmetz

Awards

A total of 12 members of the 94th ID were awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross and 32 with the German Cross in Gold.

Knight's Cross bearer
Rank Surname unit Award date
Captain Wilhelm von Hagen Battalion Commander II.Btl./IR 267 0September 2, 1942
Sergeant Major Gustav Strauss Platoon leader 10th Kp./IR 267 October 25, 1942
Captain Arthur Rittner Battalion Commander III.Btl./IR 276 October 25, 1942
Lieutenant General Georg Pfeiffer Division commander 94th ID January 15, 1943
Colonel Albert Brendel Regimental commander IR 274 January 20, 1943
Lieutenant colonel Werner Reich Regimental commander GR 274 February 29, 1944
First lieutenant Otto Post Company commander 1st Kp./Divisions- Fusilier Btl. 94 February 29, 1944
lieutenant Fritz Mann Platoon leader pioneer platoon StabsKp./GR 274 0April 6, 1944
Lieutenant colonel Wolf Ewert Regimental commander GR 274 July 18, 1944
Captain Heinz Woock Battalion Commander III.Btl./GR 274 July 18, 1944
lieutenant Alfred Heyn Platoon leader 7th Kp./GR 267 August 12, 1944
Captain Hans-Horst Manitz Battalion Commander I.Btl./GR 274 August 23, 1944

literature

  • Memory book of the 94th Infantry Division of the war years 1939–1945 - Delivery 1: Use on the Siegfried Line and the French campaign 1939–1940, Martin Borriss, Minden.
  • Memory book of the 94th Infantry Division of the war years 1939–1945 - Delivery 2: Deployment in Russia 1941 to the beginning of 1943, Hans Horst Manitz, ed. Kameradschaft der 94th Inf.Div., 1985.
  • Memory book of the 94th Infantry Division for the war years 1939–1945 - Delivery 3: Defense in the northern section of the Stalingrad pocket from November 21, 1942 to February 2, 1943 - Rudolf Krell, publisher with an addendum from the Comradeship of the 94th Infantry Division , Self-published, 1982.
  • Memory book of the 94th Infantry Division of the war years 1939–1945 - Delivery 4: The deployment in Italy 1943–1945, B. Steinmetz, Hanover 1973.
  • My experiences in the newly established 94th Infantry Division August 1943 – April 1945 - Wolfgang Wiedemann, published by the comradeship of the 94th Inf.Div., 1997.
  • David M. Glantz: Armageddon in Stalingrad: September – November 1942 (The Stalingrad Trilogy, Volume 2) . University of Kansas Press, Lawrence 2009, ISBN 978-0-7006-1664-0 .
  • Georg Tessin : Associations and troops of the German Wehrmacht and Waffen SS in World War II 1939–1945. Volume 6. The Land Forces 71-130 . 2nd Edition. Biblio-Verlag, Bissendorf 1979, ISBN 3-7648-1172-2 .

Individual evidence

On the pages of the book:

  • David M. Glantz: Armageddon in Stalingrad: September – November 1942 (The Stalingrad Trilogy, Volume 2). University of Kansas Press, Lawrence 2009.
  1. ↑ pp. 92-94.
  2. ↑ pp. 99-100.
  3. ↑ pp. 104-105, 112.
  4. ↑ pp. 114-115.
  5. ↑ p. 120.
  6. ↑ p. 125.
  7. ↑ pp. 128-130.
  8. ↑ pp. 141-144.
  9. ↑ pp. 151-152.
  10. ↑ p. 163.
  11. ↑ p. 165.
  12. ↑ pp. 190-191.
  13. ↑ pp. 196-199.
  14. ↑ p. 201.
  15. ↑ p. 204.
  16. ↑ p. 231.
  17. ↑ pp. 233-235.
  18. ↑ pp. 255-257, 274.
  19. ↑ p. 281.
  20. ↑ pp. 292-298.
  21. ↑ p. 302.
  22. ↑ pp. 307-308, 339.
  23. ↑ p. 355.
  24. ↑ pp. 358, 375.
  25. ↑ pp. 375-377.
  26. ↑ p. 397.
  27. ↑ p. 501.
  28. ↑ p. 698.

Further evidence

  1. ↑ Ukrainian loess gorge, erosion gorge.
  2. ^ Janusz Piekałkiewicz: Stalingrad. Anatomy of a battle. Heyne, Munich 1993, p. 210.
  3. ↑ to the south, frontal assaults by infantry from 94th Division's 267th Regiment finally snuffed out all Soviet resistance in the Grain Elevator and nearby buildings in David M. Glantz: Armageddon in Stalingrad: September-November 1942 (The Stalingrad Trilogy, Volume 2). University of Kansas Press, Lawrence 2009, p. 199.
  4. ^ Janusz Piekałkiewicz : Stalingrad. Anatomy of a battle. Heyne, Munich 1993, p. 194.
  5. ↑ San Polo Arezzo July 14, 1944 (Arezzo - Toscana). In: straginazifasciste.it. Retrieved October 26, 2019 (Italian).
  6. ↑ Carlo Gentile : I crimini di guerra tedeschi in Italia from 1943 to 1945. Einaudi, Turin 2015 ISBN 978-88-06-21721-1 pp. 414-416
  7. ↑ 94th Infantry Division. In: straginazifasciste.it. Retrieved October 26, 2019 (Italian).