Anton Grasser

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Anton Grasser (born November 3, 1891 in Bossendorf , Alsace ; † November 3, 1976 in Stuttgart ) was a German officer , most recently General of the Infantry in World War II and Commanding General and Commander-in-Chief of the Narva Army Department . Appointed inspector of the riot police in 1950 , he became the first inspector of the newly founded Federal Border Police (BGS; today Federal Police ) on May 18, 1951 .

Life

As a one-year volunteer , Grasser joined the 1st Lower Alsatian Infantry Regiment No. 132 on October 1, 1913 and marched on the Western Front with the 1st Company on August 8, 1914 . After his promotion to NCO on January 27, 1915, Grasser was appointed leader of the 9th company of his regiment, where he was appointed vice sergeant on March 10 of the same year . On November 9, 1916, he was wounded and after recovering on July 2, 1917, meanwhile appointed lieutenant , he went to the air observation school in Thorn and was then assigned to the replacement battalion of Infantry Regiment No. 132. After his discharge from military service, Grasser joined the Baden police force in December 1918 and was made a police lieutenant in Freiburg im Breisgau on April 15, 1920.

Police service

Already on June 1, 1921, Grasser was promoted to lieutenant police and on January 1, 1923 was appointed police captain. On April 9, 1923 he was transferred to Rastatt and came to Mannheim on February 23, 1924 . After stints in Karlsruhe (from August 1, 1925) and Villingen (from September 28, 1931), he was transferred to Karlsruhe again on April 3, 1933 after Adolf Hitler came to power . During his service in Heidelberg on August 1, 1935, he was appointed police major.

Wehrmacht

With the rank of police major, Anton Grasser was accepted into the newly founded Wehrmacht on March 16, 1936 and was assigned to the 110 Infantry Regiment, but on May 16 to the staff of III. Battalion of Infantry Regiment 13 transferred. In the same year, on October 6th, Grasser took over the 9th company of the 119th Infantry Regiment, which was newly established in Stuttgart on the same day. Almost two months later, on November 30th, he was assigned to the Army Gas Protection School in Berlin.

Anton Grasser was promoted to lieutenant colonel on March 1, 1938 and took over as commander of the 1st battalion of the 119th Infantry Regiment from Württemberg on November 10, 1938.

After the outbreak of war in 1939, Grasser became commander of the 119 Infantry Regiment on February 6, 1940. He held this position until January 25, 1942. At dawn on June 5, 1940, the regiment succeeded in crossing the Aisne-Oise Canal and successfully storming the Chemin des Dames , which had been fought over during the First World War and which French units had previously been able to hold as a locking bolt in tough defense for days. According to other sources, the overrun did not occur until a few days after June 6th. Around 8:30 a.m. on this successful day of the attack, Lieutenant Colonel Grasser and Lieutenant Rolf Reuchlin were able to hoist the German war flag on the conquered Fort de la Malmaison bridgehead . The achievements of Grasser and his regiment were noticeable as a result. After the storm on the Chemin des Dames he was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross on June 16, 1940 . On November 15, 1940, Grasser's regiment was motorized and on March 1, 1941, he was promoted to colonel . On January 25, 1942, Grasser was entrusted with the command of the 25th motorized infantry division , which was then in the Brjansk- Orel area.

On January 1, 1943, he was appointed lieutenant general and later his division was renamed the 25th Panzer Grenadier Division and on November 5, 1943 Grasser was transferred to the Führer Reserve . After he was appointed from November 15, 1943 with the deputy leadership of the LVI standing on the Eastern Front . Panzer Corps , was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with the Oak Leaves on December 5 of the same year.

Due to his military merits, he was assigned to the course for commanding generals in Hirschberg , Silesia, on January 5, 1944 , and on February 15, 1944 as the newly appointed infantry general with the leadership of the XXVI. Army Corps ( Army Group North ) entrusted. On May 1 of the same year he was appointed Commanding General of the XXVI. Army Corps . He held this position until May 11th.

From July 3, 1944 to September 25, 1944 he was Commander-in-Chief of the LIV on February 2, 1944. Army Corps set up Army Detachment Narwa ( Army Group North ), which defended the Estonian area west of the isthmus between the Gulf of Finland and Lake Peipus against the Red Army . In his various commanding functions, Grasser was directly involved in the course of the Battle of Narva between February 2, 1944 and September 19, 1944 . After the battle, on September 25, 1944, he became the commanding general of the Narva Army Division, which has now been renamed "Grasser Army Division". On January 22, 1945, he was entrusted as commanding general with the management of the LXXII. Army Corps and reassigned him to the Führerreserve on April 20, 1945.

On May 8, 1945 Grasser was taken prisoner of war , from which he was released on July 1, 1947.

Anton Grasser and other former members of the Wehrmacht relieved after 1947 enables them to establish Colonel Heinz Gaedcke , who during his denazification process was considered a "major offender" initially due to his work in the army high command, so that this "not charged" as could be classified. Gaedcke was later recalled as an officer in the Bundeswehr .

Riot Police and Federal Border Guard

Until 1950 Grasser worked as an employee of a Stuttgart forwarding company. Subsequently, he was appointed to the newly founded Federal Ministry for the temporary performance of special police tasks. On November 21, 1950, Grasser was appointed Inspector General of the Riot Police in the Interior Ministry, which was established by the Federal Government under Chancellor Konrad Adenauer on behalf of the American military administration with its representative John Jay McCloy under the impression of the escalating Cold War . This police force already had a paramilitary character, as it was equipped with pistols, carbines and submachine guns.

The declaration of honor for the soldiers of the Wehrmacht by the then Commander-in-Chief of the NATO armed forces, Dwight D. Eisenhower , was important for the establishment of new defense forces, which were initially trained from March 16, 1951 in the Federal Border Guard , which was also organized as a paramilitary organization . to Federal Chancellor Adenauer. This made the reintegration of former Wehrmacht cadres and men possible in the first place, since at that time only a few post-war cohorts and almost no officers were available.

In February 1951, Grasser was taken over by the newly founded Federal Border Guard (BGS) and appointed as the commander of the Federal Border Guard Command with the rank of Brigadier General. As early as April 1 of the same year, he was transferred to Munich as commander of the Federal Border Guard Command South III . In this function he was also appointed inspector of the Federal Border Guard on May 18, 1951. He held both posts until the end of his term of service, which ended at the end of June 1953. Therefore, he said goodbye to the teams of Division South III on June 10th during a bivouac of the Hundreds on Staffelberg . On July 5, 1953, Grasser retired.

Awards

literature

  • Dermot Bradley , Karl-Friedrich Hildebrand, Markus Rövekamp: Die Generale des Heeres 1921-1945, Volume 4: Fleck-Gyldenfeldt , Biblio Verlag, Osnabrück 1996, ISBN 3-7648-2488-3 , pp. 397-399.

Remarks

  1. ↑ a b c d e Hans Booms, Friedrich P. Kahlenberg, Hartmut Weber u. a .: The Cabinet Protocols of the Federal Government, Volume 14, 1961 , R. Oldenbourg Verlag, January 2007, ISBN 3486575848 , p. 821
  2. ^ The Second World War - Step across the border (Part 2), Manfred Pawlak Verlagsgesellschaft mbH, Herrsching 1989, ISBN 3-88199-536-6 , p. 338.
  3. ^ Gerhard Brugmann: Ways of a Soldier: Heinz Gaedcke , Books on Demand GmbH, 2005, ISBN 3833426241 , p. 93.
  4. ^ Gerhard Brugmann: Ways of a Soldier: Heinz Gaedcke , Books on Demand GmbH, 2005, ISBN 3833426241 , p. 166.
  5. ↑ Arvo Puu (translation: Koidu Uustalu): Im Raum Narva 1944 ... 1996 , Estonian Red Cross, 1996, p. 8
  6. ↑ Wolfgang Schumann, Gerhart Haß, Karl Drechsler, Wolfgang Bleyer, Olaf Groehler: Germany in the Second World War , Pahl-Rugenstein Verlag , Bonn 1985, ISBN 3760905749 , p. 71
  7. ^ Gerhard Brugmann: Ways of a Soldier: Heinz Gaedcke , Books on Demand GmbH, 2005, ISBN 3833426241 , p. 260
  8. ^ Documentation of Time, German Institute for Contemporary History , Institute for International Politics and Economics, 1949, p. 1205.
  9. ↑ Hans-Jürgen Schmidt: We carry the eagle of the federal government on the rock - Chronicle of the Federal Border Police 1951 - 1971 Fiedler-Verlag, Coburg 1995, ISBN 3-923434-17-0 , p. 72.
  10. ^ Wilhelm Cornides: Europa-Archiv , 1951 , Verlag für Internationale Politik, 1951, p. 4238
  11. ↑ Hans-Jürgen Schmidt: We wear the eagle of the federal government on the rock - Chronicle of the Federal Border Guard 1951 - 1971 Fiedler-Verlag, Coburg 1995, ISBN 3-923434-17-0 , p. 86
  12. ↑ a b Veit Scherzer : Knight's Cross bearer 1939–1945. The holders of the Iron Cross of the Army, Air Force, Navy, Waffen-SS, Volkssturm and armed forces allied with Germany according to the documents of the Federal Archives. 2nd Edition. Scherzers Militaer-Verlag, Ranis / Jena 2007, ISBN 978-3-938845-17-2 , p. 345.
personal data
SURNAME Grasser, Anton
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German police officer, general of the infantry and inspector of the Federal Border Guard
DATE OF BIRTH November 3, 1891
PLACE OF BIRTH Bossendorf
DATE OF DEATH 3rd November 1976
Place of death Stuttgart