Curt Rechel

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Curt Rechel (born December 1, 1902 in Iserlohn ; † August 10, 1973 in Farchant ) was a German sea ​​captain and holder of the Knight's Cross in World War II .

career

After completing his school education, Rechel joined the Reichsmarine on March 30, 1922 as an officer candidate . There he was on 1 October 1926 Ensign promoted and then promoted on September 17, 1928 Lieutenant and on October 1, 1934. Lieutenant . In 1936, now in the Navy , he was appointed commander of the old G 7 torpedo boat , which served with its sister ships G 8 , G 10 and G 11 in the torpedo school flotilla .

Destroyer Z 11 Bernd von Arnim

On August 1, 1938 he was promoted to corvette captain . Three months later he put the new destroyer Z 11 Bernd von Arnim into service as its first commander on November 7, 1938 . The ship was used at the beginning of the Second World War in the Gdańsk Bay to blockade the Polish Navy , then moved to the North Sea at the end of September 1939 , where it carried out trade wars , mine-laying operations and escort and security services. On November 6, 1939 Rechel received the Iron Cross, 2nd class.

In April 1940 Rechel took part with his ship in the occupation of Norway ( Operation Weser Exercise ). Z 11 picked up 200 mountain fighters in Wesermünde and ran out to Norway on April 6, 1940 as part of "Warship Group 1" under Commodore Friedrich Bonte . During the crossing to Narvik , the Bernd von Arnim suffered an oar failure in heavy seas on the morning of April 8 , which almost led to the destroyer capsizing . Shortly afterwards, the ship got into a violent battle with the British destroyer HMS Glowworm , which was then sunk by the heavy cruiser Admiral Hipper, who had come to the rescue .

On the morning of April 9, the Bernd von Arnim ran into the port of Narvik in fog and blowing snow as the first warship of the German invasion fleet and dropped her mountain troops at the pier. She was shot at by the Norwegian coastal armored ship Norge . The Bernd von Arnim returned fire, and the second incoming German destroyer, the Georg Thiele , also shot at the coastal armored ship, but the poor visibility made it difficult for both sides to score. Rechel therefore had a total of three torpedo double compartments shot at the Norge . The first two missed, but the third hit amidships and the Norge sank in just a minute. 90 men of their crew were able to save themselves, while 101 were killed.

During the British counterattack on the port of Narvik on April 10, 1940, the Bernd von Arnim and the Georg Thiele , led by frigate captain Erich Bey , the chief of the 4th destroyer flotilla, were lying in the Balangenfjord west of Narvik. They only found out about this attack when the British destroyers had expired and then attacked them. In the battle, the British flotilla leader HMS Hardy and the destroyer HMS Hunter were so badly damaged that they had to be abandoned. The Bernd von Arnim received five hits and had two deaths. During the second British attack on Narvik on April 13, 1940, in which the battleship Warspite was also involved, the Bernd von Arnim retreated to the Rombakenfjord after all her ammunition had been used up and was there, as were the destroyers Hans Lüdemann and Wolfgang Zenker , self- sunk by their crew .

Narvik Naval Regiment; Air fleet 3

Since all ten German destroyers sent to Narvik had been destroyed after the second British attack, their surviving crew members, around 2600, were on the next day, April 14th, under the command of frigate captain Fritz Berger , the previous chief of the 1st destroyer flotilla four battalions in the so-called Marine Regiment Narvik (renamed Marine Regiment Berger on April 18) and assigned to Major General Eduard Dietl's 2000 mountain troops . Korvettenkapitän Rechel became the commander of the Arnim marine battalion, which, with two companies of former Bernd von Arnim sailors, took over the protection of the ore railway to Narvik in the Bjørnfjell section of the Swedish border . Dietl's troops, cut off from any supplies, held their ground against a five-fold superiority of Allied troops until their withdrawal from Norway on May 24th. For his service in the fighting around Narvik, Rechel was awarded the Iron Cross 1st Class on June 30, 1940, the Destroyer War Badge on October 19, 1940 and the Narvik Shield on November 1, 1940 .

From July 13, 1940 to June 17, 1941 Rechel served as a naval liaison officer with the staff of the Commander in Chief of Air Fleet 3 , which was used in the Battle of Britain .

Destroyer Z 29

On June 18, 1941 he was appointed commander of the destroyer Z 29 launched on October 16, 1940 at AG "Weser" in Bremen , which he put into service on June 25, 1941 for the 8th destroyer flotilla. He remained in command of this ship until March 24, 1943. In this position he was awarded the German Cross in Gold on November 20, 1941 and promoted to frigate captain on March 1, 1942.

With his ship he led the battleship Tirpitz from Wilhelmshaven to Trondheim in January 1942 and the battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau and the heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen von Brest through the English Channel to Germany at the Cerberus company in February 1942 .

In May 1942, Z 29 moved in association with the heavy cruiser Lützow , three other destroyers and the Flottentender Jagd to Norway. There the ship first took off on 17./18. May on a minelaying company in the western Skagerrak extending the Western Wall - minefields in part, before the bandage over Trondheim (May 19) and the Ofotfjord (May 25), where the heavy cruiser Admiral Scheer added thrust, in the Alta Fjord (July 3) drove on. There the association met with a combat group under General Admiral Schniewind with the battleship Tirpitz , the heavy cruiser Admiral Hipper and other destroyers and torpedo boats, in order to then attack the northern sea convoy PQ 17 in the company Rösselsprung . Since the convoy had already been crushed by submarines and the air force, the operation was canceled and the combat group ran back to Narvik.

In September Rechel laid mines with his ship, in association with others, off the northern Norwegian coast, in the Kara Strait and near Novaya Zemlya . In October, the Z 29 and other destroyers escorted the Admiral Scheer to Narvik, then the Admiral Scheer and Tirpitz to Trondheim. In November, Z 29 was part of the escort of Admiral Scheer from Trondheim to Copenhagen and then the light cruiser Nürnberg from Copenhagen via Trondheim to the bow bay near Narvik. Z 29 returned to the Altafjord on December 9th . The ship then belonged to the German units that set out on December 30, 1942 under the command of Vice Admiral Kummetz for "Operation Rainbow" , the attack on the convoy JW 51B . On December 31, there was heavy fighting with the British escort until Kummetz, following the instruction not to take unnecessary risks, broke off the fight and returned to the Altafjord.

On January 24, 1943, the Z 29 and two other destroyers escorted the Admiral Hipper and the light cruiser Köln from the Altafjord to Kiel , where they arrived on February 8, 1943. The next day Rechel brought his ship to Wesermünde , where it went to the Norddeutscher Lloyd shipyard for overhaul.

Destroyer ZG 3 Hermes

On March 25, 1943, Rechel succeeded frigate captain Rolf Johannesson in command of the destroyer ZG 3 Hermes , the largest ship in the Navy in the Mediterranean . The destroyer captured in Greece mainly provided escort for the ship convoys between Italy and Tunis , which brought supplies for the German and Italian troops in North Africa. On April 21, 1943 Rechel succeeded in sinking the British submarine HMS Splendid south of Capri with depth charges. 30 British sailors were rescued by Hermes , 18 were killed. For this achievement Rechel was on April 27, 1943 by the Italian King Viktor Emanuel III. personally awarded the silver medal for bravery , and on May 8, 1943 he received the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross .

Only a few days later, on April 30, 1943, the Hermes was on its way to Tunis again with the Italian destroyer Leone Pancaldo when both were attacked by Allied bombers . The Leone Pancaldo sank after heavy bomb hits, while the Hermes was towed into the port of Tunis with severe damage and 23 dead. A week later, on May 7th, the Hermes was sunk as a barrier in the approach of Allied troops in the port entrance of La Goulette .

Staff service

From June 23, 1943 to August 11, 1944, Rechel served as 1st Admiral Staff Officer with the commanding Admiral Aegean. In this position he was promoted to sea captain on August 1, 1943 . His last post was that of a department head at the Eckernförde torpedo testing facility , which he held from October 18, 1944 until the end of the war. He was then a British prisoner of war until November 1945.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ The regiment was disbanded on July 1, 1940.
  2. ↑ deutsches-marinearchiv.de
  3. ↑ 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. 615.
personal data
SURNAME Rechel, Curt
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German sea captain, knight's cross bearer
DATE OF BIRTH December 1, 1902
PLACE OF BIRTH Iserlohn
DATE OF DEATH August 10, 1973
Place of death Farchant