Detlev Vett

Detlev Dietrich Vett (born October 4, 1859 in Bartelsbusch , † August 14, 1927 in Ratzeburg ) was a Prussian lieutenant general .

Life

Vett was transferred to the 5th Brandenburg Infantry Regiment No. 48 of the Prussian Army in Küstrin on April 12, 1879 , coming from the Cadet Corps as a characterized Portepeefähnrich . There he received the patent for his rank on November 13, 1879 and was promoted to second lieutenant on October 14, 1880 . From October 1, 1888, he served as a regimental adjutant, became Prime Lieutenant on September 21, 1889, and then graduated from the War Academy from October 1889 to July 1892 . After returning to his regiment, Vett rose to captain and chief of the 9th Company on June 16, 1894 . On March 22nd, with effect from April 1st, 1897, he was transferred to the Infantry Regiment No. 149 in Schneidemühl in the same position . There Vett became major on September 12, 1902 and received on April 24, 1904 his appointment as commander of the 2nd battalion. On February 20, 1909, he was transferred to Allenstein to the staff of the 1st Warmian Infantry Regiment No. 150 . In this position, Vett became lieutenant colonel two months later . With his promotion to colonel on March 22, 1912, he was appointed commander of the Kulm Infantry Regiment No. 141 .

With the outbreak of World War I , Vett was appointed commander of the 70th Reserve Infantry Brigade, which was under the 36th Reserve Division . In association with the I. Reserve Corps , Vett's troops initially took part in the border guard battles in East Prussia and the Battle of Gumbinnen . There Vett was promoted to major general on August 19, 1914 . This was followed by the battles near Tannenberg and the Masurian Lakes . Assigned to the 9th Army in November 1914 , Vett's large association took part in the fighting that led to the capture of Gostynin and Gombin . In the following months the brigade was used in the battle of Łowicz and the Rawka . In February 1915 Vett and his troops were subordinated to the "Gallwitz" army group and loaded into the Przasnysz area . Here they took part in the battles for the city in the coming weeks . This was followed by the advance into Courland and Lithuania from the end of April to the beginning of May as well as skirmishes and fighting on the lower Dubissa . During the battle for Schaulen , his brigade was able to prove itself particularly well. After further battles at Kupischki and Schimanzy-Ponedeli followed Trench warfare and in September / October 1915, the Battle of Daugavpils . After a short rest period, the brigade was used in the trench warfare off Riga from mid-November 1915 .

On September 6, 1916, Vett was appointed commander of the newly formed 216th Infantry Division . This large unit was in Galicia and intervened in the fighting on the Eastern Front for the first time in the Second Battle of the Narajowka and Zlota-Lipa . For leadership performance , Vett was awarded the Order of the Red Eagle, Second Class with Oak Leaves and Swords. After trench warfare , the division moved to the Romanian theater of war in early November . There she fought with the group "Krafft" first at the Red Tower Pass and at Pitesti , followed by the Battle of Argeș . After the battle was won, his troops went into pursuit. The units led by Vett also remained victorious in the battle of Rimnicul-Sarat . For this he received the Order of the Crown, 2nd Class with Star and Swords. At the end of the year his division stormed Valului and fought in the Battle of the Putna in early January 1917 . After that, the large association was engaged in trench warfare on the Romanian front until the armistice came into effect on December 10, 1917. This combat activity was interrupted in August 1917 when the 9th Army counterattacked after a failed attempt by the Russian and Romanian armed forces to break through . In the days that followed, the division under Vett's leadership a. a. the bridgehead of Baltaretul and was able to wipe out most of the defending Romanian 5th Division. In addition, around 3,500 prisoners were brought in and 16 artillery pieces and forty machine guns were captured. For these achievements, Vett was awarded the Cross of the Commander of the Royal House Order of Hohenzollern with Swords.

In April 1918 Vett and his division were transferred to the Western Front and placed under the 4th Army in Flanders . During the trench warfare there, he was promoted to lieutenant general on June 10, 1916. As such, Vett was able to prove himself so well in August during the fighting on the Vesle and the subsequent skirmishes of retreat to the Siegfriedstellung that the Commander-in-Chief of the 7th Army , General of the Infantry Eberhardt , submitted him to the Order Pour le Mérite . As a result, Vett was awarded the highest Prussian bravery award on October 4, 1918. After further retreats in the Hundigstellung and in front of the Antwerp-Meuse position, the Compiègne armistice came into effect on November 11, 1918 . Vett led the remnants of his division back home and acted after the demobilization from January 27 to February 13, 1919 as commander of the 35th division and from February 15 to July 25, 1919 as commander of the 1st division in the border guard against Poland. At his request, Vett was put up for disposition on July 26, 1919 .

By order of the Interior Minister Carl Severing on August 9, 1920 he received permission to use his previous family name "von Vett" again. After a long and serious illness, Vett died in Ratzeburg in 1927.

literature

• Karl-Friedrich Hildebrand, Christian Zweng: The knights of the order Pour le Mérite of the First World War. Volume 3: P-Z. Biblio Verlag, Bissendorf 2011, ISBN 3-7648-2586-3 , pp. 464-465.
• Hanns Möller: History of the knights of the order pour le mérite in the world war. Volume II: M-Z. Bernard & Graefe Verlag, Berlin 1935, pp. 453–454.

Individual evidence

1. ^ Military weekly paper . No. 59 of September 23, 1916, p. 1307.
2. ^ Reich Ministry of War (ed.): The World War 1914–1918. Eleventh volume: The warfare in autumn 1916 and in winter 1916/17. ES Mittler & Sohn , Berlin 1938, p. 265.
3. ^ Military weekly paper. No. 117 of December 30, 1916, p. 2743.
4. ^ Military weekly paper. No. 46 of October 16, 1917, p. 1196.
5. ^ Military weekly paper. No. 9 of August 28, 1920, p. 204.