Dietrich von Saucken

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Dietrich Friedrich Eduard Kasimir von Saucken (born May 16, 1892 in Fischhausen , † September 27, 1980 in Pullach ) was a German general of the armored forces in World War II . He was one of the 27 winners of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords and Diamonds and was the last German soldier to receive this award.

Life

He came from the noble family Saucken and was the son of the Prussian government councilor in Opole Erich von Saucken (* 1858) and his wife Bertha, née Westphal (* 1862).

Saucken attended the Königliche Friedrichs-Gymnasium in Königsberg and then joined the Grenadier Regiment "King Friedrich-Wilhelm I." (2nd East Prussian) No. 3 of the Prussian Army on October 1, 1910 as a flag junior . There he advanced to lieutenant until mid-June 1912 .

First World War and Weimar Republic

In the First World War Saucken was used as a company commander from October 7, 1914. From November 15, 1916, he was employed as a battalion adjutant and from April 10, 1917 as a regimental adjutant. On August 18, 1917 Saucken was promoted to first lieutenant . During the war Saucken was wounded a total of seven times, for which he was awarded the Wound Badge in Gold. He also received both classes of the Iron Cross for his achievements , the Knight's Cross of the Royal House Order of Hohenzollern with Swords and the Austrian Military Merit Cross III. Class with war decorations. At the end of the war Saucken was adjutant of the 2nd Infantry Brigade .

From 4 December 1918, took place demobilization of the German Army . Saucken reported to the Eastern Border Guard in December 1918 and was accepted into the Provisional Reichswehr on October 1, 1919 and in 1921 as a company commander in the 1st (Prussian) Infantry Regiment in the Reichswehr. On December 15, 1921 Saucken was transferred to the 8th (Prussian) cavalry regiment in Oels . This was done to transfer infantry skills to cavalry units. On January 1, 1923 Saucken was transferred to the 3rd Squadron of the 2nd (Prussian) Cavalry Regiment in Osterode in East Prussia at his own request . There he married his third cousin Elisabeth von Saucken on July 27, 1923. On April 1, 1925 he was promoted to Rittmeister and served in the regimental staff until spring 1927. From then on he was chief of the 2nd squadron in the 2nd (Prussian) cavalry regiment, which was stationed in Lyck at that time . In 1927, as part of the secret collaboration between the Red Army and the Reichswehr, he was given leave to go to the Soviet Union to deepen his Russian language skills .

time of the nationalsocialism

In 1934 Saucken was given leave to go to the Baltic States to consolidate his language skills. In April of this year, he was promoted to major . Shortly afterwards, from May 1, 1934, he was transferred to the Hanover War School as a tactics teacher . On February 19, 1935, he passed the interpreter test in Russian there. On October 1, 1936 Saucken received the rank of lieutenant colonel . From April 1, 1937, he was used as commander of the 2nd Cavalry Regiment in Angerburg . On June 1, 1939, he was promoted to colonel .

Second World War

From the beginning of the Second World War on September 1, 1939 Saucken led the 2nd Cavalry Regiment during the attack on Poland and the western campaign in France. On October 1, 1940, he was briefly transferred to the Führerreserve . From November 16, 1940, he commanded the 4th Rifle Brigade. With this unit he took part in the Balkan campaign and the initial phase of the German-Soviet war . On December 9, 1941, he gave up command of the brigade and switched to the armored force . On December 27, 1941, he was given the command of the 4th Panzer Division , which at that time was involved in the Battle of Moscow . On January 1, 1942, he was promoted to major general and appointed division commander. During defensive battles around the city of Bolchow he was seriously wounded on January 2, 1942 and had to temporarily relinquish command of the division to Major General Heinrich Eberbach on January 6 . On the same day he was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross .

It took Saucken several months to recover from the injury. After the end of the hospital stay, he was appointed commander of the school for fast troops in Krampnitz on August 24, 1942. On April 1, 1943, he was promoted to lieutenant general . On May 31, 1943 Saucken returned to the Eastern Front as commander of the 4th Panzer Division. He led the division, interrupted by a vacation from January 15 to February 5, 1944, until May 20, 1944. In addition to other combat operations, the 4th Panzer Division was involved in the tank battle near Kursk (northern wing in July 1943) , 9th Army) and participated in the successful relief of the Kovel Fixed Place in April 1944. From May 21 to June 1944 Saucken was with the leadership of the III. Panzer Corps commissioned.

At the end of June 1944, during the Soviet summer offensive Operation Bagration , he took over command of the XXXIX, which was then re-established ad hoc as a combat group "von Saucken" . Panzer Corps in the area of ​​Army Group Center. The combat group, which at that time essentially consisted of the 5th Panzer Division together with the Heavy Panzer Division 505 and the 170th Infantry Division , had to defend itself against attacks by the Soviet 3rd Belarusian Front at Borissow, Logoisk and Molodechno Put up resistance, whereby the balance of power between the German and Soviet troops should have been 1:10. Saucken managed to delay the Soviet advance through skillful leadership and to keep the units under his command capable of fighting - he was unable to prevent the Soviet reconquest of Minsk on July 3, 1944 due to the catastrophic overall military situation of Army Group Center.

On August 1, 1944 Saucken was promoted to General of the Panzer Force. At the same time he became the commanding general of XXXIX, which had emerged from the combat group. Panzer Corps. He then led this until mid-October 1944. On October 15, 1944, he handed over command to the general of the tank troop Karl Decker and was transferred to the Führerreserve. In the meantime his eldest son, Hans-Erich, had died. In December 1944 he took command of the "Greater Germany" tank corps . The formation of the corps was not completed when the Soviet winter offensive Vistula-Oder operation began on January 12, 1945 . Until February 12, 1945, von Saucken led the Panzer Grenadier Division “Brandenburg” during the chaotic fighting from the Lodz area in a wandering basin to a position near Görlitz . A subsequent dispute with the Army Chief of Staff about the futility of continuing the war ultimately led to Saucken being reassigned to the Führer Reserve.

On March 12, 1945, however, he was appointed commander of the 2nd Army (renamed Army East Prussia in April 1945 ). During this time he was responsible for ensuring that around 300,000 German refugees from the contested area around the city of Danzig and the mouth of the Vistula River were able to escape to the west across the Baltic Sea. (→ Company Walpurgis Night )

Saucken remained in command of the 2nd Army until May 9, 1945. On this day Saucken fell into Soviet captivity on the Hela peninsula after negotiating with the Marshal of the Soviet Union Konstantin Rokossowski the cessation of the fighting of the German troops remaining on the peninsula . The surrender of the German troops lasted until May 14, 1945.

Soviet Captivity and Later Life

Orjol Central Prison (older photo, around 1920)

After his capture, Saucken initially lived in solitary confinement, first for 32 months in the Lubyanka in Moscow, and later in the central prison in Oryol . In the Soviet Union, because of his intransigence, he was so badly mistreated by investigators of the MGB that he later became dependent on a wheelchair. He refused to sign a fake confession. On May 10, 1949, he was sentenced to 25 years of forced labor in the GULag by the military tribunal of the MGB in Oryol Oblast . He then spent the rest of his imprisonment in the GULag camp district OSERLAG (near Taischet along the Taischet - Lena railway line ) in Siberia. On October 9, 1955, Saucken was freed together with the last German prisoners of war in the course of the return of the ten thousand negotiated by Konrad Adenauer and released from the prisoner of war camp 5110/48 Woikowo in the Federal Republic of Germany .

After his return, Saucken settled near Munich and became a painter. He was not included in the development of the Bundeswehr and no longer held any military functions. Nevertheless, he was honored by representatives of the Bundeswehr, for example on the occasion of his 75th birthday. Saucken died on September 27, 1980 in Pullach at the age of 88 and was buried in the Munich forest cemetery in Solln (grave site 17-1-12).

Awards

  • War Merit Cross II. And I. Class with swords
  • Clasp for the Iron Cross 2nd and 1st class on September 13, 1939 and October 3, 1939, respectively
  • Wound badge (1939) in gold
  • mentioned three times in the Wehrmacht report on December 3, 1943, July 5, 1944, May 9, 1945
  • Tank battle badge in silver with number 75
  • Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross on February 6, 1942
    • Oak leaves for the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross on August 22, 1942 (281st award)
    • Swords for the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross on January 31, 1944 (46th award)
    • Diamonds for the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross on May 8, 1945 (27th award)

Works

  • With Joachim Neumann : 4th Panzer Division. Division history. Part 2: The Russian campaign from May 1943 to May 1945. Self-published. Coburg 1968 and the 4th Panzer Division 1943–1945. Report and reflection on the last two years of the war in the East. Self-published. Bonn 1989. (greatly expanded revision of the division history from 1968).

literature

  • Ernst Bahr , Gerd Brausch (ed.): Old Prussian biography . Volume 4. Elwert-Verlag. Marburg / Lahn 1995, ISBN 3-7708-1003-1 .
  • Antony Beevor : Berlin the Downfall 1945. Viking-Verlag. London, New York 2002, ISBN 0-670-88695-5 .
  • Gerhard Boldt : The last days of the Reich Chancellery. Europa Publishing House. 1947.
  • Kathryn Barbier: Kursk 1943: The Greatest Tank Battle Ever Fought. Zenith imprint. 2002, ISBN 0-7603-1254-0 .
  • Ирина Владимировна Безбородова: Генералы вермахта в плену. Российский гос. гуманитарный университет, 1998, ISBN 5-7281-0206-9 (Irina Vladimirovna Besdorodowa: Generals of the Wehrmacht in Captivity. Russian State Humanitarian University. 1998).
  • Large: Garrison town of Angerburg. In: Angerburger Heimatbrief. Issue 51, autumn 1965. pp. 8–16 ( Kreis-angerburg.de PDF).
  • Christian Hartmann : Wehrmacht in the Eastern War: Front and military hinterland 1941/42. Oldenbourg science publisher. Munich 2010, ISBN 978-3-486-70225-5 .
  • Wolfgang Keilig: The Generals of the Army 1939–1945. Podzun-Pallas-Verlag. Friedberg 1983, ISBN 3-7909-0202-0 .
  • Samuel W. Mitcham : Rommel's lieutenants: the men who served the Desert Fox, France, 1940. Praeger Security, Westport. Conn. 2006. ISBN 0-275-99185-7 .
  • К. А. Залесский: Энциклопедия Третьего рейха: Вермахт. Яуза-ЭКСМО, М. 2005 (KA Salesski: Encyclopedia of the Third Reich: Wehrmacht. Jausa-EKSMO. Moscow 2005).
  • Rudolf Vierhaus (ed.): German biographical encyclopedia. KG Saur Verlag, Munich 2007, ISBN 978-3-598-25038-5 .
  • Thomas Vogel: Uprising of conscience: Military resistance against Hitler and the Nazi regime 1933–1945. ES Mittler, Hamburg et al. 2000, ISBN 3-8132-0708-0 .
  • Gordon Williamson: Knight's Cross with Diamonds Recipients: 1941-45. Osprey Publishing, 2005, ISBN 1-84176-644-5 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h i Bahr, Brausch: Old Prussian Biography. Volume IV, p. 1149.
  2. ^ Vierhaus: German biographical encyclopedia. P. 711.
  3. ^ A b Williamson: Knight's Cross with Diamonds Recipients: 1941-45. Pp. 58-59.
  4. ↑ a b c d e Veit Scherzer : Knight's Cross bearers 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. 651.
  5. ^ Wilhelm Eduard Hans George Erich [von Saucken] . In: Marcelli Janecki , Deutsche Adelsgenossenschaft (Hrsg.): Yearbook of the German nobility . Third volume. WT Bruer's Verlag, Berlin 1899, p. 392 ( dlib.rsl.ru ).
  6. ↑ Reichswehr Ministry (Ed.): Ranking list of the German Reichsheeres. ES Mittler & Sohn , Berlin 1925, p. 166.
  7. ↑ a b c Keilig: The Generals of the Army 1939–1945. P. 292.
  8. ^ Nehring: The history of the German tank weapon 1916 to 1945. P. 47.
  9. ↑ a b Grosse: Garrison town of Angerburg. Pp. 14-16.
  10. ↑ Mitcham: Rommel's lieutenants. P. 143.
  11. ↑ Apparently during the Jassy-Kishinev operation , cf. http://www.von-restorff.de/TNG/getperson.php?personID=I1725&tree=20170804
  12. ^ Ludger Tewes , The Panzergrenadierdivision Großdeutschland in the campaign against the Soviet Union from 1942 to 1945 , Verlag Klartext Essen 2020, ISBN 978-3-8375-2089-7 , pp. 572-592.
  13. ^ Hartmann: Wehrmacht in the Eastern War. Pp. 167-168.
  14. ^ Rauchsteiner, Beer, Etschmann: Austria 1945. P. 120.
  15. ↑ Manfred Zeidler: Stalin Justice contra Nazi crimes. The war crimes trials against German prisoners of war in the USSR from 1943 to 1952. State of knowledge and research problems. Hannah Arendt Institute for Research on Totalitarianism, Dresden 1996. ISBN 3-931648-08-7 , p. 70 "Returning transport list from October 1955 with those released from the general camp Vojkovo."
  16. ↑ Salessky: Encyclopedia of the Third Reich. Pp. 200-201.
  17. ↑ Dietrich Friedrich Wilhelm Eduard Kasimir von Saucken on ww2gravestone.com (English)
personal data
SURNAME Saucken, Dietrich von
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Saucken, Dietrich Friedrich Eduard Kasimir von (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German General of the Armored Force in World War II
DATE OF BIRTH May 16, 1892
PLACE OF BIRTH Fischhausen
DATE OF DEATH September 27, 1980
Place of death Pullach