Erich Förste

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Erich Förste (born February 11, 1892 in Magdeburg , † July 10, 1963 in Kiel ) was a German admiral in World War II .

Grave in the north cemetery in Kiel

Life

After visiting the Royal Albert Gymnasium in Leipzig Förste occurred on 1 April 1910 as a midshipman in the Imperial Navy and completed his basic training at the Great cruiser Hertha . After attending the naval school, where he was appointed ensign at sea on April 15, 1911 , he came on October 1, 1912 on the large- scale ship Friedrich the Great . There he was promoted to lieutenant at sea on September 27, 1913 and Förste was used as an officer on watch and adjutant on the ship after the outbreak of the First World War . As a first lieutenant at sea (since March 22, 1916) he completed submarine training at the submarine school from August 9 to December 31, 1916 and was then an officer on watch on U 86 . At the beginning of March 1918 Förste took over his first own boat with UB 34 as commander. From September 4 to November 9, 1918 he was in command of UB 99 and in the following period until February 28, 1919 with the I. Submarine Flotilla. For his conduct during the war, Förste was awarded both classes of the Iron Cross , the Knight's Cross II. Class of the Albrecht Order with Swords, the U-Boat War Badge and the Navy Wound Badge .

Imperial Navy

Förste joined the III. Marine Brigade to, a free corps , which significantly at Kapp coup involved. In October 1921 he was accepted into the Reichsmarine and assigned to the 2nd division of the ship master division of the Baltic Sea. There Förste was promoted to lieutenant captain on January 1, 1921 . From July 1, 1922 to March 1, 1925, Förste was in command of the torpedo boat T 143 and then in command of T 141 . On September 28, 1925, he was appointed 2nd Admiral Staff Officer on the staff of the Baltic Naval Station . From April 20 to October 5, 1927, he was made available and subsequently completed the training as a guide assistant . Meanwhile, on November 1, 1928, he became a corvette captain . After the successful completion, the building instruction took place at the light cruiser Königsberg from February 26th to March 14th 1929 . He was then leader of the crew for a month and became first officer on April 17, 1929 after the ship was commissioned . Förste disembarked on September 25, 1931 and was transferred to the budget department of the naval management on October 1, 1931 . On October 1, 1933 he was promoted to frigate captain and on September 25, 1934 he was appointed head of the department.

Navy

On September 1, 1935, he was promoted to sea captain and on September 29, 1937 appointed in command of the light cruiser Karlsruhe . On May 21, 1938 he became the commandant of the battleship Gneisenau .

Staff officer

Förste remained on board at the beginning of the Second World War , was promoted to Rear Admiral on November 1, 1939 , and was relieved a short time later on November 25, 1939. He came to the Kriegsmarinewerft Wilhelmshaven on December 6, 1939 , where he was chief of the central department and then chief of staff until February 3, 1941. In this capacity he became Vice Admiral on September 1, 1941 .

Admiral Aegean

After the occupation of Greece , Förste was appointed Admiral Aegean on September 27, 1941 . This was subordinate to the Marine Group Command South , which had been established a few months earlier. Förste took over the post from Vice Admiral Hans Hubertus Stosch and was the second in command in this position. The naval group command coordinated the joint operation of the German and Italian naval forces, whereby the inputs of the Italian staff officers in the complex structure of responsibilities were only granted a suggestion. The deployment of the naval forces of the Axis Powers was in fact commanded solely by the chief of the Naval Group Command South, Karlgeorg Schuster . Shortly before Förste's appointment, the 23rd U-Flotilla had been set up on Salamis , which was under the command of the experienced U-boat commander Fritz Frauenheim . In this area of ​​the sea, however, the Admiral Aegean was nominally in command. With Frauenheim's command of the 23rd U-Flotilla, which made him directly subordinate to the Naval Group Command South, however, his command of the German (and thus also the Italian) submarines east of the Strait of Messina went hand in hand. This led to a grotesque equality with the considerably senior and higher ranking forester, which prompted Admiral Schuster to lodge a complaint on October 16. As a consequence, Schuster was withdrawn from command of the German submarines and completely transferred to the leader of the submarines in the Mediterranean, Victor Oehrn , which Schuster regretted very much. When the port facilities of the naval base in Saint-Nazaire were damaged by a British commando in March 1942, the naval command considered sending a "permanent representative of the Navy" to the Führer headquarters. Heinz Assmann , an advisor at the Navy High Command , brought Förste up for discussion, which, however, was rejected by Raeder. Förste retained his post after the agency was renamed Commanding Admiral Aegean from February 1, 1943.

End of war

Simultaneously with his promotion to admiral on March 1, 1943 Förste was commanding admiral of the naval station of the North Sea and in this position was awarded the German cross in gold on May 25, 1943 . From June 22, 1943 until his capture on July 10, 1945, Förste acted as Commander-in-Chief of the Northern Naval Command .

post war period

Förste was released from British captivity on January 20, 1947 . From 1953 to 1956 he was editor-in-chief of the Marine-Rundschau , whose publication had ceased in 1944. He also wrote leading articles and the political feature section for the Jeversche Wochenblatt.

Raeder's memoir

From 1955 he was commissioned by Erich Raeder , who is a friend of his, to write his memoir . In his formulation of the memories of the former Grand Admiral , who was released from prison for health reasons in the same year , Förste was able to fall back on extensive support from the ranks of the former officer corps of the Navy. He commented on the observation made during the research, "... that the Navy will come together immediately [...] when it comes to our two Grand Admirals" as "touching ". Some controversial topics, such as the much-discussed change in the post of fleet chief from Wilhelm Marschall to Günther Lütjens in the run-up to the Weser Exercise business in 1940 or the relationship between Raeder and Karl Dönitz , Förste only sparsely highlighted in his presentation or left them out entirely. Raeder's autobiography, to which he had not contributed anything other than editing, was published in 1957 under the title "My Life" .

Fonts

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ König Albert-Gymnasium (Royal High School until 1900) in Leipzig: Student album 1880-1904 / 05. Friedrich Grober, Leipzig 1905
  2. ^ Reichswehr Ministry (ed.): Ranking list of the German Reichsmarine. ES Mittler & Sohn , Berlin 1929, p. 44.
  3. ^ Admiral Aegean Office in Jürgen Rohwer : "Chronicle of the Sea War 1939–1945", on the website of the Württemberg State Library in Stuttgart, accessed on February 2, 2020
  4. ^ Michael Salewski : The German naval warfare 1935-1945. Volume I: 1935-1941 , Bernard & Graefe Verlag für Wehrwesen, Frankfurt am Main 1970, page 480
  5. ^ Michael Salewski : The German naval warfare 1935-1945. Volume II: 1942-1945 , Bernard & Graefe Verlag für Wehrwesen, Frankfurt am Main 1970, page 34
  6. ↑ Klaus D. Patzwall , Veit Scherzer : The German Cross 1941-1945. History and owner. Volume II, Verlag Klaus D. Patzwall, Norderstedt 2001, ISBN 3-931533-45-X , p. 118.
  7. ^ Biographical note in Spiegel-online (archive of March 14, 1956), accessed on February 8, 2020
  8. ^ Michael Salewski : The German naval warfare 1935-1945. Volume II: 1942-1945 , Bernard & Graefe Verlag für Wehrwesen, Frankfurt am Main 1970, page 590
  9. ↑ Jörg Hillmann, The Post-War Navy in Dealing with July 20 , Marine Portal, Federal Navy
  10. ↑ Der Spiegel 11/1956, March 14, 1956 on Förste
  11. ↑ http://www.polunbi.de/bibliothek/1946-nslit-f.html
personal data
SURNAME Förste, Erich
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German admiral in World War II
DATE OF BIRTH February 11, 1892
PLACE OF BIRTH Magdeburg
DATE OF DEATH July 10, 1963
Place of death Kiel