Parachute Panzer Division 1 Hermann Göring

Parachute Panzer Division 1 "Hermann Göring"
Troop registration number of the Hermann Göring Division
active	February 24, 1933 as a police department zbV "Wecke"  until May 1945 (surrender)
Country	German Empire
Armed forces	Wehrmacht
Armed forces	air force
Type	Armored Division
structure	structure
garrison	Berlin , Hermann Göring barracks
Second World War	1939 Attack on Poland in 1940 Weser exercise company Western campaign 1941-1943 Eastern Front Africa campaign 1943 Italian campaign Allied invasion of Sicily Battle for Monte Cassino 1944 Warsaw Uprising Vistula-Oder operation 1945 Battle of Bautzen
Commanders
list of	Commanders
insignia
Afrikakorps special characters

The Parachute Panzer Division 1 "Hermann Göring" was a German tank division during World War II . She was subordinate to the Luftwaffe , but used in the context of large army units and not capable of parachuting.

Its staff was recruited from volunteers from Nazi organizations such as the Hitler Youth . She fought in the African campaign , in Sicily and Italy and on the Eastern Front . During the war it was enlarged from regiment to tank corps . The association was stationed in Berlin in the newly built Hermann Göring barracks (today's Julius Leber barracks ) and in Velten . It was named after the Reichsmarschall and Commander in Chief of the Air Force Hermann Göring . This naming was intended to establish a close connection between Wehrmacht units and National Socialism , while at the same time documenting the domestic power within the party hierarchy.

history

Historical overview

Police department z. b. V. Wecke - February 1933 to June 1933

State police group Wecke z. b. V. - June 1933 to January 1934

State Police Group General Göring - January 1934 to September 1935

General Göring Regiment - September 1935 to the beginning of 1941

Regiment (motorized) Hermann Göring - beginning of the year 1941 to July 1942

Brigade Hermann Göring - July to October 1942

Hermann Göring Division - October 1942 to June 1943

Panzer Division Hermann Göring - June 1943 to April 1944

Parachute Panzer Division 1 Hermann Göring - April to October 1944

Parachute Panzer Corps Hermann Göring - October 1944 to May 1945

Establishment and initial phase - police administration

Command flag of the chief of the police

When Hitler ( NSDAP ) was appointed Reich Chancellor on January 30, 1933, Hermann Göring was Prussian Minister of the Interior . This gave him supreme command of the entire Prussian police .

On February 24, 1933, Göring had the police department z. b. V. Wecke (zbV: "for special use") set up. His intention was to create a police association that was loyal to the NSDAP regime. The association was named after its commander, Major of the Schutzpolizei, Walther Wecke , a veteran of the First World War and a member of the NSDAP, and was stationed in Berlin-Kreuzberg . The department soon became notorious for its brutal practices. In cooperation with the Gestapo , which was also under Göring's control, she was involved in many attacks against communists and Marxists and was responsible for the arrest of opponents of the regime.

In June 1933, Göring enlarged the department and placed it under the command of the state police . The department became the state police group Wecke z. b. V. renamed.

Göring strengthened the group further and made it a requirement that all of its members had to complete military training. The association was renamed the State Police Group General Göring . In the so-called Röhm Putsch on June 30, 1934, Hitler resorted to both Göring's state police group and Himmler's Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler . Goering's troops and the Leibstandarte executed many leading members of the SA .

Air Force Control - Early Missions

Special troop flag of the 1st battalion of the "General Göring" regiment

In 1935, Goering was appointed Commander in Chief of the Air Force . Since he wanted to keep control of his "favorite unit", it was transferred to the Luftwaffe in September 1935 and renamed the Regiment General Göring .

At the beginning of 1936 the regiment was ready to fight again. At that time all organized resistance to the NSDAP had been eliminated. During this time, the regiment served Göring as a personal bodyguard and covered Hitler's headquarters with his anti-aircraft guns. During this time the IV. (Jäger-) Battalion / RGG and the 15th Pioneer Company were assigned to the Döberitz Aviation School for parachute training . These units were separated from the regiment in March 1938 and transformed into I./Fallschirmjäger-Regiment 1, the first paratrooper association of the Wehrmacht.

When the German Reich annexed Austria in March 1938 , the regiment was one of the first units to cross the border. Two companies landed with Ju 52/3 m transport planes at Aspern Airport near Vienna . General Göring's regiment was also involved in the occupation of the Sudetenland in October 1938 and the “ rest of the Czech Republic ” in March 1939 .

During the attack on Poland only a small part of the regiment was involved in fighting. Most of the association stayed in Berlin to protect Göring and the Nazi leadership. On the operation weserübung the spring of 1940 against Norway only parts attended the regiment (the Guard Battalion, a Kradschützenkompanie and a light anti-aircraft battery).

The largest part was relocated to the west on the German-Dutch border under the code names "Flak-Regiment 101" and "Flak-Regiment 103". As part of the western campaign , this troop took part in the invasion of the Netherlands and Belgium . The Eben-Emael fortress was taken by paratroopers, many of whom had previously served in General Göring's regiment.

After the surrender of the Netherlands, the regiment was divided into several small combat groups, which were assigned to the armored divisions that spearheaded the attack. The anti-aircraft troops were often used to fight tanks and destroyed 18 French tanks using 8.8 cm anti-aircraft guns during a battle in the Mormalwald .

After the capitulation of France , the regiment was stationed on the Channel coast before it was ordered to Paris as an anti-aircraft unit . The new commander was Colonel Paul Conrath in June 1940 , who was to lead the regiment and the later division until 1944. At the end of 1940 the regiment was moved back to Berlin to resume its old job as a bodyguard and air defense unit.

German-Soviet War and North Africa

At the beginning of 1941 the association was motorized and renamed Regiment (motorized) Hermann Göring after Göring had been appointed Reichsmarschall in 1940 . During the Balkan campaign in spring 1941, the regiment was stationed near Ploieşti in Romania to protect the oil fields there, and then to be made available for the attack on the Soviet Union .

The attack on the Soviet Union began on June 22, 1941. During the campaign, the regiment was assigned to the 11th Panzer Division and served in Army Group South in the area around Radziechów , Kiev and Brjansk , where it was again used to fight tanks. At the end of 1941 it was moved back to Germany for rest and refreshment. The Rifle Battalion Hermann Goering remained until May 1942 at the front.

In July 1942 the regiment was expanded to brigade size and renamed Brigade Hermann Göring . As early as October 1942, when the brigade was still being reformed, it was decided to expand it to division size, whereby it was to be structured according to the guidelines of a tank division of the army . Göring arranged for experienced army tank crews to be assigned to his division and reinforced the infantry with the 5th Parachute Regiment, veterans of the airborne battle of Crete .

While the division was being formed, the defeat in the second battle of El-Alamein and the Allied landing in northwest Africa ( Operation Torch ) forced General Field Marshal Erwin Rommel's Africa Corps to withdraw from the Egyptian-Libyan border into Tunisia . Parts of the division that had already been set up (a total of around 11,000 men) were then transferred to Tunisia from November 1942. The remnants of this formation, known as "Kampfgruppe Schmid", surrendered to the Allies in May 1943 after the battle for Tunisia with the other units of Army Group Africa .

Armored Division - Sicily - Italy

Some units of the Hermann Göring Division , which were just finishing their training or were waiting to be transported to Tunisia, were used as the basis for the newly founded division, which was then called the Panzer Division Hermann Göring . In mid-June she was shipped to Sicily to help fend off the expected Allied invasion . On 10 July 1943, led Allies to Operation Husky by, during which most of the allied Italian showed troops. The Panzer Division fought in Gela and Priolo , but had to withdraw to Messina with air and sea support due to heavy Allied attacks . During the company's training course , the German evacuation of Sicily, the division's troops were part of the rearguard and one of the last units to retreat to mainland Italy.

When the Italian government signed an armistice with the Allies in early September 1943 , the division took part in the disarmament of the Italian troops. After the Allies landed at Salerno on September 9, the division stationed nearby was tasked with the counter-resistance, but had to retreat to the Volturno - Termoli line and later to the Gustav line , where they finally had to recover and refresher was drawn from the fight.

Art treasures of Monte Cassino

Soldiers of the division show a painting

The works of art packed in wooden boxes are loaded onto a truck

When the Allies advanced north to the monastery of Monte Cassino , troops of the division under Lieutenant Colonel Julius Schlegel made themselves available to the monks of the monastery to bring the unique cultural treasures to safety. After much persuasion, the monks agreed to Schlegel, and the division's vehicles were used to secure the works of art, including paintings by Leonardo da Vinci , Titian and Raphael, as well as the remains of Benedict of Nursia before the attack on Castel Sant'Angelo in Rome bring. In this way they escaped destruction in the battle for Monte Cassino .

Göring, who was known as an art lover and looter, commissioned an SS department to arrest and execute Schlegel. Only through the intervention of the monks and the commander of the division could Schlegel be saved and the operation continued. As a thank you, the monks of Monte Cassino held a mass for him and awarded him and General Conrath a certificate in Latin. The translation of the certificate into German reads:

“In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. The Cassinians thank the illustrious and beloved officer Julius Schlegel, who saved the monks and goods of the holy monastery of Cassino, with all their hearts and ask God for his continued well-being. "

- signed Gregorius Dimare, OSB, Bishop and Abbot

(Note: On the document of General Paul Conrath, who gave his consent to Schlegel's action only after his near-arrest by the Feldgendarmerie and only then confessed to Schlegel that he was using 20 trucks unrelated to the war, there is the rather idiosyncratic translation of the name Leader of a tank division into Latin as Dux ferreae legionis .)

After the war, Schlegel was arrested on suspicion of war crimes and looting and only released after the intervention of British Field Marshal Harold Alexander . By saving the art treasures and the library as well as the construction plans, the reconstruction of the destroyed monastery was later possible. Schlegel was in the early 1950s by Pope Pius XII. invited to a special audience. There is also a memorial plaque dedicated to the Austrian at Pokornygasse 5 in Vienna and a memorial in Wertheimsteinpark not far from it .

More fighting in Italy

When the US Army landed at Anzio and Nettuno in February 1944 , the division attacked the landing forces. From February to April 1944 she fought in Cisterna , on the Rapido River and in Minturno .

In April 1944, the division was withdrawn from the fighting in Tuscany and converted into the Hermann Göring Parachute-Panzer Division . It was made ready for relocation to France to fend off the anticipated Allied invasion .

The Allied offensive against Rome on May 12th, however, nullified these plans and the Hermann Göring Parachute Panzer Division continued to be deployed in Italy. She withdrew to Rome fighting, holding up the Allied forces while the last German troops were evacuated. From June 4th, the retreat passed through the Italian capital, which had been declared an “ open city ” in order to avoid its destruction, as far as Florence . On July 4th, the division carried out a massacre of residents of the town of Cavriglia , killing 180 civilians. On July 15, the division was pulled from the front and prepared for transport to the Eastern Front .

Relocation to the Eastern Front

During this time, several experienced ranks were withdrawn from the division to help set up a sister division, the Fallschirm-Panzergrenadier Division 2 Hermann Göring , which was formed in Radom at that time . Most of the supply troops and some staff officers were also relocated. They were supposed to take part in the development of the Hermann Göring Parachute Panzer Corps , under which the two sister divisions were to unite.

At the end of July, the division reached the Vistula front and was immediately thrown into the battle, where together with the 5th SS Panzer Division "Wiking", the III. Red Army tank corps in the Wołomin / Radzymin area destroyed. Goering's nephew, Captain Heinz Goering, was killed in these battles on July 29th. With the start of the Warsaw Uprising on August 1, 1944, most of the German troops were deployed to suppress it.

East Prussia - end of the war

The Hermann Göring Parachute Panzer Corps was ready for action in early October 1944 and the Hermann Göring Panzer Division was placed under the command of the corps together with its sister Panzer Grenadier Division . The Panzer Corps was relocated to the East Prussia - Courland region to stop the Soviet offensive that had already encircled Army Group North and was pushing further into East Prussia. The Panzer Corps was involved in violent defensive battles near Gumbinnen ( Gumbinnen-Goldaper Operation ). When the Soviet offensive came to a halt at the end of November, the Panzer Corps withdrew to solid lines of defense.

During the Battle of East Prussia , the Hermann Göring Panzer Corps was enclosed in the Heiligenbeiler Kessel together with the remains of the 4th Army in early 1945 . In February 1945 the Panzer Grenadier Division Greater Germany was assigned to the corps.

After several unsuccessful attempts to break out, the corps had to be evacuated by sea to Swinoujscie in Pomerania . After landing, it was immediately instructed to defend the Oder-Neisse Line against Soviet attacks in mid-March 1945. Another elite division, the Brandenburg Panzer Grenadier Division , was added to the corps to strengthen it again .

In April the remnants of the corps were moved to Silesia and pushed back to Saxony in heavy fighting . Nevertheless, the Parachute Panzer Division 1 Hermann Göring was able to achieve some successes against the 2nd Polish Army in mid to late April with a victory in the battles for Bautzen and the crushing of the 1st Polish Division near Koenigsbrück .

At the beginning of May 1945 the Panzer Corps was stationed near Dresden . The remnants of the corps began to break through to the west to surrender to the Americans who were standing on the Elbe at that time . This plan failed, the corps was surrounded and surrendered to the Red Army on May 8, 1945. As members of the Air Force, the troops of the corps such as members of the Waffen SS and the police were classified as war criminals by the Soviet leadership because of their involvement in the atrocities on the Eastern Front and imprisoned in Soviet gulags , from which only a few survivors returned.

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War crimes

The division came in 1944 in the fight against partisans of the LXXXV. Army corps deployed in Italy. Units of the division shared responsibility for the massacres in the villages of Monchio, Susano and Costrignano (March 18), Villaminozo (March 18 to 20), Monte Falterona (March 13), Cervarolo and Civago ( province of Reggio Emilia ) ( March 20) March 1944), Monte Morello (Province of Florence) (April 10-11, 1944), Mommio (municipality of Fivizzano / Province of Massa-Carrara) (May 5, 1944), and in the districts of Castelnuovo dei Sabbioni, Meleto and San Martino of the Cavriglia community (July 4-11, 1944), in which 173 people, including women, children and the elderly, were shot in revenge for attacks by the Resistance ; also for the Civitella massacre in Val di Chiana, Cornia and San Pancrazio on June 29, 1944, in which 250 civilians were shot. From October 1 to 3, 1943, the Acerra massacre took place in which several units of this division were involved, with 84 people, including 7 children and 14 women, killed.

According to the Atlante degli Stragi Naziste e Fasciste in Italia (Atlas of Nazi and Fascist massacres in Italy) project, financed by the German Federal Government and led by a historians' commission, over 1000 people were killed in massacres and executions in Italy between September 1943 and July 1944 killed by members of the division. The historian Carlo Gentile puts the number of victims higher and divides them regionally: 600 to 650 civilians killed in southern Italy , 390 in the area of ​​the Tuscan - Emilian Apennines and 450 in the Arezzo area . He names around 1500 women, men and children who were murdered by this division in Italy.

Units of the division were involved in the fighting during the Warsaw Uprising. On the orders of Hitler, the city was destroyed and mass executions of civilians were carried out. Soldiers from the Hermann-Göring Panzer Division are said to have used civilians as human shields for the tanks.

A court hearing against twelve former soldiers took place in Verona in 2010/11 in the absence of the accused. Seven former soldiers of the "Hermann Göring" parachute tank division were sentenced to life imprisonment on July 6th. An extradition did not take place according to German law, whose legal principle is also applied in many other countries.

The Italian documentary The Violin from Cervarolo deals with the massacre of Italian civilians in the Reggian Apennines in spring 1944, one of the war crimes committed by Hermann Göring's Parachute Panzer Division 1, and the trial in Verona against members of the division.

Commanders

• Colonel of the State Police Walther Wecke - February 23, 1933 to June 5, 1934
• Lieutenant Colonel of the State Police Friedrich-Wilhelm Jakoby - June 6, 1934 to August 12, 1936
• Colonel Walther von Axthelm - August 13, 1936 to May 31, 1940
• Lieutenant General Paul Conrath - June 1, 1940 to April 14, 1944
• Major General Wilhelm Schmalz - April 16 to September 30, 1944
• Major General Horst von Necker - October 1, 1944 to February 8, 1945
• Major General Max Lemke - February 9 to May 8, 1945

Parachute Panzer Corps Hermann Göring

• Lieutenant General Wilhelm Schmalz - October 4, 1944 to May 8, 1945

organization

General Göring Regiment , 1939

Regimental staff

• Music corps
• I. (heavy) anti-aircraft dept.
• II. (Light) anti-aircraft dept.
• III. Headlight Dept.
• IV. (Light) anti-aircraft department
• Guard Battalion
  • Cavalry squadron
  • 9th company
  • 10th company
  • 11. Guard company
• Replacement department
• (heavy) railway anti-aircraft battery
• (light) anti-aircraft battery

Hermann Göring Division , November 1942

• Division staff
• Grenadier Regiment 1 Hermann Göring
• Grenadier Regiment 2 Hermann Göring
• Hermann Göring Jäger Regiment
• Flak Regiment Hermann Göring
• Guard battalion Hermann Göring
• Replacement battalion Hermann Göring
• 2 auxiliary batteries Hermann Göring

Parachute Panzer Division 1 Hermann Göring , May 1944

• Division staff
• Headquarters company
• Feldgendarmerie troop
• Parachute Panzer Grenadier Regiment 1 Hermann Göring
• Parachute Panzer Grenadier Regiment 2 Hermann Göring
• Hermann Göring parachute tank regiment
• Parachute Panzer Reconnaissance Department 1 Hermann Göring
• Parachute Panzer Fusilier Battalion 1 Hermann Göring
• Parachute Panzer Artillery Regiment 1 Hermann Göring
• Parachute Panzer Pioneer Battalion 1 Hermann Göring
• Parachute Panzer News Department 1 Hermann Göring
• Parachute Panzer Field Replacement Battalion 1 Hermann Göring
• Field post office 1 Hermann Göring

Parachute Panzer Corps Hermann Göring , November 1944

• Staff of the Corps
  • Feldgendarmeriezug
  • Readiness to fly
  • War reporting party
  • Hermann Göring Parachute Flak Regiment
  • Parachute Panzer Storm Battalion Hermann Göring
  • Parachute Panzer Corps Spy Battalion Hermann Göring
  • Parachute Panzer Corps News Department Hermann Göring
  • Supply department Hermann Göring
  • Repair department Hermann Göring
  • Administrative battalion Hermann Göring
  • Hermann Göring's medical department
  • Corps field post office Hermann Göring
• Parachute Panzer Division 1 Hermann Göring
• Parachute Panzer Grenadier Division 2 Hermann Göring

literature

• Roger James Bender, George A. Petersen: "Hermann Göring". From Regiment to Parachute Armored Corps. Schiffer, Atglen PA 1993, ISBN 0-88740-473-1 .
• Alfred Otte : The HG Panzer Division . Schiffer, West Chester PA 1989, ISBN 0-88740-206-2 .
• Georg Tessin : Associations and troops of the German Wehrmacht and Waffen SS in World War II 1939–1945. Volume 14. The Land Forces. Name associations. The air force. Flying bandages. Flak deployment in the Reich 1943–1945 . Biblio-Verlag, Bissendorf 1980, ISBN 3-7648-1111-0 , p. 117 ( limited preview in Google Book search).

Web links

• Julius Leber barracks . In: District lexicon of the Luisenstädtischer Bildungsverein
• Organizational History of the German Armored Forces 1939–1945. (PDF; 292 kB) Accessed September 15, 2011 (English). 

Individual evidence

1. ^ Alfred Otte: The white mirrors, From the regiment to the parachute tank corps , Dörfler Verlag, ISBN 3-89555-271-2 ; P. 16
2. ↑ Manfred Zeidler : End of the war in the east - The Red Army and the occupation of Germany east of Oder and Neisse 1944/45 . Oldenbourg, Munich 1996, ISBN 3-486-56187-1 ( google.de ).
3. ^ Carlo Gentile : Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS in Partisan War: Italy 1943–1945 . Verlag Ferdinand Schöningh, Paderborn 2012, ISBN 978-3-506-76520-8 . P. 309/310
4. ^ Carlo Gentile: Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS in Partisan War: Italy 1943–1945 . Verlag Ferdinand Schöningh, Paderborn 2012, ISBN 978-3-506-76520-8 . Pp. 308/309
5. ^ Carlo Gentile: Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS in Partisan War: Italy 1943–1945 . Verlag Ferdinand Schöningh, Paderborn 2012, ISBN 978-3-506-76520-8 . Pp. 226/232
6. ↑ Cavriglia on gedenkorte-europa.eu, the homepage of Gedenkorte Europa 1939–1945 , accessed on December 3, 2017
7. ^ Carlo Gentile: Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS in Partisan War: Italy 1943–1945 . Verlag Ferdinand Schöningh, Paderborn 2012, ISBN 978-3-506-76520-8 . Pp. 320/334
8. ↑ Michael Geyer: It must therefore be taken with rapid and draconian measures . In: Hannes Heer, Klaus Neumann (ed.): War of destruction. Crimes of the Wehrmacht 1941–1944 . Hamburg 1995, ISBN 3-930908-04-2 , p. 220
9. ↑ [1]  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
10. ↑ Acerra October 1st, 1943 (Italian), in Atlante delle Stragi. Retrieved November 26, 2019
11. ^ Parachute Panzer Division "Hermann Goring". In: straginazifasciste.it. Retrieved October 24, 2019 (Italian). 
12. ^ Judgment in the war crimes trial in Verona , on resistance . Retrieved October 26, 2019
13. ↑ Professor Peter K. Gessner of the State University of New York ( Memento of the original dated December 3, 2005 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (English) 
14. ^ Formal justice after 67 years