Fort Douaumont

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Aerial view of the fort from the spring of 1916, before the start of the German offensive. In the picture, to the right of the fort, you can see the annex battery No. 36. The windows and entrances of the barracks building to the inner courtyard on the throat side of the fort as well as the open gun positions between hollow cross-beams (between the barracks building and the Saillant ) based on the original design by Séré de Rivières can also be seen. During the later reconstructions, all the guns and machine weapons were moved to armored towers or concrete casemates.
Plan of the fort. Floor plan of all the fixtures that existed in 1914.
The 155 mm Galopin tank turret

The Fort Douaumont (French: Fort de Douaumont - for a short time also Fort Gérard ) was the largest and most powerful structure of the outer fort belt of the French Festive Place Verdun in Lorraine and was heavily fought over in the First World War in the Battle of Verdun . The fort was part of the outer defense line of the fortress from the 19th century, which consisted of eleven forts and 23 intermediate structures (French "ouvrages intermédiaires d'infanterie"). Its prominent role in the defensive battle of Verdun had a not to be underestimated influence on the construction of the Maginot Line , with which one intended to stop an attacker from the east in France in the period before the Second World War .

Today around 200,000 people visit the fort and the nearby Douaumont ossuary and the Verdun military cemetery every year .

designation

For a few months it was named after the Maréchal de France Étienne Maurice Gérard from Damvillers . By presidential decree of January 21, 1887, the Minister of War, Georges Boulanger , implemented that all forts, fortified artillery installations and barracks of the Système Séré de Rivières must bear the names of former military commanders. On October 13, 1887, this was reversed by Boulanger's successor, Théophile Ferron, and the fort was given its current name.

The Fort

The overgrown surface of the fort in 1978. The observation domes and the armored 75 mm rotating turret (behind the two people) are clearly visible.
Outer gate, January 1916

The fort was built from 1885 to 1913 in two expansion and renovation steps as part of the overall concept of General Séré de Rivières . The cost was 6.1 million gold francs, about twice as much as the other forts, the majority of which were between 2.4 and 2.9 million francs.

First construction phase:

In 1885 the fort was built with sand-lime brickwork. At that time, the plant was Verdun's largest fort and belonged to the second, advanced line around the fortress city. According to the original construction plans from 1884, the fort's crew should consist of 19 officers, 44 non-commissioned officers and 828 men in the event of a siege. According to the construction method of the time, it comprised a two-story semi-underground barracks , casemates , powder storage and not directly connected trench trenches / throat bastions.

Second construction phase:

The general introduction of the " explosive grenades " only a few years after the start of construction required extensive reinforcements and modifications to increase military strength. Primarily all parts of the fortress were reinforced with concrete and the moat was expanded. Five of the hollow beams of the original design were converted into concrete ammunition depots. In addition, the moat was integrated into the outer front moat wall, the throat bastion was converted into a moat and the entrance area was adapted. A 155 mm gun turret (on the right flank next to the main building) and a 75 mm gun rotating / sinking tower system Galopin , each with a tank observation bell, as well as two Tourelle de mitrailleuses modèle 1899 rotating / sinking turrets (left and on the right on the two shoulder points) were installed on the left side of the throat and the right front side. Furthermore, a casemate de Bourges facing west was built on the left side of the throat in order to line the space to the intermediate works “ Ouvrage de Thiaumont ” and “ Ouvrage de Froide Terre ”. On the left front side, foundations were made for further expansion. According to the mobilization plan of 1914, the full crew of the converted fort should consist of 7 officers and 477 NCOs and men in the event of a siege.

In the last construction phase of the fortress, between 1908 and 1914, numerous concrete shelters and magazines as well as covered batteries were built in the fortified zone between the large forts, which gave the defenders a great support during the Battle of Verdun in 1916.

  • Project 1908
Installation of two 155-C towers to cover the blind spots . Abandoned in 1909.

Tunnel constructions

During the German occupation (February 25 to October 24, 1916) the fort was largely used as a shelter. In order to improve the safety of the inmates, a 250 m long connecting tunnel to the 2808 quarry was to be built at a depth of 17 m. The excavation project, known as the southern tunnel, was only about 60 m completed before the German withdrawal. A second, called the north tunnel, barely got beyond the first digs. Ingress of water was a very big problem here and especially at the southern facility.

The French first completed the southern tunnel that had been started and expanded it to three exits. With the handover of the management to Capitaine Harispe, who established the construction of such protective tunnels at the Verdun fortifications in Fort de Moulainville , work on an extensive tunnel system began on the Douaumont. A 30 m deep shaft was built at the old entrance, from which the overburden was brought up with three elevators. Three corridors to the moat and the completed south tunnel were created. A second tunnel system running at a depth of 20 m connected the artillery towers, the northern machine-gun turret and the powder magazines. The work lasted until 1918. In the end, corridors with a total length of 800 m and shafts of 60 m were dug.

Between 1914 and 1918

Fort Douaumont during the Battle of Verdun around the end of April / beginning of May 1916, at the bottom right the destroyed village of Douaumont
Courtyard of Fort Douaumont, January 1916

In the course of the First World War, the fort initially lost its importance. After the conversion of the Verdun fortress governor into a "fortified region" on August 5, 1915, the guns in the fortress' intermediate batteries were distributed among field units. On February 8, 1916, the Fort de Douaumont was to be partially blown up, but information about an impending German attack on Verdun prevented the French from doing so. At that time, the fort's crew comprised only about 60 to 70 Landwehr artillerymen (territorial artillery) under the command of the Adjudant Cenot, which was sufficient for operating the few guns. According to the concept of the "fortified region", in which the previously independent gouvernement of the fortress was abolished and placed under the command of an army, in the event of an enemy attack the nearest field unit should provide the further crew for the fort in its area. After several reinforcements in February 1916, the "fortified region of Verdun" (French. " Région fortifiée de Verdun ", RFV) under General Herr de facto had the rank of an army group that was directly subordinate to the French "Army Group East".

Although the French leadership had been expecting a German attack on the Meuse since the beginning of February, they had been completely surprised by the force of the German offensive with which the Battle of Verdun began on February 21 , which hit the French positions north of the City collapsed. The subsequent attack on February 25, 1916 again surprisingly broke through the French lines north of the Douaumont, so that in the evening the fort could be captured by German troops almost at a stroke . Because of the great confusion that had reigned in the French headquarters since the collapse of the French front on February 21, it had been neglected to order immediately all infantry units that were intended as a crew into the fort. When the German attack began a little more than two kilometers north of the fort on the afternoon of February 25, most of the units intended for this purpose were prevented from reaching it in time by the German barrage around the fort. At the same time, however, the German troops crossed their own gunfire on the other side. Since the German artillery fire with heavy mortars was still on the fort, the crew did not expect a storm on the fort at this time and had therefore not yet occupied the armored observation domes. Only the heavy 155 mm artillery tower was in action, but that afternoon it fired indirectly at German positions and traffic routes according to a predetermined plan, not on sight. In the battles that followed, the fort proved to be extremely resistant to almost all artillery attacks, which can primarily be attributed to the careful processing of the concrete as a new building material for fortifications . In the further course of the battle, however, several direct hits from the more than a tonne shells of the French 400 mm howitzer broke through the concrete ceiling of the upper floor on the uncovered throat barracks of the fort (i.e. on the southern side facing the city of Verdun). For the French, the fort had a high ideal value, which is why they made numerous attempts to recapture it. The loss of human life was enormous.

Kehlkaserne partially damaged by a direct hit
The "German Cemetery" in the fort
80 cm tank observation dome Observatoire cuirassé

At dawn on May 8, 1916, several hundred German soldiers were killed in the explosion of a grenade and flamethrower depot. Due to time constraints, 679 of them were brought to the ammunition casemate I in the fort's inner courtyard and the entrance was bricked up (see photo). Today the cross stands in front of the walled-up exit to the courtyard, which has meanwhile been buried. The casemate is about 20 meters behind. This place is the so-called “German cemetery” in the fort, which is now under state administration by the French government.

On May 22nd, the first French attempt to retake Fort de Douaumont began with a major attack. It succeeded in pushing the German troops back to the casemates in the throat. Unnoticed by the French, the Germans received reinforcements and started a counterattack on May 23, with the support of heavy mortars. By the morning of May 24th, the French could be pushed back over the southern glacis. In the following months, the fighting shifted to the area south of the fort. It is estimated that 400,000 shells (including 23 shells from the German 42 cm mortar and 15 from the French 400 mm howitzer ) hit the inner core of the fort during the First World War , d. H. the basement, but survived this bombardment, which was previously considered impossible, largely undamaged (see pictures from the interior of the fort in the gallery).

Only on October 24, 1916, the French troops succeeded in reoccupying Fort de Douaumont after a major offensive on a broad front. Two 400 mm howitzers of the "77 e batterie" (77th battery) of the "3 e régiment d'artillerie à pied" (3rd foot artillery regiment) were set up in the course of the French offensive off Verdun on October 21, 1916 near Baleycourt. The bombardment of Fort Douaumont began on October 23, at which a total of 15 shells were fired, six of which penetrated the roof of the fort. The first exploded in the medical casemate, another in the main aisle, three others in the casemates of the barracks, and a last one in the pioneer depot. This caused a severe fire which forced the German occupation to abandon the fort and which was occupied by the French the next morning.

Later myth formation

The alleged conquest of Fort Douaumont by the company of Lieutenant Cordt von Brandis on February 25, 1916 was later celebrated by Paul von Hindenburg as a "Fanal of German heroism" and formed material for further legends for many years. First Lieutenant von Brandis was unjustifiably awarded the Pour le Mérite for his act by Kaiser Wilhelm II . The military historian German Werth covered Verdun in 1979 . The battle and the myth that the actual events had happened completely differently and that the fortress had fallen into the hands of the Germans without a fight.

Other historians such as Georges Blond and Alistair Home found that it was not Brandis' company that first entered the fort. During his research, Werth made four combatants of Infantry Regiment No. 24 / III. Finding army corps that could provide him with a detailed battle report that had almost nothing in common with the previous myths.

On February 21, 1916, extensive preparatory artillery fire began on Fort Douaumont to enable a subsequent infantry attack. The assault was supposed to begin in the early hours of February 25, 1916. The artillery attack was very poorly coordinated and would have threatened the advance of its own infantry acutely. Four companies of the III. Battalions were to take Fort Douaumont, which at the time was considered the "strongest fortress in the world". At the time, it was not yet known on the German side that the fort's ability to defend itself with its armored turrets, heavy artillery and machine-gun positions was mainly an "optical illusion". The 500-strong fortress garrison had already been evacuated at this point and the order issued on February 24, 1916 to destroy the fortification itself had not reached anyone. Only 70 French soldiers of the Territorial Infantry (Landwehr) remained there. From 4 p.m. the 6th Company (Lt. Radtke) and the 8th Company (Olt. Von Brandis) should work their way up to 400 meters to Fort Douaumont and prepare the area for “storm and break-in” of their own fortress pioneer units the following day . The army corps telephoned all companies through: “The battalion will attack at 4:00 p.m., in the 5th and 6th division. The lines are advanced by about 1800 m. The order is to be made known to every sergeant. Under no circumstances may it go through again ”. Captain Haupt's 7th Company caught artillery fire of its own and issued the order: “Everything in one go! The next layer of our artillery must already be behind us. ”During the subsequent forward movement, the Haupt and Radtke companies hindered each other and now both came under the full weapon effect of their own artillery fire. To escape certain death, they took cover at Fort Douaumont. They wanted to be captured by the French rather than die in the open. Radtke and a 20-strong platoon stormed the mountain slope of the fort and overcame the wire entanglement and an iron grating, which was damaged in one place by a grenade explosion. Next they jumped into the four to five meter deep ditch and from there they were able to penetrate deeper into the fort and capture the crew. In the meantime, more and more German infantrymen flocked as "battle strollers". Meanwhile, Brandis' 8th Company was under French fire from the town of Douaumont for a while and was therefore only able to get to the fort relatively late. On the march there, von Brandis encountered a telephone squad that was establishing a connection with the battalion headquarters. The company commander left the message, “Fort Douaumont is firmly in our hands. Brandis Company is now going to the fort ”. During the transfer from the battalion via the regiment to the division it became “Fort Douaumont is firmly in the hands of First Lieutenant von Brandis”. According to Werth, this turned into a "parody of reality" in which the Frankfurter Zeitung declared the fortunate seizure of the fort to be the "innate forward thrust of the German infantry". The award of the medal to von Brandis aroused the displeasure of the 6th Company, which complained to a higher authority. The battalion commander, Major Kurt von Klüfer , felt compelled to apply to the relevant army corps for an honorary judicial investigation into the incidents. The Corps interpreted this as "indecency to criticize a decision of His Majesty". Von Klüfer was then transferred to a sentence. For the hero myth of Douaumont, the figure of the nobleman von Brandis is more suitable than that of the unmilitary-looking lieutenant of the reserve Eugen Radtke. As a memento of the events, Radtke received an autograph from the Crown Prince and a job with the Deutsche Reichsbahn. It was only in 1926, when former members of the 6th Company massively disrupted von Brandis' lectures with chants (“You weren't there!”), That the Reichsarchiv was forced to make a correction by admitting that Radtke was “the was the first German officer to penetrate the fort ”. There had never been an official correction of the events.

Interior photos 2011

  • Main course in the above-ground barracks area

  • Armored turret 155 mm

  • Side corridor

  • Main course in the basement

  • Washroom in the above-ground barracks area

  • Casemate with a French memorial

useful information

In Hamburg , the Douaumont barracks built in 1935/36 was named after Fort Douaumont. Today the barracks is part of the Helmut Schmidt University / University of the Federal Armed Forces Hamburg .

See also

literature

  • Martin J. Gräßler: Fort Douaumont. Verdun's fortress, Germany's myth . Munich 2009, ISBN 978-3-89975-812-2 .
  • Kurt Fischer: Reports from Fort Douaumont . Bonn 2004, ISBN 3-7637-6248-5 .
  • German Werth: Verdun . Bergisch Gladbach 1984, ISBN 3-404-65041-7 .
  • Paul Ettighoffer: Verdun. The great judgment. With an afterword by Maurice Genevoix . 5th edition. Wiesbaden 1985, ISBN 3-8090-2089-3 .
  • Werner Beumelburg: Douaumont. Using the official sources of the Reich Archives . 2nd Edition. Oldenburg 1924.
  • Eugen Radtke: The storming of the Douaumont . Leipzig 1938.

Web links

Commons : Fort de Douaumont  - Fort de Douaumont - Verdun

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ recorded on German plans / maps as No. 637; right next to this battery was an external tank turret (on German maps: PT), which was not yet completed in 1914
  2. ↑ Le Hallé: Verdun. Les forts de la Victoire. 1998, pp. 182-194.
  3. ^ Note n ° 5285 of March 25, 1886 from War Minister Boulanger to the General Commanders of the Military Regions; Presidential decree of January 21 on the renaming of forts, fortified artillery installations and barracks, as proposed by M. le général Boulanger, Minister of War.
  4. ↑ with the note n ° 14980 from the same date
  5. ↑ Le Hallé: Verdun. Les forts de la Victoire. 1998, p. 124.
  6. ↑ Le Hallé: Verdun. Les forts de la Victoire. 1998, p. 85.
  7. ↑ d. H. the filling of the grenades with highly explosive explosives such as Mélenit or TNT
  8. ↑ Le Hallé: Verdun. Les forts de la Victoire. 1998, p. 86.
  9. ↑ Le Hallé: Verdun. Les forts de la Victoire. 1998, pp. 120-124.
  10. ↑ Martin Egger: The tunnel construction in the forts of Verdun during the battle . In: IBA Information . No. 9 , 1987, pp. 30–46, here 40–42 .
  11. ^ After the decree for the creation of "fortified regions" (Wendt: Verdun 1916. 1931, p. 50).
  12. ↑ On February 21, the RFV were subordinate to three army corps with a total of eleven infantry divisions; in the northern sector of the fortress, which was responsible for Fort de Douaumont, there were three divisions (Le Hallé: Verdun. Les forts de la Victoire. 1998, pp. 135f; Wendt: Verdun 1916. 1931, pp. 62-65).
  13. ↑ Gold: The tragedy of Verdun. Part I, 1926, card inserts
  14. ↑ Even the German leadership did not expect that the French positions north of the fort would be breached so quickly
  15. ↑ For this reason, most of the French sources that report on the event speak of a " coup d'état " and the (older) Germans usually speak of a "storm attack" (see also the main article → Battle of Verdun ).
  16. ↑ The thickness of the concrete ceiling of the main building (barracks) was 1.5 to 2.5 meters, with the thinner covers on the valley side of the building with the workshops of the craftsmen and the hospital. A layer of earth between one and two meters thick lay over this ceiling (Le Hallé: Verdun. Les forts de la victoire. 1998, p. 86).
  17. ↑ the windows of the Kehl barracks were temporarily closed with sandbags by the German soldiers.
  18. ↑ Detailed description of the explosion and its consequences: K. Fischer: Reports from Fort Douaumont. 2004, pp. 32-56.
  19. ↑ Le Hallé: Verdun. Les forts de la victoire. 1998, p. 83 (the number 400,000, however, refers to the entire area around the fort).
  20. ↑ Verdun. The battle and the myth. Lübbe 1979, 1982 (fully revised and expanded version), 1987 (paperback), Weltbild Verlag 1990 (licensed edition, ISBN 3-89350-016-2 ).
  21. ↑ Georges Blond: Verdun. Rowohlt, 1965.
  22. ↑ Alistair Home: The Rewards of Fame. Verdun 1916, Luebbe Publishing Group, 1983, ISBN 978-3-404-01351-7 .
  23. ↑ a b c d e f g h Verdun: Prussian grotesque. A legend killer is going on: He proves that the Battle of Verdun in 1916 was not the most costly battle in history as it went down in the history books. DER SPIEGEL, November 26, 1979 ( Memento from April 2, 2016 in the Internet Archive )
  24. ↑ The capture of Fort Douaumont. ( Memento from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive )
  25. ^ First World War: A murderous slaughter. Nobody gets through. Zeit Online, February 25, 2014
  26. ^ Commemoration of the dead and the military: The sandstone reliefs in Hamburg's Douaumont barracks | OHLSDORF - magazine for the culture of mourning. Retrieved June 23, 2020 .

Coordinates: 49 ° 13 ′ 0 ″  N , 5 ° 26 ′ 20 ″  E