General Command 54

The Generalkommando 54 was a large unit of the army of the German Empire during the First World War .

structure

The General Command 54 was a General Command z. b. V. (General Command for Special Use). These emerged from 1916 and were purely command posts; the military units were assigned to him as required.

history

On September 4, 1916, the Emperor appointed Lieutenant General Viktor Kühne leader of the newly formed General Command (z. B. V.) No. 54. This General Command was first deployed in Verdun and was transferred to the Eastern Front in Transylvania on October 12 . The group "Kühne" formed at Petroszeny consisted of the 41st , 109th and 301st divisions . The corps intervened in mid-November as part of the 9th Army for a comprehensive operation in the battle of Targu Jiu and, together with the Schmettow cavalry corps, managed to break into Wallachia . On November 20, they entered Craiova without a fight . From December 2, 1916, the Kühne group fought intensively with the Bavarian 11th Division in the Battle of the Argesch and stood before Bucharest on December 6 . The General Command 54 then forced the breakthrough through the positions of the Romanian 2nd Army (General Averescu ) in the battle of Rimnicul-Sarat (December 22-27, 1916 ) and pushed together with the 1st Reserve Corps towards Focsani . In January 1917, the General Command was used in the Battle of the Putna ( Vrancea County ) and attacked with the 41st and 109th Divisions at Mărăşeşti against the Sereth . On February 2, 1917, General Richard von Kraewel was given a new commander.

Under the following commanding generals Eduard von Liebert and Max von Müller , the General Command was transferred to the Western Front as the "Liesse" group of the 7th Army and was involved in the successful defensive battles on the Aisne . During the Battle of Malmaison , the 13th Division and the 2nd and 5th Guard Divisions were subordinate to the General Command. Attacked by the French together with the VIII Reserve Corps between October 23 and 25, 1917, the front corner at Lauffaux was lost.

On January 20, 1918, Alfred von Larisch was appointed leader of the General Command, to which the 5th and 6th Divisions as well as the 51st Reserve Division and the 6th Royal Bavarian Reserve Division were subordinate. It was involved in the German attack that began on May 27, 1918 , the battle of Soissons and Reims . On the first day of the fighting, 40 officers and 2,000 prisoners were brought in on the plateau of Pinon- Chavignon, and 50 artillery pieces and over 200 machine guns were also captured. After further successful advance, the combat group encountered bitter resistance on May 30, northwest and west of Soissons, which ultimately led to the end of the German offensive in early June. In the Allied offensive that began on August 8, 1918 , the General Command of the 2nd Army was able to successfully defend the section north of the Somme that it had defended. During these battles the command on the right was the 233rd Division at Albert , in the middle at the Ancre the 54th Reserve Division and on the left at Morlancourt the 27th Division . Larisch was awarded the order Pour le Mérite on August 25, 1918 . From August 22nd to September 2nd the group fought at Albert - Péronne , from September 8th for a month in the Siegfried position between Cambrai and St. Quentin and then in the Hermann position . At the beginning of November 1918, Larisch withdrew with his associations to the Antwerp - Maas position.

After the Armistice of Compiègne , Larisch led the divisions subordinate to him back home, where the General Command was demobilized on January 18, 1919.

Commanding general

Rank	Surname	date
Lieutenant General	Viktor Kuehne	0September 4, 1916 to February 2, 1917
Lieutenant General	Richard von Kraewel	0February 2, 1917 to February 25, 1917
General of the Infantry	Eduard von Liebert	February 25, 1917 to June 17, 1917
Lieutenant General	Max von Müller	June 17, 1917 to January 21, 1918
Lieutenant General	Alfred von Larisch	January 21, 1918 until the end of the war

literature

• Reichsarchiv: The World War 1914-1918 , Volume XI: The Warfare from Autumn 1916 to February 1917, ES Mittler, Berlin 1938.

Individual evidence

1. ^ Reichsarchiv (ed.): Volume XIV, ES Mittler & Sohn, Berlin 1944, card insert 25.