Hans Mikosch (officer)

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Hans Mikosch (born January 7, 1898 in Katowice , † January 18, 1993 in Reichshof ) was a German lieutenant general in World War II .

Life

Hans Mikosch joined the army as a volunteer in 1914 and was in various pioneer battalions until 1916, including as a lieutenant in pioneer battalion 27 . At the end of January 1920 he was released from the army and then entered the police service.

On October 15, 1935, he would be reactivated as a captain . From October 1937, Lieutenant Colonel Mikosch led the pioneer battalion 51 ( Roßlau ), was involved in the invasion of Austria and was then used with the battalion for fortification work on the Siegfried Line. At the beginning of the war, the battalion was moved to the Eastern Front . Further pioneering assignments followed. In May 1940 he played a key role with the battalion in the capture of the Belgian fort Eben-Emael . For this he was on 21 May 1940 at Felsennest of Adolf Hitler together with the subordinate sergeant Josef Portsteffen with the Knight's Cross awarded.

At the end of July 1940, Mikosch traveled to Spain with a special Abwehr staff headed by Admiral Wilhelm Canaris and other officers, including Colonel Hans Piekenbrock and Major Wolfgang Langkau . The aim was to determine the situation on site.

As part of the Stalingrad campaign in 1941, he was commissioned to set up and manage an army pioneer school for the 6th Army , which was to be built in a former sanatorium on the Don Heights near Kalatsch . Here the different units were to be specially trained for the expected house-to-house fighting in Stalingrad . At the same time as the head of the Army Pioneer School, he was the leader of the Mikosch combat group . With his combat group, which was initially subordinated to the 3rd Panzer Division , he fought for Kharkov in March 1941 . In 1942, Mikosch was promoted to colonel. In November 1942 he received instructions to arrange for three battalions to be accommodated in Kalatsch. For this he received far-reaching orders in the execution of the instructions, including about the city commandant. From the end of November 1942 he and the men from the pioneer school formed a bridgehead on the Don , but could not prevent enemy tanks from breaking through. As the leader of his combat group near Stalingrad , he was awarded the Oak Leaves for the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross on March 6, 1943.

From October 1943 to December 1943 he was acting commander of the 10th Panzer Grenadier Division . Colonel Mikosch then took over as commander of the 13th Panzer Division until mid-May 1944 . In January 1944 he was promoted to major general in this position . With the division he first stood in Krivoy Rog and then took part in the retreat movements of Army Group A , including after the Cherkassy Battle .

From June 1944 he was combat commander of Boulogne for two months , then from August 1944 until his capture in command of all fortifications in East Prussia . Shortly before the end of the war he was again commander of a combat group Mikosch (also known as a division e.g. V. Mikosch ) and also deputy combat commander of Königsberg . The combat group Mikosch was subordinate to Army Group North . This combat group was made up of so-called "eye and stomach patients", soldiers who were actually medically retired, to defend Königsberg's western flank. On March 16, 1945, Mikosch was promoted to lieutenant general. Later he and his staff were to be brought before the Reich Court Martial for the "failure of the fortification work in East Prussia" . He was arrested, but taken prisoner by the Soviet Army on April 8, 1945 together with General of the Infantry Otto Lasch . He remained in captivity for over 10 years . In 1958 Mikosch lived in Essen and died in Westphalia in 1993 .

literature

  • Wolfgang Keilig : The German Army. 1939-1945. Volume 3, Podzun, 1956, p. 221.
  • François de Lannoy, Josef Charita: Panzer troops . Casemate Pub & Book, 2001, p. 79.
  • Samuel W. Mitcham Jr : The Panzer Legions. A guide to the German Army Tank Divisions of WWII and Their Commanders. Stackpole Military History, 2007, ISBN 978-0811733533 , p. 116.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b Jason Mark: Island of Fire: The Battle for the Barrikady Gun Factory in Stalingrad . Rowman & Littlefield, 2018, ISBN 978-0-8117-6619-7 , pp. 72 ( google.de [accessed on May 19, 2020]).
  2. ^ A b Ernst Rebentisch: The Combat History of the 23rd Panzer Division in World War II . Stackpole Books, 2012, ISBN 978-0-8117-4641-0 , pp. 483 ( google.de [accessed on May 19, 2020]).
  3. ^ Samuel W. Mitcham Jr: Panzer Legions: A Guide to the German Army Tank Divisions of World War II and Their Commanders . Stackpole Books, 2006, ISBN 978-1-4617-5143-4 , pp. 169 ( google.de [accessed on May 19, 2020]).
  4. ↑ Matthias Ruiz Holst: Neutrality or War Participation? Centaurus-Verlag-Ges., 1986, ISBN 978-3-89085-080-1 , pp. 79 ( google.de [accessed on May 19, 2020]).
  5. ↑ The rearguard . Working Group of Former Defense Members, 1983, p. 54 ( google.de [accessed on May 19, 2020]).
  6. ↑ Veterans of the 3rd Panzer Division: Armored Bears: The German 3rd Panzer Division in World War II . Stackpole Books, 2013, ISBN 978-0-8117-4966-4 , pp. 2 + 3 ( google.de [accessed on May 19, 2020]).
  7. ↑ Jason Mark: Island of Fire: The Battle for the Barrikady Gun Factory in Stalingrad . Rowman & Littlefield, 2018, ISBN 978-0-8117-6619-7 , pp. 23 ( google.de [accessed on May 19, 2020]).
  8. ^ Klaus Böhm: The Organization Todt in action, 1939-1945: Depicted according to theaters of war on the basis of the field post numbers . Biblio Verlag, 1987, ISBN 978-3-7648-1704-6 , pp. 551, 552 ( google.de [accessed on May 19, 2020]).
  9. ↑ 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. 544.
  10. ^ Samuel W. Mitcham Jr: Panzer Legions: A Guide to the German Army Tank Divisions of World War II and Their Commanders . Stackpole Books, 2006, ISBN 978-1-4617-5143-4 , pp. 114 ( google.de [accessed on May 19, 2020]).
  11. ↑ a b Helmut Damerau, Wolfgang Hausen: German Soldier Yearbook . Schild Verlag, 1996, p. 446 ( google.de [accessed on May 19, 2020]).
  12. ↑ Traugott Ehrhardt: The history of the fortress Königsberg / Pr., 1257-1945 . Holzner, 1960, p. 84 ( google.de [accessed on May 19, 2020]).
  13. ^ Hans Meier-Welcker: Defensive battles on the northern wing of the Eastern Front, 1944-1945 . Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1963, p. 338 ( google.de [accessed on May 19, 2020]).
  14. ↑ Otto Lasch: This is how Königsberg fell: The fight and fall of East Prussia's capital . Gräfe and Unzer, 1961, p. 79 ( google.de [accessed on May 19, 2020]).
  15. ^ News for the troops . Kraus Reprint, 1945, p. 107 ( google.de [accessed on May 19, 2020]).
personal data
SURNAME Mikosch, Hans
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German Lieutenant General in World War II
DATE OF BIRTH January 7, 1898
PLACE OF BIRTH Katowice
DATE OF DEATH January 18, 1993
Place of death Reichshof