Hans von Salmuth

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Hans von Salmuth (1943)

Hans Eberhard Kurt von Salmuth (born November 29, 1888 in Metz , Alsace-Lorraine , † January 1, 1962 in Heidelberg ) was a German officer , most recently Colonel General during the Second World War .

Life

The officer's son Hans von Salmuth joined the Queen Elisabeth Guard Grenadier Regiment No. 3 in Berlin-Charlottenburg on September 19, 1907 . During the First World War he was deployed on the western and eastern fronts and most recently as a captain in the general staff.

Interwar period

After the end of the war he was accepted into the Reichswehr and, after serving in the staff of the 1st Division and General Staff Officer of the Königsberg Fortress, he was appointed company commander of the 1st Infantry Regiment 9 in Potsdam for three years from 1927 and promoted to Major there on January 1, 1928 . As 1st General Staff Officer in Military District Command I in Königsberg, he was promoted to lieutenant colonel on February 1, 1932. Subsequently, von Salmuth led the 1st Battalion of the 12th Infantry Regiment in Dessau as commander.

Hans von Salmuth was quickly promoted to Colonel on May 1, 1934, Major General on August 1, 1937, and Major General on August 1, 1939, due to his good assessments and in the course of the increase in the army, which brought numerous new posts for General Staff officers with it Lieutenant General. His other posts in the peace years were: From July 1, 1934, Chief of the General Staff of the II Army Corps in Stettin and, from October 1, 1937, Chief of the General Staff of the newly formed Group Command 1 in Berlin.

Second World War

Group Command 1 was later renamed Army Group Command B. In September 1939 von Salmuth was Chief of Staff of the Army Group North under General Fedor von Bock and took part in the war against Poland . After the quick victory against Poland, Army Group Command B was moved to the western border in October 1939, from where the Army Group launched the attack on the Netherlands and Belgium from May 10, 1940. After the campaign in the west, von Salmuth was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross for his special achievements as Chief of Staff on July 19, 1940, and was promoted to General of the Infantry with effect from August 1, 1940. Von Salmuth was involved in the planning of Operation Barbarossa , especially since Army Group B (from June 22, 1941 Army Group Center) was supposed to lead the main thrust through Belarus on Moscow. General von Salmuth was transferred before the start of the campaign and took over the leadership of the XXX on May 10, 1941. Army corps , which was deployed in Romania to attack southern Ukraine . After the XXX. Army Corps had advanced to the north shore of the Sea of Azov , it was relocated in order to ensure, together with the other forces of the 11th Army, the breakthrough to the Crimean peninsula and its complete conquest. However, General von Salmuth fell ill in November 1941 and had to be transferred to the army’s reserve for several months. After his recovery, on April 20, 1942, he took over the leadership of the 17th Army in the Second Battle of Kharkov on behalf of Colonel General Hermann Hoth . On June 6, 1942, he handed the army over to the new Commander-in-Chief, Colonel-General Richard Ruoff , became deputy leader of the 4th Army in the central section and finally on July 15, 1942 received supreme command of the 2nd , which was the northern flank of Army Group B (previously South) formed. On July 1, 1942, Hans von Salmuth was promoted to Colonel General. With his army he had to endure the defensive battles on both sides of the city of Voronezh and the Soviet winter offensive, which in January / February 1943 led to heavy losses on the German side and to a large retreat beyond Kursk to the west. Von Salmuth was made responsible for this defeat and had to hand over command of the 2nd Army to General of the Infantry Walter Weiß on February 3, 1943 . After a recovery phase, he was used again in the spring of 1943 as a temporary representative for the commanders in chief of the 17th and 4th Armies.

After that, the Colonel General finally left the eastern theater of war and on August 1, 1943, took over as Commander-in-Chief of the 15th Army in the West. At the beginning of the invasion on June 6, 1944, this was the strongest German army in the west and stood between Lille and Cambrai . When the invasion took place in Normandy, neither Hitler, as Commander-in-Chief of the Army, nor General Field Marshal Walter Model, as the newly appointed Commander-in-Chief West von Salmuth, trusted to lead his army successfully in the expected heavy fighting, so that on August 25, 1944 he was called OB was replaced and replaced by General of the Infantry Gustav-Adolf von Zangen . Until the end of the war, Hans von Salmuth was no longer used.

post war period

In July 1945 he was taken prisoner by the US and was charged with war crimes in the trial against the Wehrmacht High Command . He was charged with his orders to fight partisans in the Soviet Union and on October 28, 1948 he was sentenced to twenty years in prison. On July 23, 1953, he was released early from Landsberg Detention Center . From 1958 to 1962 he chaired the Association of German Soldiers , "the umbrella organization of all traditional military associations".

He was married to Liselotte von Meßling and had two sons.

Awards

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Ernst Klee : Das Personenlexikon zum Third Reich , Frankfurt am Main 2007, p. 518.
  2. a b c d Ranking list of the German Imperial Army , Mittler & Sohn Verlag, Berlin, p. 123.
  3. 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. 649.