Maximilian Fretter-Pico

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Maximilian Fretter-Pico (born February 6, 1892 in Karlsruhe , † April 4, 1984 in Kreuth am Tegernsee ) was a German officer , most recently general of the artillery in World War II .

Life

Fretter-Pico entered the field artillery regiment "Grand Duke" (1st Badisches) No. 14 in Karlsruhe on September 20, 1910 as an officer candidate and attended the war school in Danzig from March to November 1911 . On January 27, 1912, he was promoted to lieutenant and completed a course at the artillery school in Jüterbog from September 1913 to January 1914 .

First World War

With his regiment he took as an aide in the First World War and took over in January 1915 a balloon-guns train . On September 18, 1915, he was promoted to lieutenant . In May 1916 he gave up his command again and worked as an adjutant in various brigades and divisions until 1918 . In January and February 1918 he completed general staff training in the high command of the Army Group Duke Albrecht von Württemberg . Before the end of the war, he was promoted to captain on October 18, 1918, and as such he was accepted into the Reichswehr .

Between the world wars

There he was initially on the staff of the 1st (Prussian) Artillery Regiment in Königsberg and was then transferred to the staff of Group Command 1 in Berlin until April 1923 . This was followed by an activity in the Reichswehr Ministry in the Army Operations Department T 1 until October 1927 , which was only interrupted by a one-year transfer from October 1925 to October 1926 as a company commander in the 6th (Prussian) Artillery Regiment in Hanover .

He then returned to Hanover as chief of the 8th battery of the 6th Artillery Regiment and held this command until September 1930. After Fretter-Pico had completed a two-month training course at the Army Riding School , he was transferred to the staff of 1. Cavalry Division moved to Königsberg. He stayed there until October 1933. On April 1, 1932, he was promoted to major and on March 1, 1935 to lieutenant colonel. In October 1935 he was transferred to the foreign department in the Army High Command and on August 1, 1937 he was promoted to colonel . In 1938 he was posted to the Turkish Army for a few months until November of the same year. After his return he was appointed Chief of Staff of the General Command of the Saar-Palatinate Border Troops in Kaiserslautern .

Second World War

After the start of the Second World War , this General Command was renamed XXIV Army Corps on September 17, 1939 . As part of the western campaign , the corps took part in the fighting in France. On March 1, 1941, he was promoted to major general and in April of the same year he was briefly transferred to the Führerreserve . On April 19, 1941, he took over as commander of the 97th Light Infantry Division . With this he fought from the beginning of Operation Barbarossa , the attack on the Soviet Union, in the area of Army Group South . On November 1, 1941, the division took the city of Artemovsk and built it into a supply and refreshment center for the 17th Army as a measure for the coming winter . To do this, the division had to move the city out of range of enemy artillery, which was achieved by further advances to the east and the formation of the Troitskoye-Kalinowo-Kaganowitscha line. Although this line went far beyond the defense capabilities of a division and there was insufficient winter equipment, the division was able to repel enemy attacks by the vastly outnumbered enemy troops throughout December.

For the success of the division subordinate to him, Fretter-Pico was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross on December 27, 1941 and he was then awarded the leadership of the XXX. Army Corps entrusted. On January 15, 1942, he was promoted to lieutenant general and on June 1, 1942, to artillery general and thus commanding general of the corps.

In the winter of 1942/43, Fretter-Pico led the Fretter-Pico army division, which was temporarily formed from his corps , and then again the XXX. Army Corps. At the beginning of July 1944 he was briefly reassigned to the Führerreserve in order to take over command of the 6th Army in the middle of the month , which was destroyed a little later during the Soviet operation Jassy-Kishinev and then had to be reorganized. Due to the subordination of the Hungarian 2nd and 3rd Army , it was temporarily referred to as the Army Group Fretter-Pico . On December 23, 1944 he gave up his command and was z. b. V. of the High Command of the Army. This put him on March 25, 1945 as an assessor in the court martial in Torgau against the general of the armored forces Walter Fries . Contrary to Hitler's express order, Fries had given up the city ​​of Warsaw , which had been declared a fortress, and had the German troops withdrawn. The trial ended on March 30, 1945 with Fries' acquittal and Fretter-Pico was appointed commander of military district IX based in Kassel with his last command . There he was taken prisoner by the US on April 22, 1945 , from which he was released in mid-1947.

The Soltmann hereditary funeral, in which Maximilian Fretter-Pico and his wife were buried.

post war period

In the post-war years he wrote several books in which he dealt with the role of the Wehrmacht .

Maximilian Fretter-Pico died at the age of 92 on April 4, 1984 in Kreuth am Tegernsee. He was buried in the cemetery IV of the Jerusalem and New Church on Bergmannstrasse in Berlin-Kreuzberg , in the hereditary funeral of the Soltmann family, from which his wife Gertrude (1901-1993) was born.

family

One year younger Otto Fretter-Pico , also an officer and most recently lieutenant general in World War II, was his brother.

Awards

Works

  • Abused Infantry - German infantry divisions in the Eastern European metropolitan area 1941 to 1944. Verlag für Wehrwesen Bernard & Graefe, Frankfurt am Main 1957.
  • Forsaken by the Gods of Victory - (Abused Infantry). Kyffhäuser Verlag, Wiesbaden 1969.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Hans-Jürgen Mende : Lexicon of Berlin burial places . Pharus-Plan, Berlin 2018, ISBN 978-3-86514-206-1 , pp. 290, 294.
  2. ↑ a b c d Ranking list of the German Imperial Army. Mittler & Sohn Verlag, Berlin 1930, p. 134.
  3. ↑ a b Veit Scherzer : Knight's Cross bearer 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. 318.

literature

  • Dermot Bradley (Ed.): Soldier Fates of the 20th Century, Volume 5: Maximilian Fretter-Pico - The Years After: Memories of the General of the Artillery a. D. 1945 to 1984. Biblio-Verlag, Osnabrück, 1986, ISBN 3-7648-1464-0 .
  • Dermot Bradley: Die Generale des Heeres 1921 to 1945, Volume 4. Biblio-Verlag, Bissendorf 1996, ISBN 3-7648-2488-3 , p. 75 f.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Fretter-Pico, Maximilian
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German officer and general of the artillery in World War II
DATE OF BIRTH February 6, 1892
PLACE OF BIRTH Karlsruhe
DATE OF DEATH April 4th 1984
Place of death Kreuth am Tegernsee