Otto Kähler (Admiral)

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Major General Hans von der Mosel (left), Rear Admiral Otto Kähler (center) and Major General Hans Kroh (right) capitulate in Brest on September 18, 1944

Otto Kähler (born March 3, 1894 in Hamburg , † November 2, 1967 in Kiel ) was a German naval officer , most recently rear admiral in World War II .

Life

Otto Kähler in Norway under German occupation in 1942.
Lieutenant Colonel Schröder, Fritz Johlitz and Otto Kähler in Norway in 1942.
Fritz Johlitz, Otto Kähler, Rudolf Schiedermair and Hans Keller on the ferry between Bodø and Narvik in 1942.

After serving in the merchant navy since 1909, Kähler joined the Imperial Navy as a one-year volunteer on April 1, 1914 and completed his basic training on the great cruiser Hansa . Before the outbreak of World War I , he was transferred to the great cruiser Roon on July 29, 1914 , where he was to serve until February 6, 1916. Then Kähler received appropriate training at the submarine school until June 1, 1916 and was used as an officer on watch with the Kurland submarine flotilla until October 16, 1916 . In the meantime, on July 13, 1916, he had been promoted from vice-mate of the reserve to lieutenant at sea in the reserve. Kähler was transferred to the Flanders submarine flotilla and deployed as an officer on watch on UB 30 and UB 112 . After the end of the war, he was initially on leave from December 19, 1918 to June 30, 1919, then until April 20, 1920 as an adjutant and officer on watch with the V Baltic Minesweeping Flotilla and then again on leave until September 8, 1920. During this time he acquired the patent captain on long voyages at the seafaring school .

On September 9, 1920 he was taken into active service and on September 28, 1920 promoted to lieutenant at sea . From November 8, 1920 to June 4, 1921, Kähler was assigned to the 12th semi-flotilla as the commander of the M 75 minesweeper . He then served as a consultant and adjutant at the North Sea Personnel Office until January 30, 1921, before commanding the M 134 tender until September 30, 1922 . For the next three years he was a member of the 4th torpedo boat semi-flotilla and was deployed here as an officer on watch on T 151 and later as commander on T 153 . On October 1, 1925, he was transferred to the II. Torpedo Boat Flotilla and served as a flag lieutenant . At the same time he subsequently acted as commander of the T 196 and T 185 . From November 26, 1927 to September 30, 1929, he was a member of the staff of the Commander-in-Chief of the Naval Forces of the North Sea as an Admiral Staff Officer and then completed the guide assistant course until April 6, 1931. In the following period he was used as a company commander at the Friedrichsort Naval School until March 27, 1933 . This was then followed by his transfer to the light cruiser Karlsruhe as a navigation officer and promotion to the corvette captain on December 1, 1933. Until November 7, 1937, Kähler was in the naval command (from January 11, 1936, high command of the navy ) as a consultant in the shipping department. and Operations Department and was promoted to frigate captain on July 1, 1937 . From November 10, 1937 to March 18, 1938 he was placed at the disposal of the Navy's educational inspectorate and was then used as the commandant of the Gorch Fock training ship. As such, he was promoted to sea captain on April 1, 1939 .

He stayed on board at the beginning of World War II and was the leader of the West Outpost Associations from September 6 to October 15, 1939 . He then completed the building instruction of ship 10 , the later auxiliary cruiser Thor , whose commander Kähler was from March 15, 1940. On December 5, 1940, the Thor fought a battle with the British auxiliary cruiser HMS Carnarvon Castle (20,122 GRT , 8 × 15.2 cm guns) under the command of Henry Noel Marryat Hardy . The time on the Thor was later viewed by himself as the highest point in his career. By the end of his command on July 20, 1941, he had gained a tonnage of 96,603 GRT in total. His sinkings included u. a. also the British passenger ship Britannia .

After Kähler had handed over the command to his successor Captain Günther Gumprich , he worked as a department head in the shipping office of the Reich Ministry of Transport until June 30, 1942 and then came to the Reich Commissioner for Maritime Shipping as a naval liaison officer until October 15, 1942. Then you transferred Kähler as head of the shipping department in the high command of the Navy and promoted him on February 1, 1943 to Rear Admiral . From January 5, 1944 he acted as naval commander of Brittany and fortress commander of Brest . On September 18, 1944, he was taken prisoner by the United States , from which he was released on February 28, 1947.

Awards

literature

  • Dermot Bradley (eds.), Hans H. Hildebrand, Ernest Henriot: Germany's Admirals 1849-1945. Volume 2: HO (Habicht to Orth). Biblio Verlag, Osnabrück 1989, ISBN 3-7648-2481-6 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Ranking list of the German Reichsmarine. Ed .: Reichswehr Ministry . Mittler & Sohn . Berlin 1929, p. 46.
  2. ↑ 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. 427.
personal data
SURNAME Kähler, Otto
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German naval officer, most recently rear admiral in World War II
DATE OF BIRTH March 3, 1894
PLACE OF BIRTH Hamburg
DATE OF DEATH November 2nd, 1967
Place of death Kiel