Otto von Rauchberger

Otto von Rauchberger

Otto Rauchberger , since 1917 Knight of Smoking Berger (born September 11, 1864 in Würzburg , † August 7, 1942 in Munich ) was a German infantry general .

Life

family

He was the son of the main cashier Martin Rauchberger and his wife Barbara, née Englert. Rauchberger married Johanna Strauss on July 8, 1895. The marriage produced a son and a daughter.

Military career

Smoke Berger made his Abitur at the Wilhelm Gymnasium München and then stepped on October 1, 1882 as a one-year volunteer in the Infantry Regiment body of the Bavarian army in Munich. At the end of the month he was accepted into the regiment as an officer trainee , and after successfully attending the war school , he was promoted to secondary lieutenant on March 24, 1885 . As such, Rauchberger was commanded twice in 1888/89 as an assistant teacher for the intake exercises at the war school. From mid-May 1889 he served as regimental adjutant and was promoted to prime lieutenant on September 22, 1893 . From 1894 to 1897, Rauchberger graduated from the War Academy , which made him qualified for the general staff and the subject. This was followed by his command to the General Staff and, with his promotion to captain, on September 23, 1898, he was transferred to the Central Office of the General Staff in Munich. From mid-February 1900 to mid-April 1901, he was assigned to the War Ministry . Rauchberger then returned to the troop service and worked as a company commander in the 1st Infantry Regiment "König" until June 7, 1902 . This was followed by his renewed transfer to the Central Office of the General Staff, and in the years to come Smokingberger held various General Staff assignments. Among other things, he had been assigned to the Great General Staff in Berlin as a major in 1905/06 and during this time also served as an extraordinary member of the Bavarian Senate of the Reich Military Court . On October 1, 1907, Rauchberger was appointed battalion commander in the 21st Infantry Regiment , which he commanded for one year. Then Rauchberger was head of department in the Central Office of the General Staff, became a lieutenant colonel on October 16, 1908 , and from mid-February 1909 to January 23, 1910 also a member of the study commission of the War Academy. He was then again assigned to the General Staff in Berlin, where he was promoted to colonel on October 23, 1910 , and as such was appointed commander of the 21st Infantry Regiment in Fürth on October 1, 1911 . This regiment gave up Rauchberger on September 30, 1913 and was given command of the 1st Infantry Brigade . In this position he was promoted to major general on January 7, 1914 .

First World War

With the outbreak of World War I , his brigade mobilized on August 2, 1914 and first came into battle against the French at Badonviller . This was followed by the fighting at Vezouze and Sarrebourg, as well as the battle in Lorraine , in which Rauchberger was wounded on August 20, 1914. After his recovery, he returned to his brigade on the Western Front , took part in the Battle of the Somme and then went west of Saint-Quentin into trench warfare. Here, on March 9, 1915, he took over the 20th Infantry Brigade , which had been newly formed from his old large formation , with which he subsequently fought on the Somme and took part in the battle of La Bassée and Arras in the autumn . During the year 1915, in June / July and from the end of September to the middle of December, Rauchberger was in charge of the 2nd Infantry Division . In 1916, Rauchberger and his brigade continued to take part in trench warfare in the Artois and took part in the Battle of the Somme . At the beginning of August he was then commander of the newly formed 14th Infantry Division , with which he was used in the Battle of Verdun , before he intervened again in November 1916 in the Battle of the Somme.

After the spring battle near Arras in April 1917, Rauchberger, Lieutenant General since January 17, 1917 , relocated with his division to the Eastern Front . Here it was used near Riga , where the large formation on the Russian north flank near Uexküll crossed the approximately 400 m wide Daugava and led its attack over the Kleiner Jägel to the Livonian Aa . The division managed to bring in 2000 prisoners and 20 guns in addition to the land gain. For this achievement, which shortly afterwards led to the fall of Riga, Rauchberger was awarded the order Pour le Mérite on September 6, 1916 by Wilhelm II . A day earlier, Ludwig III. entrusted him with the Knight's Cross of the Military Max Joseph Order . With the award, the elevation into the personal nobility was connected and he was allowed to call himself Ritter von Rauchberger after his entry in the nobility register .

After the conquest of Riga, his troops also took part in the capture of Jakobstadt , before the division was relocated to the west again after the armistice in mid-December 1917. Here she was with the 1st Army in the trench warfare around Reims . From March 21, 1918, Rauchberger was involved in the spring offensive , was deployed on the Avre and Ancre, and was appointed commander of the 6th Infantry Division after the defensive battle between Somme and Avre at the end of May 1918 . In the following heavy defensive battles before the Siegfried position and the defensive battle between Cambrai and Saint-Quentin, enemy attacks were repeatedly repelled in its area. For this, at the suggestion of the commanding general of the 18th Army, Oskar von Hutier , Rauchberger was awarded the oak leaves for the Pour le Mérite on October 19, 1918.

In the last weeks of the war his troops withdrew fighting over the Hermann to the Antwerp Maas position and from there to Maubeuge .

post war period

After the armistice of Compiègne and the repatriation of the remnants of his division back home, the large association was demobilized and finally dissolved. Smokingberger was then appointed on December 20, 1918 as the commanding general of the deputy general command of the II Army Corps in Würzburg. At his request, he was placed on June 9, 1919 for the planning and five days later adopted him from military service.

After his departure he worked as an author and wrote various military history books and writings.

On August 27, 1939, on the so-called Tannenberg Day, Rauchberger was given the character of General of the Infantry.

literature

• Othmar Hackl : The Bavarian War Academy (1867-1914). CH Beck'sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, Munich 1989, ISBN 3-406-10490-8 . Pp. 546-547.
• Rudolf von Kramer, Otto Freiherr von Waldenfels: VIRTUTI PRO PATRIA. The Royal Bavarian Military Max Joseph Order. Acts of War and Book of Honor 1914-1918. Self-published by the Royal Bavarian Military Max Joseph Order, Munich 1966, pp. 205, 382–383.
• Hanns Möller: History of the knights of the order pour le mérite in the world war. Volume II: MZ. Verlag Bernard & Graefe, Berlin 1935, pp. 172-173.

Web links

• Bavarian State Library Online Otto von Rauchberger. In: Joachim Lilla: Minister of State, senior administrative officials and (NS) functionaries in Bavaria from 1918 to 1945.

Individual evidence

1. ^ Annual report from the K. Wilhelms-Gymnasium in Munich 1881/82.
2. ↑ Othmar Hackl: The Bavarian War Academy (1867-1914). CH Beck´sche publishing house bookstore. Munich 1989. ISBN 3-406-10490-8 . P. 547.