Theodor Geib

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Theodor Friedrich Geib (born September 15, 1885 in Landau in the Palatinate ; † November 26, 1944 in Freiburg im Breisgau ) was a German artillery general in World War II .

Life

Origin and family

Theodor Geib was a son of the railway administrator Philipp Jakob Geib (1854-1909) and Auguste Frantz (1856-1939). Auguste Frantz was a daughter of the pastor, author, editor of a Protestant church paper and the Dawn and revolutionary from 1849 Friedrich Theodor Frantz (1809–1864).

He was married to Alma Maria Wieselhuber. They had a son Joachim (1927–1992), who was born in Kassel and later emigrated to America.

Career

Geib occurred on 15 July 1904 as an officer cadet in the 2nd Foot Artillery Regiment of the Bavarian army and was after attending the military academy in Munich in early March 1906. Lieutenant promoted. For further training he was assigned to the artillery and engineering school in 1908/10 . When the First World War broke out , Geib was first lieutenant in the replacement battalion and on August 10, 1914, he joined the 2nd Reserve Foot Artillery Regiment as a battery leader . At the beginning of September he was promoted to the regiment staff as an orderly officer. Geib took part in the battles of Lorraine , the Marne and the Aisne in France . On October 6, 1915 he was appointed adjutant to the general of the foot artillery of III. Army Corps and promoted to captain in this position in mid-May 1916 . From November 16, 1916 to February 27, 1917, Geib was again a battery leader in the 2nd Foot Artillery Regiment and then served as an adjutant to the artillery commander of the 12th Infantry Division during the campaign in Romania . After the armistice there , on March 9, 1918, he was transferred to the staff of General Artillery 1 in the main headquarters .

Awarded both classes of the Iron Cross and the Order of Military Merit IV. Class with Swords, Geib returned to his main regiment on January 8, 1919 after the end of the war . After the demobilization and dissolution of the association , he was accepted into the Reichswehr . He was initially adjutant of the Grafenwoehr Training Area Command , joined the staff of the Cuxhaven Command in June 1921, and four months later joined the Wilhelmshaven Command . On April 1, 1923, Geib was appointed head of the 4th (Bavarian) Squadron of the 4th Driving Department in Landsberg am Lech . Then he moved on March 1, 1925 to the staff of the 2nd Division of the 7th (Bavarian) Artillery Regiment . At the beginning of February 1927 he was transferred to the staff of Group Command 2 in Kassel , where he was promoted to major in the same year . In June 1929 he was transferred to the Army Weapons Office in the Reichswehr Ministry in Berlin , and two years later he was also employed there in the Army Supply Department. In Berlin he lived at Johanna-Stegen-Strasse 17 in Steglitz .

At the beginning of April 1934 he was appointed chief of the staff of the field witness inspection at the General Army Office, one year later he was appointed head of the field weapon inspection department and in 1937 he was army field officer with the position of field witness inspector. The head of his staff was Wolfgang von Kluge . In this position he was promoted to General of the Artillery in early 1942.

From August 17 to September 7, 1943, he was in the Führerreserve . Subsequently, Geib was appointed military commander for Albania and Montenegro as well as the German Plenipotentiary General in Albania. At the same time he acted from September 15, 1943 to May 31, 1944 as field commander Cetinje and from April 15 to May 31, 1944 as German Plenipotentiary General in Montenegro. On November 9, 1943, he received the German Silver Cross . In this newly created position to represent the German Wehrmacht in the Albanian government, he was directly subordinate to the Chief of the Wehrmacht High Command Wilhelm Keitel and was replaced by Otto Gullmann in 1944 .

In June 1944 he was reassigned to the Führerreserve, but in the same month he succeeded Heinrich Niehoff as commander of the military area in southern France. On the way to his new place of work, he survived an attack by French partisans near Chalon-sur-Saône on July 30, 1944 , but died a little later as a result. Ernst Dehner became his successor as commander of the Army Territory of Southern France .

literature

  • Dermot Bradley (ed.), Karl-Friedrich Hildebrand, Markus Rövekamp: The Generals of the Army 1921–1945. The military careers of the generals, as well as the doctors, veterinarians, data officers, judges and ministerial officials with the rank of general. Volume 4: Fleck-Gyldenfeldt. Biblio Verlag, Osnabrück 1996, ISBN 3-7648-2488-3 , pp. 204-205.
  • Robert Elsie : A Biographical Dictionary of Albanian History. IBTauris, 2013, pp. 163-164.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Nikolaus von Preradovich: The military and social origin of the generals of the German army: May 1, 1944 . Biblio Verlag, 1978, ISBN 978-3-7648-1061-0 , p. 101 ( google.de [accessed on May 21, 2018]).
  2. ↑ a b War ranking and master roles of the Kingdom of Bavaria, World War I 1914 to 1918 . State Archives Bavaria, p. 73 .
  3. ↑ Reichswehr Ministry (Ed.): Ranking list of the German Reichsheeres. ES Mittler & Sohn , Berlin 1924, p. 143.
  4. ↑ Ranking list of the German Imperial Army . ES Mittler & Sohn., 1926, p. 77 ( google.de [accessed on May 21, 2018]).
  5. ↑ Germany Reich Chancellor (1933-1945: Hitler), Germany Reich Chancellor (1933-1945: Hitler), Adolf Hitler, Martin Moll: "Fuehrer-Erasse" 1939-1945: Edition of all surviving, not printed in the Reichsgesetzblatt, by Hitler during the During the Second World War, directives issued in writing from the areas of state, party, economy, occupation policy and military administration . Franz Steiner Verlag, 1997, ISBN 978-3-515-06873-4 , p. 361 ( google.de [accessed on May 21, 2018]).
  6. ^ Franziska A. Zaugg: Albanian Muslims in the Waffen-SS: From "Greater Albania" to the "Skanderbeg" division . Verlag Ferdinand Schöningh, 2017, ISBN 978-3-657-78436-3 , p. 103 ( google.de [accessed on May 21, 2018]).
  7. ^ Rolf-Dieter Müller, Hans Umbreit: The German Reich and the Second World War: 1942-1944 / 45. Organization and mobilization of the German sphere of influence. War administration, economics and human resources . Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1999, ISBN 978-3-421-06499-8 , pp. 92 + 93 ( google.de [accessed on May 21, 2018]).
  8. ↑ Peter Lieb: Conventional War or Nazi Weltanschauungskrieg ?: Warfare and Fight against Partisans in France 1943/44 . Walter de Gruyter, 2007, ISBN 978-3-486-70741-0 , p. 57 ( google.de [accessed on May 21, 2018]).
personal data
SURNAME Geib, Theodor
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Geib, Theodor Friedrich (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German general of the artillery
DATE OF BIRTH September 15, 1885
PLACE OF BIRTH Landau in the Palatinate
DATE OF DEATH November 26, 1944
Place of death Freiburg in Breisgau