XIV Panzer Corps (Wehrmacht)

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The General Command XIV Army Corps was a major military unit of the German Wehrmacht in World War II . It was set up in Magdeburg on April 1, 1938 as the XIV. Army Corps (mot.) , Designated as the Wietersheim Group in June 1942 and renamed the XIV. Panzer Corps from June 21, 1942 . It came to the Eastern Front in 1941 , was destroyed in Stalingrad in January 1943 and, after being reorganized , was used in the theater of war in Italy until the end of the war .

history

1939/40

After the mobilization on August 1, 1939, the XIV Army Corps (mot.) Was used as part of the 10th Army in the attack on Poland . The subordinate 13th and 29th motorized infantry divisions were called in until September 9 after the advance to the Vistula near Deblin and Kozienice to close the Radom pocket and fought in the Warsaw area in the second phase of the campaign .

In December 1939 the corps was part of the 16th Army during the seated war in the Trier area and then joined Army Group A's reserve . During the German attack in the western campaign (May 1940) the corps was concentrated in the Ardennes behind the 12th Army as a reserve of Panzer Group Kleist . After breaking through to the canal , the corps was prematurely stopped in the Cambrai area in order to build up a front to the south.

In the second phase of the attack (June 1940) assigned to Army Group B , the General Command was alternately deployed with the 6th and 4th Army on the Somme sector. The 9th and 10th Panzer Divisions , the 13th Infantry Division (motorized) and the Infantry Regiment Greater Germany were subordinate to the General Command and advanced across the Loire into the Poitiers and Angouleme area. Subordinated to the 12th Army established there between July and September in the Orléans area as security, the corps and the army command were relocated back to Poland from October 1940 .

1941

From January 1941 the command with the 12th Army was transferred to Romania and took part in the Balkan campaign in April . Deploying in western Bulgaria , the corps attacked the Morava sector from the deployments northwest of Sofia . The troops of the commanding general von Wietersheim broke into Serbia with the 60th Infantry Division (motorized) and the 5th and 11th Panzer Divisions via Pirot . After a short stay with the 2nd Army, the general command was transferred to Galicia for the attack on the Soviet Union and assigned to Panzer Group 1 (Field Marshal Kleist ) as a reserve.

After the start of Operation Barbarossa , it was followed by Panzer Group 1 via Annopol with the 9th Panzer Division and the SS divisions "Leibstandarte" and "Wiking" . During the tank battle of Lutsk-Dubno , it led defensive battles against Soviet tank attacks near Zloczow . Tarnopol was taken on July 2nd and the Stalin line was broken on July 7th . On July 16, Biala Zerkow was reached and then turned south to take part in the Kesselschlacht near Uman until August 8 . The further advance took place on Pervomaisk , on August 16 it took part in the capture of Krivoy Rog and two days later it reached the Dnieper in the Dnepropetrovsk area . After that, stopped and directed back north, the Dnieper was crossed at Kremenchug on September 11th to take part in the battle of the Kiev kettle . The corps continued with the 9th Panzer , 16th and 25th Infantry Division (motorized) in cooperation with the divisions of the XXXXXVIII. Army Corps (motorized) (General Kempf) to break through to the north. On September 15, the connection with the troops of Panzer Group 2 at Lochwitza was established and the eastern boiler front was closed. After enemy attempts to break through had been defeated, the corps was brought forward to the Oriol sector via Zaritschanka-Majatschka . By September 27, it had advanced on Novomoskovsk and formed a bridgehead on the east bank of the Samara . The 16th Panzer Division had succeeded to Kobeljaki, parts of the assigned 14th Panzer Division ten kilometers south of Novomoskovsk. On October 2, the troops had reached the area northwest of Orechow as part of the Battle of the Sea of ​​Azov . On October 4, the western wing was advanced to the Zaporozhye and Novo Grigoryevskoye, and on October 5, Soviet counter-attacks at Semenovka were absent. The XIV Corps had closed the pocket on the Azov Sea on October 9th by advancing from the northeast and east. The subordinate divisions were advancing, the 16th Panzer Division to Andrejewka, the 60th Infantry Division (motorized) to Semenowka and the SS brigade "Wiking" in the area east of Mermentschik. After the conclusion of this battle, the corps had advanced to the Kalmius section on both sides of Karan and on October 12th pushed the 16th Panzer Division to Mikhailovskaya, the SS brigade "Wiking" to Pavlopol and to the west of it the motorized 60th Infantry Division in the Space east of Mariupol to. In November 1941 the corps led the advance on Rostov , was forced to retreat by the Soviet counteroffensive and in the winter of 1941/42 defended the positions against the Soviet 56th Army on the southern Mius .

1942

Until June 1942, also known as the von Wietersheim group, the general command was part of the 1st Panzer Army on the southernmost section of the Eastern Front on the Mius as far as Taganrog . On June 21, it was renamed XIV Panzer Corps and a few days later joined Operation Blau from the Artemovsk area on the German summer offensive across the Donets to the east. After the capture of Millerowo in mid-July, the General Command of the 6th Army was assigned to the advance on the great Donbogen. At the beginning of August 1942 it enclosed together with the divisions of the VIII and LI. Army Corps the boiler from Kalach to the Soviet 62nd Army and came to Stalingrad front. The XIV Panzer Corps had the task of protecting the northern wing of the 6th Army from counterattacks by the Soviet 66th Army between the Don and the Volga . After the armed forces had been regrouped for the attack on Stalingrad, the 3rd and motorized 60th Infantry Division and the 16th Panzer Division were deployed in the northern corridor between the two rivers to break through to the Volga at Rynok on August 23. A strip 29 kilometers wide south of the Kotluban-Orlovka line had to be secured by the XIV Corps. During the offensive by the Soviet 1st Guard and 66th Army from September 3rd to 12th in the north of Stalingrad, the 24th Panzer Division and the 60th Motorized Infantry Division provided the defense. On September 14, 1942, General von Wietersheim was dismissed by Hitler because he had proposed to abandon the further attack on Stalingrad. The new commander, Major General Hans-Valentin Hube , ordered another attack on the Orlowka front ledge on September 27th, but it collapsed quickly, so that the 94th and 389th Infantry Divisions had to be supplied as reinforcements. By October 2, 1942, another Soviet offensive on the defensive front of the corps failed, although the newly formed Soviet 4th Panzer Army was deployed. On November 20th, Colonel-General Friedrich Paulus released the general command from the northern front of Stalingrad in order to keep open the threatened retreat route near Kalatsch am Don with the 29th motorized infantry division. General Hube took over the defense of the Don crossings in Golubinskaya and received parts of the 14th and 16th Panzer Divisions as reinforcements. The XIV. Panzer Corps was pushed aside by superior Soviet armored forces, cut off with the bulk of the 6th Army and destroyed in the Stalingrad pocket by February 1943 .

1943

The corps was reorganized on March 5, 1943 under General Hube in France . From June to August 1943, the General Command was at the disposal of the Commander-in-Chief in Central Italy . After the Allied landing in Sicily ( Operation Husky from July 10th), the General Command was entrusted with counter-attacks. On July 31, the Italian General Guzzoni handed over command of the island to the German General Hube, to whom the 15th and 29th Panzer Grenadier Divisions , the Panzer Division Hermann Göring and the 1st Paratrooper Division were assigned. In the company training course (August 17, 1943) all troops were withdrawn via the Strait of Messina to the mainland. Almost 40,000 soldiers, 9,000 vehicles, 27 tanks and 94 artillery pieces were successfully evacuated to Calabria . On October 22, 1943, General of the Senger and Etterlin armored forces became the new commanding general of the corps deployed in front of Salerno and on the Sangro . After being assigned to the 10th Army , the 29th and 90th Panzer Grenadier Divisions and the 20th Air Force Field Division were subordinate to the General Command .

1944/45

At the beginning of January 1944, the 5th US Army under Lieutenant General Clark had reached the Gustav Line along the Garigliano and met new resistance there. The XIV Panzer Corps was supposed to prevent the Allies from advancing through the Liri Valley towards the Italian capital Rome . It came to the battle of Monte Cassino . The command of the monastery mountain was incumbent on the adjacent general command of the LI. Mountain Corps under General of the Feurstein Mountain Troop . The decisive Allied final offensive did not begin until May 11, 1944; the attack ran from the sea to beyond Cassino at a width of 32 kilometers. The British XIII. Corps under General Kirkman succeeded in bypassing the mountain and thereby breaking into the Gustav Line. This success enabled the 5th US Army, attacking in front of the front of the XIV Panzer Corps, to break through on Rome. From June 1944 retreat fights followed in the association of the 14th Army through Tuscany to Bologna . After the collapse of the German front lines near Bologna during the Allied spring offensive in 1945 on April 21, 1945, the corps crossed the Po and continued its retreat via Verona to the South Tyrolean Alpine front , where the surrender to the Americans took place in May 1945. Most recently, the 65th and 94th Infantry Divisions and the 8th Mountain Division were subordinate to the command.

guide

Commanding generals

literature

  • Frido von Senger and Etterlin: War in Europe . Kiepenheuer and Witsch, Cologne / Berlin 1960.
  • Percy E. Schramm (Ed.): War diary of the High Command of the Wehrmacht , 8th volumes, Volume I: 1940/41 edited by Hans-Adolf Jacobsen, Bernard & Graefe Verlag für Wehrwesen, Frankfurt am Main 1965
  • Peter Young: The great atlas for World War II , Südwest Verlag 1974. Page 121
  • Niall Barr / Russell Hart: Tank War , Kaiser Verlag 2000

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Schramm: War Diary of the OKW, Volume IV, p. 1902