In the fate of the Generals of the Second World War.
In the course of hostilities, for one reason or another, servicemen are sometimes taken prisoner, so according to the archival data of the FRG for all the years of World War II, a total of almost 35 million people passed through captivity, according to researchers, officers from this total number of prisoners amounted to about 3%, and the captured military in the rank of generals, there were a total of fewer, only a few hundred people. However, it is this category of prisoners of war that has always been of particular interest to the special services and various political structures of the belligerent parties, therefore, it most of all experienced ideological pressure and other various forms of moral and psychological influence.
In connection with which the question involuntarily arises, which of the belligerent parties had the largest number captured by the highest military officials who had the rank of generals, in the Red Army or in the German Wehrmacht?
From various sources it is known that during the Second World War, 83 generals of the Red Army were captured in German captivity. Of these, 26 people died for various reasons: they were shot, killed by the camp guards, died from diseases. The rest after the Victory were deported to the Soviet Union. Of these, 32 people were repressed (7 were hanged in the Vlasov case, 17 were shot on the basis of the Headquarters order No. 270 of August 16, 1941 "On cases of cowardice and surrender and measures to suppress such actions") and for "wrong" behavior in captivity 8 generals were sentenced to various terms of imprisonment. The remaining 25 people, after more than six months of checking, were acquitted, but then they were gradually fired into the reserve (link: http://nvo.ng.ru/history/2004-04-30/5_fatum.html).
The overwhelming majority of Soviet generals were captured in 1941, only 63 generals of the Red Army. In 1942, our army suffered a series of defeats. And here, surrounded by the enemy, 16 more generals were captured. In 1943, three more generals were taken prisoner, and in 1945 - one. In total during the war - 83 people. Of these, 5 army commanders, 19 corps commanders, 31 division commanders, 4 chiefs of staff of an army, 9 chiefs of combat arms, etc.
In the book of modern researchers of this issue, F. Gushchin and S. Zhebrovsky, it is argued that about 20 Soviet generals allegedly agreed to cooperate with the Nazis, according to other sources, there were only 8 generals who agreed to cooperate with the Germans (http://ru.wikipedia.org / wiki) if these data correspond to reality, then of these 20, only two generals are known who voluntarily and openly went over to the enemy's side, this is Vlasov and another of his fellow treacherous former commander of the 102nd rifle division brigade commander (major general) Ivan Bessonov is the one who, in April 1942, proposed to his German masters to create special anti-partisan corps, and that's all, more names of traitor generals are not mentioned anywhere..
Thus, most of the Soviet generals who fell into the hands of the Germans were either wounded or were in an unconscious state and subsequently behaved in captivity with dignity. The fate of many of them still remains unknown, so the fate of Major General Bogdanov, commander of the 48th Infantry Division, Major General Dobrozerdov, who headed the 7th Infantry Corps, is still unknown, the fate of Lieutenant General Ershakov is unknown. In September 1941 he took command of the 20th Army, which was soon defeated in the battle of Smolensk.
Smolensk became a really unhappy city for Soviet generals, in the same place Lieutenant General Lukin commanded the 20th Army at the beginning, and then the 19th, which was also defeated there in the battle of Smolensk in October 1941.
The fate of Major General Mishutin is full of secrets and mysteries, an active participant in the battles on Khalkhin-Gol, by the beginning of the Great Patriotic War he commanded a rifle division in Belarus, in the same place in hostilities and disappeared without a trace.
Only in the late 1980s was an attempt made to pay tribute to Generals Ponedelin and Kirillov, who flatly refused to cooperate with the Germans.
The fate of Major General of Tank Troops Potapov was interesting; he was among the five army commanders whom the Germans captured during the war. Potapov distinguished himself in the battles on Khalkhin Gol, where he commanded the Southern Group, and at the beginning of the war he commanded the 5th Army of the Southwestern Front. After his release from captivity, Potapov was awarded the Order of Lenin, and later he was promoted to the rank of colonel-general. Then, after the war, he was appointed first deputy commander of the Odessa and Carpathian military districts. His obituary was signed by all representatives of the high command, which included several marshals. The obituary did not say anything about his capture and stay in German camps. So it turns out that not everyone was punished for being in captivity.
The last Soviet general (and one of the two air force generals) captured by the Germans was Air Force Major General Polbin, commander of the 6th Guards Bomber Corps, which supported the 6th Army, which surrounded Breslau in February 1945. He was wounded, captured and killed, and only then did the Germans establish the identity of this person. His fate was quite typical for everyone who was captured in the last months of the war.(link: http://nvo.ng.ru/history/2004-04-30/5_fatum.html).
And what about the captured German generals? How many of them turned out to be in Stalin's grub under the protection of the NKVD special forces? If Soviet soldiers and commanders were held captive by the Germans, according to various sources, there were from 4.5 to 5.7 million people, and the Germans, along with their allies, were held captive in the USSR by almost 4 million people, a difference of a whole million in favor of the Germans, then the generals picture was different, there were almost five times more German generals in Soviet captivity than Soviet ones!
From the research of B.L. Khavkin it is known:
The first captive generals ended up in the GUPVI (Main Directorate for Prisoners of War and Internees (GUPVI) of the NKVD-Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR) in the winter of 1942-1943. These were 32 prisoners of Stalingrad, led by the commander of the 6th Army, Field Marshal Friedrich Paulus. In 1944, 44 more generals were captured. 1945 was especially successful for the Red Army, when 300 German generals were captured.
According to the information contained in the certificate of the head of the prison department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs
Colonel P.S. Bulanov dated September 28, 1956, all in Soviet captivity was
376 German generals, of whom 277 were released from captivity and repatriated to their homeland, 99 died. Among the dead, the official statistics of the GUPVI included those 18 generals who were sentenced to death by the Decree of April 19, 1943 and hanged as war criminals.
The number of captured generals and admirals included the highest ranks of the ground forces, the Luftwaffe, the navy, the SS, the police, as well as government officials who received the rank of general for services to the Reich. Among the captured generals, most of all were representatives of the ground forces, as well as, oddly enough, retirees(link: http://forum.patriotcenter.ru/index.php?PHPSESSID=2blgn1ae4f0tb61r77l0rpgn07&topic=21261.0).
There is practically no information that any of the German generals were captured wounded, shell-shocked or with weapons in their hands, they surrendered in a civilized manner, with all the attributes of the old Prussian military school. It is more often that Soviet generals were burned alive in tanks, died on the battlefield and disappeared without a trace.
Captured German generals were kept practically in resort conditions, for example, in camp number 48, founded in June 1943 in the former rest house of the Central Committee of the railway workers' trade union in the village of Cherntsy, Lezhnevsky district of the Ivanovo region, in January 1947 there were 223 prisoners of generals, of which 175 Germans, 35 Hungarians, 8 Austrians, 3 Romanians, 2 Italians. This camp was located in a park in which linden trees grew, there were walking paths, flowers bloomed in the flower beds in summer. In the zone there was also a vegetable garden, which occupied about 1 hectare of land, in which generals and vegetables worked at will, from which they went to their table in addition to the existing food standards. Thus, the food for the generals was improved. The patients were given an additional ration, which included meat, milk and butter. However, there were also hunger strikes in the camp, the participants of which protested against poor service in the canteen, under-dispensing of food set as required, blackouts, etc. There were no attempts to escape from captivity, attempts to raise some kind of revolt or uprising among the German generals.
A completely different picture was observed with Soviet generals, 6 of them, risking their lives, escaped from the camp in order to continue to fight in the ranks of the partisans in the future, these are Major Generals I. Alekseev, N. Goltsev, S. Ogurtsov, P. Sysoev, P. Tsiryulnikov and Brigade Commissioner I. Tolkachev (link: http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki). Another 15 Soviet generals were executed by the Nazis for preparing escapes and clandestine activities.
Much is known about the cooperation of German generals with the Soviet authorities, facts confirm that the generals collaborated with the Soviets very actively and willingly, for example, in February 1944, Generals Seidlitz and Kofes took personal part in campaigning in German military units surrounded in the region Korsun-Shevchenkovsky town. Seidlitz and Kofes even met with General of the Army Vatutin, with whom a plan of action was agreed. 500 thousand copies of Seidlitz's appeal to the officer corps and soldiers of the encircled group were printed and dropped from aircraft, calling for them to end resistance in order to avoid senseless casualties. German general Seidlitz apparently dreamed of becoming the new liberator of Germany and even asked the Soviet leadership to give him permission to form German national units, but the Russians, like the Germans, did not trust the defectors, the captured Germans were allowed to mainly engage in propaganda work to decompose enemy troops at the front. and nothing more, and Vlasov received the go-ahead from the Germans for the real formation of the ROA troops only in the fall of 1944. right before the catastrophe of the Third Reich, when the Germans already had no one to send to the front line.
Soon in the summer of 1944, once after the last attempt on Hitler's life, realizing that the Reich was coming to an end, almost all the generals led by Paulus rushed to cooperate with the Soviet administration. anti-fascist movement and already on August 14 he entered the Union of German Officers and made an appeal to the German troops at the front, the appeal was broadcast by radio, leaflets with his text were thrown into the location of the German troops, apparently, this had an impact on many soldiers and officers. Goebbels' department even had to launch a retaliatory propaganda campaign to prove that this appeal was falsification.
War is a cruel test, it does not spare even generals and marshals. A general in the army is a very big power, and with it a very big responsibility. Each commander has ups and downs, each has its own destiny. One becomes forever a national Hero, and the other disappears into oblivion.
War is always a cruel test; it does not spare anyone, not even generals and marshals. Each military leader has ups and downs during hostilities, each has its own destiny. As one American president rightly pointed out, war is a dangerous place. The statistics of the deaths of high-ranking officers during the hostilities of the Second World War are a clear confirmation of this.
If a lot has been written about the military destinies and losses of the generals of the Red Army during the Great Patriotic War in recent years, much less is known about their German "counterparts" who died on the Eastern Front. At least the authors do not know about books or articles published in Russian on the topic in the title. Therefore, we hope that our work will be useful for readers interested in the history of the Great Patriotic War.
Before proceeding directly to the narration, it is necessary to make a small note. In the German army, the practice of posthumous assignment of general ranks was widespread. We do not consider such cases and we will only talk about persons who had a general rank at the time of their death. So let's get started.
1941 year
The first German general killed on the Eastern Front was the commander of the 121st East Prussian Infantry Division, Major General Otto LANCELLE, who died on July 3, 1941, east of Kraslava.
In the Soviet military history literature, various information was provided about the circumstances of the death of this general, including a version of the involvement of Soviet partisans in this episode. In fact, Lancelle was the victim of a fairly typical offensive incident. Here is an excerpt from the history of the 121st Infantry Division: “ When the main body of the 407th Infantry Regiment reached the forest, General Lancelle left his command post. Together with the divisional headquarters officer, Chief Lieutenant Steller, he went to the command post of the 407th regiment. Having reached the forward divisions of the battalion advancing to the left of the road, the general did not notice that the right battalion had lagged behind ... the Red Army men retreating in front of this battalion suddenly appeared from the rear. In the ensuing close combat, the general was killed ...».
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On July 20, 1941, the acting commander of the 17th Panzer Division, Major General Karl von Weber, died in a field hospital in Krasny. He was wounded the day before during shelling by fragments of a Soviet shell in the Smolensk region.
On August 10, 1941, the first general of the SS troops, SS Gruppenfuehrer and Lieutenant General of Police, Commander of the SS Polizai Division, Arthur MULVERSTEDT, was killed on the Soviet-German front.
The division commander was at the forefront, during the breakthrough by units of his division of the Luga defensive line. Here is how the death of the general is described on the pages of the divisional chronicle: “ Enemy fire paralyzed the attack, she was losing strength, she was threatened with a complete stop. The general immediately assessed the situation. He rose to resume promotion by example. "Go guys!" In such a situation, it doesn't matter who sets an example. The main thing is that one attracts the other, almost like a law of nature. A lieutenant can raise a shooter to attack, or maybe a whole battalion is a general. Attack, forward! The general looked around and gave an order to the nearest machine-gun crew: "Cover us from the side of that fir tree!" The machine-gunner gave a long burst in the indicated direction, and General Mühlverstedt again moved forward, into a small hollow overgrown with alder bushes. There he knelt down to get a better look around. His adjutant, Lieutenant Rymer, was lying on the ground, changing the magazine in the submachine gun. Nearby, a mortar crew was changing positions. The general jumped up, his command "Forward!" At that moment, a shell explosion threw the general to the ground, fragments pierced his chest ...
A non-commissioned officer and three soldiers were taken toIljishe Proroge... There, a dressing station for the 2nd Medical Company was organized under the leadership of the senior physician, Dr. Ott. When the soldiers delivered their cargo, the only thing that the doctors could do was to state the death of the division commander».
According to some reports, the presence of the general directly in the combat formations of the infantry was caused by the dissatisfaction of the higher command with the not very successful actions of the division.
A few days after Mühlverstedt, on August 13, the explosion of a Soviet anti-tank mine put the final point in the career of the commander of the 31st Infantry Division, Major General Kurt Kalmukov (Kurt KALMUKOFF). He, along with his adjutant, was blown up in a passenger car while driving to the front line.
Colonel General Eugen Ritter von SCHOBERT, commander of the German 11th Field Army, became the highest-ranking Wehrmacht officer to die on the Soviet-German front in 1941. He also had the fate of becoming the first German army commander to die in World War II.
On September 12, Schobert flew in a liaison Fieseller-Storch Fi156 from the 7th Courier Detachment (Kurierst. 7), led by pilot Captain Suvelak, to one of the divisional command posts. For some unknown reason, the plane landed before reaching its destination. It is possible that the vehicle received combat damage on the way. The landing site for the "fiziler" (with serial number 5287) turned out to be a Soviet minefield near Dmitrievka, in the area of the Kakhovka-Antonovka road. The pilot and his high-ranking passenger were killed.
It is curious that in Soviet time, the heroic story of ts was written. "Based on" this event. In his story, a German general watched as his subordinates forced Soviet prisoners to clear the minefield. At the same time, it was announced to the prisoners that the general had lost his watch on this very field. One of the captive sailors who took part in the demining, with a mine just removed in his hands, approached the surprised Germans with a message that the watch had allegedly been found. And, approaching, blew himself up and enemies. However, it may be that the source of inspiration for the author of this work was completely different.
On September 29, 1941, Lieutenant General Rudolf KRANTZ, commander of the 454th Security Division, was wounded. On October 22 of the same year, he died in a hospital in Dresden.
On October 28, 1941, on the Valki-Kovyagi road (Kharkov region), the car of Lieutenant General Erich BERNECKER, commander of the 124th artillery command, was blown up by an anti-tank mine. During the explosion, the artillery general was mortally wounded and died on the same day.
In the early morning of November 14, 1941, Lieutenant General Georg BRAUN, commander of the 68th Infantry Division, took off with a mansion at 17 Dzerzhinsky Street in Kharkov in Kharkov. This triggered a radio-controlled land mine planted by miners from the operational engineering group of Colonel I.G. Starinov in preparation for the evacuation of the city. Although by this time the enemy had already more or less successfully learned how to deal with Soviet special equipment, but in this case the German sappers blundered. Together with the general, two staff officers of the 68th division and "almost all of the clerks" (or rather 4 non-commissioned officers and 6 privates) were killed under the rubble, as the record in German documents says. In total, the explosion killed 13 people, and, in addition, the head of the division's reconnaissance department, an interpreter and a sergeant major were seriously injured.
In retaliation, the Germans, without any proceedings, hung the first seven townspeople who came to hand in front of the explosion site, and by the evening of November 14, crazed by the explosions of radio-controlled land mines thundering all over Kharkov, they took hostages from the local population. Of these, 50 people were shot on the same day, and another 1000 had to pay with their lives if sabotage was repeated.
The death of General Kurt von BRIESEN, commander of the 52nd Army Corps, opened an account for the losses of senior Wehrmacht officers from Soviet aviation. On November 20, 1941, at about noon, the general left for Malaya Kamyshevakha to set the task for subordinate units to capture the city of Izium. At that moment, a pair of Soviet planes appeared over the road. The pilots attacked very competently, planning with engines running on low gas. Target fire was opened from a height of no more than 50 meters. The Germans sitting in the general's car discovered the danger only from the roar of the engines again working at full power and the whistle of flying bullets. Two officers accompanying the general managed to jump out of the car, one of them was wounded. The driver remained completely unharmed. But von Briesen received twelve bullet wounds in the chest, from which he died on the spot.
Who was the author of this queue label is unknown. Note that according to the operational summary of the Air Force headquarters of the Southwestern Front, on November 20, our aviation, due to bad weather, acted limitedly. Nevertheless, the Air Force units of the 6th Army, operating just over the area of von Briesen's death, reported on the destruction of five vehicles during the attack of enemy troops moving along the roads.
Interestingly, the father of the deceased von Briesen, Alfred, was also a general and also died on the Eastern Front in 1914.
On December 8, 1941, Lieutenant General Herbert GEITNER, commander of the 295th Infantry Division, was wounded near Artyomovsk. The general was evacuated from the front line, but the wound was fatal, and he died on January 22, 1942 in a hospital in Germany.
The death of Lieutenant-General Conrad COCHENHAUSEN, commander of the 134th Infantry Division, was very unusual for the Wehrmacht "model of 1941". The general's division, together with the 45th Infantry Division, was surrounded by units of the Southwestern Front in the Yelets area. In winter conditions, the Germans had to fight their way out of the resulting "cauldron" to join up with the rest of their army. Cohenhausen could not resist nervous tension and on December 13, considering the situation hopeless, he shot himself.
Most likely, such a tragic outcome was predetermined by the general's character traits. Here is what he wrote about this: “ Already when I met Lieutenant General von Cohenhausen on September 30, 1941, he was very pessimistic about the general martial law on the Eastern Front.". Of course, the encirclement is not a pleasant thing and the losses of the Germans were great. We do not know for sure the losses of the 134th division, but its "neighbor", the 45th infantry division, lost over a thousand people from 5 to 17 December, including 233 killed and 232 missing. Material losses were also great. Only light field howitzers were left by the 45th division during the retreat of 22 pieces. But, in the end, the Germans still managed to break through.
The rest of the Wehrmacht divisions in the central sector of the Soviet-German front found themselves in similar situations more than once or twice. The losses were also very significant. But their division commanders, nevertheless, did not lose their composure. How can I not remember folk wisdom- "all diseases are from the nerves."
The penultimate general of the Wehrmacht, who died on the Eastern Front in 1941, was the commander of the 137th Infantry Division, Lieutenant General Friedrich Bergman (Friedrich BERGMANN). The division lost its commander on December 21 during the Kaluga operation of the Western Front. Trying to deny the exit of the mobile group of the 50th Soviet army on Kaluga, parts of the 137th division undertook a number of counterattacks. General Bergman arrived at the command post of the 2nd battalion of the 449th infantry regiment, located in the forest north of the village of Syavki (25 kilometers southeast of Kaluga). Trying to personally assess the situation on the battlefield, Bergman moved with the battalion reserve to the edge of the forest. The Germans were immediately fired upon by Soviet tanks supporting their infantry. One of the machine-gun bursts mortally wounded the general.
The last to die in 1941 (December 27) was the commander of the 1st SS Motorized Brigade, SS Brigadeführer and SS Major General Richard HERMANN. This is how the episode is reflected in the combat log of the 2nd Field Army: “ 12/27/1941. From the very early morning, the enemy with a force of up to two reinforced rifle regiments, with artillery and 3-4 squadrons of cavalry, began an offensive to the south through Aleksandrovskoe and Trudy. By noon, he managed to advance to Vysokoe and break into the settlement. SS Major General Herman was killed there.».
Two more episodes should be mentioned that are directly related to the topic touched upon in this article. A number of publications provide information about the death of General Veterinarian of the 38th Army Corps Erich BARTSCH on the Soviet-German front on October 9, 1941. However, Dr. Barch, who died from a mine explosion, had the title of Oberst Veterinarian at the time of his death. it has nothing to do with purely general losses.
According to some sources, the commander of the 2nd SS Police Regiment, Hans Christian Schulze, is considered an SS Brigadefuehrer and Police Major General. In fact, Schulze was a colonel both at the time of his injury near Gatchina on September 9, 1941, and at the time of his death on September 13.
So, let's summarize. In 1941, twelve Wehrmacht and SS generals were killed on the Soviet-German front (including the commander of the 295th Infantry Division who died in 1942), and another general committed suicide.
German generals killed on the Soviet-German front in 1941
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Name, title |
Position |
Cause of death |
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Major General Otto Lancelle |
Commander of the 121st Infantry Division |
Melee Killed |
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Major General Karl von Weber |
etc. commander |
Artillery fire |
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Police Lieutenant General Arthur Mühlverstedt |
Commander of the MD SS "Policeay" |
Artillery fire |
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Major General Kurt Kalmukov |
Commander of the 31st Infantry Division |
Undermining on a mine |
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Colonel General Eugene von Schobert |
Commander of the 11th Army |
Undermining on a mine |
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Lieutenant General Rudolf Krantz |
Commander of the 454th Security Division |
Not installed |
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Lieutenant General Erich Bernecker |
Commander of the 124th art. command |
Undermining on a mine |
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Lieutenant General Georg Brown |
Commander of the 68th Infantry Division |
Sabotage (detonation of radio explosives) |
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General of the infantry Kurt von Briesen |
Commander of the 52nd ak |
Air raid |
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Lieutenant General Herbert Geithner |
Commander of the 295th Infantry Division |
Not installed |
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Lieutenant General Konrad von Cohenhausen |
Commander of the 134th Infantry Division |
Suicide |
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Lieutenant General Friedrich Bergmann |
Commander of the 137th Infantry Division |
Machine gun fire from a tank |
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Major General of the SS forces Richard Hermann |
Commander of the 1st SS IBR |
Melee Killed |
1942 year
In the new year 1942, the bloody battles that eventually engulfed the entire Eastern Front could not help but result in a steady increase in irrecoverable losses among the senior officers of the Wehrmacht.
True, the first loss in the second year of the war on the Soviet-German front, the generals of the Wehrmacht suffered for a non-combat reason. On January 18, 1942, Lieutenant General Georg HEWELKE, commander of the 339th Infantry Division, died of a heart attack in Bryansk.
We will now be transported to the southernmost sector of the Soviet-German front, to the Crimea. On the isthmus connecting the Kerch Peninsula with the rest of the Crimea, stubborn battles are going on. The combat ships of the Black Sea Fleet provide all possible assistance to the ground forces of the Red Army.
On the night of March 21, 1942, the battleship "Paris Commune" and the leader "Tashkent", while maneuvering in the Feodosiya Gulf, fired at the enemy's troop concentrations in the Vladislavovka and Novo-Mikhailovka areas. The battleship fired 131 shells of the main caliber, the leader - 120. According to the chronicle of the 46th Infantry Division, the units located in Vladislavovka suffered serious losses. Among the seriously wounded was the divisional commander, Lieutenant General Kurt HIMER, who had his leg amputated at the hospital, but the general's life was saved. German doctors failed. On April 4, 1942, he died in the military hospital 2/610 in Simferopol.
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On March 22, Soviet pilots achieved new success. In an air raid on a command post in the village of Mikhailovka, the commander of the 294th Infantry Division, Lieutenant General Otto GABCKE, was killed. Here is what Stefan Heinsel, the author of the book about the 294th division, said about this episode: The command post of the division was located at the school in the village of Mikhailovka. At 13.55, two so-called "rats"on low level flight, they dropped four bombs on the school. Major Jarosch von Schwedler, two sergeant major, one senior corporal and one corporal were killed along with General Gabke.". Interestingly, Major Jarosch von Schwedler, who died in the bombing, was the chief of staff of the neighboring 79th Infantry Division, temporarily assigned to the headquarters of the 294th.
On March 23, 1942, Walter STAHLECKER, the head of the Einsatzgroup A, the chief of the order police and the security service of the Reichskommissariat Ostland, completed his bloody journey. If the biography of the SS Brigadefuehrer and Major General of the Police is known quite well, then the circumstances of his death are rather contradictory. The most plausible version is that the brigadeführer was seriously wounded in a battle with Soviet partisans, leading a detachment of Latvian policemen, and died while being transported to a rear hospital. But at the same time, the area in which a military clash with the partisans took place - Krasnogvardeisk, which is indicated in all sources without exception, looks very doubtful.
Krasnogvardeysk in March 1942 is the front-line zone of the 18th Army, which was besieging Leningrad, and occasionally fell under the shells of Soviet railway artillery. It is unlikely that in those conditions the partisans could conduct an open battle with the Germans. The chances of surviving for them in such a battle were close to zero. Most likely, Krasnogvardeysk is a more or less conventional point (like "Ryazan, which is near Moscow"), to which events are "tied", but in reality everything happened much further from the front line. There is no clarity about the date of the battle in which Stahlecker was wounded. There is an assumption that it happened a little earlier on March 23rd.
In the introductory part of the article, the principle was declared - not to include in the list of losses officers who received the rank of general posthumously. However, on common reason, we decided to make a few deviations from this principle. We will justify ourselves by the fact that the officers mentioned in these retreats were not only posthumously promoted to the rank of general, but, and this is the main thing, at the time of their death they held general positions of divisional commanders.
The first exception will be Colonel Bruno HIPPLER, commander of the 329th Infantry Division.
So, the 329th Infantry Division, which was transferred to the Eastern Front from Germany in late February 1942, took part in Operation Bruckenschlag, the result of which was to release the six divisions of the Wehrmacht's 16th Army encircled in the Demyansk region.
At dusk on March 23, 1942, the divisional commander, Colonel Hippler, accompanied by an adjutant, rode out in a tank for reconnaissance. After a while, the crew of the car radioed: “ The tank ran into a mine. The Russians are already there. Rather help b ". After that, the connection was interrupted. Since the exact location was not indicated, the searches made the next day were unsuccessful. Only on March 25, a reinforced reconnaissance group found a blown up tank, the bodies of the division commander and his companions on one of the forest roads. Colonel Hippler, his adjutant and the tank crew, apparently died in close combat.
Another "fake" general, but the commander of the division, the Wehrmacht lost on March 31, 1942. True, this time Colonel Karl FISCHER, commander of the 267th Infantry Division, did not die from a Soviet bullet, but died of typhus.
On April 7, 1942, west of the village of Glushitsa, a well-aimed Soviet sniper shot ended the career of Colonel Franz SCHEIDIES, commander of the 61st Infantry Division. Shadies took over command of the division only on March 27, leading the "national team" from different parts and units that repulsed the attacks of the Red Army north of Chudov.
On April 14, 1942, in the area of the village of Korolevka, the commander of the 31st Infantry Division, Major General Gerhard Berthold, was killed. Apparently, the general personally directed the attack of the 3rd battalion of the 17th infantry regiment on the Soviet positions at Zaitseva Gora on the Yukhnov-Roslavl highway.
On April 28, 1942, Major General Friedrich KAMMEL, commander of the 127th artillery command, shot himself in the village of Parkkin. This is the only German general who died in Northern Finland during the Great Patriotic War. The reason for his suicide is not known to us.
The beginning of the 1942 summer campaign was marked, as the Germans like to write, by the "spectacular" success of Soviet anti-aircraft gunners. As a result, the first general of the Luftwaffe died on the Soviet-German front.
So, in order. On May 12, 1942, a German transport plane Junkers-52 from the 300th transport group was shot down by Soviet anti-aircraft artillery in the Kharkov region. Survivor and captured Feldwebel Leopold Stefan said during interrogation that there were four crew members, ten passengers and mail on board. The car lost its bearings and was shot down. However, during the interrogation, the captured sergeant major did not mention a very significant detail - there was a whole German general among the passengers. This was the commander of the 6th Luftwaffe Construction Brigade, Major General Walter HELING. It should be noted that since Feldwebel Stefan was able to escape, then Heling could well become the first Wehrmacht general to be captured.
On July 12, 1942, the habit of taking advantage of a flight on a communications plane ended deplorably for another Wehrmacht general. On that day, the Chief of Staff of the 4th Panzer Army, Major General Julius von BERNUTH, flew to the headquarters of the 40th Panzer Corps in a fiziler-Storch plane. It was assumed that the flight will take place over the territory that is not controlled Soviet troops... However, the "Aist" never arrived at its destination. Only on July 14, a search group of the 79th Infantry Division found a wrecked car, as well as the bodies of the general and the pilot, in the area of the village of Saving. Apparently, the plane was hit by ground fire and made an emergency landing. The passenger and pilot were killed in the shootout.
During the summer campaign of 1942, heavy fighting took place not only on the southern flank of the huge Soviet-German front. The troops of the Western and Kalinin Fronts tried to knock out of the hands of the Wehrmacht "the pistol at the heart of Russia" - the Rzhev-Vyazemsky ledge. Combat actions on it quickly took on the character of bloody battles within the defensive line, and therefore, these operations did not differ in rapid and deep breakthroughs, leading to a violation of the enemy's control system and, as a consequence, to losses among the highest command personnel. Therefore, among the losses of German generals in 1942, there was only one who died in the central sector of the front. This is the commander of the 129th Infantry Division, Lieutenant General Stephan RITTAU.
Here is how the death of the divisional commander on August 22, 1942 is described in the divisional chronicle: “ At 10.00, the commander of the 129th Infantry Regiment, accompanied by an adjutant in an all-terrain vehicle, went to the command post of the 427th Infantry Regiment, located in the forest between Tabakovo and Markovo. From there, the divisional commander intended to personally conduct a reconnaissance of the battlefield. However, 15 minutes later, a motorcyclist messenger arrived at the division's command post, who reported that the division commander, Lieutenant General Rittau, his adjutant, Dr. Marschner and the driver had died. Their all-terrain vehicle received a direct hit from an artillery shell on the southern exit from Martynovo».
On August 26, 1942, another Wehrmacht general added to the list of losses, this time again on the southern flank of the Soviet-German front. On this day, the commander of the 23rd Panzer Division, Major General Erwin MACK, with a small task force went to the forward units of the division, repelling the fierce attacks of the Soviet troops. Further events are reflected in the dry lines of the "Journal of Combat Actions" of the 23rd TD: " At 08.30, the division commander arrived at the command post of the 2nd battalion of the 128th motorized infantry regiment, located on a collective farm south of Urvani. He wanted to personally find out the situation at the Urvan bridgehead. Shortly after the start of the discussion, a mortar mine exploded in the middle of the participants. The division commander, the commander of the 2nd battalion, Major von Unger, the adjutant of the 128th regiment, Captain Graf von Hagen, and the chief of the division commander, Chief Lieutenant von Puttkamer, were mortally wounded. They died on the spot or on the way to the infirmary. Miraculously survived the commander of the 128th regiment, Colonel Bachmann, who received only a slight wound.» .
On August 27, 1942, General medical service Dr. Walter HANSPACH corps doctor (chief of medical service) of the 14th Panzer Corps. True, so far we have not found information on how and under what circumstances this German general died.
The authors, who grew up on Soviet military-patriotic literature and cinema, more than once read and watched how Soviet military intelligence officers infiltrated enemy lines, ambushed, and then successfully destroyed a German general riding in a car. It would seem that such plots are just the fruit of the activity of a sophisticated writer's mind, but in the reality of the war there really were such episodes, although of course there were not many of them. During the battle for the Caucasus, it was in such an ambush that our soldiers managed to destroy the commander and chief of staff of the 198th Infantry Division of the Wehrmacht.
On September 6, 1942, at about noon on the road leading northeast from the village of Klyuchevaya to Saratovskaya, an Opel passenger car with a commander's flag on the hood was driving. In the car were the commander of the 198th Infantry Division, Lieutenant General Albert BUCK, the chief of staff of the division, Major Buhl, and the driver. On approaching the bridge, the car slowed down. At this moment, explosions of two anti-tank grenades were heard. The general was killed on the spot, the major was thrown out of the car, and the seriously wounded driver turned the Opel into a ditch. The soldiers of the construction company working on the bridge heard explosions and shots, were able to quickly organize the pursuit of Soviet intelligence officers and were able to capture several of them. From the prisoners it became known that the reconnaissance and sabotage group consisted of servicemen from the reconnaissance and mortar company of the 723rd Infantry Regiment. The scouts set up an ambush, taking advantage of the fact that the dense bushes in this place approached the road itself.
On September 8, 1942, Dr. SCHOLL, General of the Medical Service from the 40th Panzer Corps, was added to the list of Wehrmacht losses. On September 23, 1942, Major General Ulrich SCHUTZE, commander of the 144th Artillery Command, was on the same list. As in the case of the medical general Hanshpakh, we have not yet been able to find information under what circumstances these two generals died.
On October 5, 1942, the Wehrmacht command issued an official message, which said: “ On October 3, 1942, the commander of a tank corps, general of tank forces, Baron Langermann und Erlenkapm, holder of the Knight's Cross with Oak Leaves, was killed on the front line on the Don River. Colonel Nagi, the commander of one of the Hungarian divisions, died shoulder to shoulder with him. They fell in battles for the freedom of Europe". The message was about the commander of the 24th Panzer Corps, General Willibald Freiherr von LANGERMANN UND ERLENCAMP. The general came under Soviet artillery fire while traveling to the front line at the Storozhevsky bridgehead on the Don.
In early October 1942, the German command decided to withdraw the 96th Infantry Division to the reserve of Army Group North. The division commander, Lieutenant General Baron Joachim von SCHLEINITZ, went to the corps command post to receive the appropriate orders. On the night of October 5, 1942, an accident occurred on the way back to the division. The divisional commander and the chief lieutenant Koch who accompanied him were killed in a car accident.
On November 19, 1942, a hurricane of Soviet artillery fire announced the beginning of the Red Army's winter offensive and an imminent turning point in the course of the war. With regard to the topic of our article, it should be said that it was then that the first German generals who went missing appeared. The first of these was Major General Rudolf MORAWETZ, head of POW camp # 151. He went missing on November 23, 1942 in the Chir station area and opened the list of losses of German generals during the 1942-1943 winter campaign.
On December 22, 1942, the commander of the 62nd Infantry Division, Major General Richard-Heinrich von REUSS, was killed near the village of Bokovskaya. The general tried to slip through the columns of Soviet troops rushing to the rear of the enemy after breaking through the German positions during the operation "Little Saturn".
It is noteworthy that 1942, which began with a heart attack in General Gevelke, ended with a heart attack in another German divisional commander. On December 22, 1942, Major General Viktor KOCH, the commander of the 323rd Infantry Division, which was on the defensive in the Voronezh region, died. Several sources claim that Koch was killed in action.
Medical Service General Dr. Josef EBBERT, corps physician of the 29th Army Corps, committed suicide on December 29, 1942.
Thus, in 1942, losses among German generals amounted to 23 people. Of these, 16 people died in battle (counting two colonels - division commanders who were posthumously awarded the general rank: Hippler and Shadies). It is interesting that the number of German generals killed in battle in 1942 was only slightly higher than in 1941. Although the duration of hostilities doubled.
The rest of the irrecoverable losses of the generals occurred for non-combat reasons: one person died as a result of an accident, two committed suicide, three died as a result of an illness, and one disappeared without a trace.
German generals who died on the Soviet-German front in 1942
|
Name, title |
Position |
Cause of death |
||
|
Lieutenant General Georg Gevelke |
Commander of the 339th Infantry Division |
Died of illness |
||
|
Lieutenant General Kurt Giemer |
Commander of the 46th Infantry Division |
Artillery fire |
||
|
Lieutenant General Otto Habke |
Commander of the 294th Infantry Division |
Air raid |
||
|
Police Major General Walter Stahlecker |
Chief of the Order Police and Security Service of the Reichskommissariat "Ostland" |
Close combat with guerrillas |
||
|
Colonel (posthumously Major General) Bruno Hippler |
Commander of the 329th Infantry Division |
Close combat |
||
|
Colonel (posthumously Major General) Karl Fischer |
Commander of the 267th Infantry Division |
Died of illness |
||
|
Colonel (posthumously Major General) Franz Scheidies |
Commander of the 61st Infantry Division |
Killed by a sniper |
||
|
Major General Gerhard Berthold |
Commander of the 31st Infantry Division |
Not installed |
||
|
Major General Friedrich Kammel |
Commander of the 127th art. command |
Suicide |
||
|
Major General Walter Helling |
Commander of the 6th Luftwaffe Construction Brigade |
Killed in a downed plane |
||
|
Major General Julius von Bernuth |
Chief of Staff of the 4th Panzer Army |
Melee Killed |
||
|
Lieutenant General Stefan Rittau |
Commander of the 129th Infantry Division |
Artillery fire |
||
|
Major General Erwin Mack |
Commander of the 23rd TD |
Mortar fire |
||
|
General of the Medical Service Dr. Walter Hanshpach |
Corps doctor of the 14th Panzer Corps |
Not installed |
||
|
Lieutenant General Albert Buck |
Commander of the 198th Infantry Division |
Melee Killed |
||
|
General of the Medical Service Dr. Scholl |
Corps doctor of the 40th tank corps |
Not installed |
||
|
Major General Ulrich Schütze |
Commander of the 144th art. command |
Not installed |
||
|
General Willibald Langermann und Erlenkamp |
Commander of the 24th Panzer Corps |
Artillery fire |
||
|
Lieutenant General Baron Joachim von Schleinitz |
Commander of the 96th Infantry Division |
Killed in a car accident |
||
|
Major General Rudolf Moravec |
Head of the transit camp for prisoners of war No. 151 |
Missing |
||
|
Major General Richard-Heinrich von Reuss |
Commander of the 62nd Infantry Division |
Not installed |
||
|
Major General Viktor Koch |
Commander of the 323rd Infantry Division |
Died of illness |
||
|
General of the Medical Service Dr. Josef Ebbbert |
Corpus Doctor of the 29th Army Corps |
Suicide |
As we can see, in 1942, there were no prisoners among the German generals. But everything will change dramatically in just a month, at the end of January 1943, in Stalingrad.
1943 year
Undoubtedly, the most important event of the third year of the war was the surrender of the German 6th Field Army in Stalingrad and the surrender of its command led by Field Marshal Paulus. But, besides them, in 1943, quite a lot of other senior German officers, who are little known to fans of military history, fell under the "Russian steam roller".
Although the generals of the Wehrmacht began to suffer losses in 1943 even before the final of the Battle of Stalingrad, we will start with it, or rather with a long list of captured senior officers of the 6th Army. For convenience, this list is presented in chronological order in the form of a table.
German generals captured at Stalingrad in January-February 1943
|
Capture date |
Title, name |
Position |
|
|
Lieutenant General Hans-Heinrich Sixt von Armin |
Commander of the 113th Infantry Division |
||
|
Major General Moritz von Drebber |
Commander of the 297th Infantry Division |
||
|
Lieutenant General Heinrich-Anton Deboi |
Commander of the 44th Infantry Division |
||
|
major general professor dr Otto Renoldi |
Chief of Medical Service of the 6th Field Army |
||
|
Lieutenant General Helmuth Schlomer |
Commander of the 14th Panzer Corps |
||
|
Lieutenant General Alexander Baron von Daniels |
Commander of the 376th Infantry Division |
||
|
Major General Hans Wulz |
Commander of the 144th Artillery Command |
||
|
Lieutenant General Werner Sanne |
Commander of the 100th Jaeger (Light Infantry) Division |
||
|
Field Marshal Friedrich Paulus |
Commander of the 6th Field Army |
||
|
Lieutenant General Arthur Schmidt |
Chief of Staff of the 6th Field Army |
||
|
General of Artillery Max Pfeffer |
Commander of the 4th Army Corps |
||
|
General of Artillery Walther von Seydlitz-Kurzbach |
Commander of the 51st Army Corps |
||
|
Major General Ulrich Vassoll |
Commander of the 153rd Artillery Command |
||
|
Major General Hans-Georg Leyser |
Commander of the 29th Motorized Division |
||
|
Major General Dr. Otto Korfes |
Commander of the 295th Infantry Division |
||
|
Lieutenant General Carl Rodenburg |
Commander of the 76th Infantry Division |
||
|
Major General Fritz Roske |
Commander of the 71st Infantry Division |
||
|
Colonel General Walter Heitz |
Commander of the 8th Army Corps |
||
|
Major General Martin Lattmann |
Commander of the 14th Panzer Division |
||
|
Major General Erich Magnus |
Commander of the 389th Infantry Division |
||
|
Colonel General Karl Strecker |
Commander of the 11th Army Corps |
||
|
Lieutenant General Arno von Lenski |
Commander of the 24th Panzer Division |
One note should be made to this table. The German bureaucracy seems to have tried to do everything to make life as difficult as possible for future researchers and military historians. Examples of this are innumerable. Stalingrad was no exception in this respect. According to some reports, the commander of the 60th Motorized Division, Major General Hans-Adolf von Arenstorff, became a general in October 1943, i.e. already after six months spent in Soviet captivity. But that's not all. The rank of general was awarded to him on January 1, 1943 (the practice of assigning titles "retroactively" was not so rare among the Germans). So it turns out that in February 1943 we captured 22 German generals, and six months later there were one more of them!
The German group surrounded in Stalingrad lost its generals not only as prisoners. Several more senior officers died in the "cauldron" under various circumstances.
On January 26, the commander of the 71st Infantry Division, Lieutenant General Alexander von HARTMANN, was killed south of the Tsaritsa River. According to some reports, the general deliberately sought his own death - he climbed the railroad embankment and began firing a rifle in the direction of the positions occupied by Soviet troops.
On the same day, death overtook Lieutenant General Richard Stempel, commander of the 371st Infantry Division. On February 2, the commander of the 16th Panzer Division, Lieutenant General Gunter ANGERN, was added to the list of irrecoverable losses. Both generals committed suicide, not wanting to surrender.
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Now, from the grandiose battle on the Volga, let us return to the chronological presentation of the events of the winter campaign of the third military year.
Uniform plague attacked the commanders of the 24th Panzer Corps in January 1943, when corps units came under attack from the advancing Soviet formations, during the Ostrogozh-Rossoshan operation of the Voronezh Front troops.
On January 14, at his command post in the Sotnitskaya area, the corps commander, Lieutenant General Martin WANDEL, was killed. The command of the corps was taken over by the commander of the 387th Infantry Division, Lieutenant General Arno JAHR. But on January 20, Wandel's fate befell him. According to some reports, General Yaar committed suicide, not wanting to be captured by the Soviet Union.
Only one day, January 21, commanded the 24th Panzer Corps, Lieutenant General Karl EIBL, commander of the 385th Infantry Division. In the confusion of the retreat, the column in which his car was located ran into the Italians. They mistook the allies for the Russians and opened fire. In the fleeting battle, it came to hand grenades. The general was seriously wounded by shrapnel from one of them and died a few hours later from severe blood loss. Thus, within one week, 24th Panzer Corps lost its full-time commander and the commanders of both infantry divisions that were part of the formation.
The Voronezh-Kastornenskaya operation carried out by the troops of the Voronezh and Bryansk fronts, which completed the defeat of the southern flank of the Wehrmacht on the Eastern Front, became a "crop" for the general's losses.
The German 82nd Infantry Division came under the first blow of the advancing Soviet troops. Its commander, Lieutenant General Alfred BAENTSCH, is listed as dead of his wounds on January 27, 1943. The confusion reigning in the German headquarters was such that on February 14, the general was still considered missing, along with his chief of staff, Major Allmer. The division itself, under the command of the Wehrmacht's 2nd field army, was categorized as defeated.
Due to the rapid advance of Soviet units to the Kastornoye railway junction, the headquarters of the 13th Army Corps was cut off from the rest of the troops of the 2nd German Army, and its two divisions, in turn, from the corps headquarters. Corps headquarters decided to push westward. A different solution was chosen by the commander of the 377th Infantry Division, Lieutenant General Adolf LECHNER (Adolf LECHNER). On January 29, when an attempt was made to break through in the southeastern direction, to parts of his compound, he and most of the division headquarters were missing. Only the chief of staff of the division, Oberst Lieutenant Schmidt, went out to his own people by mid-February, but he too soon died of pneumonia in a hospital in the city of Oboyan.
The encircled German divisions began to make attempts to break through. On February 1, the 88th Infantry Division broke through to the outskirts of Stary Oskol. Parts of the 323rd Infantry Division moved behind it. The road was under constant fire from the Soviet troops, and on February 2, the divisional headquarters following the head battalion was ambushed. The commander of the 323rd Infantry Division, General Andreas NEBAUER, and his chief of staff, Lieutenant Colonel Naude were killed.
Despite the fact that in the North Caucasus, the Soviet troops did not manage to inflict the same crushing defeat on the German Army Group "A" as on the Volga and Don, the battles there were no less fierce. On the so-called "Hubertus Line" on February 11, 1943, the commander of the 46th Infantry Division, Major General Ernst HACCIUS, was killed. It was credited to Soviet pilots, most likely attack aircraft (the division's chronicle says "attack from low level flight"). The general was posthumously awarded the following rank and given the Knight's Cross. Hatzius became the second commander of the 46th Infantry Division killed on the Eastern Front.
On February 18, 1943, the commander of the 12th Army Corps, Infantry General Walter GRAESSNER, was wounded in the central sector of the front. The general was sent to the rear, underwent treatment for a long time, but, in the end, died on July 16, 1943 in a hospital in the city of Troppau.
On February 26, 1943, not far from Novomoskovsk, the Fiziler-Storch disappeared, on board of which was the commander of the SS Panzer-Grenadier Division "Dead's Head" SS Obergruppenführer Theodor Eicke (Theodor EICKE). One of the reconnaissance groups sent to search for Eicke found the shot down plane and the body of the Obergruppenführer.
On April 2, in the Pillau area, the aircraft SH104 (head 0026) from the Flugbereitschaft Luftflotte1 crashed. The crash killed two crew members and two passengers on board. Among the latter was General Engineer Hans FISCHER of the 1st Air Fleet Headquarters.
On May 14, 1943, the commander of the 39th Infantry Division, Lieutenant General Ludwig LOEWENECK, was killed north of Pechenega. According to some reports, the general was the victim of an ordinary traffic accident, according to others, he fell into a minefield.
On May 30, 1943, Soviet aviation inflicted a strong beat on the German defense at the Kuban bridgehead. But according to our data, from 16.23 to 16.41 the enemy positions were stormed and bombed by 18 groups of Il-2 attack aircraft and five groups of "Petlyakovs". During the raid, one of the groups "hooked" on the command post of the 97th Jaeger Division. The division commander, Lieutenant General Ernst RUPP, was killed.
On June 26, 1943, the Germans suffered another loss at the Kuban bridgehead. In the morning of that day, the commander of the 50th Infantry Division, Lieutenant General Friedrich Schmidt (Friedrich SCHMIDT) headed for the positions of one of the battalions of the 121st Infantry Regiment. On the way, his car ran into a mine near the village of Kurchanskaya. The general and his driver were killed.
In the Battle of Kursk, which began on July 5, 1943, the German generals did not suffer large losses. Although there were cases of injury to division commanders, only one division commander was killed. On July 14, 1943, during a trip to the front line north of Belgorod, the commander of the 6th Panzer Division, Major General Walter von HUEHNERSDORF, was mortally wounded. He was badly wounded in the head by a well-aimed shot from a Soviet sniper. Despite the hours-long operation in Kharkov, where the general was taken, he died on July 17.
The offensive of the troops of the Soviet fronts in the Oryol direction, which began on July 12, 1943, was not replete with deep breakthroughs, in which the enemy headquarters fell under attack. Nevertheless, there were losses in generals. On July 16, the commander of the 211st Infantry Division, Lieutenant General Richard MUELLER, was killed.
On July 20, 1943, Lieutenant General Walter Schilling, commander of the 17th Panzer Division, was killed near Izyum. We were unable to establish the details of the deaths of both generals.
On August 2, the commander of the 46th Panzer Corps, General of the Infantry Hans ZORN, was killed. Southwest of Krom, his car was bombed by Soviet planes.
On August 7, in the midst of our counteroffensive near Kharkov, the commander of the 19th Panzer Division, Lieutenant General Gustav SCHMIDT, who was familiar to everyone who watched the film "Arc of Fire" from the famous Soviet epic "Liberation", was killed. True, in life everything was not as impressive as in the movies. General Schmidt did not shoot himself in front of the commander of Army Group South, Erich von Manstein, and his staff officers. He died in the defeat of a column of the 19th division by tankmen of the Soviet 1st Tank Army. The general was buried in the village of Berezovka by the crew members of the commander's tank, who survived and were taken prisoner by the Soviets.
On August 11, 1943, at about six o'clock in the morning Berlin time, Soviet snipers again distinguished themselves. A well-aimed bullet overtook the commander of the 4th mountain infantry division, Lieutenant General Hermann KRESS. The general at that moment was in the trenches of the Romanian units blocking Myskhako - the legendary "Small Land" near Novorossiysk.
On August 13, 1943, Major General Karl SCHUCHARDT, commander of the 10th Anti-Aircraft Artillery Brigade, was killed. Details of the death of the general - the anti-aircraft gunner could not be found, but he died unambiguously in the zone of the 2nd field army of the Wehrmacht. According to the documents of this association, on August 12, Shuhard reported to the army headquarters about the transfer of the brigade to operational subordination.
On August 15, 1943, Lieutenant General Heinrich RECKE, commander of the 161st Infantry Division, went missing. The general personally raised his soldiers to counterattack in the area south of Krasnaya Polyana. The division's chronicle provides information from eyewitnesses who allegedly saw how Soviet infantrymen surrounded the general. On this, his traces were lost. However, in the Soviet sources available to us, there is no mention of the capture of General Rekke.
On August 26, in the area of the Polish city of Ozarov, the commander of the 174th reserve division, Lieutenant General Kurt RENNER, was killed. Renner was ambushed by Polish partisans. Together with the general, two officers and five privates were killed.
The aforementioned 161st Division was taken over by Major General Karl-Albrecht von GRODDECK. But the division did not fight with the new commander for two weeks. On 28 August, von Groddeck was wounded by shrapnel from an aerial bomb. The wounded man was evacuated to Poltava, then to the Reich. Despite the efforts of the doctors, the general died on January 10, 1944 in Breslau.
On October 15, 1943, the 65th Army of the Central Front launched an offensive in the Loy direction. The powerful fire of the Soviet artillery violated the communication lines of the German troops defending in this sector. Lieutenant General Hans KAMECKE, the commander of the 137th Infantry Division, went to the command post of the 447th Infantry Regiment to personally orientate himself in the situation developing during the large-scale Russian offensive that had begun. On the way back south settlement The general's Kolpen car was attacked by Soviet attack aircraft. Kameke and the liaison officer who was accompanying him, Chief Lieutenant Mayer, were seriously injured. On the morning of the next day, the general died in a field hospital. Interestingly, Lieutenant General Kameke was the second and last full-time commander of the 137th Division in the Second World war... Recall that the first commander, Lieutenant General Friedrich Bergmann, was killed in December 1941 near Kaluga. And all the other officers in command of the divisions wore the prefix "acting" until December 9, 1943, the unit was finally disbanded.
October 29, 1943 german troops fought stubborn battles in the Krivoy Rog region. During one of the counterattacks, the commander of the 14th Panzer Division, Lieutenant General Friedrich SIEBERG, and his chief of staff, Oberst Lieutenant von der Planitz, were wounded by fragments of an exploding shell. If Planitz's wound was minor, then the general was out of luck. Although he was urgently taken by plane "fiziler-Storkh" to hospital No. 3/610, despite all the efforts of the doctors, Sieberg died on November 2.
On November 6, 1943, the commander of the 88th Infantry Division, Lieutenant General Heinrich ROTH, died of an injury received the day before. His division at that time was engaged in heavy battles with Soviet troops who were storming the capital of Soviet Ukraine - Kiev.
Major General Max Ilgen (Max ILGEN), commander of the 740th formation of the "eastern" troops, is listed as missing on November 15, 1943 in the Rivne region. As a result of a daring operation, the general was stolen from his own mansion in Rovno by the legendary Soviet intelligence officer Nikolai Ivanovich Kuznetsov, who operated under the name of Lieutenant Paul Siebert. Due to the impossibility of transporting the captured Ilgen to Soviet territory, after interrogation he was killed in one of the neighboring farms.
On November 19, 1943, the aviation of the Black Sea Fleet and the 4th Air Army delivered the most powerful blow since the beginning of the war against the enemy's naval base. This base was the port of Kamysh-Burun on the Crimean coast of the Kerch Strait. From 10.10 to 16.50, six "petlyakovs" and 95 attack aircraft, whose operations were supported by 105 fighters, worked at the base. Several high-speed landing barges were damaged as a result of the raid. But this was not the only loss of the enemy from our strike. It was on this day that the commander of the German Navy on the Black Sea ("Black Sea Admiral") Vice Admiral Gustav KIESERITZKY decided to visit Kamysh-Burun and reward the BDB crews successfully blocking the Soviet bridgehead in the Eltigen area. At the entrance to the base, the car, in which, in addition to the admiral, his adjutant and the driver, there were two more naval officers, was attacked by four "silts". Three, including Kiesericki, died on the spot, two were seriously injured. According to A.Ya. Kuznetsov, the author of the book "Big Landing", the enemy fleet in the Black Sea was beheaded by one of the four fours of the 7th Guards Assault Regiment of the 230th ShAD of the 4th Air Army. Note also that Kiesericki became the first admiral of the Kriegsmarine to die on the Eastern Front.
On November 27, 1943, the acting commander of the 9th Panzer Division, Colonel Johannes SCHULZ, was killed north of Krivoy Rog. He was posthumously awarded the rank of major general.
On December 9, 1943, the combat career of Lieutenant General Arnold SZELINSKI, commander of the 376th Infantry Division, ended. We have not established the details of his death.
The third war year brought both quantitative and qualitative changes to the structure of losses of the German generals on the Soviet-German front. In 1943, these losses amounted to 33 people killed and 22 people taken prisoner (all captured in Stalingrad).
Of the irrecoverable losses, 24 people died in the battle (including Colonel Schultz, the division commander, who was awarded the rank of general posthumously). It is noteworthy that if in 1941 and 1942 only one German general died from air strikes, then in 1943 - as many as six!
In the remaining nine cases, the reasons were: accidents - two people, suicides - three people, "friendly fire" - one person, two were missing, and one more was killed after being captured in the German rear by partisans.
It should be noted that among the losses due to non-combat reasons, there are no deaths due to diseases, and the reason for all three suicides was the unwillingness to be in Soviet captivity.
German generals who died on the Soviet-German front in 1943
|
Name, title |
Position |
Cause of death |
||
|
Lieutenant General Martin Wandel |
Commander of the 24th Panzer Corps |
Possibly killed in close combat |
||
|
Lieutenant General Arno Yaar |
And about. Commander of the 24th Panzer Corps, Commander of the 387th Infantry Division |
Suicide possible |
||
|
Lieutenant General Karl Able |
And about. Commander of the 24th Panzer Corps, Commander of the 385th Infantry Division |
Close combat with allied Italian units |
||
|
Lieutenant General Alexander von Hutmann |
Commander of the 71st Infantry Division |
Close combat |
||
|
Lieutenant General Richard Shtempel |
Commander of the 371st Infantry Division |
Suicide |
||
|
Lieutenant General Alfred Bench |
Commander of the 82nd Infantry Division |
Not installed. Died of wounds |
||
|
Lieutenant General Adolf Lechner |
Commander of the 377th Infantry Division |
Missing |
||
|
Lieutenant General Gunther Angern |
Commander of the 16th TD |
Suicide |
||
|
General Andreas Nebauer |
Commander of the 323rd Infantry Division |
Close combat |
||
|
Major General Ernst Hazzius |
Commander of the 46th Infantry Division |
Air raid |
||
|
General of the infantry Walter Greissner |
Commander of the 12th Army Corps |
Not installed. Died of wounds |
||
|
SS Obergruppenfuehrer Theodor Eicke |
Commander of the SS Panzer-Grenadier Division "Death's Head" |
Killed in a downed plane |
||
|
General Engineer Hans Fischer |
1st Air Fleet headquarters |
Plane crash |
||
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Lieutenant General Ludwig Loeweneck |
Commander of the 39th Infantry Division |
Killed in a car accident |
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Lieutenant General Ernst Rupp |
Commander of the 97th Jaeger Division |
Air raid |
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Lieutenant General Friedrich Schmidt |
Commander of the 50th Infantry Division |
Undermining on a mine |
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Major General Walter von Hünersdorf |
Commander of the 6th TD |
Wounded by a sniper. Died from his injury |
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Lieutenant General Richard Müller |
Commander of the 211st Infantry Division |
Not installed |
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Lieutenant General Walter Schilling |
Commander of the 17th TD |
Not installed |
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General of the infantry Hans Zorn |
Commander of the 46th Panzer Corps |
Air raid |
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Lieutenant General Gustav Schmidt |
commander of the 19th TD |
Close combat |
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Lieutenant General Hermann Kress |
Commander of the 4th GPD |
Killed by a sniper |
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Major General Karl Schuhard |
Commander of the 10th Anti-Aircraft Artillery Brigade |
Not installed |
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Lieutenant General Heinrich Recke |
Commander of the 161st Infantry Division |
Missing |
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Lieutenant General Kurt Renner |
Commander of the 174th Reserve Division |
Close combat with guerrillas |
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Major General Karl-Albrecht von Groddeck |
Commander of the 161st Infantry Division |
Wounded during an air raid. Died of wounds |
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Lieutenant General Hans Kameke |
Commander of the 137th Infantry Division |
Air raid |
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Lieutenant General Friedrich Sieberg |
Commander of the 14th TD |
Wounded during an artillery attack. He died of his wounds. |
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Lieutenant General Heinrich Rott |
Commander of the 88th Infantry Division |
Not installed |
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Major General Max Ilgen |
Commander of the 740th formation of the "eastern" troops |
Killed after being captured by partisans |
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Vice Admiral Gustav Kiesericki |
Commander of the German Navy on the Black Sea |
Air raid |
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Colonel (posthumously Major General) Johannes Schultz |
and about. commander of the 9th TD |
Not installed |
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Lieutenant General Arnold Zhelinski |
Commander of the 376th Infantry Division |
Not installed |
- Geschichte der 121. ostpreussischen Infanterie-Division 1940-1945 / Tradizionverband der Division - Muenster / Frankfurt / Berlin, 1970 - S. 24-25
We were unable to make an adequate reverse translation of the name of the mentioned settlement from German into Russian.
Husemann F. Die guten Glaubens waren - Osnabrueck - S. 53-54
U.S. National Archives T-314 roll 1368 frame 1062
U.S. National Archives T-314 roll 1368 frame 1096
Vokhmyanin V.K., Podoprigora A.I. Kharkov, 1941. Part 2: City on fire. - Kharkov, 2009 - p. 115
TsAMO F. 229 Op. 161 storage units 160 "Headquarters of the Air Force of the South-Western Front. Operational report by 04.00 on November 21, 1941 ".
Hartmann Ch. Wehrmacht im Ostkrieg - Oldenburg, 2010 - S. 371
Ibid.
Meyer - Detring W. Die 137. Infanterie - Division im Mittelabschnitt der Ostfront - Eggolsheim, o.J. - S.105-106
U.S. National Archives T-312 roll 1654 frame 00579
For some reason, the wrong corps number is indicated - the 37th ak.
US National Archives Т-311 roll 106 “Recorded losses of officers Gr. And "North" from October 1, 1941 to March 15, 1942 "
That is how, in the army, and not the rank of the SS troops, the rank of Schulze is indicated in the document.
US National Archives T-311 roll 108 "Losses of the 18th Army and 4th Panzer Group from June 22 to October 31, 1941"
Chronicle of the Great Patriotic War Soviet Union at the Black Sea Theater - Vol. 2 - M., 1946 - S. 125
Scherzer V. 46. Infanterie-Division - Jena 2009 - S.367
It should be noted that the Germans could call any Soviet aircraft "rata", not just the I-16
Saenger H. Die 79. Infanterie– Division, 1939 - 1945 - o.O, o.J. - S. 58
Einsatzgruppen der Sicherheitspolizei und des SD is a special task force of the SD security service. On the territory of the USSR, the tasks of operational and special groups included: identifying and eliminating party and Komsomol activists, conducting search activities and arrests, destroying Soviet party workers, NKVD employees, army political workers and officers, combating manifestations of anti-German activity, seizing institutions that have file cabinets and archives, etc.
Colonel Hippler was promoted to the rank of major general on April 8, 1942
Pape K. 329. Infanterie-Division - Jena 2007 - S.28
Colonel Fischer was promoted to the rank of major general on April 8, 1942
Hinze R .: Bug - Moskwa - Beresina - Preußisch Oldendorf, 1992 - S.306
Spektakular - sensational, attention grabbing
Ju-52 (serial number 5752, board number NJ + CU) from KGrzbV300, pilot non-commissioned officer Gerhard Otto.
Zablotskiy A.N., Larintsev R.I. "Air bridges" of the Third Reich - M., 2013 - P.71
In German documents, on this day, Fi156 from the 62nd communications detachment (serial number 5196), pilot Oberfeldwebel Erhard Zemke - VA-MA RL 2 III / 1182 S. 197. It is true that in some sources the name another pilot is brought - Linke.
Boucsein H. Halten oder Sterben. Die hessische 129. ID in Russland und Ostpreussen 1941-1945 - Potsdam, 1999 - S.259
U.S. National Archives T-315 roll791 frame00720
Graser G. Zwischen Kattegat und Kaukasus. Weg und Kaempfe der 198. Infanterie-Divivsion - Tubingen, 1961 - S. 184-185
Pohlman H. Die Geschichte der 96. Infanterie-Division 1939-1945 - Bad Nacheim, 1959 - S.171
Durchgangslager (Dulag) 151
Schafer R.-A. Die Mondschein - Division - Morsbach, 2005 - S. 133
U.S. National Archives T-314 Roll357 Frame0269
Die 71. Infanterie-Division 1939 - 1945 - Eggolsheim, o.J. - S.296
U.S. National Archives NARA T-314 roll 518 fram 0448
Scherzer V. 46. Infanterie - Division - Jena, 2009 - S.453
Zablotskiy A., Larintsev R. Losses of the German generals on the Soviet-German front in 1942. "Arsenal-Collection". 2014, No. 5 - P.2
Military Archives of the Federal Republic of Germany BA-MA RL 2 III / 1188 S. 421-422
The time is indicated in Moscow
U.S. National Archives NARA T-312 roll 723
U.S. National Archives NARA T-314 roll 1219 fram 0532
V. N. Zamulin Forgotten battle on Kursk Bulge- M., 2009 - S. 584-585
Ibid - p. 585-586
Braun J. Enzian und Edelweiss - Bad Nauheim, 1955 - S.44
Kippar G. Die Kampfgescheen der 161. (ostpr.) Infanterie - Division von der Aufstellund 1939 bis zum Ende - o.O., 1994 - S. 521, 523
Kippar G. Op.cit., S. 578
Zablotsky A., Larintsev R. "Devil's dozen" Losses of the Wehrmacht generals on the Soviet-German front in 1941. "Arsenal-Collection". 2014, No. 3 - P.18
Meyer - Detring W. Die 137. Infanterie - Division im Mittelabschnitt dr Ostfront - Eggolsheim, o.J. - S. 186-187
Grams R. Die 14. Panzer-Division 1940 - 1945 –Bad Nauheim, 1957 –S. 131
The time is indicated in Moscow
Kuznetsov A.Ya. Large landing - M., 2011 - S. 257-258
It is believed that of the 83 generals of the Red Army who were captured by the Nazis, the fate of only one remains unknown - divisional commissar Serafim Nikolaev. In fact, it turns out that there is no reliable information about at least 10 more captive senior commanders. German historians write one thing about them, ours - another, and the data differ dramatically. Why are there data, they still haven't counted exactly how many of them were captured generals - either 83 people, or 72?
Official data says that 26 Soviet generals were killed in German captivity - someone died of illness, someone was swiftly killed by the guards, someone was shot. The seven who had betrayed their oath were hanged in the so-called Vlasov case. Another 17 people were shot on the basis of the order of the Headquarters number 270 "On cases of cowardice and surrender and measures to suppress such actions." With them, at least, everything is more or less clear. And with the rest? What happened to the others?
Who collaborated with the Germans - General Mishutin or his double?
Perhaps the most controversial among historians is the fate of Major General Pavel Semyonovich Mishutin - the hero of the battles for Khalkhin Gol. The Great Patriotic War found him in Belarus - Mishutin commanded a rifle division. Once the general disappeared without a trace - along with several officers. It was believed that they were killed, but in 1954 the Americans provided information that Mishutin holds a high position in one of the intelligence services of the West and allegedly works in Frankfurt.
German historians have a version that Mishutin collaborated with Vlasov, and after the war he was recruited by the commander of the American 7th Army, General Patch. But Soviet historians put forward a different version of the fate of General Mishutin: he really was captured and died. A.
The idea with a double came to the head of General Ernst-August Köstring, who was responsible for the formation of the "native" military units. He was struck by the outward resemblance between the Soviet general and his subordinate, Colonel Paul Malgren. At first, Koestring tried to persuade Mishutin to go over to the side of the Germans, but, having made sure that our general did not intend to trade in his homeland, he tried to resort to blackmail. Having ordered to make up Malgren, he showed him to Mishutin in the uniform of a Soviet general without insignia and shoulder straps (this episode is given in the Soviet collection of memoirs "The Chekists Tell", published in 1976). By the way, Malgren spoke Russian well, so it was quite easy to make a forgery.
There is no clarity about the fate of the commander of the Ural Military District, Lieutenant General Philip Ershakov. At the beginning of the war, the district was transformed into the 22nd Army and sent it to the very hell, to the Western Front.
In August 1941, Ershakov's army was actually defeated near Smolensk, but the general survived. And, strange to say, he was not sent to court, but entrusted with the command of the 20th Army. A month later, the Germans smashed this army to smithereens near Vyazma - and again Ershakov survived. But the further fate of the general raises many questions. Soviet historians defend the version that Ershakov died in the Hammelburg concentration camp less than a year after his capture, referring to the camp book of memory. But there is no confirmation that it was General Ershakov who was being held in Hammelburg.
Two generals: such similar fates and such different endings
If there is no clarity at all about the fate of Mishutin and Ershakov, then the biographies of the army commanders Ponedelin and Potapov are more or less known. And nevertheless, there are still a lot of secrets and unsolved mysteries in these biographies. During the war, five of our army commanders were captured - among them were Ponedelin and Potapov. Pavel Ponedelin, by order of the Headquarters number 270 of August 16, 1941, was declared a malicious deserter and sentenced to death in absentia.
It is known that until the end of April 1945, the general was held in a German concentration camp. And then the oddities begin. The camp in which the general was kept was liberated by American troops. Ponedelin was offered to serve in the US Army, but he refused, and on May 3 he was handed over to the Soviet side. It would seem that the sentence has not been canceled, Ponedelin should be shot. Instead, the general is released and goes to Moscow. For six months the general cheerfully "washes" the victory and his unexpected release in the capital's restaurants. Nobody even thinks of detaining him and carrying out the current sentence.
Ponedelin is arrested on New Year's Eve, December 30, 1945. He spends four and a half years at Lefortovo, to put it mildly, in sparing conditions (there is evidence that food was carried to the general from the restaurant). And on August 25, 1950, the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR sentenced the general to capital punishment, and he was shot on the same day. Strange, isn't it?
The fate of Major General of Tank Forces Mikhail Potapov looks no less strange. The commander of the 5th Army of the Southwestern Front was captured in the fall of 1941 under circumstances similar to the capture of Ponedelin. Just like Ponedelin, Potapov stayed in German camps until April 1945. And then - a completely different fate. If Ponedelin was released on all four sides, then Potapov was taken under arrest to Moscow, to Stalin.
And - lo and behold! - Stalin gives the order to restore the general in service. Moreover, Potapov was awarded the next rank, and in 1947 he graduated from higher courses at the Military Academy of the General Staff. Potapov rose to the rank of colonel-general - even his personal meeting with Hitler and rumors that the red commander, while in captivity, allegedly "consulted" the German command, did not prevent his career growth.
The traitor to the Motherland turned out to be a scout performing a combat mission
The fates of some captive generals are so exciting that they could be scripted for action adventure movies. The commander of the 36th Rifle Corps, Major General Pavel Sysoev, was captured near Zhitomir in the summer of 1941 while trying to break out of the encirclement. The general escaped from captivity, acquired the uniform and documents of a private, but he was again caught, however, without recognizing him as a military leader. Having pushed around the concentration camps, in August 1943, the general escaped again, gathered a partisan detachment and beat the Nazis. Less than a year later, the partisan-hero was summoned to Moscow, where he was arrested, and Sysoev spent six months behind bars. After the war, the general recovered in the service and, after graduating from higher academic courses at the AGSH, retired and took up teaching.
The chief of staff of the 6th Rifle Corps of the Kiev Special Military District, Boris Richter, was a career officer in the tsarist army, a nobleman who voluntarily sided with the Red Army. Richter not only successfully survived all kinds of personnel purges, but also received the rank of major general in 1940. And then - war and captivity.
In Soviet times, the official version of the future life of General Richter read: in 1942, under the name of Rudaev, he headed the Abwehr reconnaissance and sabotage school in Warsaw, and on this basis, the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR sentenced him to death in absentia.
In August 1945 he was allegedly detained and shot, but ... it turned out that Richter was by no means shot, but disappeared without a trace in the last days of the war. Archival data declassified several years ago indicate that Major General Boris Richter was carrying out a Soviet intelligence mission in the German rear, and after the war he continued to fulfill his duty to the Motherland, being in the inner circle of German General Gehlen, the founding father of the West German special services.
During the years of the Great Patriotic War, 78 Soviet generals were captured in German captivity. 26 of them died in captivity, six escaped from captivity, the rest after the end of the war were repatriated to the Soviet Union. 32 people were repressed.
Not all of them were traitors. On the basis of the order of the Headquarters of August 16, 1941 "On cases of cowardice and surrender and measures to suppress such actions", 13 people were shot, eight more were sentenced to imprisonment for "improper behavior in captivity."
But among the senior officers there were also those who, to one degree or another, voluntarily chose to cooperate with the Germans. Five major generals and 25 colonels were hanged in the Vlasov case. In the Vlasov army there were even Heroes of the Soviet Union - Senior Lieutenant Bronislav Antilevsky and Captain Semyon Bychkov.
General Vlasov case
They still argue about who General Andrei Vlasov was, an ideological traitor or an ideological fighter against the Bolsheviks. He served in the Red Army since Civil war, studied at the Higher Army Command Courses, moved up the career ladder. In the late 30s he served as a military adviser in China. Vlasov survived the era of great terror without shocks - he was not subjected to repression, even, according to some information, was a member of the military tribunal of the district.
Before the war, he received the Order of the Red Banner and the Order of Lenin. He was honored with these high awards for the creation of an exemplary division. Vlasov received under his command a rifle division, which did not differ in special discipline and merit. Focusing on German achievements, Vlasov demanded strict observance of the charter. His caring attitude towards subordinates even became the subject of articles in the press. The division received the Challenge Red Banner.
In January 1941, he received command of the mechanized corps, one of the best equipped at the time. The corps included new KV and T-34 tanks. They were created for offensive operations, but in defense after the start of the war, they turned out to be not very effective. Soon Vlasov was appointed commander of the 37th Army, which was defending Kiev. The connections were broken, and Vlasov himself was hospitalized.
He managed to distinguish himself in the battle for Moscow and became one of the most famous commanders. It was his popularity that later played against him - in the summer of 1942, Vlasov, being the commander of the 2nd Army on the Volkhov Front, was surrounded. When he went to the village, he was handed over to the German police by the headman, and the arriving patrol identified him from a photo in the newspaper.
In the Vinnitsa military camp, Vlasov accepted the Germans' offer of cooperation. Initially, he was an agitator and propagandist. He soon became the head of the Russian Liberation Army. He acted with agitation, recruited captured soldiers. Groups of propagandists and a training center in Dobendorf were created, there were also separate Russian battalions that were part of different parts of the German armed forces. The history of the Vlasov army as a structure began only in October 1944 with the creation of the Central Headquarters. The army was named "The Armed Forces of the Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia." The committee itself was also headed by Vlasov.
Fedor Trukhin - the creator of the army
According to some historians, for example, Kirill Aleksandrov, Vlasov was more of a propagandist and ideologist, while Major General Fyodor Trukhin was the organizer and real creator of the Vlasov army. He was the former head of the Operations Directorate of the North-Western Front, a professional general staff officer. Surrendered together with all the documents of the headquarters. In 1943 Trukhin was the head of the training center in Dobendorf, from October 1944 he was appointed chief of staff of the Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia. Under his leadership, two divisions were formed, the formation of the third began. In the last months of the war, Trukhin commanded the Southern group of the Committee's armed forces located in Austria.
Trukhin and Vlasov hoped that the Germans would transfer all Russian units under their command, but this did not happen. With almost half a million Russians who passed through the Vlasov organizations in April 1945, his de jure army amounted to about 124 thousand people.
Vasily Malyshkin - propagandist
Major General Malyshkin was also one of Vlasov's associates. Once captured from the Vyazemsky cauldron, he began to cooperate with the Germans. In 1942 he taught at Wulguide on propaganda courses, soon became assistant chief for the educational department. In 1943 he met Vlasov while working in the propaganda department of the Wehrmacht High Command.
He also worked for Vlasov as a propagandist, was a member of the committee's presidium. In 1945 he was authorized to negotiate with the Americans. After the war, he tried to establish cooperation with American intelligence, even wrote a note on the training of the command staff of the Red Army. But in 1946 it was still transferred to the Soviet side.
Major General Alexander Budykho: service in the ROA and escape
In many ways, Budykho's biography resembled Vlasov's: several decades of service in the Red Army, command courses, division command, encirclement, detention by a German patrol. In the camp, he accepted the offer of the brigade commander Bessonov and joined the Political Center for the Fight against Bolshevism. Budykho began to identify pro-Soviet prisoners and hand them over to the Germans.
In 1943, Bessonov was arrested, the organization was disbanded, and Budykho expressed a desire to join the ROA and came under the command of General Helmich. In September, he was appointed headquarters officer for the training and education of the eastern troops. But immediately after he arrived at his duty station in the Leningrad region, two Russian battalions fled to the partisans, killing the Germans. Upon learning of this, Budykho himself fled.
General Richter - sentenced in absentia
This traitor-general in the Vlasov case did not pass, but he helped the Germans no less. Once captured in the early days of the war, he ended up in a prisoner of war camp in Poland. Nineteen German intelligence agents caught in the USSR testified against him. According to them, since 1942, Richter headed the Abwehr reconnaissance and sabotage school in Warsaw, and later in Weigelsdorf. During his service with the Germans, he bore the pseudonyms Rudaev and Musin.
The Soviet side was sentenced to capital punishment back in 1943, but many researchers believe that the sentence was never carried out, since Richter disappeared in the last days of the war.
The Vlasov generals were executed by the verdict of the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court. Most - in 1946, Budykho - in 1950.
When they talk about the Soviet commanders of the Great Patriotic War, they recall Zhukov, Rokossovsky, Konev more often than others. In honoring them, we almost forgot the Soviet generals who made a huge contribution to the victory over Nazi Germany.
1.Commander Remezov is an ordinary Great Russian.
In 1941, the Red Army left town after town. The rare counter-offensives of our troops did not change the oppressive feeling of impending catastrophe. However, on the 161st day of the war - November 29, 1941, the elite German troops of the Leibstandarte-SS Adolf Hitler tank brigade were driven out of the largest southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don. Stalin telegraphed congratulations to the senior officers taking part in this battle, including the commander of the 56th division, Fyodor Remezov. It is known about this man that he was an ordinary Soviet general and called himself not a Russian, but a Great Russian. He was also appointed commander of the 56th by the personal order of Stalin, who appreciated the ability of Fyodor Nikitich, without losing his composure, to conduct a stubborn defense against the advancing Germans significantly superior in strength. For example, at first glance, his decision, strange at first glance, by the forces of the 188th cavalry regiment to attack the armored vehicles of the Germans in the area of the Koshkin station (near Taganrog) with the forces of the 188th cavalry regiment, which made it possible to withdraw the cadets of the Rostov Infantry School and parts of the 31st division from under the crushing blow. While the Germans were chasing light cavalry, running into fiery ambushes, the 56th Army received the necessary respite and was rescued from the Leibstandarte-SS Adolf Hitler tanks that broke through the defenses. Subsequently, the bloodless Remezov's fighters, together with the soldiers of the 9th Army, liberated Rostov, despite Hitler's categorical order not to surrender the city. This was the first major victory of the Red Army over the Nazis.
2. Vasily Arkhipov - tamer of "royal tigers"<к сожалению не нашел фото>.
By the beginning of the war with the Germans, Vasily Arkhipov had successful combat experience with the Finns, as well as the Order of the Red Banner for the breakthrough of the Mannerheim Line and the title of Hero of the Soviet Union for the personal destruction of four enemy tanks. In general, in the opinion of many military men who knew Vasily Sergeevich well, at first glance he accurately assessed the capabilities of German armored vehicles, even if they belonged to the novelties of the fascist military-industrial complex. So, in the battle for the Sandomierz bridgehead in the summer of 1944, his 53rd tank brigade first met the "royal tigers". The brigade commander decided to attack the steel monster on his command tank in order to inspire his subordinates by personal example. Using the high maneuverability of his car, he several times went to the side of the "clumsy and slow beast" and opened fire. Only after the third hit did the "German" flare up. Soon, his tankers captured three more "royal tigers". Twice Hero of the Soviet Union Vasily Arkhipov, about whom his colleagues said "does not sink in water, does not burn in fire", became a general on April 20, 1945.
3. Rodimtsev: “But it’s pasaran.”
Alexander Rodimtsev in Spain was known as Camarados Pavlito, who fought in 1936-1937 with Franco's Phalangists. For the defense of the university city near Madrid, he received the first gold star of the hero of the Soviet Union. During the war with the Nazis, he was known as the general who turned the tide of the Battle of Stalingrad. According to Zhukov, Rodimtsev's guards literally at the last moment dealt a blow to the Germans who came to the banks of the Volga. Later, recalling these days, Rodimtsev wrote: “On the day when our division approached the left bank of the Volga, the Nazis took Mamayev Kurgan. They took it because ten fascists attacked each of our fighters, ten enemy tanks attacked each of our tanks, for each Yak or Il that took off there were ten Messerschmitts or Junkers ... the Germans knew how to fight, especially when such numerical and technical superiority. " Rodimtsev did not have such forces, but his well-trained fighters of the 13th Guards Rifle Division, also known as the Airborne Forces, fighting in the minority, turned Nazi Goth tanks into scrap metal and killed a significant number of German soldiers of Paulus' 6th Army in hand-to-hand urban combat ... As in Spain, in Stalingrad Rodimtsev repeatedly said: "but passaran, the fascists will not get through."
4.Alexander Gorbatov - Beria's enemy<к сожалению не смог загрузить фото>.
Former non-commissioned officer of the tsarist army, Alexander Gorbatov, who was awarded the rank of major general in December 1941, was from the category of those who were not afraid to conflict with their superiors. For example, in December 1941, he told his immediate commander Kirill Moskalenko that it was stupid to throw our regiments into a frontal attack on the Germans if there was no objective need for this. He responded harshly to the abuse, saying that he would not allow himself to be insulted. And this is after three years of imprisonment in Kolyma, where he was convoyed as an "enemy of the people" according to the notorious 58th article. When Stalin was informed about this incident, he grinned and said: "Only the grave will fix the hunchback." Gorbatov also entered into a dispute with Georgy Zhukov over the offensive on Oryol in the summer of 1943, demanding not to attack from the existing bridgehead, but to force the Zushi River in another place. At first, Zhukov was categorically against it, but on reflection, he realized that Gorbatov was right. It is known that Lavrenty Beria had a negative attitude towards the general and even considered the stubborn one his personal enemy. Many people didn’t like Gorbatov’s independent judgments. For example, having carried out a number of brilliant operations, including the East Prussian one, Alexander Gorbatov suddenly spoke out against the storming of Berlin, proposing to start a siege. He motivated his decision by the fact that the Fritzes would surrender anyway, but this would save the lives of many of our soldiers who went through the entire war.
5.Mikhail Naumov: a lieutenant who became a general.
Once in the occupied territory in the summer of 1941, the wounded senior lieutenant Mikhail Naumov began his war against the invaders. At first he was a private in the partisan detachment of the Chervony district of the Sumy region (in January 1942), but after fifteen months he was awarded the rank of major general. Thus, he became one of the youngest senior officers, moreover, having an incredible and one-of-a-kind military career. However, such a high rank corresponded to the number of partisan units led by Naumov. This happened after the famous 65-day raid with a length of almost 2,400 kilometers across Ukraine to the Belarusian Polesye, as a result of which the German rear was pretty bled.
