Hans Von Luck - Panzer Commander
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Since 12 January, when Marshal Zhukov had massed on the Vistula, his army group had gained 350 kilometers of terrain. Transport space for the overland route seemed to be inadequate. Rolling stock on the rail-ways had first to be converted from the Russian broad gauge to the narrow European gauge. In addition, Zhukov had an exposed right wing. There was a large gap to the Second White Russian Front under the command- of Marshal Rokossovsky. After 9 February we lay west of the Oder, organized for defense. Access to Kuestrin was kept open.
To gain some protection from enemy artillery and air attacks, I had set up my command post in the cellar of a farmhouse. We couldn't believe our eyes when we saw hundreds of bottles of' French perfume, cognac, and champagne piled up in the cellar, besides dozens of silk stockings, bales of material, and elegant shoes. This was the outcome of the barter deals common throughout Germany, by which the towns supplied themselves with butter, meat, and milk, to augment their meager food rations.
Outside, our artillery could be heard now and then, and sporadic gunfire; not, we hoped, the quiet before the storm. It was already growing dark when the door opened and Dagmar appeared.
I was flabbergasted.
“What! Are you mad? How on earth did ou get here? How did you find me?” My adjutant and some orderly officers stood about incredulously.
"You know about my contacts at GHQ in Berlin. They told me there where your command post was.
“I first took a train, early this morning, right across Berlin,” she went on. “Then I got on my bike and cycled east on Highway 1, until I was picked up by a truck. My bicycle is outside.”
"Listen, you simply can't turn up here on the battlefield; there's shooting going on everywhere still, and you might have run into a Russian counterattack.
Hans Von Luck - Panzer Commander
“I'm very worried. Happy though I always am to see you, Daginar, this venture of yours is highly risky.” Without a word she handed me a letter. It was a document from the Sachsenhausen concentration camp, which ran as follows: This is to inform you that your father, Herr S has died of cardiac insufficiency. The um may be collected by previous arrangement with the camp administration.
With German greetings, Heil Hitler!
Signed... I was profoundly shocked and didn't know what to say.
“I had an idea this would happen,” Dagmar forestalled me. “I knew from a reliable source that the whole camp was to be moved, before the Russians took Berlin, perhaps, and discovered the camp. So all the weak and the sick were liquidated. A crazy ”Final Solution,“ don't you think.”
“Dagmar, listen. You must get away from here again as quickly as possible. The balloon may burst at any time. I am so sorry about it all. And I had been so hopeful after my talk with Kaltenbrunner. It's outrageous that we should be fighting here for survival and for our families, while at the same time good patriots are being killed in cold blood.” I asked an orderly officer to find out whether there was a truck of any kind going in the Berlin direction, to get supplies. We were in luck. Within half an hour Dagmar and her bicycle would at any rate be out of the danger zone.
Suddenly the door of our cellar room opened and a colonel appeared in peacetime uniform with a Distinguished Service Cross on his chest. Was this a madhouse? First Dagmar and now this apparition. We all stared at the colonel with his highly polished riding boots.
The Eastern Front: The Last Battle 247 “What brings you here?” was my first -astonished question.
“Have you lost your way?”
“Herr Reichsminister von Ribbentrop and Reichsjugendfuehrer Axmann would like to speak to you.”
“Am I supposed to go to Berlin, or what's going on here?” I asked in return.
“No, the two gentlemen are waiting for you outside in the car.”
“Then perhaps they would be kind enough to step in. I'm not leaving my command post.” The two then appeared.
“Heil Hitler, Colonel. The Fuehrer has sent us here to learn something of the situation at Kuestrin. Is there any danger that the Russians will march on Berlin?”
“Heff von Ribbentrop”-l avoided addressing him as Minister, as I didn't like him; he was always known to us at the front as “champagne salesman”-“to find that out it would be best for the two of us to go to my grenadiers and tanks, which are in positions on the west bank of the Oder. That's where one can form the best impression of the situation.” Von Ribbentrop at once declined. “That will not be necessary, if you tell me how you assess the situation.” At that his eye fell on Dagmar, who had been following our dialogue with amusement.
“My apologies, I didn't know that army auxiliaries were in service so far forward. Is it not too dangerous for you, madam?” Without answering his question, Dagmar handed the Minister the letter from Sachsenhausen.
“Please read this letter, Herr von Ribbentrop. It's because of it that I have come here from Berlin to my fianc6, Colonel von Luck.” Ribbentrop paled on reading the letter and seemed rather irritated.
“Well, yes I am naturally sorry about that, my. apologies,” and he turned to me. “I have the impression that the situation here before Kuestrin has been cleared up through the efrorts of two experienced panzer divisions, and I shall pass thi; welcome news to the Fuehrer. Heil Hitlerl” The two entlemen abruptly left my cellar.
We all shook our heads and started to laugh out loud.
“My God, what have we come to, that a foreign minister should appear at the front so that he can reassure himself and Hitler!”
The 21st Panzer Division as ','Fire Brigade“: The Beginning of the End It gradually grew dark. On both sides the artillery and machine-gun fire intensified, the usual ”good-night greetings." I was glad to put Dagmar and her bicycle onto a truck going to Berlin. We waved to each other one last time, and never suspected for how long.
Shortly after came an “urgent” order to pull out at once and transfer our position to our friends of the 25th Panzer Grenadier Division. Our division was to be moved that same night, via the highway and rail to the south, to the area of Sagan. While Marshal Zhukov was at a standstill on the Oder at Kuestrin and Frankfurt, Marshal Koniev, with the
“Ukrainian Front,” Army Group South, had launched an attack in the Silesian area, across the Oder to the west, and had overrun the weak defensive forces. our command was trying to guess the direction of this thrust: to the west, toward Dresden-Leipzig on the Elbe?
Or to the south, into the important industrial area of Moravia round Ostrava in Czechoslovakia? I very soon realized that the Russian command had learned a great deal about its job since I had left Russia at the beginning of 1942: the preparation of their offensives and their strategic planning were well thought out, and supplies well organized.
While we were on the move from the early morning of 10 February, Lieutenant-General Wemer Marcks arrived as our new divisional commander. I knew him slightly from North Africa, where he had received the Knight's Cross for bravery, dropped out because of a serious tropical disease until the beginning of 1944, and had then, as commander of the Ist Panzer Division in Russia, been decorated with the “oak leaves.” Thereafter he had again fallen seriously ill. I was not altogether happy at the thought of now having to work with Marcks. He was regarded as ambitious, a hard man, and ruthless in carrying out orders.
In that he resembled the commander in chief of Army Group Center, Field Marshal Schoemer, in whose area we now entered.
Schoerner, like Rommel, had been decorated in the First World War with the
“Pour le merite,” on the Italian front. It was said that he envied Rommel his fame and popularity. He seemed to want to The Beginning of the End 249 give himself a high profile through exceptional severity and success. Schoemer was notorious for the operations of the so-called “flying drumhead courts-martial.” On Hitier's orders any incipient defeatism, desertion, failure to carry out orders or malingering were to be nipped in the bud by the imposition of death sentences as a deterrent, against which there was no app
eal. On the contrary, specially selected judge advocates, who were accompanied by a firing squad, could pronounce death sentences and have them carried out immediately, without infonning, let alone hearing, the man's commanding officer.
A few weeks later I too was to be confronted with one of these “flying drumhead courts-martial.” I had sent one of my best sergeants, the highly decorated leader of an antitank platoon, to our workshop in the rear, with a couple of drivers, to bring forward some armored tractors that were being repaired. I had told him to put the screws on as we needed the vehicles urgently. He passed word to me through a messenger that he would be arriving with the vehicles the following morning. What happened then was told me the next day by one of the drivers. In tears, hardly able to control his voice, he said, “We were sitting together in the evening, after we had made sure that the last vehicles would be finished during the night, in a little inn, eating our day's ration and talking about the future, our homes and all the other things that soldiers talk about. Suddenly the door was pushed, open and in rushed a staff officer with some military policemen. ”I am Chief Judge Advocate under the direct orders of Field Marshal Schoemer. Why are you sitting about here while up at the front brave soldiers are risking their lives?"
“My platoon leader replied:”I was ordered by my regimental commander, Colonel von Luck, to bring some armored vehicles that are being repaired here up to the front as quickly as possible.
Work will be going on through the night. We'll be able to go back to the front tomorrow morning.“' ”The judge advocate:“Where is your movement order?”
“Answer:”I had it from the commander by word of mouth."
“Advocate:”We know about that, that's what they all say when they want to dodge things. In the name of the Fuehrer and by the authority of the commander in chief Army Group Center, Field Marshal Schoemer, I sentence you to death by shooting on account of proven desertion."
“But you can't do that,” shouted our platoon leader, “I've been at the front right through the war. Here, look at my medals.”
“Advocate:”But now, when it matters and everyone is needed up at the front, you soon decided you'd like to dodge things after all, didn't you? The sentence is to be carried out."
“Then the military police took our platoon leader and shot him in the garden behind the inn.” The man could hardly go on.
“We then had to bury him under the supervision of the MPS.” Deserters were not allowed to have a cross on their graves.
“After that the advocate disappeared as fast as he had come.” Although we were in the middle of an action, I got in touch with divisional HQ, seething with rage, and reported the unbelievable occurrence. I demanded the name of the judge advocate, so that I could prefer a charge against him.
“That will hardly be possible,” one of the officers replied.
“Our divisional commander, General Marcks, is in full and complete agreement with Schoerner's measures.” I was appalled. So we had come to this.
“For God's sake, one of my best platoon leaders has been shot without further ado and nothing is supposed to happen? I shall make a written report and insist that the judge advocate be found.” Military events and the bitter end made it impossible for any amends to be made for a flagrant injustice. My men of the workshop company were at least able to tend the grave properly and put up a cross with name and unit. I informed the parents that their son had unfortunately met a soldier's death “in the performance of his duty.” Certainly, there were signs of dissolution, especially where the Russians had overrun our defensive positions and stragglers then tried to escape captivity or get back to their units. The psychological pressure was immense, especially on the old men who had been called up to the Volkssturm, and on the boys of 14 and 15, who were supposed to stop the enemy in close combat with antitank grenades. None had any expefience; all had only one desire, to save their lives.
Wherever we, and other divisions that were still intact, came upon stragglers, we incorporated them into our own units and gave them fresh support. We too condemned all forms of desertion, which undermined the morale of our men. But anyone who saw the civilian population fleeing in panic, who heard of the maltreatment The Beginning of the End 251 and raping of women, or who listened to the stragglers, whose divisions had lain for hours under a bwtage and then been overrun by the Russians, had to judge differently, more humanely. At any rate, this war was no longer to be won with flying drumhead courtsmartial. The endless slogans and proclamations emanating from Hitler's HQ in the Chancellery bunker in Berlin sounded to us here at the front like sheer mockery.
On 12 February the motorized elements of the division rolled along the Berlin-Breslau highway in the direction of Sapn in Lower Silesia. ()wing to fuel shortage we had to organize a shuttle service. The armored elements came by rail.
In the morning of that day the Russians launched an attack along a wide front and threatened to cross the highway. ele. ments of the “Brandenburg” panzer division had to yield to the pressure. In the morning of 13 February'i moved into the counterattack with a combat group. We were able to free the highway, but were bypassed in the flank. With further elements of the division that had arrived in the meantime, and with a combat group of the 17th Panzer Division, which was hastily brought up, we managed to hold the enemy for the short term. In the days that followed the Russians made constant attempts to outflank us; our own division was split up into a number of small combat groups.
On 17 February, the Russians succeeded in making a breakthrough, which cut off elements of our division and threatened to destroy them. In this critical situation it was shown yet again what a high value the concepts of comradeship and independent action always have.
Major Hannes Grimminger, a battalion commander in our sister Regiment 192, spotted our desperate situation and didn't hesitate for a second. He attached to his own unit the reconnaissance battalion under Major Brandt, which was then just available, as well as a number of our tanks, and at once launched a relieving attack. The Russians were taken completely by surprise and withdrew after suffering losses. The encircled elements were freed.
In March Grimminger was given comipand of Regiment 192 and was wounded again. During a short stay in a military hospital at home he received the Oak Leaves to the Knight's Cross, on I I March; on 21 March he married and after his return to the front fell on 16 April, married less than a month. His men buried him in the park of the manor house at Drebkau; our divisional chaplain, Tarnow, delivered the funeral oration. After the war Grimminger was transferred to the forest cemetery at Halbe, where 20,000 graves recall the last, hopeless battle.
In spite of the utmost efforts, and the ever-present sight of the desperate refugees, the area round Sagan was no longer tenable. The risk of encirclement for the few intact panzer divisions was too great.
So Schoemer's Army group ordered a withdrawal over the Neisse.
One or two bridgeheads were to be kept open to enable rear guards, stragglers, and civilians to pass to the west.
The Neisse flows from the mountains of the former Sudetenland, via Goerlitz, due north and into the Oder south of Frankfurt.
The Neisse-Oder line constituted the last natural barrier before Dresden, the Elbe, and Berlin.
On 20 February the tired and battle-weary men crossed the Neisse north of Goerlitz and at once began to dig in.
From Goerlitz via Guben to the confluence of the Neisse with the Oder, the remnants of a few reliable panzer divisions and stragglers from infantry divisions that had been wiped out were used to set up a new defensive line, in the center of which were the shrunken elements of our own division.
Marshal Koniev at once moved up to the eastern bank of the Neisse; but then he stopped and the only further development was strong patrol activity and battles for our few bridgeheads. As with Marshal Zhukov at Frankfurt and Kuestrin, Koniev appeared to have supply problems.
The Neisse-Oder line would be held like this until the middle of April.
From Goerlitz our front ran east, passing north of Lauban and south of Breslau, and then turned south at Oppelh down to the mountains of the High Tatra. This line was only weakly held and would be unlikely to withstand a vigorous attack on the Czech industrial area at Ostrava in Moravia. This, it seemed, was the very thing that Marshal Koniev was planning.
The Beginning of the End 253 On 15 March 1945, the First Ukrainian Front started an offensive from the area of Upper Silesia southwest of Gleiwitz, which forced our Army group to pull back our front to the former German frontier in the mountains bordering Czechoslovakia, connecting up in the west with the Neisse position at Goerlitz.
THE BATTLE OF LAUBAN At the end of February, Hitler decided to fight through to the fortress of Breslau by means of a major attack from the Lauban area. This operation, I heard later, was to be the prelude to a “spring offensive” that he was planning.
While we gave “Operation Lauban,” as we called it among ourselves, a certain chance, the freeing of the fortress of Breslau was to us pure utopia and the idea of a “spring offensive” sheer madness.
Hitler and the High Command of the Wehrmacht were still juggling with divisions that no longer existed or, despite the latest material and the intake of replacements, lacked the fighting strength to be capable of-stopping a far superior enemy effectively. So I was horrified after the battle of Lauban to be given a “stomach and ear battalion” as replacements. This was made up in part of patients with severe stomach trouble, who had been gathered up from military hospitals and from back home, and who were accompanied by a special “diet” catering company.