At 0300 hours on the 15th, the 2nd Panzer Division received a message from corps about that day's operations. The objective of the corps for the new day was the line between Rethel and Wasigny (thirteen kilometers north of Rethel). The division was to move forward, maintaining a strong force on its left flank, pass through Boulzicourt (ten kilometers west of Pont à Bar) and Poix-Terron (fifteen kilometers west-southwest of Pont à Bar), and seize the terrain along the line between Wasigny and Séry (eight kilometers north of Rethel).44 With the 2nd Panzer Division having responsibility for the northern half of the line and the 1st Panzer Division for the southern half, the next day's objective was more than thirty kilometers southwest of the circular bridgehead around Sapogne, Boutancourt, and Flize that the 2nd Division had carved out the previous evening. Placed within the context of the division's having had difficulty getting across the river during the previous day and not having completed the bridge across the Meuse at Donchery until 0400 hours, Guderian's expectations were remarkably high. That they could be so high amidst the concerns of von Kleist and others is even more remarkable.
In the broadest sense, it was thus Guderian's vision and insistence that propelled his corps forward, and he therefore deserves much of the credit for the subsequent success of his corps when it rolled up the flank of the French Ninth Army to the west and raced toward the coast. His decision to press forward with less than two-thirds of his forces and almost without regard for enemy actions against his flanks, however, was clearly a risk—if not a gamble.
Any credit given to Guderian, however, should be balanced by an acknowledgment of von Kleist's role. Although Guderian did not believe the conservative cavalryman recognized the potential of his Panzers, von Kleist managed until the 17th to keep his higher-level commanders from halting the XIXth Panzer Corps.45 Despite Guderian's lack of caution and occasional bullheadedness, von Kleist shielded him from more conservative German commanders and reluctantly gave him the leeway to succeed. After the campaign, Guderian, and not von Kleist, received much of the credit for its success; had the XIXth Corps failed, Guderian and von Kleist would have received the blame.
SECURING THE FLANK FOR GUDERIAN'S ADVANCE
When the 1st Panzer Division began moving most of its tanks toward Vendresse and its infantry toward Omicourt and the Forêt de Mazarin, it began changing the direction of its attack toward the west. The 10th Panzer Division, Gross Deutschland Regiment, and the 4th Armored Reconnaissance Battalion from the 1st Panzer Division moved south to protect its flank.
As mentioned earlier, the 10th Panzer Division did not learn until some time around midnight on the 14–15th that it had the mission of capturing the heights around Stonne. When the division operations officer flew to corps headquarters, he learned about the mission and finally was able to inform the division commander in the early morning hours of the 15th. The Gross Deutschland Regiment was attached to the division for the attack, but the division commander could not make radio contact with the regiment and knew little or nothing about its situation. Consequently, the division advanced toward Stonne in the early morning hours of the 15th with only small elements.
Around 0400 hours on the 15th, the written corps operations order arrived at the command post of the 10th Division. With the attachment of the Gross Deutschland Regiment and the 1/37th Artillery, the division's mission was to seize a line running from the Ardennes Canal in the west, across the heights of Mont Dieu and Stonne, to a bend in the Meuse River south of Villemontry (twelve kilometers east-northeast of Stonne). After seizing this line, the division had the mission of defending it and thereby protecting the bridgehead at Sedan and the flank of the XIXth Corps.46 A battalion from the 29th Motorized Division, which had just arrived at Bulson, moved forward and was attached to the Infantry Brigade for the operation.
Some time after the arrival of the corps order, the 10th Division learned that the Gross Deutschland Regiment was located about three kilometers south of Maisoncelle. The 3rd Battalion occupied an area west of the village of Artaise-le-Vivier (two kilometers southwest of Maisoncelle), the 1st Battalion and elements from the 43rd Assault Engineer Battalion occupied an area just northwest of Stonne, and the 2nd Battalion was attacking the southern edge of the Bois de Raucourt (two kilometers northeast of Stonne, and three kilometers southeast of Maisoncelle). Artillery support came from the 1/37th Artillery, which was located just north of Maisoncelle. The division commander ordered the Gross Deutschland Regiment to continue moving through the woods of Bois du Mont Dieu, seize the southern woodline on the far side, and secure the heights around Stonne.47
At the same time, the division launched two other attacks. The Armor Brigade (which was reinforced by two infantry companies, an engineer company, an antiaircraft company, and an antitank battalion) moved forward to seize the heights southeast of Yoncq (seven kilometers east of Stonne). The 1/90th Artillery provided fire support. Continuing the attack that had begun on the previous evening, the 2/8th Panzers advanced via La Besace toward Stonne and reached the town around 0700 hours. Around 1100 hours, however, a French counterattack drove them from the town and destroyed four heavy tanks. Not being able to hold the hotly contested village, the battalion withdrew north toward the Bois de Raucourt.
Unfortunately, the headquarters of the 10th Division did not know that Stonne had been captured around 0700 hours and lost at 1100 hours. The Armor Brigade had reported at 1015 that Stonne had been captured at 0700 hours but failed to report its subsequent loss.48 This mistake caused the 10th Division to underestimate the difficulty of the task confronting it.
At 0900 hours on the 15th, the commanders of the XIXth Panzer Corps and the XIVth Army Corps met at the 10th Division's command post. Effective around 1100 hours, the XIVth Corps assumed control of the bridgehead south of Sedan, as well as control over the 10th Panzer Division and the Gross Deutschland Regiment.49 The generals met to discuss the attachment of the 10th Division to the XIVth Corps. During discussions about the attachment of the 10th Panzer Division, the commanding general of the XIVth Corps did not modify substantially the mission for the division. He ordered the division to protect the Sedan bridgehead by securing the heights along Mont Dieu, Stonne, and southeast of Yoncq. He informed the division commander that the 29th Motorized Division would operate on his eastern flank, and that if need be, an additional battalion from the 29th Division could be attached to the 10th Panzer Division.50
Since the division headquarters was not aware that the French had recaptured Stonne, it did not believe it required additional forces to accomplish its mission. It could not have been more wrong. The division was about to enter some of the deadliest fighting of the entire campaign.
The first indication of things going wrong came from the Gross Deutschland Regiment at 1030 hours on the 15th. It reported an armor attack from the vicinity of Mont Dieu toward the north, and shortly thereafter the commander of the 90th Armored Reconnaissance Battalion reported that the enemy attack had reached a point just south of Maisoncelle. Reacting quickly, the 10th Division employed the Antitank Instructional Battalion of the division with its two immediately available companies and an antitank company from the 86th Infantry Regiment to seal off the attack south of Maisoncelle and then to repulse it.51 For the next day and a half, the division waged a seesaw battle with the French, both sides alternately attacking and defending.
After the French counterattacked from Mont Dieu toward Chémery around 1030 hours and then recaptured Stonne around 1100 hours, the 10th Division continued to believe the 1015 report about Stonne being captured and rearranged its forces based on the false assumption that the critical heights around Stonne were in German hands. Believing that the most threatened areas were the heights southeast of Yoncq and the northern edge of the woods of the Bois du Mont Dieu to the south of Chémery, it directed the reinforced Armor Brigade to attack the heights southeast of Yoncq. Almost simultaneously, a small French armored counterattack from Mont Dieu toward Chémery was beaten back by one of the
antitank companies.
Throughout much of the afternoon, however, two battalions of the Gross Deutschland Regiment, which were located northeast and northwest of Stonne, came under strong enemy pressure.52 After the 10th Panzer Division finally learned about the French continuing to hold Stonne, the daily log notes:
[T]he incoming reports from the Gross Deutschland infantry Regiment become ever more serious about the situation of the regiment and the continuous attacks of smaller enemy armored groups, despite the fact that the regiment has been reinforced by an antitank company…. The regiment no longer appears to be in the position to be able to hold its sector in its entire breadth.53
The 14th Antitank Company became deeply embroiled in the intense fighting. In contrast to its light casualties in the fighting around Connage, it suffered thirteen killed and sixty-five wounded in the fighting around Stonne. Also, twelve of its vehicles and six out of twelve of its guns were destroyed. Yet, Lieutenant Beck-Broichsitter claimed his company destroyed thirty-three French tanks.54 To buttress the Gross Deutschland Regiment, the division sent the 69th Infantry Regiment (minus its 2nd Battalion) forward to occupy a sector between Stonne and La Besace (about three kilometers northeast of Stonne). The 2/90th Artillery provided fire support. The 10th Division told the Gross Deutschland Regiment to move its battalion that had been in the woods northwest of La Besace and employ it as a reserve.
Even though the German infantry frequently came under French artillery fire, it managed to push the French from the heights on the northern edge of Stonne around 1700 hours. When the commander of the Gross Deutschland had proposed the counterattack against the heights, he had cautiously explained in his proposal that his regiment was “physically completely exhausted and only marginally combat capable.”55 Despite the exhaustion of the regiment, the Germans launched their counterattack. The heights around Stonne, however, were recaptured around 1700 hours by the 1/69th Infantry, not the Gross Deutschland Regiment. Because of its exhaustion and losses, the elite infantry regiment had been reduced to playing a supporting role.
During the course of the afternoon, the French counterattacked in the Yoncq sector (east of Stonne) with the 1st Colonial Infantry Division and the 2nd Light Cavalry Division, but the reinforced Armor Brigade from the 10th Panzer Division met their thrust with heavy fire. Though the French were strongly supported by artillery fire, they soon had to withdraw toward the east. The German armor commander did not pursue the withdrawing French tanks, because he had recently been informed that the VIIth German Corps was moving up on his left (eastern) flank. He expected elements of the VIIth Corps to engage the French units that had pulled back. Leaving the 2/71st Infantry on the edge of the Yoncq sector, he withdrew his brigade, as ordered by division, to a position northeast of the Bois de Raucourt.56 From this position, the Armor Brigade could counterattack against any sizable French thrust.
Late in the afternoon of the 15th, the French attacked again, this time from the Bois du Mont Dieu toward Chémery. The division considered this attack to be particularly dangerous, for it threatened to cut the important road from Chémery to Malmy to Vendresse, and to hit the XIXth Panzer Corps in the flank. Fortunately for the Germans, the significant antitank assets that had been placed south of the Chémery-Maisoncelle road managed to halt the French but only after they had been reinforced. Meanwhile, the division had ordered the Armor Brigade to counterattack, but the withdrawal of the French made this unnecessary.57
According to French records, the attack came from a lone B-I bis tank company with about ten tanks, which had not received word about the cancellation of a division-sized attack. Though the French company lost only two tanks, the Germans reported having destroyed four or five heavy and five medium tanks out of approximately ninety heavy and twenty medium tanks.58 As with the French, reports of combat actions often inflated the size of the enemy force and the number of casualties inflicted.
By nightfall the 10th Panzer Division had almost all its infantry forward and its tanks in reserve. From west to east, the three battalions of the Gross Deutschland Regiment and the 1/69th Infantry occupied the heights southwest of Stonne, the village of Stonne, and the southern edge of the Bois de Raucourt. To the east of these battalions, the 2/69th Infantry (minus one company) occupied a large sector extending from the Bois de Raucourt to the Bois d'Yoncq; and the 2/71st Infantry occupied the Bois d'Yoncq. The 1/86th Infantry acted as a reserve for the forward infantry units, while the 2/86th Infantry cleared the enemy out of the area north and east of Raucourt. To the rear of the infantry, the division had three antitank companies between the Bois du Mont Dieu and Chémery and the entire Armor Brigade northwest and northeast of Maisoncelle. The 90th Armored Reconnaissance Battalion and the 49th Armored Engineer Battalion remained north of Bulson.
In short, the division had six infantry battalions along a line between Mont Dieu and Yoncq, one infantry battalion in reserve, and one infantry battalion operating north and east of Yoncq. It also had four tank battalions and at least three antitank companies to the rear of the line of infantry and had its armored engineer battalion and armored reconnaissance battalion farther to the rear near Bulson.59
On the morning of the 16th, the French counterattacked, again hitting the Gross Deutschland Regiment and the 1/69th Infantry near Stonne. According to the Germans, the attack consisted of twelve tanks and heavy artillery fire. Though the 1/69th Infantry was forced from its position on the heights near Stonne and had to pull back toward the Bois de Raucourt, the Germans claimed the attackers soon had to withdraw. The French, however, claimed to hold the town from 0555 to 1500 hours on the 16th.60 In reality, amidst the bitter fighting, the area was likely held by neither side.
Unfortunately for the Germans, their own artillery fire landed during the fighting in the collocated command posts of the 69th Infantry Regiment and the Gross Deutschland Regiment and wounded “numerous” officers.61 But this did not cause subordinate battalions to lose effectiveness. After the French counterattack failed to push the Germans completely out of Stonne, additional units, including artillery, arrived to reinforce the German defenders, and the level of French activity seemed to wane. The 10th Division worked to “create clearer command relationships and to shorten the defensive sector” by identifying clearer boundaries between the infantry regiments and by relocating some of the units. The division also attacked and seized La Besace. Clearly, the danger posed by the French was decreasing.
At noon on the 16th, the XIVth Corps informed the 10th Division that the 24th and 16th Infantry divisions would assume responsibility for the entire sector at 2300 hours, evidently in a night relief. When representatives of these two divisions arrived at the command post of the 10th Division, they objected strenuously to having to conduct a nighttime relief-in-place operation. Recognizing the complexity and difficulty of such an operation, they had concerns about the French possibly launching an attack during the middle of the relief in place, and they wanted the 10th Panzer Division to remain in the area. Their objections offer an interesting contrast to the relative absence of objectives when the French 71st Division moved forward to relieve part of the 55th Division shortly before the Germans attacked across the Meuse. The relief in place went as scheduled, and fortunately for the Germans, it was conducted under more favorable conditions than the one conducted by the French.
As a final footnote to the fighting around Mont Dieu and Stonne, the 1/69th Infantry retook the heights around Stonne in the early evening hours of the 16th. That night the 10th Division turned over the heights to the 16th Infantry Division. The daily log for the 10th Division concludes, “With that, the casualty-heavy and difficult battles to cover the Sedan bridgehead have ended for the division and its attached troops.”62 On orders from the XIXth Panzer Corps, the Gross Deutschland Regiment remained near Bulson to reorganize and rest its units. On the morning of 17 May, the 10th Division moved west to join the other two divisions in the XIXth Corps.
Though the division had secured the
flank of the XIXth Panzer Corps and had protected the bridgehead around Sedan, the fighting in the Stonne area had been extremely costly to the Germans. For example, the 14th Antitank Company of the Gross Deutschland Regiment, which had not had any casualties during the sharp fighting around Connage, suffered a total of thirteen killed during the heavy fighting around the heights of Stonne.63 By contrast, the fighting associated with subsequent operations in the push toward the west must have seemed easy.
MAKING THE PIVOT: THE ATTACK TOWARD SINGLY
Returning to the fighting west of Chémery on the 14th, the main axis of advance to the west for the 1st Panzer Division was along the broad valley that extends west-northwest of Chémery. To the south of Chémery, Vendresse, and Singly is a long, relatively narrow band of hills that includes the high ground of Stonne and Mont Dieu and that extends toward the northwest. Before turning south toward Bethel, the axis of advance for the XIXth Panzer Corps ran just north of and parallel to this band of hills through the broad valley west of Chémery. But the valley was not open. As one moves along the road west of Chémery, one encounters Vendresse about five kilometers west of Chémery. To the rear of the village is a small wooded hill mass through which the road passes before reaching the large open valley around Singly. To the north of this valley is a very thick forest, the Forêt de Mazarin, which has a few logging trails through it and whose highest point is Hill 303. Another road leads west from Vendresse and, after turning southwest, passes through the line of hills by way of Omont and Chagny.
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