Hitler's Commanders (22 page)

Colonel General Dollmann alerted the 77th Infantry Division for a possible movement to Normandy on the morning of D-Day, but Rommel’s headquarters delayed this move, based on erroneous reports of possible Allied paratroop landings in Brittany. (Rommel himself was on his way back from a trip to Germany at this time and could not be reached.) On the morning of June 7, however, the Desert Fox was back and trying to gain control of the battle. He immediately realized that the port of Cherbourg was the initial strategic objective of the landings. He understood that the weak left flank of the Normandy sector must be reinforced or the Americans would drive west from their invasion beachheads, cut across the Cotentin peninsula to the sea, and isolate Cherbourg to the north from the rest of 7th Army, in the St. LÔ sector to the south. Consequently, he ordered the 77th Infantry to reinforce Group von Schlieben, which was assigned the task of holding the southern approaches to Cherbourg. Stegmann received this order at 10:15 a.m., but his division did not move out until 3 p.m. Once it began, the march was to be rapid—or relatively so under the circumstances. Since there were no motorized transportation units available, the entire distance had to be covered on foot, and the division was constantly harassed by Allied fighter-bombers. General Dollmann was very much concerned that it would not arrive in time to prevent the collapse of von Schlieben’s line, but the vanguard of the division arrived on June 10, and by the next day much of the 77th was on the front line, defending in the hedgerow country on both sides of the Merderet River, where it prevented much stronger elements of the U.S. VII Corps from outflanking the critical position of Montebourg, a major junction on the road to Cherbourg. A much-relieved Friedrich Dollmann signaled Rommel on June 11 that he was satisfied that the situation had been restored on his part of the front. The following day the rest of Stegmann’s division arrived and went into the line.
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General Dollmann’s sense of relief was short-lived. South of Stegmann’s positions lay the 100th Panzer Replacement Battalion, which consisted mainly of foreign personnel. On the morning of June 12, it broke and ran away upon first contact with the enemy. U.S. Lieutenant General Joseph “Lightning Joe” Collins, the commander of the VII Corps, was quick to take advantage of this gap in the German line. Living up to his nickname, he committed the U.S. 9th Infantry and 82nd Airborne divisions into an attack along the Pont-l’Abbe–St. Sauveur–le Vicomte road, which was now defended only by the few surviving remnants of the 91st Air Landing Division, a battle-weary unit that had been in action since D-Day and was now at regimental strength. It was here that Collins achieved the decisive breakthrough that Stegmann had foiled the day before. The American spearheads reached the sea near the little port of Barneville at 5:05 a.m. on June 18, isolating Group von Schlieben in the northern part of the Cotentin peninsula and trapping what was left of four German divisions: the 91st Air Landing and the 77th, 243rd, and 709th Infantry Divisions.

While Collins pushed to the sea, the 77th Infantry Division engaged the U.S. 90th Infantry Division in bitter fighting. It took the U.S. 357th Infantry Regiment two full days of fighting to capture the village of Gourbesville, while the 358th and 359th Infantry regiments (also of the 90th Division) accomplished even less. The road to Montebourg, Valognes, and Cherbourg remained blocked, the 77th continued to resist tenaciously, and Rudolf Stegmann was proving that he could get the maximum combat effort from a division that previously had been considered unreliable. The American breakthrough, however, had left his right flank completely exposed, and even a retreat to Cherbourg could only end in the sacrifice of the division—if it could even make it to the “fortress.” Since the 77th was nonmotorized and the Americans were fully motorized and had several tank battalions, even an escape to the north was highly doubtful. Rommel, therefore, authorized the division to disengage and break out to the south, where the German forces in the thinly manned St. Lô sector would soon need every rifle they could muster. This sensible order, however, was countermanded by Adolf Hitler. The 77th Infantry, he decreed, was to hold its present positions at all costs. The American breakthrough was to be dealt with by ignoring it. What good this would accomplish, with a gaping hole in the German line, the Fuehrer did not explain.

While Stegmann held firm, General Collins’s VII Corps turned north and began to work its way behind the 77th. Meanwhile, a new U.S. corps—Major General Troy H. Middleton’s VIII—was committed to hold the corridor across the Cotentin, in the unlikely event that Dollmann’s battered 7th Army tried to relieve Cherbourg. On June 18, the Americans at last began to close in on the 77th Infantry. By now Hitler had relaxed his original order somewhat. Limited withdrawals toward Cherbourg were permitted, he said, but only under enemy pressure. Any breakout to the south was still forbidden. Nevertheless, General Stegmann led a breakout attempt to the south, taking whatever he could with him—right through American lines. Whether this move was initiated or even authorized by Colonel General Dollmann is still the subject of debate. Naturally enough Dollmann denied it at the time, and it is true beyond question that his chief of staff denied permission for just such an action as late as the evening of June 16. In any case, Stegmann was the man who finally acted. He began thinning out his line on the afternoon of June 17, arranged elements of his division into a five-column formation during the night of June 17–18, and attempted to find a hole in and/or break through the U.S. line on June 18.

It was already too late for most of the division. While Hitler delayed, the veteran U.S. 9th Infantry joined the battle against the 77th and much of the German division was not able to disengage. The column consisting of the bulk of the 177th Artillery Regiment (and most of the division’s motorized vehicles) successfully made its way through the American front line but was caught on the road west of Hill 145 and destroyed by the U.S. 60th Field Artillery Battalion, with the aid of a few infantry and anti-tank units. Meanwhile, other columns were spotted by the Allied fighter-bombers, which seemed to be everywhere. Grenadiers dove for cover as the airplanes struck, but the horse-drawn wagons could not do so. The slaughter was terrible, and confusion and disorganization soon seized the columns, which threatened to disintegrate. In the middle of all this, Rudolf Stegmann raced from place to place in his camouflaged command car, restoring order out of chaos and keeping the columns moving south, toward the main German lines. Then, near the village of Bricquebec, his car was spotted by an American pilot, who dived to almost ground level and opened up on Stegmann’s car at close range. The general’s body was riddled with 20mm shells, one of which hit him in the head. He was dead before his body reached the floorboard.

Command of the division now devolved on the senior regimental commander, Colonel of Reserves Bernard Bacherer of the 1049th Grenadier. He ignored advice to surrender or to turn back toward Cherbourg and instead kept trying to find a way through the American line. He found one and, accompanied by about 1,700 men, marched deep into the corridor between the U.S. VII and VIII corps during the night of June 18–19. Colonel Bacherer was lucky. He marched south all night long, and when dawn broke on June 19, a heavy cloud cover and drizzle kept the enemy fighter-bombers on the ground, enabling the division to continue pushing south undetected. About 11 a.m. his forward patrols reported that a strong American force was encamped less than 500 yards away. Bacherer ordered his men to hide in a sunken lane and go to sleep. With no rest for more than 30 hours, they did not have to be told twice: they slept where they fell. Late that afternoon they moved on, still unspotted by the enemy. That night they reached the Ollande River but found all the crossings blocked by strong American detachments. Bacherer then pulled a last, desperate maneuver: he launched an old-fashioned bayonet charge against one of the bridges. The American defenders (part of the 2nd Battalion, 47th Infantry Regiment) were taken completely by surprise and were quickly overwhelmed. The 77th Infantry had breached the last obstacle to safety. Colonel Bacherer reached German lines without further incident, carrying with him about 1,500 soldiers (including all his wounded), plus 250 prisoners and 12 captured jeeps. As small as it now was, the 77th was a welcome addition to the German defenders, who would continue to hold up the Allies in the hedgerow country of Normandy for more than another month.
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Ironically, General Stegmann’s career was not ended by his death. He was credited with saving the remnants of the 77th Infantry Division and—even though he had acted against the Fuehrer’s orders—he was posthumously promoted to lieutenant general, effective June 1, 1944. Hitler’s empire was indeed a strange and lethal place to be in the last year of the war.

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I have vivid memories of my meeting with
baron hasso von manteuffel
in 1973, when I visited him at his home in Bavaria, near Ammersee, a large glacial lake in Upper Bavaria. He was very polite, energetic, and extroverted. Although he was thin and small in stature, about five foot two, I could understand how he commanded respect by his obvious self-confidence and his knowledge of military affairs. He was a gracious host, and when I told him I was staying with a brother-in-law who was stationed in Wurzburg with the American army, Manteuffel remarked that one of his ancestors took the famous castle there for the Hohenzollerns in the 1850s. Indeed, his family had served the Hohenzollerns of Prussia faithfully and with distinction for several generations. Otto von Manteuffel, for example, served as prime minister of Prussia from 1850 to 1858, and General Edwin von Manteuffel was once chief of the military cabinet of Kaiser Wilhelm I, until he was pushed aside by Otto von Bismarck.
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Hasso von Manteuffel was born in Potsdam on January 14, 1897. He and his three sisters were raised primarily by his mother, for his father died when Hasso was seven years old. The family was well off and lived on a well-groomed estate in a villa that was exquisitely furnished. Young Manteuffel received an excellent education in an expensive preparatory school operated by his cousin. (Young Manteuffel was an exemplary student who always put his studies first.) Continuing in the family tradition, he entered the Prussian cadet school at Naumburg/Saale in 1908. This school was one of the most modern in Germany, and its curriculum centered on the classical model, with heavy emphasis on sports and military instruction.

Upon leaving the school in Naumburg/Saale, Manteuffel entered the main cadet school in Berlin-Lichterfelde. One of a thousand cadets, he lived in a plainly furnished apartment with seven others. In January 1916, Manteuffel passed his finals and received his Certificate of Maturity and the next month he was promoted to officer candidate (Faehnrich). At the request of Manteuffel’s stepfather, Crown Prince Wilhelm intervened on his behalf and Manteuffel was transferred to the replacement squadron of the Hussar Regiment von Zieten (Brandenburger) Number 3.
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Later that year, Manteuffel was promoted to second lieutenant and was transferred to the 5th Squadron of the 6th Prussian Infantry Division, stationed on the Western Front.

While carrying out a reconnaissance mission near Bapaume, France, in October 1916, Baron von Manteuffel was wounded when a piece of shrapnel struck him in the leg. He was sent to a rearward hospital for medical attention and to recover; however, he desperately wanted to return to his unit and, in January 1917, left the hospital without authorization and returned to the front. Although he was later sentenced to three days arrest in his quarters, he never served the sentence. Manteuffel was transferred to the 6th Infantry’s divisional staff in February and remained with the division as it fought the Russians in East Galicia in July 1917 and when it returned to the Western Front in March 1918.

After the war ended, Manteuffel joined Freikorps von Oven as second adjutant and fought the Spartacists in Berlin, as well as other Communist revolutionaries in Munich and Leipzig. He was selected to remain in the 100,000-man army and, in May 1919, was assigned to the 25A Cavalry Regiment at Rathenow. In 1921, he married a beautiful, blue-eyed blonde named Armgard von Kleist, whose uncle was future Field Marshal Ewald von Kleist. The von Manteuffels were to have two children. From 1925 to 1930, Hasso served as the regimental adjutant of the 25A Cavalry and then became commander of the experimental mechanical squadron—a position normally reserved for a captain. In 1932, he became a squadron leader in the 17th Cavalry Regiment at Bamberg and in October 1934 was promoted to Rittmeister (captain of cavalry). Later that same year he was transferred to the 2nd Motorcycle Battalion, along with two squadrons of the 17th Cavalry. Although Manteuffel was an excellent horseman, he was literally drafted into the motorized battalion by Major General Viktor von Schwedler, the chief of the Army Personnel Office. In 1935, Colonel Heinz Guderian of the panzer branch convinced Manteuffel to transfer to one of the newly created tank divisions. Manteuffel responded by joining Guderian’s own 2nd Panzer Division as a squadron leader in the 3rd Motorcycle Battalion. Guderian developed such confidence in Manteuffel that he put him in charge of all cadet training for the division in 1936, shortly after Manteuffel received his promotion to major.

The close relationship between the two men continued, and, as Guderian’s fortunes rose, so did Manteuffel’s. Early in 1937 Manteuffel served as official adviser to the Inspectorate of Panzer Troops (part of OKH), directly under Guderian. On February 1, 1939, Manteuffel was named commandant of Officer Training School Number 2, located at Potsdam-Krampnitz, and was promoted to lieutenant colonel two months later. “Manteuffel somehow left the stamp of his own personality on his trainees, and he taught them independent action within the framework of an integrated team effort,” General Frederick Wilhelm von Mellenthin wrote later.
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He believed that tank crews needed to be very much aware of battlefield tactics, so that if necessary each crew could make independent decisions during the heat of battle to positively affect the outcome. He stressed the concepts of mobility and maneuverability and the use of ground cover, all of which may give a particular panzer force a decisive advantage. He remained at the school during both the Polish and French campaigns. Upon hearing of the impending invasion of the Soviet Union, Manteuffel asked for a field command and, as a result, was named commander of the I Battalion of the 7th Rifle Regiment of the 7th Panzer Division in June 1941. During that same month his battalion saw heavy fighting on the Russian Front; among other things it spearheaded a bridgehead across the Memel River in Lithuania. The 7th Panzer Division continued to engage in intensive combat as it penetrated deep into Soviet lines, becoming the first German force to reach the highway between Minsk, Smolensk, and Moscow.