Douglas E. Nash - From the Realm of a Dying Sun. Volume 2

FROM THE REALM OF A DYING SUN

Volume II: The IV. SS-Panzerkorps in the Budapest Relief Efforts, December 1944February 1945

DOUGLAS E. NASH SR.

Published in the United States of America and Great Britain in 2020 by

CASEMATE PUBLISHERS

1950 Lawrence Road, Havertown, PA 19083, USA

and

The Old Music Hall, 106108 Cowley Road, Oxford OX4 1JE, UK

Copyright 2020 Douglas E. Nash Sr.

Hardback Edition: ISBN 978-1-61200-8738

Digital Edition: ISBN 978-1-61200-8745

eISBN 978-1-61200-8745

Mobi ISBN 978-1-61200-8745

A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library

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Maps by Thomas Houlihan and Phillip Schwartzberg

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SS-Obergruppenfhrer Herbert Gille (left) with SS-Obersturmbannfhrer Manfred Schnfelder standing in Gilles command vehicle, a Horch mittlerer Einheits-Personenkraftwagen (medium-size standard passenger car) (Kfz.) 21 Cabriolet, as they observe the fighting around Modlin in late November or early December 1944. On the left front fender, the corps symbol can barely be seen under a layer of mud. Gilles command pennant is also displayed on both the bumper and front fender. (Lange)

Introduction

This is the second of three volumes, which together trace the history of the IV. SS-Panzerkorps ( IV. SS-Pz.Korps ) from its inception until the end of the war. The first volume focused on the activation of the corps, its structure and organization, leadership, and the history of its two core divisionsthe 3. SS-Panzerdivision Totenkopf and the 5. SS-Panzerdivision Wiking . It then traced the history of the corps after its introduction to battle on 28 July 1944, its participation in the massive tank battle of Praga, its role in the three defensive battles of Warsaw, and ended on 26 November 1944 with the siege of Modlin and the transfer of the corps to . The first volume described some of the heaviest fighting ever witnessed on the Eastern Front, which forged the IV. SS-Pz.Korps into a responsive and lethal instrument of war. This phase of the corps history, which began with its participation in a highly mobile, fluid battle, ended with its troops engaged in static trench warfare reminiscent of World War I.

This second volume picks up at the end of November 1944, where the first left off, with the corps still engaged in defending the so-called Wet Triangle, that tactically significant chunk of terrain situated between the Narew and Vistula Rivers. Seemingly relegated to a secondary front, the corps was jolted out of its holiday preparations when the Oberkommando der in Sesmuk had reprimanded the corps IIa (its adjutant, or chief personnel officer) on 16 January 1945 for his failure to submit the corps annual historical report and all of the related material, such as its war diaries, records of tank assaults, etc. for archiving.

Involved as he and the rest of the Korpsstab were at that time in the relief of Budapest, it is understandable that Stubaf. Karl-Willy Schulze failed to meet the deadline, but one wonders what happened to all of the corps historical material, or whether it was delivered to the Kriegsarchiv der Waffen-SS at all. Consequently, with a few exceptions, the author has had to rely on a number of secondary sources, some of which are unit histories written after the war by participants in the campaign, while others, such as Krisztin Ungvrys The Siege of Budapest: 100 Days in World War II , were composed by military historians using such records that survived the war.

The primary sources consulted for this work include an electronic copy of the war diary, or Kriegstagebuch ( KTB ), of Heeresgruppe Sd ( H.Gr. Sd , or Army Group South) (Operations Section), the headquarters responsible for planning and coordinating German operations in Hungary, which covers the period from 1 February to the end of March 1945. Heeresgruppe Sd was the higher headquarters two levels above the IV. SS-Pz.Korps , so it primarily concerns the actions and activities of the three to four German and one Hungarian field armies under its command, and not individual corps. Therefore, events happening at the lowest tactical level of the division, regiment, and battalion have been filtered somewhat by the need to simplify and reduce the amount of information being sent from front-line units up the chain of command. The KTB used includes three separate sections: the summarized daily KTB , the Meldungen (daily reports) of the subordinate armies and other major subordinate units, as well as various command-related Befehle (orders), other reports, troop strength, armor strength, proclamations, and so forth, totaling thousands of pages of documents.

Another source recently uncovered in the German records cache in Moscow and published online by the German-Russian consortium, Deutsch-Russisches Projekt zur Digitalisierung Deutscher Dokumente in Archiven der Russischen Fderation , also known as the German Documents in Russia website, includes several hundred pages of captured reports, situation maps, and messages from as well as armored vehicle and antitank gun availability with A.Gr. Balck / 6. Armee , including Hungarian units.

This cache of captured documents also includes the complete daily intelligence reports compiled by the 6. Armee Ic staff officer for the entire month of January 1945, which provides a detailed, day-by-day description of the operations carried out by each corps under its command, including the IV. SS-Pz.Korps , as well as the air situation and assessments of Soviet plans and activities. In this manner, it is similar to the Ia KTB , though not as detailed or as comprehensive. Another equally valuable resource contained within this archive are the full-color daily situation maps in either 1:200,000 or 1:300,000 scale maintained by the A.Gr. Balck / 6. Armee Ia from 28 November 1944 until 31 January 1945 that depict the location of all the units under its command, including Hungarian units, as well as the position of the German front line on any given day. Some maps also depict suspected locations of Soviet units and the directions of their attacks. While this proved to be an invaluable source, it is unfortunate that information for December 1944 and January 1945 was all that survived intact. In toto , this records grouping proved to be an invaluable source that contains many documents submitted by or pertaining to the IV. SS-Pz. Korps for the month of January 1945 that would have been destroyed had the Red Army not overtaken a portion of the A.Gr. Balck / 6. Armee s staff caravan transporting them before the war ended.