Regimental histories...

[Chris Boonzaier]

The Kaiser was delighted when III. RK beat up about 150,000 Belgians and Brits and took the third largest fortress complex in the world.

Hi,

not 100% historically correct.

1) The amount of brits involved in the fighting at Antwerp were proportionally less than the number of players of non European descent in a pre- end of Apartheid era South African Cricket team (if that is possible).

2) The III. R.K. was not on its own having the Marine- and 4th Ersatz Division with it.

3) The taking of Antwerp was facilitated by the fact that the belgians were leaving anyway. A victory against 150 000 men is of little practicle value when most of them turn up in Flanders a short while later to continue the fight. King Albert realised that holding Antwerp was not an option and while delaying with troops in front of it, he was evacuating like crazy at the back. It was the Schlieffen plan that made Antwerp redundant and caused it to be evacuated.

Just a couple of points as it is a section i am working on at the moment for some Iron Cross documents.

Best

Chris

[bob lembke]

Bob,

a couple of thoughts:

in 1914 I would imagine the EK2 was still a very prestigious award.

The EK2 when newly presented was worn suspended from its ribbon in the second buttonhole.

Regards

Glenn

Glenn;

Got off my butt and went elsewhere in my house and actually looked at the photo of the Generalkommando at Ghent. I am learning more about the functioning of my memory. The photo shows the officers wearing one medal, not two, hanging from their second buttonhole, with one ribbon hanging the medal, and a second ribbon crossed over the ribbon that the medal hangs from. I believed at the time when I evaluated this photo re: the medals that when one EK ribbon is worn crossed over the other it represents having been awarded both EKs. (I am no expert on medals, by any means.) I guess that I then conflated in my mind that the men were wearing pairs of medals, not one medal with a pair of ribbons.

Some time ago you sent me two scans from your then recently purchased serious book on the Feuerwerker u. Feuerwerk=Offizier institution and their part in the war. I stored the scan in several ways, as I do with important materials. I have the scans themselves on a hard-drive (actually a RAID II pair of hard-drives), but an AOL download blew out my operating system big-time and the files there are for the while inaccessible. The material is mentioned and described in my family history time-line, and it mentions where printouts of the scans are in a hanging file that is not in its place in my paper file. (There are some files visable under a pile of material to be filed; it must be there. I have to do the filing to get at the files, unless I risk a "datalanche".) I also have a couple of copies in a pile of material that I am going to send to a couple of older family members that knew Heinrich. The long and the short of it is that I have saved the two scans in a number of ways and places, but that at the moment they all are inaccessable.

The two scans were a scan of an article written by Heinrich Fuchs for your book describing how he was, upon an order of the Ministry of War, sent out to roam over Belgium looking for valuable Beute, and how he did find goodies, including two rail cars of eau de Cologne, but his real prize was finding 1100 rail cars of nitrates. This jibes with the family oral history. The other scan was of another page of your book that, as I remember, listed the Feuerwerk=Offiziere that received the EK I during the war, and I believe that you gave an approximate date of the award.

I also preserved your scans with the e-mail that you used to send them, but that is also locked up in the computer with the blown operating system, which requires complex work to restore it to life. I just want to let you know that I have saved your valuable material in multiple fashions (five at least), but that for the moment they all are inaccessable. Thank you again for sending me this treasured information.

The page of awards could also be suffering a breakdown of my memory, and only be an award of his EK II, but as I recall the listing was limited, a listing of those getting the EK I would be more like a phone book.

The question remains why neither EK was mentioned in the book that Dave has uncovered. It suggests that that source is not complete.

I have other photos of my g-f wearing the EK, but they are in true archival storage, and a bit of a bother to get at. The photo of the Generalkommando of III. RK is actually a copy I made centuries ago and frames and hung somewhere.

Glenn, once again thanks for your help with my research.

Bob Lembke

[Glenn J]

Bob,

no problem and I can confirm the the Feuerwerker book lists Herr Fuchs with an EK1 but does not give any indication of the award date. Frustratingly, the wartime editions of the Milit?r-Wochenblatt listed Bavarian winners of the EK1 but not the Prussians!

If you need the scans again I can of course do that.

Regards

Glenn

[bob lembke]

Hi,

not 100% historically correct.

1) The amount of brits involved in the fighting at Antwerp were proportionally less than the number of players of non European descent in a pre- end of Apartheid era South African Cricket team (if that is possible).

2) The III. R.K. was not on its own having the Marine- and 4th Ersatz Division with it.

3) The taking of Antwerp was facilitated by the fact that the belgians were leaving anyway. A victory against 150 000 men is of little practicle value when most of them turn up in Flanders a short while later to continue the fight. King Albert realised that holding Antwerp was not an option and while delaying with troops in front of it, he was evacuating like crazy at the back. It was the Schlieffen plan that made Antwerp redundant and caused it to be evacuated.

Just a couple of points as it is a section i am working on at the moment for some Iron Cross documents.

Best

Chris

There was a bit of puffery in my description, but I think that it is historically correct, without making your statement historically incorrect. First of all, the Kaiser was indeed delighted; one only has to read his telegram of congratulations to appreciate that.

The newly formed Marine Division and the 4. Ersatz Division were, along with some smaller units, such as a bicycle company or battalion on the right flank, added to the III. Reservekorps, not fighting alongside it, so technically one can say that the III. RK alone was fighting tha Allied forces.

Roughly, the Allied forces were as follows. I believe that six of the seven divisions of the Belgian army were in the action, if you include the Belgian cavalry division protecting the Allies' lines of communications. Belgian divisions were enormous, almost double the size of a German division. (I think that this is complicated by the fact that the Belgians had two things that they called "divisions", one, I think, twice the size of the other. I dimly recall a lengthy thread on this topic on another forum a year or two ago.)

The British forces were not inconsiderable, they were, if memory serves, the Naval Division, also newly formed (a brigade of sailors and one of Marines?), commanded by the intrepid Sir Winston, who I understand created great mirth when he telegraphed the Cabinet from Belgium requesting his promotion from lieutenant to major general. I believe that about 3500 men of the Naval Division were not able to retreat to the west but were driven into internment in Holland. (Did they ever rejoin the war effort?)

Additionally, the Antwerp fortress complex, the third biggest in the world, after Paris and Amsterdam, I believe, comprising something like 45 forts, was manned by about 30,000 fortress troops.

So six enormous Belgian divisions, plus the UK Naval Division, plus 30,000 fortress troops, must have been more than double the size of III. RK, which basically comprised four reserve and scratch divisions. Additionally, the defenders should have also had some advantage from the forts and being on the defensive. (But of course the 30.5 cm mortars and 42 cm howitzers were a big factor when they pounded forts which the Belgians were attempting to defend. I have letters written by my grand-father from the firing positions of these guns as they shelled forts, and I can locate some of these batteries within about 100 meters, based on the letters and other sources that I have.)

While the forces at Antwerp were in danger of being cut off, at the same time they were a serious threat to the lines of communication to the German forces further west.

So I think that both our statements were largely correct, except your suggestion that the British forces were comparable to two or three token black players on a Apartheid-era S. African football team; they were a full division, after all, although they possibly did not have all their artillery, etc.

I have a theory that Sir Winston, seeing the German 16.5" howitzers quickly reduce the Belgian forts, assumed that the 15" guns of the Queen Elisabeth would quickly blow the old Turkish forts up. But the guns, the ballistics, shells, etc. were very different. Sir Winston was not really a "detail guy".

Bob Lembke

[bob lembke]

Bob,

no problem and I can confirm the the Feuerwerker book lists Herr Fuchs with an EK1 but does not give any indication of the award date. Frustratingly, the wartime editions of the Milit?r-Wochenblatt listed Bavarian winners of the EK1 but not the Prussians!

If you need the scans again I can of course do that.

Regards

Glenn

Great! I was beginning to fear that I was totally "losing my marbles". I thought that you had estimated roughly when he got the EK I, I guess not. Perhaps the Generalkommando all got the EK II, and g-f later got the EK I, possibly for finding that 1100 car-loads of hidden nitrates, which was vital for the war effort. Family oral history says that he got a citation from the High Command for finding the explosives.

I don't want to bother you for the scans again. I am now embarrassed as the 5-6 places I put the great information are all temporarily not working. (Just wait, I may end up on your "doorstep", hat in hand, pleading for them in a month or two.)

It is really fascinating learning more and more about my g-f, a really interesting guy, a sensitive guy quite different from my father, who was a murderous thug at this point in his life. He later really mellowed out and was a great Dad. No one on my mother's side seemed to have served in the military, they were half English, many were communists, and some later suddenly popped up as Nazis, to the great amusement of the rest of the family. Pop and g-f were well to the right of the Nazis, died-in-the-wool monarchists.

Bob Lembke

[Chris Boonzaier]

Hi,

a note to Antwerp,

the fortresses may have been big but were outdated and were to all intents and purposes useless in the face of modern siege artillery. The ring of positions did not take into account the rage or heavy calibers.

When King Albert realised they could not withstand the barrage and his troops would not be able to attack out of Antwerp he ordered his troops to move out, which took place largely on the 6th of october. Antwerp was left in the hands of a much smaller group of defenders and fell 3-4 days later.

It is sure the Kaiser was happy when it fell, but I would class it more as a "strategic withdrawl" by the enemy than a hard fought battle with glorius victory. Almost all of the Belgians lived to fight another day. As Moltke had remarked further down the front where the French were pulling back "Great victories were signaled by great hauls of prisoners and guns... Where are the prisonners and guns?"

It was evident that when the race for the sea was on that any troops left in Antwerp would be lost.

For the Brits, Churchill was responsible for forming the three brigades (Hastily formed and only half equiped) but he did not lead them at the front, Asquith would not allow it. I dont think they got near the action, were caught up in the pullback and one of the three brigades was interened.

I classify it like St Mihiel in 1918, it was a victory, but the enemy was leaving anyway...

[Chris Boonzaier]

Some great stuff emailed to me by Dave yesterday.... history comes alive!!!

Does anyone have the history of the 31st bavarian regt?

Thanks

Chris