Info on Leutnant der Reserve Werning 26 IR

[JohnW]

Hi,

I have a waffenrock named to a Leutnant der Reserve Werning of 26 Infantrie Regiment. can anyone point me in the right direction to find out more about him. Below is what I have ammassed so far about the unit.

'Formed on 01.10.34 around the old 6.Infanterie-Regiment of the Reichswehr as Infantrie Regiment Flensburg, (before being renamed IR26 on 15.10.36) this unit, composed mainly of Schleswig-Holstein recruits from northern Germany (Wehrkreis X) was earmarked in 1938 to be an advance unit in the proposed invasion of Czechoslovakia. The 3rd Battalion (Major Nickel) was stationed in Flensburg, and the 2nd Bn (Oberst von Dewitz) and 13 (IG) Kompanie (Oberleutnant B?ssemeister) in Schleswig - the 1st Bn (Major Feuring) only being activated on mobilization on August 1st 1939. In Sept.1939, IR26 (Generalmajor Basler) as a part of Heeresgruppe Sud (Generaloberst Gerd von Rundstedt), 8.Armee (General Johannes Blaskowitz), X Armeekorps (General der Artillerie Wilhelm Ulex), the 30th Inf. Div. , led by Generalmajor Kurt von Briesen, saw very heavy action against the cut-off Polish Army in the final stages of the short campaign. After action reports state that with his division stretched to the limits against the counter-attacking Poles, von Briesen personally led his last reserve battalion into the desperate fighting, halting the Poles, but losing his left forearm in the process. Visited in Hospital by Keitel and Hitler, von Briesen was awarded the Knights Cross for his gallantry, and for maintaing the integrity of Blaskowitz's 8.Armee's lines; the first Divisional commander of the war to be thusly awarded. Hereafter, the 30.Infanterie was commonly known as the Briesen Division. The division fought in Belgium in May 1940, and was sent East by June ?41 to be part of X.Armeekorps, Heeresgruppe Nord - the higher formation with which it would stay until the end of the war. It fought at Dvinsk in 1941, and was later encircled, under command of Generalleutnant Emil von Wiekede, for more than a year with II.Armeekorps at Demjansk in January 1942. On 10.12.42 the regiment was amalgamated with IR 6 and renamed Fusilier Regiment 26. In the winter 1942/43 the 2nd Bn was dissolved due to heavy losses and upon being freed from the Demjansk pocket in Feburary ?43, the division fought in the Leningrad Salient, again as part of X.Armeekorps, falling back with the rest of Heeresgruppe Nord through the Baltic states in 1944. On 09.06.44 the 3rd Bn was renamed as the 2nd Bn but in October ?44 the 2nd Bn was again dissolved due to further losses, finally becoming one of the encircled formations of the now re-named Heeresgruppe Kurland of March 1945, fighting in the Kurland Kessel in a defensive role until its eventual surrender after May 9, 1945.

Thank you for any help,

John