PzLdr History Facts

[PzLdr]

He was born in Ohio, but by the mid-1850s, he was living on the Kansas- Missouri border. He'd been a schoolteacher, a teamster, and a criminal. And with the coming of the Civil War, he became a Southern guerilla, a 'Bushwhacker', with a commission as a Confederate Captain under the Confederacy's Partisan Ranger Act. His name was William Clarke Quantrill, and he would be the most infamous of as bloody a bunch of murderers, thieves and scoundrels as ever sat a horse.

Quantrill had lived in Kansas and Missouri, but it seems a stint as a teamster with Albert Sidney Johnston's campaign against the Mormons in 1858, and led him into the orbit of pro-slavery Missourians. And Quantrill demonstrated that allegiance by organizing Unionist 'Jayhawker' raids on Missouri slave holders, and then betraying the Unionists to their putative victims. With the outbreak of the Civil War, Quantrill joined the [pro-Confederate] Missouri State Guard, and when the Unioist forces triumphed, he took to the bush and became a guerilla.

The Border war was the most vicious combat in the entire Civil War. At first, it appears Quantrill attempted to follow the rules, paroling prisoners, etc. But the union Army refused to treat guerillas, most with no recognizable uniform, as legitimate soldiers. they executed the ones they caught. Quantrill caught on quickly, as did the rest of the Bushwhackers, and the Black Flag was soon out. Atrocities on both sides mounted, and the Union commander, Ewing [Sherman's brother-in-law] quickly applied more and more stringent policies to deprive the rebel guerillas of their support. One of those actions was tyo arrest female relatives of known guerillas and imprison them in a hotel in Kansas City. the hotel partially collapsed , injuring one of Cole Younger's sisters, and killing another. Another woman killed was the sister of William "Bloody Bill" Anderson. The guerillas were outraged and called for blood. Quantrill answered the call.

Quantrill was not the Supremo of the Missouri guerillas, but he was primus inter pares. So when he called a meeting of the various bands, the Who's Who of the guerilla forces showed up. They included Dave Poole, Anderson, George Todd [Quantrill's first Lieutenant, and such rank and file as Frank James. Cole Younger, and Little Archie Clements. What Quantrill proposed both stunned and enthralled them.

Quantrill saw the capitol of Kansas, Lawrence, as the root of all evil. It was the home of U.S. Senator James Lane, a leading Jayhawker, and a hotbed of abolition. Quantrill had lived their before the war. He now proposed to raid it, burn it, and kill all the men and boys over 12. To do that required crossing a somewhat fortified and patrolled border, and an approach march of some 50 miles through Union territory. Despite that, Quantrill assembled a force of some 400 men for the operation [about 350 guerillas, and some 50 Confederate troops, who did NOT engage in any of the atrocities on August 21st.

Quantrill led his force out of the woods along the Little Blue River, and riding mostly at night, with impressed guides from the local population, arrived at Mount Ouriat outside Lawrence on the morning of the 21st. Leaving lookouts to scan for potential U.S troops, Quantrill handed out death lists, and dividing his raiders into groups, led the guerillas into town. One of the first casualties was a minister milking his cow.

The guerillas shot every man and teenaged boy they found, but aside from that their behavior varied widely. Some helped women move furniture and possessions out of houses they were about to burn. Some spare boys. In other cases, while no woman was harmed, no mercy or consideration was shown.

Jim Lane escaped capture, hiding in a corn field. "Red Leg" Jennison wasn't found. But approximately 162 of Lawrence's male population weren't so lucky. They were all murdered, with special efforts being made to kill Lawrence's free blacks. Most of the town was burned down by the time Quantrill left in late morning. An ineffective pursuit failed to close with his main body before they melted back into the Missouri woods. Quantrill lost only one man, a raider so drunk he failed to hear the recall order, and who was ripped limb from limb by the Lawrence survivors and relief troops.

Quantrill added to his success by attacking a Union trop column near Baxter Springs on his way south to winter in Texas. Although he failed to kill or capture the Union general riding with the column, the carnage he wreaked was substantial. And the bodies showed mutilations and scalping [Anderson].

Texas proved Quantrill's undoing. The Confederate authorities, having been apprised of Lawrence, and seeing scalps on Anderson's horse's bridle, were less than pleased to see them. They became even less pleased when Anderson's men began robbing Texans. Quantrill was ordered to arrest Anderson. Anderson refused to be arrested and rode away. He never served under Quantrill again [he did serve with him, briefly, in 1864]. Then George Todd faced Quantrill down over a card game, and took control of Quantrill's band. When he rode north in the Spring of 1864, Quantrill had only 6 followers [Frank James and Cole Younger had joined the regular Confederate Army after Lawrence].

Quantrill spent most of 1864 laying low with his bride or common law wife or mistress [take your pick]. He did participate in the ambush of the Union pursuit force after the Centralia massacre [Anderson], and he joined in an attack on a brick block house in a Union held town he counseled against, after being outvoted by Todd and Anderson. He then seemed to vanish.

By 1865, much had changed. Anderson was dead, killed in an ambush, and his head put on a pole. Todd was killed fighting alongside regular Confederate units led by Jo Shelby. Little Archie Clements had been shot dead in his home town by Union troops. Quantrill decided to break east to Virginia, perhaps to try and lose himself in Lee's Army. He got as far as Kentucky. Caught by a Union guerilla force in a barn, Quantrill was mortally wounded and paralyzed trying to escape [Frank James did get away]. Taken to a hospital Quantrill converted to Catholicism on his deathbed. And it would seem the life and times of William Clarke Quantrill were over. Except they weren't. Quantrill's skull was found in an Ohio college fraternity house in the 1960s. It was buried with military honors by the Sons of the Confederacy shortly after.

Quantrill, of all the bushwhackers, is the only one to still fascinate over a century and a half after his death [the James brothers and Cole Younger excepted]. He has been the subject of, or a major character in, at least five movies, from 1940's "Dark Command" to the recent Ang Lee film "Ride with the Devil". There are at least five or more biographies of him [See: "The Devil Knows How To Ride"]. The question is why. One reason is Quantrill did have military talent. He was a master of guerilla tactics [the James Boys robbed banks with them for 15 years]. Another was he was extremely vicious in a very vicious war. The combination makes for an interesting study.

Quantrill cast a very long shadow over the Border War. In many ways, he still does.

[apples]

Thank you PzLdr! I never knew of the atrocities on both sides. Again very good reading!

[PzLdr]

Adolf Hitler hated many things about the Versailles Treaty. But one of the things he hated most was the "War Guilt" clause that laid sole responsibility for the war on Imperial Germany.  that, however, didn't stop Hitler from announcing to his senior commanders in 1937 that they had to be ready for war before 1942 [when Hitler thought Germany would have lost its early rearmament advantage], and trying to start a war over:[a] Austria], the Sudetenland, and [c] the rest of Czechoslavakia.

By 1939, several things occurred that made war inevitable. First, by occupying the rest of Czech [non-German] lands, Hitler had lost his 'return to the Reich' fig leaf, and the gullibility of the leaders of France and Britain. Second, Britain and France then guaranteed the independence of Poland. Third, Poland declined a junior partnership in the Axis in return for Danzig, the Polish Corridor and free passage for German troops to attack the USSR. Fourth, Hitler signed a non-aggression Pact with Stalin, secretly divvying up Poland and the Baltic States. Hitler was now free to attack Poland.

But that war guilt clause nagged at him. He wanted the war, but he also wanted a plausible excuse for his actions. Enter Reinhard Heydrich and his boss, Reichsfuehrer  SS Heinrich Himmler.

Heydrich was head of the SS Security Police, the Sicherheitsdienst [SD] and the Sicherpolitzei [the Security Police], an amalgam of the Kriminalpolitzei [Criminal Police] and the Geheime Staats Politizei [Secret State Police - Gestapo for short], as well as being head of Interpol for 1939-1940. Heydrich decided to fake an attack, with SD personnel on a radio station in Gleiwitz, while it was on the air. A Polish speaking officer would then take over the microphone, and yell threats in Polish. Gunshots would be fired, and a dummy rescue force would eventually appear and drive the 'Poles' away.

To add a touch of realism, Heydrich altered the basic plan with "Operation Canned Meat". Admiral Canaris' Abwehr was required to furnish a complete Polish uniform. SS Gruppenfuehrer Heinrich 'Gestapo' Mueller furnished a corpse, newly executed by lethal injection, from one of the camps. The corpse, then shot, was left outside the radio station.

It was bad theater, but Hitler didn't care. When he spoke to the Reichstag on 1 SEP., he spoke in terms of "returning fire" and responding to the Polish attack. He had his excuse, even as his Wehrmacht engaged the Poles from three sides.

Eventually, after the founding of the Reichssicherheithauptamt [the RSHA], Heydrich had a model of the radio station and its surroundings built on a table in the lobby, which he would show visitors while mournfully declaiming that "this was how the war started". And considering where he was making that statement, he was telling the absolute truth.

[PzLdr]

By 1939, reality on the ground was coming into synchronicity with Hitler's world view. Austria and Czechoslavakia were his. So was the port of Memel. Only Poland stood between Germany and the Lebensraum Hitler intended to add to the Reich - the western USSR. And Hitler prepared to act.

Initially, the Germans had tried diplomacy. They gave Poland a piece of the now dismembered Czechoslavakia. They offered Poland a junior partnership in the Axis, provided the Poles gave Germany back Danzig and the Polish Corridor, either given to Poland as part of the Versailles Treaty [the Corridor], or put under Poland's governance as a League of Nations trustee [Danzig]. The Poles refused.

Then, after Hitler gobbled up the rest of Czechoslavakia, Britain issued a guarantee of Polish sovereignty, dragging France along with her, and signed an alliance. the Poles dug in their heels.

Britain and France thought the German Army would act as a brake on Hitler, since the concept of zweifruntenkrieg [two front war] was anathema to them. And to further bolster their own position, the British and French began to woo the wild card in the deck, Stalin, with a view toward a collective defensive pact against Germany. The problem proved to be the Poles. The Soviets had posed such an arrangement back in 1938, during the Sudeten crisis, but it foundered on the Poles' refusal to allow Soviet troops transit over their territory to Czech lands. The Poles were in less of a mood to allow Soviets into Poland now [As the foreign minister said, "with the Germans we lose our lives, with the Russians, our souls"], especially with their Franco-British guarantee. Still, at a somewhat leisurely pace [they traveled by boat], a fairly low level group of diplomats and military officers traveled to Moscow for a series of talks with Voroshilov and the Soviet government. While that dragged on, Hitler's foreign minister, Von Ribbentrop flew to Moscow to begin talks with Stalin and Molotov. The result was the Nazi-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact of 1939. On its surface it was all the usual. But the attached Secret Protocols were another whole ball of wax. Hitler and Stalin agreed to carve up Poland, and the Baltic States. Poland was to be divided. The two front war was off [until 1941].

Poland was in a very bad position. Her military was outnumbered and outclassed by a better trained, better armed enemy. That enemy surrounded her on three sides, north: East Prussia; west: The Reich; and south: The Czech mountains. Topographically, except for those mountains, Poland's major defense lines were dependent on rivers. Poland was basically as flat as a pool table.

Despite this, the initial Polish war plans called for the concentration of their troops in some five army groups on the border [with a reserve]; the intent being not only to hold ALL Polish territory, but to counterattack into Germany. Not only did Poland put the bulk of their troops into the jaws of their enemy, they positioned them almost down their throat.

The Germans were organized into two Army Groups. AG North [Fedor von Bock] consisted of the 3rd Army [von Kuechler] in East Prussia, and the 4th Army [von Kluge] in Western Pomerania. Attached to the 4th Army was the XIXth Panzer Corps [Guderian], which was intended to cut the Corridor, move into East Prussia, and then southeast toward Brest-Litovsk. AG South [Gerd von Rundstedt] included the 8th Army [Blaskowitz], 10th Army [Reichenau], and 14th Army [von List]. Rundstedt also had Kleist's Panzer Corps. His task was to engage and encircle the bulk of the Polish forces, split them, drive on Warsaw, and drive east with the 14th Army.

The Germans deployed the bulk of their Army, some 44 infantry divisions, 5 Panzer Divisions, 5 'light' divisions [an amalgam of Panzer, horse cavalry and mechanized infantry, two Waffen SS units, and three air fleets of the Luftwaffe against Poland [as well as the pre-Dreadnaught battleship SCHLESWIG-HOLSTEIN]. The West was held by some 10 divisions, and one air fleet, with no armor [they did have the Siegfried Line].

First blood went to the Luftwaffe, bombing a city near the border, and then expanding its attacks to airfields, troop headquarters and communication hubs. This was particularly disastrous because the Poles had stopped their initial mobilization at the urgings of France, and the replacement depots, brimming with recruits were hit.

At almost the same time, SCHLESWIG-HOLSTEIN opened fire on the Westerplatte fortress in Danzig. Despite that bombardment, and sustained German infantry attacks, the Poles put up a courageous defense that lasted over a week.

The rest of the first few days did not go well for the Poles. Guderiasn sliced the corridor, crossed into East Prussia and began to drive deep into the Polish rear. Kleist split two of the Polish Army groups, and followed by 10th Army, headed for Warsaw [the 4th Panzer reached the suburbs of Warsaw in a week, but was driven out by Polish infantry. The 14th Army drove east, swinging towards the northeast. Kuechler crossed the Narew river and drive south. The Germans were in the midst of creating a concentric double envelopment.

Then, at the Bzura River, the Poles counterattacked, driving back elements of Blaskowitz's  8th Army. At first the Poles made excellent progress, attacking out of a forest. But Rundstedt recalled elements of 10th Army, not only reinforcing Blaskowitz, but creating an encirclement [Kluge sent troops from the north]. Then the Luftwaffe pounded the Poles from the air. Within a short time, the Poles broke. Those that failed to break through German lines and retreat to the East were captured.

By now the Polish Army fell back, in some disorder, behind the Vistula River; to wait for the Autumn rains to turn the roads into quagmires, and for the British and French to attack from the west, causing the Germans to redeploy to the West, and to relieve the pressure on the Poles. Neither the rains, nor the Allies ever came to the rescue. It was the driest Fall in memory. And aside from a 1/2 mile penetration near Strasbourg, followed by a fairly rapid retreat, the French did nothing [the British did less].

By now the Germans had closed their inner ring around Warsaw, and their outer ring around Brest-Litovsk. the concentric double envelopment was a done deal. And then the other shoe dropped.

On September 17th, in accord with the Secret Protocols of the Non-Aggression Pact, the Red Army invaded Eastern Poland. The Poles were now faced with a two front war, one they couldn't win. The government fled to Romania [as did what Polish troops that could].Warsaw held out to the end of the month, under an air and artillery bombardment viewd by Hitler himself. Thorn fell a few days later. On October the 5th, Hitler viewed a victory parade in Warsaw. The Russians were rounding up military POWs and political prisoners by the boxcar. Heydrich's SS Einsatzkommandos, who had followed the German Army into Poland continued the slaughter of priests, intellectuals, political leaders and Jews they had started right after the invasion [German Army units also participated in war crimes]. For Poland, a long night of repression and subjugation had begun.

And the short term result? The Germans annexed the Corridor, Danzig and western Poland. A southern 'rump', became the 'Government General' under Hans Frank, and German Poland became the home to the death camps of the Holocaust. The Polish government eventually fled to London, still an ally. That alliance was eventually betrayed by the British, after the discovery of some 4,000 corpses of Polish officers at Katyn Forest, near Smolensk, by the Germans. They had been shot by Stain's NKVD. When the Poles demanded a neutral investigation, the Reds broke relations with them. And Churchill chose Stalin over the Poles. And since, as Nathan Bedford Forrest used to say, "Git thar fustest with the mostest", the Red Army got to Poland first [and Allowed the Germans to liquidate the Home Army for them Poland, whose freedom and independence were the casus belli for the Franco-British declaration of war on the Reich, disappeared behind the Iron Curtain until the dissolution of the Soviet Empire.

[PzLdr]

It was the third great battle in the Western Theater of the Civil War. It was also the bloodiest. And when it was over, the North had suffered a tactical defeat, and Braxton Bragg snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.

By early September, 1863, William Rosecrans had, largely by clever maneuver, levered the Confederate forces out of Chattanooga, Tennessee. He then gathered his army, some 60,000 strong, and began a new series of maneuvers to force Bragg's Army of Tennessee, out of the southern portion of the state. But Bragg wanted Chattanooga back, and calling for reinforcements, he began marching north to do just that.

Braxton Bragg had been a legend in the pre-war U.S. Army. He was acerbic, rigid, and thick headed. One classic Bragg story involved the occasion when, as the supply officer of an Army post temporarily in command of the post while the C.O was on leave, he submitted a requisition to himself, and denied the request. But his early Civil War showed promise. Assigned to Florida, he performed well, and was very good at training troops, sort of liker a George B. McClellan in gray. But like McClellan, he would prove to be a failure on the battlefield of epic proportions.

Bragg was eventually assigned command of the South's principal army in the West, the Army of Tennessee. The original commander, Albert Sidney Johnson, was killed at Shilo [or Pittsburg Landing, take your pick]. His deputy, Gen. Pierre Beauregard [the officer who fired on Sumter] was hated by Jefferson Davis with a passion, so he was removed. Bragg, on the other hand, was a favorite, so he got the command.

The battle started on September 18th, when elements of Bragg's Army, both infantry and cavalry, made contact with Rosecrans' men near Chickamauga Creek. By the next day, both armies were heavily engaged.

At first Bragg's attacks on the 19th bore little fruit. Then two things occurred that changed everything at almost the same instant on the 20th. First, Rosecrans was erroneously informed that there was a gap in his line, so he ordered a troop shift to cover it. At almost exactly the same moment as the troops began shifting, the lead elements of the First Corps, Army of Northern Virginia [LTG James Longstreet] marched straight from the railheads where they were unloading straight into battle, and straight into the now open gap vacated by the Federal troops that had been moved by Rosecrans order.

The rebels immediately blew through the Union lines, and drove deep. Rosecrans and a third of his Army were swept from the filed, and fell back toward Chattanooga. But then Longstreet's men [he was commanding the left of Bragg's Army, Leonidas Polk the right], ran into George Thomas, his division, and hastily organized refugees from the wreckage of the field, on a strongly held hill. Thomas held. And Longstreet, calling for reinforcements, now became acquainted with Bragg the Equivacator. No reinforcements came. Longstreet was unable to strategically take advantage of his tactical victory. Bragg refused to move quickly, despite the advice of Longstreet, Forrest, and his own officers. And by the time he did move, the Union forces in Chattanooga had been reinforced [by among others, George Thomas who had withdrawn from the field in good order on the night of the 20th]. Bragg chose to occupy the high ground around Chattanooga and lay siege to it. An epic tactical victory had been thrown away.

Bragg was eventually driven off the heights by the new Union Commander, U.S Grant. His Army was driven out of Tennessee into Georgia. When it returned, in late 1864, under John Bell Hood, it was again met by the redoubtable George Thomas, "The Rock of Chickamauga", it was virtually annihilated in the battle of Nashville [Thomas was THE only Civil War General to accomplish this feat], fled back to northern Georgia and virtually disbanded [it would reconstitute under Joe Johnston, and finish the war in North Carolina - a long way from the glimmer of glory of Chickamauga.

[PzLdr]

Two of the interesting features of the Nuremburg Trials were: Soviet Judges on the Tribunal, and the Court's refusal to countenance the admission, as a defense exhibit, of the Secret Protocols of the 1939 Nazi-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact. Both relate to the first potential charge faced by the many of the defendants [including Goering, Keitel, Raeder, Jodl, etc.] - Plotting to wage aggressive warfare. And the Court's action was understandable from the point of view that one of the parties judging, the Soviets were, by any reasonable standard, guilty of the offense for which the Germans faced execution. [In fairness to the Russians, the British kept any reference to their plans for Norway out of the trial, when Raeder was indicted for the same planning].

This messy conundrum originated, of course, in August, 1939, when as a run up to Case White, and to keep his generals quiet, Adolf Hitler, first through backchannels, and then through written correspondence, sought to improve relations with his ideological prime enemy, Communist Russia. And, surprisingly, the Soviets were receptive [actually, they were dickering with both sides].

Britain and France were trying to get Stalin to ally with them and Poland, in the hope of backing Hitler off from offensive action against Poland. the major problem was the Poles, who refused to countenance Soviet troops on their soil. [In 1938, the Poles had refused to a collective security arrangement for Czechoslavakia which  provided for the passage of Soviet troops through Poland to that country]. Still, a middle to low level delegation of British and French diplomats and military officers traveled by steamship to the U.S.S.R where they engaged in dilatory and non-specific negotiations with Klim Voroshilov, the Soviet Defense Minister, a hack of the first water, and Stalin's toad.

At the same time [in less than a week], Hitler had sent his foreign minister, Joachim von Ribbentropp, by plane to Moscow for talks with the foreign minister, Molotov, and eventually, with Stalin himself. The upshot was the Nazi-Soviet Nonaggression Pact, with both sides pledging cooperation, better trade relations, and all the usual. But as with any agreement, the devil is in the details, and the details in this pact were the Devil himself.

The pact had a list of 'Secret Protocols', along with a map, marked up and initialed, which divided Eastern Europe between the Germans and the Soviets. Poland was to be divided between Germany and the U.S.S.R.. The Baltic States, after some further talks, went to Stalin. The Polish plum was now ripe for the picking.

Germany invaded Poland on September 1, 1939. While the Poles resisted as best they could [see the Battle of the Bzura River], they were simply overwhelmed. the Germans executed a concentric double envelopment, with the inner pincers closing on Warsaw, and the outer pincers closing near the Polish-Soviet border at Brest -Litovsk.

At first the Poles fell back toward the eastern part of the country where they could, inasmuch as that was where their reserves were located. then, on September 17th, Soviet units surged over the border at multiple points, heading west, ostensibly to protect 'western Ukrainians'. The Poles, having no chance, collapsed in short order. Those that could, along with the Polish government, fled to neutral Romania, and from there on to Britain. Those that couldn't flee were captured, either by the Germans, or the Russians. German units, like Guderian's XIXth Corps, which had taken Brest-Litovsk, were forced to withdraw to the west, in conformance with the new demarcation line. Poland surrendered by the end of the month.

The Soviets immediately began shipping Poles east, including some 22,000 captured officers. most of them were killed by the NKVD in the spring of 1940. The Poles discovered by the Germans at Katyn in 1943 were some of these 'irredeemable anti-Soviets'. They also Sovietized their zone, and imprisoned or shot thousands. they also brought to the new border, by NKVD train, hundreds of German Communists and Jewish refugees they turned over to the Gestapo.

And it all happened in 1939. And never saw the light of day at the Nuremburg Trials.

[PzLdr]

By the beginning of October, 1941, the German Army was laying siege to Leningrad, having sealed off the overland route to the city by taking Schusselburg, and was driving, in the south, on Rostov on the Don, after taking Kharkov and Kursk in the aftermath of the Kiev encirclement.

Guderian's newly re-christened Second Panzerarmee had re-deployed to the southern wing of Army Group Center after their march south. And the question was, "What next"? The answer was the answer to the prayers of Field Marshal Brauchitsch, C in C of the German Army, and his Chief of Staff, Colonel General Fritz Halder - Operation Typhun [Typhoon] - an all out attack on Moscow.

It had been an article of faith for the pair that Moscow was the Holy Grail of the entire German invasion of the U.S.S.R. Despite Hitler's directives that the Donbass, Ukraine and Leningrad district were to be Barbarossa's primary objectives, they had configured the attacking forces to the greatest force facing the center part of the line - and pointed at Moscow. Both men had vociferously opposed the drive on Kiev  in August, arguing that the Russians had almost no reserves before Moscow, and conversely that a drive on Moscow would draw in the Soviet reserves to defend the capitol. Both ignored the three hundred mile open right flank of Army Group Center, and the fact that Army Group South had largely been  unable to force the Dnieper, nor take Kiev.

But now, Hitler slipped their leash, and Fedor von Bock was ordered to take Moscow. And for the operation, the number of units under his command increased. In addition to Fourth Army, Ninth Army, Second Army, Second Panzer Army and Third Panzer Army, he got Fourth Panzer Army [from Army Group North]. But tellingly, he had less troops and tanks from when he had started the campaign in June. In the three months since Barbarossa opened, the Germans had suffered horrific losses, on a scale they had not seen before in the war. Plus, equipment was wearing, or was already worn out, the supply system was in chaos, and winter was coming. What the Germans DID have [still] was operational and tactical superiority. And they used that initially to devastating advantage.

TYPHUN opened with a thunderclap, the twin encirclements of  Vyazma and Bryansk. With Guderian on the south and Hoth and Hoeppner on the north, the Germans bagged over half a million prisoners. Panic seized Moscow. There was looting on a grand scale. On October 16th, the Soviet government [but not Stalin] and the diplomatic corps moved to Kubiyshev. Martial law was declared, and the NKVD secured the city. And the Red Army scraped up whatever reserves to plug the holes.

As the Germans advanced east, the Rasputyiva [rains] hit. The German advance slowed to a crawl, then largely stopped. Supplies, which had a difficult time reaching the front in the best of circumstances, had even more trouble because of the mud. Eventually, by late October, the Germans waited, hoping for frost, and hard ground to maneuver on. They had forgotten about being careful what you wish for. But the temperature dropped, the ground froze, and the advance resumed.

On November 7th, Stalin took the parade celebrating the anniversary of the Revolution from atop the Kremlin. The troops marched straight  from the parade to the front. But by November 7th, the Germans were in deep trouble. And it was getting deeper. Neithefr Hitler, nor his generals had thought that BARBAROSSA would take more than 8 weeks. Supply, often more of an afterthought than part of planning in the German Army, had made no provision for winter uniforms for the troops. Among other things, that meant the Germans were going into combat in hobnailed jackboots. The leather didn't block the cold. The hobnails conducted it. Aside from their service caps, the only headgear the troops had were their helmets. Their steel helmets. Again, a cold conductor. And it was VERY cold. And getting colder. It would eventually fall to in excess of -20 degrees centigrade. Additionally, the Germans failed to send hydraulic fluid, grease and motor oil that could perform in the low temperatures. As a result, fires had to be lit under tank engines to turn them over. German machineguns seized up [as did the artillery. Luftwaffe aircraft were largely unable to get off the ground. And yet the Germans drove on. Until they hit the wall.

The first sign of trouble was Guderian's failure to take Tula [which was expected to be the opening move of sweep to Moscow's rear from the southeast. Reinhardt [replacing a newly promoted Hermann Hoth] and Hoeppner, drove on Moscow from the northwest. And were halted. An engineer unit of the Fourth Army got close enough [some 12 miles] from Moscow to see the Kremlin. And then that other orphan of the German General Staff, poor intelligence, kicked in. Two fresh armies, from the Far East, composed of Siberians, and others equipped and trained for winter fighting, opened an offensive in front of Moscow on December 5th. The Germans never knew they were there until they attacked. They were there because Stalin's ace spy [in Tokyo], Richard Sorge was able to tell him the Japanese were NOT going to join in the war on the U.S.S.R.  The German attack, already stalled, fell apart.

Army Group Center began falling back on December 6th. Army Group South had already withdrawn from Rostov to the Mius at the end of November. Hitler ordered 'no retreat'. That order, at that time, in that situation probably saved the German Army [Soviet-read Stalin's-ineptitude helped]. But it set a bad precedent for the future. On December 11th, Hitler declared war on the United States. With three more weeks, he had relieved all three Army Group Commanders, and Guderian and Hoeppner. Brauchitsch retired on health grounds, and Hitler made himself Commander in Chief of the German Army. The Wehrmacht's myth of invincibility was shattered. Moscow was saved. And the Typhoon had blown itself out as a ragged little zephyr.

[apples]

Thank you! Love reading these.

[apples]

Wow....once again didn't know any of this. Thank you!

[PzLdr]

If ever there was a case where a plan got a life of it's own, it occurred in September, 1944, in the Netherlands. The plan was MARKET-GARDEN. It's creator was Field Marshal Bernard Law Montgomery of El Alamein fame, commander of the 21st Allied Army Group, egotist and perpetual thorn in the side of one Dwight David Eisenhower, Commanding General of the Allied Expeditionary Forces in Europe.

Montgomery had just come off one of his usuals, a victory that really wasn't. Her had finally captured Antwerp from the Germans, a port facility desperately needed by the Allies to shorten their overlong supply lines. The Allies were still bringing their supplies in from Normandy and Cherbourg, in large part because the Germans either still held the channel ports the Allies needed, or had wrecked them to a fare the well before surrendering them. But having taken Antwerp, Monty forgot to drive the German 15th Army out of the Schedlt estuary, which was the ONLY way into Antwerp from the sea. So, no gain. to say Ike was displeased, would be putting it mildly. On top of that Monty was again pushing for: [a] being named 'Ground Commander' of all Allied forces in Northwestern Europe, and Eisenhower's agreement to Monty's pet 'narrow thrust' scheme [with Monty doing the thrusting, at the logistical and reinforcement expense of the U.S Army Groups].

Montgomery proposed a very aggressive and daring operation [which used in a sentence with Monty's name constitutes an oxymoron]. He proposed laying an airborne carpet of airborne troops from the U.S 82d and 101st airborne divisions, the Polish Parachute brigade and the 1st British Airborne, to seize a series of bridges from the Dutch border to the German border, with British  XXX Corps to drive overland over the seized bridges to debauch into the German plain north of the Ruhr. The plan was hatched in a wildly short period of time, without any input from the Dutch [who knew the country], nor anyone else.

And then the stars came into alignment. Ike said 'Yes' [he had an airborne army laying around that had undertaken no major operations since D-Day. The airborne army commander, Berenton was for it, and so was his British deputy, Gen. 'Boy" Browning, who was salivating for the opportunity to command an airborne Corps in an operation.

But there were flies in the ointment. There weren't enough planes and gliders to drop all the paratroopers in one go. The unit tasked with taking the furthest bridge, Arnheim, was to be dropped several miles from the objective. The German Army,which had been disintegrating in August, had pulled itself together by the middle of September. And then there were those pesky intelligence reports fro the Dutch underground about Arnheim, i.e, the reports of German armor, SS armor in the vicinity of the city. Those reports were accompanied by photos. But, by now, the plan had a life of its own. Monty's single thrust depended on the plan. Browning's desire to lead a Corps in combat depended on the plan. So the intelligence and the photos were discounted or disregarded. MARKET-GARDEN was a go..

The SS units near Arnheim were the remnants of the II SS Panzer Corps, comprising the 9th SS Panzer Division HOHENSTAUFFEN, and THE 10TH SS Panzer Division FRUNDSBURG, commanded by SS Obergruppenfuehrer [LTG] Wilhelm 'Willi' Bittrich. Bittrich had served in both the German Army, and the Luftwaffe before joining the SS. A skilled general, he was not one of Himmler's favorites. He allowed chaplains with his units. He vociferously denounced the punishment of Army General Erich Hoeppner [Bittrich's former commander on the Eastern front, and a participant in the 2oth of July plot] so loudly that Himmler ordered him back to Berlin for 'consultation'. But Bittrich's superiors, including the commander of Army Group B, Field Marshal Model, refused to send Bittrich back, citing military necessity. they probably saved his life.

Model's headquarters was also near Arnheim [unknown to the Allies]. and when paratroopers began raining down from the sky. Model thought they were coming for him. And then when presented with a complete set of plans, found on a dead British officer in a crashed glider, he refused to believe them. But Bittrich, assuming the bridges were the objective put the 9th SS in motion for Eindhoven and Nijmegen, and the 10th to Arnheim.

The U.S airborne landings were much closer to their bridges, and despite heavy fighting at several, the bridges were secure. At Eindoven, the Americans crossed the river in canvas boats  and assaulted from both sides. At Nijmegen, the Germans' explosive charges failed to 'blow'. But at Arnheim, only one battalion, commanded by LTC John Frost reached the bridge.On top of that the  Divisional commander, MG Urquart started off at the drop zone with radios that failed to operate. He then proceeded into town and was trapped [temporarily], by the oncoming Germans.

In addition to the units of the 10th SS, ann SS detachment, Kampfgruppe Kraft showed up, as did several Army units. In addition to heavily armed infantry, the British, with no anti-tank capability, found themselves facing German armored vehicles [half-tracks, jadgpanzers, assault guns and tanks], but eventually TIGER Is.

Frost, holding one end of the bridge, held off the reconnaissance battalion of the SS Division, but found himself cut off from the rest of his division, eventually surrounded, and eventually, out of ammo.

The airborne was supposed to hold the bridge for two days. They held over three. But the GARDEN end of MARKET-GARDEN, the ground attack of XXX Corps [Horrocks, GC] got nowhere fast. First they were advancing up what was basically one road in inhospitable terrain. Second, Von Zangen's 15th Army [or what was left of it], having been driven ut of the Scheldt Estuary was no sitting on Horrocks' left flank. And every chance they got, which was frequently, they ambushed the column [spearheaded by the Irish Guards], and cut the road behind the advance. It slowed to a crawl. Finally, just short of Arnheim, Horrocks ran into a blocking force of battalion strength TIGER tanks. GARDEN was done.

All that was left to do was get the remnants of the British 1st Airborne back over the river. The Polish airborne brigade, originally earmarked for a second drop into Arnheim [it was cancelled when the Allies realized the supplies they were dropping in were dropping to the Germans], landed on the south side, crossed into Arnheim, and evacuated what they could. Market-Garden had failed. The British alone lost over 7,000 men, killed or captured. The Dutch, who had celebrated their freedom before it actually occurred suffered the "Hunger Winter" as a result of German retaliation [one of the victims was Audrey Hepburn]. The Allies liberated South Holland, but the Germans held the rest.

MARKET-GARDEN was the result of hubris, slipshod and overly quick planning, and a refusal to consider anything that might, to a rational mind, scream "STOP".  

[PzLdr]

As the South's hopes dwindled in the Summer and early Fall of 1864, General Stirling Price led a raid into Missouri with Southern militia and various bands of 'Bushwhackers' [southern guerillas]. Some of these rode with and scouted for price, among them George Todd, Quantrill's successor, and his band. Others operated independently, seeking to disrupt Union supply and communications. One such band was led by William 'Bloody Bill' Anderson.

Anderson had been involved in the Border War between Missouri and Kansas BEFORE the Civil War. His father had been killed by Unionists. When the war broke out, Anderson was an early and dedicated "Bushwhacker". He rose steadily through the ranks, and by 1863, he was one of Quantrill's lieutenants, leading his own band of cutthroats. Anderson was at Lawrence, and participated fully in the slaughter of the 162 men and boys murdered there. For Anderson, it was personal. His sister had died as a captive in a hotel collapse while being held by the Union. The event may have caused a psychotic break, because from Lawrence onward, Anderson earned the sobriquet, "Bloody Bill". He not only killed people, he mutilated ther corpses. His horse's bridle was festooned with human scalps. Even other guerillas steered clear of him if they could help it. In the winter of 1864, Anderson's depredations in Texas caused the Confederate authorities to order Quantrill to arrest he and his men. Facing Quantrill down, Anderson rode away. While they cooperated on occasion in 1864, Anderson never served under him again.

On September, 27th, 1864, Anderson and 80 men rode into Centralia, Missouri, with the avowed purpose of wrecking the railroad. They first raided the town, then blocked the tracks. Anderson was in a foul mood. His operations that summer had mostly failed, with losses he could not sustain over the long haul. And then the train showed up.

The Engineer , seeing many of Anderson's men in blue jackets, thought they were Union troops until it was too late. The train stopped, the raiders boarded it. Among the almost 200 passengers were 24 Union soldiers going on leave from Sherman's Army. They were separated from the other passengers, made to strip off their uniforms, and kneel on the tracks. A query from Anderson for an officer led to a sergeant offering himself up for what he assumed was his death. He was wrong. Anderson was looking for a prisoner of some import to swap for one of his men. The sergeant was that prisoner [he escaped ten days later].

But the other 23 were not so fortunate. As they knelt on the tracks, at least two of the rebels walked down the line , shooting them individually. One of the killers was identified as Little Archie Clements. The other was reputedly a 16 year old who had recently joined the band. His name was Jesse Woodson James.

After the murders, Anderson and his men destroyed the depot, set the train on fire, and sent it down the line, and left. Within an hour, a force of some 100 mounted Federal infantry arrived in Centralia, then struck Anderson's trail, and rode off in hot pursuit. Anderson was waiting for them down the road, with reinforcements consisting of Quantrill's band, and those of several other guerilla chieftains. Armed with single shot muzzle loaders, the Union troops never had a chance. After their single volley, they were ridden down in a charge by the guerillas, who favored the revolver, and carried as many as eight each. According to Frank James later, his brother killed the Union commander. Almost all the Union troops were killed before the Rebels moved off. Several, at least, had been scalped.

Centralia was, for want of a more appropriate phrase, Anderson's high water mark. With two moths, he was dead, killed in an ambush by Union troops, his head mounted on a pole. Little Archie Clements was killed riding into his home town, which was swarming with Union troops near the end of the war [he served as the model for Pitt Mackeson in Ang Lee's "Ride With the Devil]. Jesse James went on to a life of crime that ended in 1881. In 1869, during a bank robbery, he murdered one of the clerks because he thought he was the man who had killed Anderson.

[PzLdr]

By 9 AD, the Romans had carved a potential new province on the east bank of the Rhine. In fact they had established a presence up to the Elbe River. They did so in the usual way - military conquest and diplomatic alliances with some of the local tribes and leaders. But, according to the archaeologists, their presence and success was much greater than had been thought, with modern excavations revealing greater numbers of Romanized German settlements, and a more extensive road network than had previously been thought. Augustus Caesar had every reason to be pleased. And then it all changed, almost in a proverbial day.

The man appointed to govern Germany was one Marcus Quinctilius Varus. He was no newbie to the game, having previously held governorships, and praetorships elsewhere. Admired by the Senate for his perceived toughness, Varus was vain, greedy, and not  particularly  known for his military abilities. He was known for squeezing the last sesterce out of subject peoples with a vengeance, and, perhaps, a more than occasional overage for himself [in addition to bribes, etc.].

In the autumn of 9 AD, Varus prepared to move his military force toward the Rhine and winter encampment. His army consisted of three legions, the XVIIth, XVIIIth, AND XIXth, plus German auxiliary cavalry commanded by one Arminius [or Hermann], a Cherusci noble, who had lived as a child in Rome as a hostage, grown to manhood there, been awarded Roman citizenship, and membership in the Equestrian order. He had also served with the Roman Army in Pannonia. He was a man Varus trusted, and whose counsel Varus apparently listened to. Big mistake.

As Varus prepared to move west, Arminius brought word of a tribal rebellion to the northwest. Either on his own, or at Arminius' suggestion, Varus decided to deal with the matter on the way to winter quarters, despite warnings from Arminius' father-in-law, Segestes, that Arminius was the leader in an inter-tribal plot against Rome, and that he was going to betray the Romans. With Arminius' cavalry leading the three legions marched off.

But it was not a military formation of three legion. Since it was an operation undertaken on the way to winter quarters, all the Army's supply wagons, and their camp followers were included in the line of march, which spread out over several miles. And then the Romans reached the Teutoburg Forest. Heavily wooded, damp, with bad weather on them, the Romans were restricted to a single track. To make any progress they marched in loose columns. Significantly they were not formed up in their unit formations. Arminius, having fought for the Romans, and understanding their tactics, had chosen his ground well. Fully aware his men could not stand up to the Romans in open battle in open terrain, he made the terrain his ally. And galloping away on reconnaissance, he and his men were never seen by the Romans again.

The attack started at the rear of the column. Using thrown spears, axes, and arrows, German tribesmen first softened up, then began to charge into, then retreat from the Romans. Unable to form up in their close order formations the Romans [and the civilians with them]took heavy losses. The attacks then moved up the line of march, the Germans content to attack the weakest portions of the line of march. By the end of the first day, trapped in a forest they had no familiarity with [absent the German scouts], and with numerous dead and wounded, the Romans laagered up for the night. They also burned a good deal of the supply column.

The second day went much as the first, although now a cold, heavy, steady rain was added to the mix. On the second night, the Romans built a crude defensive wall out of what remained of their cartage, and placed their wounded within the perimeter. They then launched a night attack in an effort to break out, and continued up the track free, albeit temporarily, of the Germans on their flank.

It all ended on the third day. The Romans emerged from the deep forest onto a strip of open land. to their left was low, swampy ground. To the right, the terrain rose. And on that terrain were crude walls of interwoven branches and uprights dug into the ground. And behind those walls were Germans. Lots of Germans. Roman efforts to assault uphill were failures. By now the troops were too few, and exhausted. And at that point Arminius' forces charged downhill. It was soon over.

The three legions were largely annihilated [the survivors could be counted on the fingers of some four hands]. Varus killed himself [bad form for a Roman general on an active battlefield. Centurions and officers captured alive were sacrificed in a grove near the battle site. Roman bodies were decapitated and left strewn along the ground [skulls were found by a Roman punitive expedition nailed to trees three years later]. The Germans then followed up by destroying the Roman presence east of the Rhine, wiping out Roman vexillations, destroying Roman forts and towns. Roman occupation of Germany was over.

That is not to say the Romans never came back. They did, on three separate occasions. But those occasions were punishment raids, against the tribes that had participated in Arminius' conspiracy. And they were very successful. Aside from annihilating several of the tribes involved, the Romans recovered two of the three legionary eagles lost in the battle [the third was recovered 32 years later], and captured Arminius' wife, who remained a Roman prisoner the rest of her life. They also, on the third expedition, brought Arminius to battle on open ground. His defeat was catastrophic. He was never again to make war with the Romans, choosing instead to war on his fellow Germans. With apparent designs on kinghood over a German confederation, he was eventually murdered by some of his own followers.

It was believed that the Teutoburg massacre hastened the death of the 70 something Augustus Caesar, already in ill health. Augustus let his beard grow for several months, and was reputed to bang his hands on the walls yelling, "Quinctilius Varus! Give me back my legions!".

The Romans lost in excess of 15,000 troops at Teutoburg [the number of camp followers is unknown]. That constituted 10% of the entire Roman Army. The three legions were never re-constituted [one was, temporarily by Nero, but disbanded by Vespasian]. And the Germans won their freedom, but remained largely cut off from the benefits of civilization for the rest of the roman Empire's time in the West.

   

[PzLdr]

It was, by any standard, a brilliant and highly successful operation. The first Blitzkrieg of modern times, it forever changed the face of war in the modern era. Along with the capture of Atlanta, it saved Lincoln's presidency. And it did more to break the Confederacy than anything else in 1864.

It began as a result of one Lieutenant William T. Sherman's travels in Georgia and the deep South in the aftermath of the Seminole War. Sherman traveled extensively, mapping the area for his own entertainment [he had finished first in his class at the Point in art]. As he later put it, he knew Georgia better than the Confederates and Georgians did. It came to fruition during the occupation of Atlanta [post 21 SEP 1864]. And it was dictated, in part, by the actions of Sherman's opponent, Confederate General John Bell Hood.

Hood was still in the vicinity of Atlanta, after it fell to Sherman. Since Hood felt compelled to do something [read 'anything'] after shooting his own army to pieces in five separate battles in front of Atlanta earlier, and since he was in no position to do anything offensively, he decided to sideslip the Union Army, fall on its supply line, and cause Sherman to abandon Atlanta and follow him around [eventually to Tennessee]. That was the plan. the result was something entirely different.

With Hood having voluntarily gotten out of his way, Georgia lay basically undefended [except for some small units and Wheeler's cavalry] before him, Sherman conceived of his March to the Sea. First, he pared down his Army. He sent Gen. George Thomas, with@ 60,000 men to deal with Hood [at the battle of Nashville, Thomas would destroy Hood's Army, the only Civil War general to accomplish such a feat]. Sherman then pared down the rest of his troops, taking only the fittest, some 62,000 with him. Using census maps and other data, Sherman plotted his march to travel through the most agriculturally rich counties, as well as those areas with the most important infrastructure [read railroads, factories, mills, etc. Sherman then divided his army into two columns, and set out to make "Georgia howl". His orders, and intent were clear. The Army was to either seize, or destroy any material and contraband useful to the Southern war effort. Foragers, called 'bummers' would be sent out each day by individual brigades to seize any foodstuffs available. The Army was to live off the land. Railroads were to be torn up and the rails burned on bonfires, and then bent around poles , the so-called Sherman's neckties [for an example see the destruction of Newton's Station in the film , "The Horse Soldiers"]. Cotton was to be burned, as well as any fodder or food usable to the Confederate forces. Civilians were not to be molested.

Sherman then moved in such a way as to have two potential objectives at each stage of the March, causing the Confederates to either stretch their already overstretched forces to cover both, or to leave one uncovered. And except for one 'battle' early on, against some Georgia militia who suffered heavy losses, the March was accompanied by cavalry skirmishing, but little else.

For most of the March, Sherman 'disappeared' from the screen as it were. Although the Richmond government was aware , to some degree, where he was, and what he was doing, Lincoln was almost in the dark about where the western Army was.

And then, around December 10th, Sherman appeared outside Savannah. Linking up with the Union Navy, he quickly closed on the city. The 10,000 defenders under Frank Cheatham fled. The city was surrendered by the Mayor, and Sherman, by telegram, presented it to Lincoln as a Christmas present, and "fairly won". By Spring, Sherman marched north into South Carolina, birthplace of Secession, followed by his invasion of North Carolina, where he was when the war ended.

Sherman's March largely broke the South will to fight. Aside from the damage he inflicted [some 300 miles of railroad torn up, devastation to food crops, factories, etc.], Sherman showed the civilian population that Union forces could go anywhere they wanted, with impunity, in the Deep South, and that the Confederacy couldn't protect them. Desertions by Georgian, and later Carolinian troops from Lee's Army of Northern Virginia increased significantly. Lee himself now faced Grant with Sherman coming up in his rear.

The March to the Sea was, with Vicksburg, one of the two most brilliant and significant campaigns of the Civil War. The March to the Sea was the first campaign of what might be termed 'modern war'. It marked Sherman as one of, if not the, most brilliant generals in American history.

[apples]

Thank you PzLdr!

[PzLdr]

It's origins are Celtic. It started as Samhain [pronounced Sah-wain], the Celtic night of the Dead, and it noted what was then the Celtic New Year, which took place at harvest time.

At that time, the Celts would drive their livestock herds into the village, to determine which were healthy enough for next season, and which would be culled, for an end year feast [or preserved and prepared for the winter]. The animals would be driven between two bonfires at the village gate, to prevent any demons hiding among them from getting into the village [interestingly, the Mongols had a similar custom, and required anyone entering the Ger of the Great Khan to walk between two fires].

But Samhain was also the time the Celts thought the fabric between this life and the afterlife, and the spirit world was at its thinnest. they believed their ancestors could, and would return to visit their families. So like the Mexicans on the Day of the Dead, they would put out food for the ancestors during the feast. And if they had to go abroad themselves, they would disguise themselves to fool demons and evil spirits that had also crossed over that night.

The early Catholic Church used co-option as a tool to win converts, and make it easier for their adaption into the Faith. Thus, Christ's birthday was celebrated in December, instead of the probable month of his birth [either April or May], in order to coopt Roman Saturnalia and the Pagan celebration of the Winter Solstice. And the Church targeted Samhain with two observances of its own, one on November 1st, making October 31st [the settled date for Samhain, "All Hallows Eve", eventually, Halloween. But Halloween refused to "die", and is still going strong [second only to Christmas]. And it is the last Pagan holiday celebrated , in any sense, today [although there seems to be some obscure and/or forgotten relationship between the Hare that represented the Celtic Goddess of fertility and the Easter Bunny].

And the Samhain customs? The bonfires became Jack 'O Lanterns, lit to protect the home from demons. The plates for the ancestors became the 'treats' of 'Trick or Treat'. And the disguises used to protect one abroad on Samhain from the spirits walking the Earth morphed into the Halloween costumes we see today. So, 'HAPPY SAMHAIN'!