Gerhard von Schwerin

Gerhard Helmut Detleff Graf von Schwerin (23 June 1899 – 29 October 1980) was a German General der Panzertruppe during World War II.

World War I Gerhard von Schwerin was born to a Prussian aristocratic family in 1899. His father was a civil official in the Prussian State Government. At the age of 15 he entered the military cadet school at Koslin. Joining the Prussian Army's 2nd Foot Guards Regiment as a Fähnrich (commissioned officer cadet), he subsequently transferred to the 2nd (1st Pomeranian) Grenadier Regiment.

He saw action with the infantry on both the Eastern and Western fronts in 1918 whilst still a teenager, serving as a company commander and battalion adjutant. He was wounded in action on 26 September 1918, and hospitalized until the war's end in November 1918. In 1918 he was awarded the Iron Cross for gallantry in action, both 2nd Class and 1st Class.

Inter-war years Schwerin was discharged from the army in 1920. He spent the following two years engaged in a managerial business apprenticeship with a coffee import firm in Bremen, and a petroleum company in Berlin. In 1922 he rejoined the Reichswehr as a professional soldier, being commissioned with the rank of lieutenant into the Prussian Army's Infantry Regiment No.1. In 1931 he joined Infantry Regiment No.18 in Paderborn. He was promoted to captain in June 1933. From 1933 to 1935 he attended the General Staff course at the Prussian Military Academy in Berlin.

Whilst Schwerin was at the academy the German Chancellor Adolf Hitler seized autocratic governing power in a paramilitary political revolution in Berlin, abolished the Weimar Republic state with the passing into law of the Enabling Act of 1933, and declared an ideological militarist dictatorship described as the Third Reich, fundamentally altering the post-World War political order in Europe.

In October 1938 Schwerin was promoted to the rank of major. At the end of the 1930s he was a staff-officer with Oberkommando des Heeres (Supreme High Command on the German Army).

In January 1939, whilst working at the UK/US intelligence section of the German War Ministry at the German Embassy in London, Schwerin made a clandestine personal approach to the British Government, suggesting that if it abandoned its policy of appeasement towards the Third Reich, and instead moved to a stance of open military opposition towards its escalating aggression in central Europe, this would provide a rallying point and catalyst for elements in the German military who were at that time considering launching a coup d'etat against the National Socialist government of Adolf Hitler. Frank Roberts, an official in the Foreign Office's German Department who also dealt with the issue, light-heartedly - in spite of the risk that Schwerin had taken in making such a move on the eve of war, which would constitute high treason and a capital crime in the Third Reich's jurisdiction if it was discovered - dismissed the subject of Schwerin's approaches as being an internal matter for the German high command. In April 1939 Schwerin was promoted to the rank of lieutenant colonel.

World War II On return to Germany, as the war was declared a few months later in September 1939, which his manoeuvring in London had failed to avert, Schwerin assumed duties as a frontline German military officer, and what followed was an extensive campaign career which took him from fighting in the Low Countries and France to North Africa, Russia to Germany and Italy.

He received command of the 1st Battalion Motorized Infantry Regiment of the Grossdeutschland Division on the war's outbreak, and took part of the invasion and defeat of France in 1940 (elements of troops under his command in this unit committed two massacres of disarmed French Imperial African Senegalese Tirailleurs whom they had captured as prisoners of war during the invasion).

Normandy The 116th Panzer Division started crossing the Seine on 20 July 1944. Schwerin attacked the American positions between Beaucoudroy and Percy, retaking the former town, but failing to take Mont Robin. In effect, the division had difficulty advancing in the Normandy landscape. Schwerin complained "Of the 120 armoured vehicles in this area, only a few managed to form a spearhead along the road. Most of the tanks can't cross this land infested with hedges and brushwood. Long queues form behind them. Precious time is lost. The Panzer IV have proven as luckless as the Panthers because they're too wide for the roads we've taken. They find themselves caught between the narrow and high embankments. All these can't be freed, and can't be deployed." He blamed Hans von Funck for his failure to take Mont Robin.

Operation Luttich

On 4 August, he confronted Raymond O. Barton and Manton S. Eddy near Sourdeval. On 6 August, Schwerin was given the mission of advancing toward Brecey as part of Operation Luttich the following morning, but on 7 August the US 28th Infantry Division attacked the 84th Infantry Division at Gathemo to the right of Schwerin's division. Schwerin, thus exposed to an attack on his right flank, maintained his defensive position, only dedicating half his forces to the mission, a quarter of them after a five-hour delay. On 8 and 9 August, the Allies bombed Sourdeval to cut off Schwerin's supplies. With the failure of the operation, Funck replaced Schwerin.

Personal life Schwerin was married three times. The first marriage was with Herta Kannengiesser; the second was with Julia Zulich, two children resulting: Gabrielle (b. August 1932) and Christian (b. January 1939), two grandsons Alex von Rutenberg and Maximilian zu Sayn Wittgenstein. The last marriage was with Esther Klippel. Schwerin died in 1980.

Awards

Iron Cross (1914) (2nd & 1st Class) Clasp to the Iron Cross (1939) 2nd Class (11 May 1940) 1st Class (19 May 1940) Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords Knight's Cross on 17 January 1942 as Oberst and commander of Infanterie-Regiment 76 (mot.) 240th Oak Leaves on 17 May 1943 as Generalmajor and commander of the 16th Infantry Division 41st Swords on 4 November 1943 as Generalleutnant and commander of the 16th Panzergrenadier Division