Additionally, to avoid being caught in the artillery preparation, the paratroopers would jump only after the amphibious troops had reached the Rhine's east bank. At nine o'clock in the evening on Sunday, September 17, 1944, Harzer received the order to defeat all the British on the north side of the Lower Rhine with his division. [34], After an hour of extremely intense artillery preparation, which Eisenhower himself viewed from the front, the 30th Infantry Division began its assault. In the British Army, divisions and brigades are referred to as "formations." After attempting to strike a deal whereby he would surrender only to the Western Allies, a proposal that was summarily rejected on 7 May, Dnitz granted his representative, Alfred Jodl, permission to effect a complete surrender on all fronts. The idea was that each Division would have 2 Task Forces , which . [21], As these three army groups cleared out the Wehrmacht west of the Rhine, Eisenhower began to rethink his plans for the final drive across the Rhine and into the heart of Germany. The British Army of the Rhine - Military History - Oxford - obo Still, Allied intelligence could not entirely discount the possibility that remnants of the German forces would attempt a suicidal last stand in the Alps. Forty-nine of these divisions were American, 12 British, eight French, three Canadian and one Polish. [44], In the center of the 12th U.S. Army Group, Hodges' 1st Army faced somewhat stiffer opposition, though it hardly slowed the pace. Captain Murray S. Pulver, commander of Company B, 120th Infantry Regiment, was in his usual placethe thick of the fighting. Contents History 1919-1929 1945-1994 Post 1994 See also During the fighting west of the Rhine up to March 1945, the German Army on the Western Front had been reduced to a strength of only 26 divisions, organized into three army groups (H, B and G). Jonathan Biney - Logistics Supply Specialist (LSS) & Health - LinkedIn [42], The final tally of prisoners taken in the Ruhr reached 325,000, far beyond anything the Americans had anticipated. The initial assault waves crossed the river quickly, meeting only light opposition. Thus, as his forces had approached the east bank of the river, Montgomery proceeded with one of the most intensive buildups of material and manpower of the war. It was administered by the War Office from London, which was subsumed into the Ministry of Defence in 1964. 101st Provost Company, Royal Military Police, 102nd Provost Company, Royal Military Police, JHQ Rheindahlen, 2nd Intelligence Company, Intelligence Corps, JHQ Rheindahlen. In a few days the war in Europe would be over. The British army has never excelled at swift advances, and the Guards Armoured Division mandated to dash for the Rhine was better suited to conduct last-ditch, last-man infantry defensive actions than to emulate General Erwin Rommel's panzers. [28], On 22 March, with a bright moon lighting the late-night sky, elements of U.S. XII Corps' 5th Infantry Division began the 3rd Army's Rhine crossing. 2 Postal and Courier Regiment, Royal Engineers. [23][24], After capturing the Ruhr, Eisenhower planned to have the 21st Army Group continue its drive east across the plains of northern Germany to Berlin. Additional losses in the Rhineland further weakened the German Army, leaving shattered remnants of units to defend the east bank of the Rhine. The British Army is the land warfare branch of the British Armed Forces. The Allied invasion of Germany east of the Rhine started with the Western Allies crossing the river on 22 March 1945 before fanning out and overrunning all of western Germany from the Baltic in the north to the Alpine passes in the south, where they linked up with troops of the U.S. Fifth Army in Italy. Although he declined to increase the size of the American crossing force beyond two divisions, he agreed to keep it under the 9th Army rather than Second Army control. While the U.S. Ninth and First Armies held their ground from Magdeburg through Leipzig to western Czechoslovakia, Eisenhower ordered three Allied field armies (1st French, and the U.S. After taking Coburg, about 50mi (80km) south of Erfurt, on 11 April, XII Corps troops captured Bayreuth, 35mi (56km) farther southeast, on 14 April. Equipped with about 60 tanks, the students put up a fanatical resistance, stalling the American armor all day. 35th Base Workshop, Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers. 256 Mobile Civilian Plant Group, Royal Engineers, 1st Postal & Courier Regiment, Royal Engineers, Hannover, 7th Tank Transporter Regiment, Royal Corps of Transport, Sennelager, 10 Corps Transport Regiment, Royal Corps of Transport, Bielefeld, 24 Transport & Movement Regiment, Royal Corps of Transport, Hanover, 25 Transport & Movement Regiment, Royal Corps of Transport, Bielefeld, 14 Corps Support Squadron, Royal Corps of Transport, Bielefeld. 44th District Workshop, Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers, HQ South-West District & 243 (Southern) Signal Squadron, Royal Signals, Bulford, Permanent Planning Group Joint Force Headquarters, Bulford. At the northern crossing site, elements of British XXX Corps began the assault (Operation Turnscrew) about 21:00, attempting to distract the Germans from the main crossings at Xanten in the center and Rheinberg to the south. The Western Allies rapidly eroded any remaining ability to resist. On the same day, however, Montgomery announced that the eastbound roads out of Wesel would be turned over to the 9th Army on 30 March with the Rhine bridges leading into that city changing hands a day later. Five armies took part in the battle: the armies of Prince Rupert of the Rhine and the Marquis of Newcastle for the Royalists, and the Army of the Covenant, the Earl of Manchester's Eastern Association and Lord Fedinando Fairfax's Northern Association for the Allies. This change will be integrated within broader Defence, national and alliance efforts and enable the Field Army to operate and fight more effectively above and below the threshold of conflict. In addition, since Berlin and the rest of Germany had already been divided into occupation zones by representatives of the Allied governments at the Yalta Conference, Eisenhower saw no political advantage in a race for Berlin. Similarly, the 3rd Army on the 6th U.S. Army Group's left flank had advanced rapidly against very little resistance, its lead elements reaching the river on 24 April. 62 BA/MA, RM 7/102, Hitler's order (signed by Keitel) of 21 March 1945 to the Wehrmacht leadership, 99f; RH 2/334, note from the Commander-in-Chief of the reserve army of 26 March 1945, concerning the transfer of the reserve training units behind the western and eastern fronts, Aktion Leuthen, 27. 34 Evacuation Hospital, Royal Army Medical Corps, 31st District Workshop, Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers, Catterick. This guide will help you find records at The National Archives relating to military operations planned and carried out by the British Army since the end of the Second World War up until. Use the search function to locate the Order of battle by title or file name. BAOR was armed with tactical nuclear weapons and supported by Royal Air Force Germany. The area 1 BR Corps had to defend lay between Hanover to the North and Kassel to the South and extended from the Inner German Border to the Upper Weser Valley. 20th Maritime Regiment, Royal Corps of Transport. [31], By 28 March, the 8th Armored Division had expanded the bridgehead by only about 3mi (4.8km) and still had not reached Dorsten, a town about 15mi (24km) east of the Rhine, whose road junction promised to expand the XVI Corps' offensive options. The Red Army also pushed deep into Hungary (the Budapest Offensive) and eastern Czechoslovakia and temporarily halted at what is now the modern GermanyPoland border on the OderNeisse line. 3rd Base Ammo Depot, Royal Army Ordnance Corps. Army Groups, Armies, Corps and Divisions. Some areas were stoutly defended while in others the enemy surrendered after little more than token resistance. 4th Armoured Division was the corps' Southern forward deployed division. The Army must remain adaptable and evolve as a fighting force. All units within the service are either Regular (full-time) or Territorial Army (part-time), or a combination with sub-units of each type. British Army of the Rhine: The BAOR, 1945-1993 (Cold War 1945-1991 Hong Kong Provost Company & Hong Kong Dog Company, HQ 48th Gurkha Infantry Brigade & 246 Gurkha Signal Squadron, This page was last edited on 12 February 2023, at 22:39. Fire and Fury Games - designers of wargame miniatures rules On 7 March, Hodges's U.S. 1st Army captured the last intact bridge over the Rhine at Remagen and steadily expanded the bridgehead. Field-Marshal Montgomei*y's British 2nd Army has becorfie the phantom force of the Western Front. 4th (NATO) Postal & Courier Regiment, Royal Engineers, Berlin Postal and Courier Troop, Royal Engineers. New book, 264 pages. Instead, the 1st Army struck eastward, heading for Giessen and the Lahn River, 65mi (105km) beyond Remagen, before turning north toward Paderborn and a linkup with the 9th Army. All three corps of the 1st Army participated in the breakout, which on the first day employed five infantry and two armored divisions. With the Soviets at the door of Berlin, the western Allies decided any attempt on their behalf to push that far east would be too costly, concentrating instead on mopping up resistance in the west German cities. Only on 20 April, after breaching the ring of anti-aircraft guns and fighting house-to-house for the city, did its forces take Nuremberg. By the end of 28 March, Hodges' 1st Army had crossed the Lahn, having driven at least 50mi (80km) beyond the original line of departure, capturing thousands of German soldiers in the process. With a strong line of defense on the west side of Arnhem, Harzer orders his troops to clear Arnhem itself first. Lt Gen Jones added: "The Field Army must build on the strong foundation of the 3rd Divisions world class warfighting force. The inventory of the Army Air Corps in 1989 consisted of the following aircraft: Outline of the British Army at the end of the Cold War, Queen Alexandra's Royal Army Nursing Corps. By sending armored spearheads around hotly contested areas, isolating them for reduction by subsequent waves of infantry, Eisenhower's forces maintained their eastward momentum. 40th Army Engineer Support Group, Royal Engineers. Seeing this equipment moving up, his frontline soldiers did not need any orders from higher headquarters to tell them what it meant. RAF Order of Battle 1949 Operation Plunder - Wikipedia [59], In retrospect, very few questionable decisions were made concerning the execution of the campaign.[who?] Under the new concept, Bradley's 12th U.S. Army Group would make the main effort, with Hodges' 1st Army in the center heading east for about 130mi (210km) toward the city of Leipzig and the Elbe River. But, the site and the Forum are not solely for the ex-services community. Curious Myths of the Middle Ages by Sabine Baring-Gould - Complete text His overriding objective was the swiftest military victory possible. Includes a chapter on the creation of the postmodern regimental system between 1945 and 1970 against the backdrop of postwar austerity and the consequent reorganization and amalgamation of many regiments. [2] The Cologne Post was a newspaper published for members of the BAOR during this period. In the south, the 1st Army's III Corps launched its strike on the 5th and the XVIII Airborne Corps joined in on the 6th, both pushing generally northward. . 1997. The General Officer commanding Headquarters Northern Ireland reported directly, operationally, to the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland. 32nd Base Workshop, Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers. During transition to war, the support units of BAOR would have formed the British Rear Combat Zone headquartered in Dsseldorf, which would have supplied the fighting forces and guarded the lines of communication within West Germany. The English Army was founded in 1660, was succeeded in 1707 by the new British Army, incorporating the existing Scottish regiments. GitHub export from English Wikipedia. The BAOR was formerly armed with tactical nuclear weapons. 21st Army Group was then instead ordered to move northeast toward Bremen and Hamburg. british army of the rhine order of battle - Greenlight Insights [58], For their part, captured German soldiers often claimed to be most impressed not by American armor or infantry but by the artillery. At the Battle of Rolia (17 August 1808), the first battle fought by the British army during the Peninsular War, [5] an Anglo-Portuguese army under Sir Arthur Wellesley defeated an outnumbered Imperial French division under General of Division Henri Franois Delaborde, near the village of Rolia in Portugal. [35], To the south, the discovery of a defensive gap in front of the 30th Infantry Division fostered the hope that a full-scale breakout would be possible on 25 March. [6] The Army Department consisted of four components: the General Staff, the Adjutant General's department, which dealt with recruiting, and also had the Provost Marshal (Army), a brigadier, reporting to him, though the RMP headquarters was at Roussillon Barracks, Chichester;[7] the Military Secretary's department, and the Quartermaster General's department. This NATO creation saw the BAOR being placed under its command. First, his headquarters received reports that Soviet forces held a bridgehead over the Oder River, 30 miles (48km) from Berlin. The best introduction to the regimental system of the British army. The British Army of the Rhine (BAOR), which was responsible for the northern portions of the central front in West Germany, had been judged to be capable of holding out for as little as two days. Nazi Germany surrendered unconditionally on 8 May, leaving the western Allies in control of most of Germany. 1st Armoured Division was the corps' Northern forward deployed division. Another seven American divisions arrived during February,[19] along with the British 5th Infantry Division and I Canadian Corps, both of which had arrived from the fighting on the Italian front. Both were originally occupation forces in Germany, one after the First World War and the other after the Second World War. The following is a hierarchical outline for the structure of the British Army in 1989. A British infantryman removes a Nazi flag from a building after crossing into Germany following the river crossing on March 23, 1945 Operation Plunder followed the Allies' victory in the Battle. General Eisenhower's Armies were facing resistance that varied from almost non-existent to fanatical[54] as they advanced toward Berlin, which was located 200km (120mi) from their positions in early April 1945. After passing north of the Lippe on 29 March, the 2nd Armored Division broke out late that night from the forward position that the XVIII Airborne Corps had established around Haltern, 12mi (19km) northeast of Dorsten. If successful, this pincer movement would envelop the industrial Ruhr area, neutralizing the largest concentration of German industrial capacity left. While manpower and force size was limited by budgetary constraints, quality of training and equipment was commonly reported of a high standard. The Allied front along the Rhine stretched 450 miles (720km) from the river's mouth at the North Sea in the Netherlands to the Swiss border in the south. The last date on which the Army did not contain either a Guard's Brigade or Division as an operational unit was in 1920. (see. Botch on the Rhine | Max Hastings | The New York Review of Books
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