1171
T. SS - PZ. GREN. REGT. 3
This soldier was a member of the 3rd Panzer Grenadier Division which was formed in September 1943 and consisted of the 103rd Panzer Battalion, 8th Panzer Grenadier Regiment, 29thPanzer Grenadier Regiment, 3rd Motorized Artillery Regiment, 103rd Panzer ReconnaissanceBattalion, 3rd Motorized Engineer Battalion, 3rd Motorized Signal Battalion, 3rd Army Anti-AircraftBattalion, 3rd Panzer Grenadier Divisional Supply Troops
Home Station: Frankfurt-on-the Oder, Wehrkreis III
Originally the 3rd Infantry Division of the peacetime army, this unit was formed in AH’s initialmilitary expansion by the enlargement of the 8th Infantry Regiment of the old Reichswehr. It includedthe 8th, 29th, and 50th Infantry Regiments. The 3rd fought in northern Poland in 1939 and in France in1940. It was reorganized in the fall of 1940, was fully motorized, and had to give up its 50th InfantryRegiment to the 111th Infantry Division. It now included the 8th and 29th Motorized InfantryRegiments, the 3rd Motorized Artillery Regiment, the 53rd Motorcycle Battalion and the 53rdReconnaissance Battalion. It crossed into Russia in 1941 as part of Army Group North, took part inthe initial drive on Leningrad, and fought at Demyansk. Shifted south late in the year, it was involvedin the final thrusts on Moscow and opposed the Russian winter offensive of 1941–42. In March 1942,it was reorganized again. The 53rd Motorcycle and Reconnaissance Battalions were combined, andthe 312th Army Anti-Aircraft Battalion was added to its table of organization. That next summer itwas sent to Army Group South, took part in the Battle of Vyasma, the advance across the Don, thepush to the Volga, and the Stalingrad fighting. It was encircled in the Stalingrad Pocket in November.It surrendered to the Russians in the southern part of the Stalingrad Pocket on January 31, 1943.
A second 3rd Motorized Division was formed in southwestern France in the spring of 1943, by absorbing most of the 386th Motorized Division, a mediocre formation, into a newly formed divisional table of organization. The reborn 3rd Motorized Grenadier, however, included many veterans of the old division (mostly returning wounded) and performed well in combat. Its 103rdPanzer Battalion had forty-two StuG assault guns and six command tanks. On June 23, 1943, it was redesignated a panzer grenadier division, along with all of the German motorized divisions except the14th and 36th. Sent to Italy in June, it opposed the Allied landings at Salerno in September, fought in the Battles of Cassino and the Bernhard Line, opposed the Allied beachhead at Anzio in January 1944, and took part in the retreat to Rome in May and June 1944. Withdrawn to Florence in late June, it was transferred to the Western Front in August and was initially engaged southeast of Paris. The 3rd Panzer Grenadier Division took part in the withdrawal from France, the evacuation of Nancy, and was resisting near Metz, covering the Saar industrial area, in September 1944. Two months later it had been rebuilt to a strength of 12,000 men, thirty-one 75mm anti-tank guns, and thirty-eight artillery pieces, making it a considerable combat force for the fifth year of the war. Sent to Aachen in November, it both suffered and inflicted severe casualties in the battle for that city. Withdrawn briefly to the interior of Germany for rest and reorganization, it was back in action in the Ardennes in December 1944, and fought in the Eifel battles of January 1945. Defending in the vicinity of Cologne in March 1945, it unsuccessfully tried to wipe out the U.S. Army’s bridgehead at Remagen. It wasfinally trapped and destroyed in the Ruhr Pocket in April 1945. It surrendered to the Americans onApril 16.
Commanders of the 3rd Motorized Division included: Colonel/Major General Curt Haase (April 1,1934), Major General/Lieutenant General Walter Petzel (March 7, 1936), Major General/LieutenantGeneral Walther Lichel (November 10, 1938), Lieutenant General Paul Bader (October 1, 1940),Lieutenant General Curt Jahn (May 25, 1941), Major General/Lieutenant General Helmuth Schloemer(April 1, 1942), and Colonel Baron Jobst von Hanstein (January 15, 1943–end). Commanders of the3rd Panzer Grenadier Division included Lieutenant General Fritz-Hubert Graeser (March 1, 1943),Colonel/Major General Hans Hecker (March 1944), Lieutenant General Hans-Guenther von Rost(June 1, 1944), Hecker (returned June 25, 1944), and Major General/Lieutenant General WalterDenkert (October 3, 1944).
