click here for our comprehensive guide to General Patton. For a five-day period at the beginning of September, Pattons Third Army remained idle as German forces to their east regrouped and entrenched behind the Moselle. To the north, German infantry launched a determined attack to seize Hill 265, but they could not prevail against entrenched forces with a clear advantage in artillery support. Although his unit was spearheading the attack toward the river, he assumed there would be a pause to get organized for the crossing. Events in the northern sector made it necessary to divert precious fuel and ammunition to British and American units in that sector, which meant that Third Army would have insufficient resources to sustain prolonged offensive action. Because Knobelsdorff had no better luck than Manteuffel against the Americans, Balck returned control of the offensive back to Manteuffel. After two days of hard fighting, the two sides braced for more of the same. But by the time Eddy was ready to resume his advance, Manteuffels Fifth Army had materialized as if out of thin air. Out of the fog on September 22, the remaining tanks of the 111th Panzer Brigade punched like a steel fist through CCAs cavalry screen around Juvelize. Patton told Wood to strike east the following day in the belief that it would keep the Germans off balance. By dawn the Germans had seized the crest of Hill 318. The World War II Database is founded and managed by The Third Army did just that on the night of 22/23 March, crossing the river with a hasty assault south of Mainz at Oppenheim. This kind of came as a surprise, but everything was so well prepared for us, recalled Tucker. The media and public back home were outraged that a general would treat an enlisted man in such a manner. Please refrain from using strong language. This meant that CCA was now on the left flank of the Arracourt-Juvelize salient and CCB was on the right. HistoryOnTheNet 2000-2019. That remained the case in the first months of 1945. The Commanders: The Leadership Journeys of George Patton, Bernard Montgomery, and Erwin Rommel. A week before the Rhine crossing, Patton had held a press conference in which he delivered a classic performance, mixing the humorous, provocative, and the profane. Manteuffels goal, as head of the 5th Panzer Army on the Western Front, was to transform Lunville into a base from which to roll up Third Armys flank on the east bank of the river. As for Patton, he incorrectly dismissed the action as nothing more than another failed local counterattack. The German high command also reinforced the Fifth Panzer Army with Gen. Lt. Wend von Wietersheims 11th Panzer Division. Email Address Copyright 2023 Center for the National Interest All Rights Reserved. While the fighting raged, P-47s flew repeated sorties against Bures, through which the Germans were funneling fresh troops and ammunition into the battle. But the main attacks were made by the bulk of the 80th Division north of Nancy, and by Maj. Gen. Paul Baades 35th Infantry Division south of the city. The Panzergrenadiers methodically fought their way up the southern slope, clearing Americans from their foxholes. When a column of tanks from the 111th Panzer Brigade appeared that morning out of the fog, it was left to the gunners of the 191st Field Artillery Battalion to fight off the attack. The very notion was unpalatable to Old Blood and Guts. Patton would now report to Bradley. The men of the 317th Infantry Regiment managed to cross a bridge left intact and braced themselves for a counterattack. Panzergrenadier formations then swept forward to clear American antitank, machine-gun, and rifle positions. XXX Corps. Maj. Gen. Leroy Irvins 5th Infantry Division pushed across the swollen waters of the flooded Metz River the following day to gain a precarious bridgehead at Dornot, five miles south of Metz. On the day of the deadline, Patton reported to Bradley that the southern wing of Third Army had broken out of its bridgeheads and was in position to continue pushing east. His superior, General Omar Bradley, released news of this crossing to the press "at a time calculated to take some of the luster from the news of Montgomerys crossing." [5] Crossing the Rhine 24 -31 March 1945: C-47 transport planes release hundreds of paratroops and their supplies over the Rees-Wesel area to the east of the Rhine. Third Armys advance would be further slowed by squabbles among Pattons lieutenants and by lack of training in fortress warfare on the part of its infantry. The Hellcats bought precious time for Companies A and B of the 37th Tank Battalion to rumble north from Lezey toward the battlefront. To their surprise, they were not opposed by enemy forces. CROSSING THE RHINE. On the evening of March 22, 1945 General George S. Patton's forces were fronting the last major obstacle to the heart of Germany, the Rhine River. Although the day was cloudy and wet, two squadrons of P-47s from the 405th Fighter Squadron were able to navigate to the area using their cockpit instruments and instructions from ground spotters. Our database is searchable by subject and updated continuously. The crossing began at 2230 hours on 23 March, when the first boats carrying 11th Infantry Regiment troops left the western bank of the Rhine. As Third Army firmly established itself on the east bank of the Moselle at Nancy, capturing not only crossing points but also key crossroads on the east bank, the Germans had to postpone their counterattack several times and continually revise it to adjust to new events. Some 22,000 tons of assault bridging had to be brought forward, including 25,000 wooden pontoons, 2,000 assault boats, 650 Storm boats, 120 River tugs, 80 miles of balloon cable and 260 miles of steel wire rope. The initial counterattacks against Third Armys bridgeheads should have convinced him that the enemy was regaining strength. The Germans gained considerable ground on the morning of September 25, but the attack ground to a halt when the Germans were unable to dislodge CCA units from high ground northeast of Arracourt. Look for the Monument Patton and stop by the General Patton Memorial Museum. This I felt was particularly true against the Germans, because as long as you attack them, they cannot find the time to plan how to attack you, Patton said. The destruction of the 112th Panzer Brigade occurred less than a week after the equally embarrassing debut of the 106th Panzer Brigade on Third Armys northern flank. The flames were transparent orange, rising with startling swiftness. The next morning, elements of the 3rd Panzergrenadier Division overran the bridgehead, killing 300 Americans. "My dear General", Winston Churchill said to the American general as they met the next morning, "the German is whipped. Not content to wait for the infantry, the vanguard of Dagers CCB managed to ford the Moselle at Bayon, where the rivers height was substantially lower because water was diverted to fill canals on each side. 140 kilometers to the north, British Second Army captured Wesel, Germany. Two days earlier, Patton had told Maj. Gen. Manton Eddy that his XII Corps would lead the way. The Germans attacking toward Hill 265 captured several key towns, one of which was Xanrey, a few miles northwest of Arracourt. This was the greatest airborne operation of the war. In late March 1945, Gen. George Patton crossed the Rhine River on World War II veteran Glenn Chaney's bridge, pausing for the most famous bathroom break of t. We began to cautiously filter down through the moonlit streets toward the shingled beach. Nevertheless, Knobelsdorff secured permission from Hitler to use the brigade for a quick strike provided he return it to First Army reserve within 48 hours. Elements of the 4th and 6th Armored Divisions, the latter which had been serving as Third Armys rear guard, and other units began converging on the townin response. The reconstituted Fifth Panzer Army was inserted into Blaskowitzs Army Group G between First Army to the north and the Nineteenth Army to the south. U.S. Army personnel cross the Ludendorff Bridge "CROSS THE RHINE WITH DRY FEET COURTESY OF 9TH ARM'D DIV". Patton arrived in France exactly one month after the D-Day invasion to set up the operational command for Third Army. ww2dbaseBetween Frankfort and the Ruhr River, the American First Army had breached the Rhine River barrier earlier in the month near Remagen. This was because Third Army, and the other Allied armies racing to its north, had stretched their supply lines until they snapped. It was significant to the Allies because it offered a gateway between the Ardennes and Vosges Mountains, through which Allied forces might reach Germany. First, it is aiming to offer interesting For the crossing 8,000 Royal Engineers came under command of the C.E. To order this book, please visit its online sales page atAmazonorBarnes & Noble. All visitor submitted comments are opinions of those making the submissions and do not reflect views of WW2DB. A major firefight developed that resulted in the destruction of seven enemy tanks at the cost of three Shermans. von Florian Weber; Verffentlicht am 1. The German troops knew that the Allied forces were only taking a short time to gather up strength before the invasion into Germany would commence. The gasoline arrived and Pattons men pressed headlong across southern Germany and into Czechoslovakia. (Back in Berlin, Adolf Hitler urged the Wehrmacht to attack the Allied bridgehead at Oppenheim, only to be told that no reserve forces were available to embark on such an operation.) The Germans attacked along the entire line on September 29, and Wietersheim committed his final reserve of 40 tanks to the fight for Hill 318. Using speed to its advantage, Third Army roared across two bridges over the Meuse River on August 31 before German forces could demolish them and slow the American advance. But the Americans stood their ground. As the troops of the French First Army crossed the Rhine River near Speyer, Germany, they became the first French troops to attack across the river since Napoleon Bonaparte. Even Hitlers closest supporters like Heinrich Himmler and Joseph Goebbels could clearly hear the clanging bell. Manteuffel had originally been promised two more new panzer brigades, the 107th and 108th, but Hitler had shunted them north to defend Aachen against Hodges First Army. Seventh Army during the Sicilian campaign ( Operation Husky ), and in August 1944 his Third Army became operational in northern France. ww2dbaseTo cross the Rhine presented the Royal Engineer with many highly technical problems, but experiments and preparations for just such a task had been carried out on the River Ouse, near Goole, since 1943, and orders for specialised equipment needed had been placed with the Ministry of Supply in good time. They did a lot of grumbling.. Most of the forces opposite Pattons Third Army belonged to the German First Army, which was part of General-Colonel Johannes Blaskowitzs Army Group G. Hitler planned to increase the forces opposite Patton to the point that they would be capable of launching a strong counterattack that would rock Third Army back on its heels. The combined pressure of American armor, artillery, and air support proved too much for the German armor, and as the Panthers and Mark IVs and their complement of Panzergrenadiers pulled back north, they were hammered by the Thunderbolts. The day dawned with a thick blanket of fog shrouding the crest of the hill. By the end of 24 Mar 1945, the German airfields were so damaged that the Luftwaffe practically ceased to exist on this front. Instead, he commented, They brought up a row of trucks filled with assault boats. It began with the crossing of the River Rhine in March 1945, with forces fanning out and overrunning all of Western Germany until their final surrender on May 8, 1945. For the Allied high command, the all-out assault across the Rhine was hugely important because crossing the river, the historic boundary of German power in the west, rang the death knell on the lunacy and bestiality of Hitlers Thousand Year Reich. Patton drove to the XII Corps front on September 19, where he met first with Eddy and later with Wood. He did not expect to encounter substantial resistance until he reached the West Wall. To descend the ridge and maneuver against the Panthers would have exposed the Shermans to the Panthers highly effective guns. To their credit, the RAF despatched fifty specialist within twelve hours and promised that a further 300 volunteers good be made available if required. Equally devastating was the loss of both panzer brigade commanders during the two-day assault on CCAs left flank. site is two fold. In addition, Eisenhower and Bradley had decided to transfer Haislips XV Corps to Lt. Gen. Jacob Devers Sixth Army leaving Patton once again with just two corps. He received the Bronze Star and was shot on or about 28 September, 1944. You have made your Army a fighting force that is not excelled in effectiveness by any other of equal size in the world, and I am very proud of the fact that you, as one of the fighting commanders who has been with me from the beginning of the African campaign, have performed so brilliantly throughout. In addition, he ordered the creation of 10 new panzer brigades, numbered 101 to 110, each of which would boast a battalion of approximately 45 Panther tanks. Copyright 2004-2023 Lava Development, LLC., all rights reserved, See all 47 photographs of Crossing the Rhine, Message from George Patton to US 5th Infantry Division. Pattons Third Army found itself mired in a morass as it struggled against fuel shortages, flooded rivers, and fresh German panzer units in September 1944. Still, the 137th Infantry Division that same day managed to establish several small bridgeheads on the eastern bank. The historic city of Metz included an extensive system of man-made fortifications from previous wars. On March 24, 1945, Patton approached a newly constructed pontoon bridge over the Rhine that his troops had placed two nights before and a Third Army division had already crossed. . Control of the crest of Hill 318 shifted back and forth on September 28. Weeks ahead of his rival, British Field Marshal Bernard Law Montgomery, Patton fought his own higher command structure nearly as hard as he did the Germans, making impolitic comments in public, moving farther and more aggressively than ordered, and even having his troops pose as First Army soldiers in order to steal fuel from that units stores in order to maintain their own advance to the east. British sappers built another Rhine bridge, "Blackfriars", by noon. Pattons rapid advance across France came to an abrupt halt at Metz, due to fuel shortages, deteriorating weather conditions, and increased enemy resistance. The attack on the 25th was not substantial enough to disrupt a shuffling of U.S. forces in the Arracourt sector. After some confusion as to the location of their target, which was Maj. Gen. Raymond McLains 90th Division of Walkers XX Corps, the Germans regrouped on the evening of September 7 and advanced after midnight in two columns through the village of Briey toward the American position. The turning point in the battle came when a U.S. artillery observer directed more than 300 howitzer rounds onto a German column lined up on a sunken road in preparation for an assault on the village of Mairy. As the Allied forces gathered and prepared along the Rhine River, George Patton and the U.S. 5 th Division were quietly carrying . Once Third Army reached the West Wall, Patton intended to concentrate his forces to achieve a breach. Eddy planned to isolate Nancy in a double envelopment. Eisenhower (18901969) was chosen in July 1942 to head Operation Torch, the Allied invasion of French North Africa in November 1943. On the banks of the Rhine River the British Royal Corps of Engineers completed the construction of a Class 9 bridge "Waterloo Bridge" at 0100 hours and a Class 15 bridge "Lambeth Bridge" at 0830 hours. Under extremely tough and experienced Parachute and Panzer officers and NCOs new replacements (many dedicated Nazis) had been moulded into a formidable fighting force. Because Haislips corps threatened his left flank, a substantial part of Luttwitzs corps was directed to take up a defensive stance. Second, it is to showcase 20th Century Timeline Of World History: What Happened? Patton began drafting plans for Third Armys advance east toward the Rhine as early as September 14. Although ordered to avoid German forces concentrated at Chateau-Salins, Abrams nevertheless overtook an armored column from the 15th Panzergrenadier Division and, in another stunning attack, captured or destroyed 26 armored vehicles and took 400 prisoners. On Pattons left wing, Walkers XX Corps began probing the Metz defenses on September 7. Patton celebrated the victory by stopping on a treadway bridge his men had built and relieving himself into the river. The crossing of the Rhine between 22 and 28 March 1945 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. On 26 Mar 1945, these troops marched southward toward Patton's troops. Though beaten across the Rhine by Patton's Third Army, Montgomery's meticulous operation shone in its flawless execution. 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