Karl Gustav Sauberzweig Bio ???

[Requin Marteau]

Research more info on Karl Gustav Sauberzweig,
SS BRIG FHR and WH Generalleutnant.

Thanks Requin

[Phil Nix]

KARL GUSTAV SAUBERZWEIG
Born 1.9.1899 Wissek Kreis Wirstiz Bezirk Bromberg West Prussia
Joined army 28/9/1916
Beim 2 Brandenberg Gren Reg Nr 12 to 11.1918
Ordnannzoffiziert Gren reg 54 15.5.19 - 7.2.20
Batt Adj Gren Reg 10 to 30.9.20
Zugfuhrer in einem MGK Kp to 1.6.22
Zugfuhrer 3 Kp, Ord Off and Signals Off in Inf Reg 8 to 30.9.30
Lehrgan 3 division berlin 1.10.30 - 1.7.33
Involved in a flying accident March 1932 Fractured skull out of action to 1.7.33
GSO 1 and Tactics Instructor Army Signals School to 30.6.35
Kp Chief Signals Abt 3 then Signals Abt 43 to Summer 1936
Ib XI Army Corps to 1.4.38
Ib XVII Army Corps to 25.9.39
Beim Training abt Generalstaff of the army to 17.12.39
Ia XI Army Corps to 1.6.41
Wounded south east of Dunkirk 1.6.40
Kdr Inf Reg 466 to 18.8.41
Hospitalised after getting sand and granite chips in his eyes19 8.41 lost the sight of his right eye
Kdr Inf reg 306 to 14.1.42
Kdr Inf Ersatz Reg 131 1.5.42 - 1.11.42
Chef des Stabes Heeres Insp Erziehungs-und Ausbildungswesens to 1.8.43
Transferred to the Waffen SS 1.8.43
Kdr kroat 13 SS Freiwilligen Gebirgsdivision "Handschar" to 1.6.44
Komm Gen IX Waffen Gebirgs Armeekorps der SS to 15.11.44
Fuhrerreserve SSFHA to 1.1945
After disputes with Himmler and Hans Juttner transferred back to the army Jan 1945
Gen z.b.V Heeresgruppe H 3.45 - 26. 4. 45
Stellv Komm Gen Generalkommando XVII Armeekorps 26.4.45 to 5,45

RANKS
Fahnenjunker 28.9.16
Lt 25.8.17
Oberlt 1.4.25
Hpt i.G. 1.4.33
Major i.G. 1.10.36
Oberstlt i.G. 1.3.38
Obesrt i.G. 1.2.42
Oberfuhrer der Waffen SS 1.8.43
Bf and Gen Maj der W/SS 1.10.43
Gf and Gen Lt der W/SS 21.6.44
Gen Lt (Army) 1.45
Suicide in prison camp at neuengamme 20.10.1946

[Wilfried Abenaschon]

Hello,
Could anybody tell me if he was the son of a general ?
(A colonel von Sauberzweig was chief of staff of XI A.K. at Cassel just prior to the outbreak of the greit war)
Willab

[Richard Murphy]

According to our own esteemed Mark C. Yerger's Waffen-SS Commanders; Krüger-Zimmermann (p185) Karl was the son of Dr. Joachim Sauberzweig. No metion is made of his fathers military service, but this may help some.

Most of what I have is drawn from either Yerger or Bender & Taylor;

SAUBERZWEIG, Karl Gustav (1/9/99-20/10/46)
A veteran of the First World War and Reichswehr, Leutnant Sauberzweig held several instructor and staff positions during the inter-war period before becoming Ib at XI Korps in the Summer of 1936 and promoted to Major the following Autumn. He was holding the same post at XVII Korps when war broke out in September 1939, but was transfered to the Formation Detachment of the General Staff at OKH after the successful conclusion of Fall Weiss. He returned to operational duties as Ia at XI Korps, he served in France (Where he was wounded at Dunkirk.), but left shortly before Barbarossa was launched in June 1941 to take up command of 466th Infantry Regiment (257th Inf. Div.), which fought in most of H. Gr. Süd ’s major battles across the Ukraine, during which Sauberzweig was again injured (By granite chips in his eyes, causing him to lose the sight in his right eye.) and returned to duty at the begining of October as commander of 306th Infantry Regiment.
Part of 211th Inf. Div, on occupation duty in France, it would appear that he relinquished command at around the same time as they were sent to reinforce H. Gr. Nord during the Winter of 1941/42 and held a number of Instructor and training posts, as well as being promoted to Oberst, until May when he took charge of 131st Infantry Ersatz Regiment in Brünn. He held this post until November, when he returned to the staff of OKH as C.o.S. at the Inspectorate of Formations Staffs.
At the begining of August 1943 he was transfered to the Waffen-SS as an Oberführer and, a few days later, took over command of the 13th (Croatian) SS-Friewilligen-Gerbis Division from Herbert von Obwurzer. The division, which was training in southern France, mutinied soon after his arrival and several German Officers and NCO’s were reportedly killed, as were a number of the mutineers when order was restored. Despite its rebellious nature they continued their training and moved to Silesia during September/October, where their commander was promoted to SS-Brigadefuhrer, and Austria (December) before being sent against Tito’s partisans in Yugoslavia as part of 2nd Panzerarmee, Heersgruppe F in February 1944. As well as setting record desertion rates, the Moslem recruits seemed to spend more time massacring Christian civilians than risking getting shot at by the resistance. Shortly before he handed command over to Desiderius Hampel in June 1944, Sauberzweig’s command was finally re-titled 13th SS-Gerbis Division “Handschar” 1. He then took command of the newly created IX SS Kroatische Gerbiskorps, responsible for control of Handschar and the newly created Kama's operations in the Balkans and was promoted to Gruppenführer shortly afterwards. He was replaced by Karl Pfeffer- Wildenbruch when the Korps was sent north to oppose the Soviet drive into Hungary in mid-December and, after a short spell in hospital (And a reported falling out with Heinrich Himmler.), transfered back to the Heer in mid-January as a Generalleutnant and served on the Staff of Heeresgrupe H until the last days of the war when he is reported to have led an ad-hoc Korps.
He committed suicide whilst under arrest in the Neuengamme prison camp after the war.

(1)Its full official title was 13. Waffen-Gerbis-Division der SS Handschar (Kroatische Nr. 1), but the shortened title that I have used was also used (See Bender & Taylor '72 p136 n8).
[/i]

[Requin Marteau]

Hi, thanks for info.

Foreign Awards ?
Requin

[Mujo]

Does anyone know what he wrote in his unpublished manuscript concerning the Handschar Division?
To my knowledge he never wrote anything negative about it, he always had patience.

Ive been hearing some stuff which is hard to believe

[Michal78]

Photo of him.
Michal

[Michael Miller]

Superb photo, Michal- thanks for sharing it. May I ask the source?

~ Mike

[Michal78]

Hi Mike,
I have found it on Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl-Gustav_Sauberzweig
Best regards,
Michal

[Michael Miller]

Thank you, Michal. That's a pretty decent article- Wikipedia gets slammed a lot, but it's getting better and better, with a lot of well sourced and highly detailed entries.

Best,
~ Mike

[askropp]

Did Sauberzweig retain his SS RDA when he returned to the Heer? At that point, the Heer had also introduced Nazi promotion dates, but a Sonnenwende RDA of a Heer officer would probably be unique.

[BernardO]

Not sure if this is same Sauberzweig. He appears in an account of Rober Baker-Byrne, an SOE-trained German agent parachuted into Germany in April 1945 to organise sabotage in Hamburg. Not finding the pro-British contacts he had been given, he abandoned his mission and made his way to the British troops....

Pt. II Experiences as a PoW.
Agent was taken by his captors to the Battery Commander who forwarded him under escort to the Abteilung, thence to Regimental and finally to Corps H.Q. on the way, the escort met a detachment of retreating SS Troops who wanted to kill him there and then, but were dissuaded from doing so. He was finally brought before the Corps Commander, Lt. Gen. SAUBERZWEIG, who restored his money to him.
No attempt was made to interrogate him properly but as an explanation of his presence, source admitted that he had been dropped by parachute about 40 Km back with the object of handing over some money to a man who was to contact him in a wood, but who did not turn up, and he (source) decided he would exfiltrate to the British lines.
SAUBERZWEIG said agent rather looked like an Abwehr [German military intelligence] Offizier or Fallschirmjager [parachutist]. He accepted source’s statement without question and in a very friendly tone continued, “I promised myself that I should have a heart-to-heart talk with the first British Officer I encountered.” He explained that earlier the same day he had been visited by a British Major who called upon him to surrender, but that he was unable to come to terms then, on account of SS supervision.
He assumed that source had certain “powers to negotiate” (which assumption was not denied) and he suggested that in exchange for a guarantee that he and his family would be left together unharmed and that he would receive early release from P.o.W states as an Indispensible Expert (Unentbehrlicher Sachbearbeiter) he offered: -
(1) To ensure immediately that, so far as possible, LUBECK would not be scorched, and
(2) To surrender a Dossier on political intrigues in the Balkans and another on SS cruelties – the latter referring to the Mihailovitsch [Serb general who led partisan guerrilla forces against Germans] activity in Yugoslavia, and to his personal experiences as L. of C. Commander in the BELSEN area at a time when important transfers were taking place.
SAUBERZWEIG also promised to offer only “token” resistance, to avoid unnecessary bloodshed, but stated that he could not surrender formally before the Front reached BAD BRAMSTEDT where his family was resident under close watch by the Gestapo.
Note: When source again met the General two days afterwards, he was told that immediately after the above mentioned interview he had taken out of the Line one of the Regiments in his Corps, thus ensuring that the British would enter SCHWERIN before the Russians. Apparently he had also made attempts to ignore the orders reaching him from his superiors.
The General continued to be very depressed and asked agent what he should do. Agent offered him the “L” tablet but he thought that whatever the future might hold for him it would be better to live for it.
At this stage, SAUBERZWEIG introduced agent to his aide-de-camp and after a good supper, he (agent) was sent to OFLAG LUBECK, being handed over there to the Abwehr Officer, Hauptmann KLAU, with explicit instructions that no interrogation was to be carried out. This took place at 0300 hours on 1st May, 1945.
On entering the OFLAG, source’s money and the “L” tablet were again taken from him, after he had tipped the Korps Interpreter OFW Willy SCHRODER with $1. The money and the “L” tablet were not returned.
At 1030 hours on 1st May agent was transferred by mistake to MARLAG in LUBECK, where he was seen by a Naval Intelligence Officer who spoke perfect English. He already had before him SAUBERZWEIG’s report …(TNA HS6/680)