V Army Corps (V. Armeekorps) was a corps in the German Army during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

Commanders

* Infantry General (''General der Infanterie'') Hermann Geyer, 16 May 1935 – 30 April 1939 * Infantry General (''General der Infanterie'') Richard Ruoff, 1 May 1939 – 12 January 1942 * Infantry General (''General der Infanterie'') Wilhelm Wetzel, 12 January 1942 – 1 July 1943 * Infantry General (''General der Infanterie'') Karl Allmendinger, 1 July 1943 – 1 May 1944 * Lieutenant-General (''Generalleutnant'') Hermann Böhme, 1 May 1944 – 4 May 1944 * Lieutenant-General (''Generalleutnant'')

Friedrich-Wilhelm Müller __NOTOC__ Friedrich-Wilhelm Müller (29 August 1897 – 20 May 1947) was a general in the Wehrmacht of Nazi Germany during World War II. He led an infantry regiment in the early stages of the war and by 1943 was commander of the 22nd Air Landing ...

, 4 May 1944 – 2 June 1944 * Infantry General (''General der Infanterie'') Dr. Franz Beyer, 2 June 1944 – 19 July 1944 * Artillery General (''General der Artillerie'') Dr. Ing. Kurt Wäger, 26 January 1945 – 8 May 1945

First formation

The V corps was formed a

Corps Corps (; plural ''corps'' ; from French , from the Latin "body") is a term used for several different kinds of organization. A military innovation by Napoleon I, the formation was first named as such in 1805. The size of a corps varies great ...

level formation of the 17th Army assigned to

Army Group South Army Group South (german: Heeresgruppe Süd) was the name of three German Army Groups during World War II. It was first used in the 1939 September Campaign, along with Army Group North to invade Poland. In the invasion of Poland Army Group So ...

. By 1943, the deteriorating situation on the Eastern Front forced the evacuation of the V corps along with the rest of 17th army to the

Crimea Crimea, crh, Къырым, Qırım, grc, Κιμμερία / Ταυρική, translit=Kimmería / Taurikḗ ( ) is a peninsula in Ukraine, on the northern coast of the Black Sea, that has been occupied by Russia since 2014. It has a pop ...

. However,

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army ( Russian: Рабо́че-крестья́нская Кра́сная армия),) often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and, afte ...

advances in the Dnieper Campaign forced more and more divisions to be diverted to the newly reconstituted 6th Army in an ultimately unsuccessful attempt to stem the onslaught. By October 1943, the whole of 17th army order of battle consisted of just two German and four Romanian divisions, all of which were under strength. During the course of the

Crimean Offensive The Crimean offensive (8 April – 12 May 1944), known in German sources as the Battle of the Crimea, was a series of offensives by the Red Army directed at the German-held Crimea. The Red Army's 4th Ukrainian Front engaged the German 17th Army ...

, the Red Army captured the Peninsula and marched the remnants of 17th army, including most of the V Corps, into captivity.

Second formation

In January 1945 a new V Army Corps was set up in Military District XIII, for which remnants of the staff of the 221st Security Division and the 20th Luftwaffe Storm Division were used, and deployed in the area of the

4th Panzer Army The 4th Panzer Army (german: 4. Panzerarmee) (operating as Panzer Group 4 (german: 4. Panzergruppe) from its formation on 15 February 1941 to 1 January 1942, when it was redesignated as a full army) was a German panzer formation during World War ...

. On April 19, the V Corps with the

35th Military units *35th Fighter Wing, an air combat unit of the United States Air Force *35th Infantry Division (United States), a formation of the National Guard since World War I *35th Infantry Regiment (United States), a regiment created on 1 July 1 ...

and 36th SS Grenadier Divisions and the 275th and 342nd Infantry Divisions, were subordinated to the 9th Army, which was surrounded by the Red Army.
When on April 28, General Busse ordered the 9th Army to break out of the Halbe pocket, the V Army Corps organized the protection of the southern flank. The Corps suffered heavy casualties and the survivors went into western captivity by crossing the destroyed Elbe bridge at

Tangermünde Tangermünde (; nds, Tangermünn) is a historic town on the Elbe River in the district of Stendal, in the northeastern part of Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. Geography Tangermünde is situated in the historic Altmark region of the North German Plain ...

Area of operations

* Western Front - September 1939 - May 1940 *

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

- May 1940 - June 1941 * Eastern Front, southern sector - June 1941 - May 1944 *

- May 1944 - July 1944 (bulk destroyed in May 1944; command disbanded in July 1944)Tessin, p. 284. * Eastern Front - January 1945 - April 1945; command reestablished and then destroyed in the Halbe Pocket in April 1945

Notes

* Georg Tessin. ''Verbände und Truppen der deutschen Wehrmacht und Waffen-SS 1939-1945.'' Volume 2. Osnabrück: Biblio Verlag, 1973

External links