Dawans, Sigismund Hellmut Konrad Alfred Georg Ritter und Edler von.

Dawans, Sigismund Hellmut Konrad Alfred Georg Ritter und Edler von, born on 23-09-1899 in Erfurt, Thüringen, to Georg Ludwig von Dawans and his wife Armgard Freiin von Watzdorff, entered the Army Service on 29-03-1917, age 17, as a Fähnrich in the Replacement Battalion of the 110^th Infantry Regiment, shortly for the outbreak of World War I. He ended the war as a Battalion adjutant in the same Regiment and was discharged to the Reserve on 25-10-1919 and retired on 01-11-1919. He married Ingeborg Hane on 06-04-1923 at Blankensee. Dawans was reactivated in the Army Service on 01-10-1924 and with the outbreak of World War II he was in the General Staff of Border Section Command North until 23-10-1939, under Generalfeldmarsdchall der Infanterie, Georg von Küchler.

  Transferred into the General Staff of the 16^th Army and landed in the Führer Reserve OKH on 28-12-1939. From 13-10-1939 to 01-11-1940, in the 19^th Infantry Division , as a Ia Oberstleutnant, then Chief of Staff in the renewed 19^th Panzer Division, under General der Panzertruppe, Otto von Knobelsdorff,

  until 01-11-1940. Again in the infamous Führer Reserve (see Adolf Hitler) (did you know) from 12-05-1942 to 01-06-1942 and Chief of General Staff of the III Army Corps. For the third time in the Reserve to 15-05-1943, Chief of the General Staff in the 4^th Army, under Generaloberst der Infanterie, Gotthard Heinrici,  to 15-10-1943. On sick leave in the Reserve OKH again, to 05-12-1943. As commander of the Panzer Troops in Normandy France, Generalmajor Sigismund Dawans was killed in battle during the RAF’s attack on Panzer Group West’s headquarters at La Caine,  on 10-06-1944. Aircraft of the Second Tactical Air Force bombed the chateau. Eighteen members of the HQ staff were known to have died in the raid, including the Chief of Staff Generalmajor Sigismund-Helmut von Dawans, the most senior officer to be killed in the raid. The group’s commander, General der Panzertruppe, Leo Geyr Schweppenburg

   was wounded. Although the chateau was not badly damaged, the nearby orchard in which the HQ’s vehicles were parked was thoroughly bombed and communications equipment was destroyed. The HQ was rendered non-operational and withdrawn to Paris. The RAF raid on the I SS Panzer Corps ; Panzergruppe West headquarters at La Caine in Normandy was an attack by the Second Tactical Air Force of the Royal Air Force (RAF).

The destruction the Panzergruppe HQ contributed to the loss of the initiative by the Germans. No German suspicions were aroused about Allied code breaking, because a reconnaissance aircraft had been seen before the raid. The decrypts revealing the whereabouts of Panzergruppe West were the first of a series which exposed the positions of tactically valuable targets, including fuel and ammunition dumps, which were attacked to exacerbate German shortages, also being revealed by Ultra decrypts. Eighteen staff officers of Panzergruppe West were known to have been killed in the raid, including the chief of staff, Dawans, interred in La Cambe German war cemetery; Schweppenburg was wounded. The château was not badly damaged but the nearby orchard, in which the HQ vehicles were parked, was thoroughly bombed and communications equipment was destroyed.

No. 180 Squadron, headed by Wing Commander Lewis Alan Lynn (wing leader of No. 139 Wing), who died died on 18-03-2000, led the formation, escorted by 33 Spitfires; 42 Typhoons took part in the operation, eight were armed with four 20 mm cannon and the other 34 also carried RP-3 rockets (sources vary slightly on the number of aircraft on the operation).

 The Typhoons attacked in two waves thirty minutes apart. The first wave of 17 aircraft from 181 and 247 Squadrons, fired 136 rockets from 2,000 ft (610 m) on the parked vehicles and the château as the Mitchells accurately dropped 536 500 lb (227 kg) bombs on the target

German command of the sector was temporarily given to SS-Obergruppenführer, Joseph “Sepp” Dietrich

and the I SS Panzer Corps . The attack destroyed the only western German Army organization capable of handling a large number of mobile divisions. The appointment of new staff under General der Panzertruppe, Heinrich Karl Eberbach  

 and the preparation of plans for the German armored counter-offensive were delayed by a vital three weeks. The counter-attack never materialized as events overtook the situation, as the British Armored spearhead headed towards Caen.

     Known throughout France as the Village des Martyrs—“Village of Martyrs,”—the pillaged remains of Oradour-sur-Glane have stood nearly eight decades now as a memorial to the dead and reminder of the atrocities of war. Everything has been kept as it was on June 10, 1944 when some 642 men, women and children were shot and burned to death. The places of execution and other points of significance where the nearly 600 unidentifiable bodies were found, are respectfully signposted.

Marguerite Rouffanche, 46 the only surviver, her two daughters and grandson, were among the 250 women and 200 children packed into the church as a group of young men in SS uniforms  carried a heavy box and placed it in front of the high altar. Soon after the men locked the front door, the box exploded with an almighty roar, shooting debris throughout the church. It blew out the stained-glass windows and filled the sanctuary with suffocating smoke.

Another victim of the attack was Major Hugo Burgsthaler, here with Generaloberst Heinz Guderian

   who found his grave with General Dawans

  

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