Langermann und Erlencamp, Willibald Karl Moritz Robert Rudolf Freiherr von.

Langermann und Erlencamp, Willibald Karl Moritz Robert Rudolf Freiherr von, born 29-03-1890 in Karlsruhe , joined the 5^th Dragoon Regiment of the Imperial German Army  in 1910 and in World War I he reached the rank of Hauptmann. Nazi Germany started almost immediately with rearmament. The scope of the Reichswehr was limited to 100,000 men by the provisions of Versailles. It had no tanks, no air force and barely any ships. Six years later, at the outbreak of hostilities, the Wehrmacht had 3.5 million soldiers, 9,000 cannon, 2,500 tanks, 2,300 aircraft, 57 submarines and 45 surface vessels. Willibald was then retained in the Reichswehr  where he served as a staff officer and was appointed commander of Cavalry Regiment 4 in 1935. He was promoted to Oberst in 1936 and in 1938 he was appointed as the inspector of horses and motor transport. On 01-03-1940 he was promoted to Generalmajor and on 07-05-1940 he was commander of the 29^th  Infantry Division, nicknamed “Falcon Division”   . The division was destroyed by the British in northern Italy just before the end of the war. For successfully crossing the Marne-Rhine Canal and advancing to the Swiss border he was awarded the Knight’s Cross of the Iron Cross on 15-08-1940. In September 1940 he was given command of the 4^th  Panzer Division,  which he led at opening stages of Operation Barbarossa. They were destroyed by the Soviet offensive of April–May 1945. In January 1942 he was promoted to Generalleutnant and Commanding General of the XXIV Panzer Corps, succeeded by General Otto von Knobelsdorff  and von Langermann led the German advance on Voronezh. On 17-02-1942 he was awarded the Oak Leaves to the Knights Cross  and on 01-06-1942 was promoted to General der Panzertruppe. After the Order of Merit on 17-02-1942 was a long man Hitler (who had given him the Order) silently stand and left the room. Taken to task by Rudolf Schmundt,

    chief aide to Adolf Hitler, he said: ‘If he does not even have as much tact to tell me the death of my only son a word, I want nothing to do with him.’ His only son was killed in action in 1942. He was married with Ermgard von Eschwege.

Death and burial ground of Langermann und Erlencamp, Willibald Karl Moritz Robert Rudolf Freiherr von

During the summer 1942 offensive von Langermann led the corps to the Don River  in Russia and he died 03-10-1942, age 52,  in an air attack near Storshewoje, during a visit of the front

, he was General-in-Command of 24^th Motorized Corps attacking Stalingrad. He was buried Kharkov German War Cemetery Kurochkina Gora, 1, Karkov, on 06-10-1942.

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