german and austrian sources

[teghist]

Does somebody has any german or austrian sources (I am especially interested in regimental histories and monographs and articles on operations) abhout WWI Eastern front?

[robert_sfl]

Hi, I particularly recommend the series "Schlachten des Weltkriegs" published by the Reichsarchiv in the 1920s and 1930s. These are small booklets of aprox. 150 pages, for example the titles "Karpathen u. Dnjesterschlacht 1915", "Die Eroberung von Nowo Georgiewsk", "Die Kämpfe um Baranowitschi Sommer 1916" and others. They usually include maps and unit information.

[John Gilinsky]

If you are in Moscow you MAY be able to see either

a) DBV or German Books in Print which was published from I think the latter 19th. century and which indicated for many years from WWI to the 1950's which German language regimental / units histories focussed on the Eastern Front

Great Britain. War Office Library. "Catalogue - Annual Subject Supplements..." 1912 to 1939. During the war and up to 1939 the annual supplements also indicated which German language unit histories focussed on the Eastern front.

Hope this helps and that you can find these say in the Russian National Library, Moscow University etc....

John (aka Ivan the Nice)

Toronto

[Ken S.]

There's also the "Der große Krieg in Einzeldarstellungen" series published during or shortly after the war by Stalling.

[Paul Hederer]

Does somebody has any german or austrian sources (I am especially interested in regimental histories and monographs and articles on operations) abhout WWI Eastern front?

Hello,

Both of the German and Austro-Hungarian (A-H) official histories cover operations on the Eastern Front, though that may be too broad for your interests. A number of the A-H official history volumes are available in PDF form for free online.

Paul

[bob lembke]

Hello,

Both of the German and Austro-Hungarian (A-H) official histories cover operations on the Eastern Front, though that may be too broad for your interests. A number of the A-H official history volumes are available in PDF form for free online.

Paul

Seconding Paul's suggestion. I recently skimmed through the Reicharchiv series Der Weltkrieg 1914 bis 1918 for mentions of a specific topic in the fighting in the East (the use of German and Austrian super-heavy siege guns on the Eastern Front), and I think that I skimmed thru at least 2000 pages of material on the East front. Despite this great number of pages, the treatment in this source is very broad-brush, as it attempted to cover the entire war. (The volumes covering the last two years of the war, completed during WW II, are almost unavailable, it seems, I have about 110 volumes of different German "Official Histories", and I have never even seen the two Der Weltkrieg volumes on 1917 and 1918, and have heard reports of costs per volume in the thousands of dollars.) The Der Weltkrieg volumes are large and expensive, while the Schlachten ("Battles") series are very focused on specific engagements, only a few are covered, are very detailed, and very inexpensive, sometimes only $6-7 a volume. (This estimated price is from several years ago.)

The Der Grosse Krieg series is roughly like the Schlachten series, and seems to have been published in 1918 by the Great General Staff. Some volumes listed for this series may never have been actually published, due to the end of the war. These are also usually very inexpensive, as well, and also cover specific important engagements.

One advantage of the Schlachten series, written after the war, is that the former General Staff officers picked to write the volumes were often the best possible person for the job. In the volume on the siege of Antwerp the volume was written by the officer who was the First General Staff Officer of the III. Reservekorps, the besieging unit, and for one month also was the Corps' Chief of General Staff when that officer was wounded. (My grand-father was the Id in the Generalkommando of this unit, and directly reported to this author.)

Bob