Very similar to the Italian episode of 1918 in France, Austria-Hungary sent several divisions to help her Central Power ally Germany in the last summer of the Great War.  Unlike the Italians, there are no monuments or military cemeteries marking their presence on the battlefields.  The only evidence of their participation is a lonely memorial and the few graves left behind in several German military cemeteries.  You must look closely to find them.

BACKGROUND

World War 1 was the final end to the Hapsburg Empire stretching back 645 years.  Over the ebbs and flows of the years, the empire finally made its fatal decision declaring war in 1914 on Serbia and the Russian Empire.  Many had been declaring the Empire dead or dying for many years before.  A war fought on two fronts destroyed the professional Austro-Hungarian army in the summer of 1914 with a winter campaign of 1914-1915 simply putting an exclamation point on the matter. 

Somehow, the Empire survived the first few years of war, going from two to four fronts.  By the winter of 1917-1918, Austria-Hungary had survived while Russia, Romania, Serbia, and Montenegro had not.  Even Italy had been pushed to the ropes with the Caporetto Offensive in the fall of 1917.  But there were a host of other enemies waiting in the wings – Britain, France and finally, the United States.

the erstwhile friend

By the winter of 1917-1918, Austria-Hungary lived on only with the extravagant help, militarily of the German Empire.  Germany had been there to help save the Hapsburg forces on multiple occasions on the East Front, the Romanian Front and the Italian Front.  While the two nations fought side-by-side, their war goals were far apart.  Austria-Hungary had “won” by the end of 1917.  The Germans, however, had not.  Germany, by this time, was no longer under the control of the Hohenzollern family, but by the military autocracy with Paul Hindenburg as the father figure and Erich Ludendorff as the big kahuna behind the curtains.

Austria-Hungary entered World War 1 fighting alongside Germany, but autonomously.  After defeat after defeat and then being bailed out by the Germans, Austria slipped further and further into the position of a beholden ally, with Germany looking to improve its economic power over Europe, as a whole.  The Austrians did not like the situation, but the weakness of their army forced them to acquiesce.  Germany provided six divisions and a host of military expertise during the 12^th Isonzo which pushed Italy to the brink of defeat, one of the true goals of the Hapsburgs.  But goals of Austria-Hungary were not shared by Germany.  The amount of help was just enough to keep Austria-Hungary in the game, but with Italy on the edge of defeat, German troops were recalled to the Western Front.

DECISIONS

German high command decided with the fall of Russia, a decision needed to be reached on the Western Front in 1918 before American forces could find their way to France irrevocably turning the tables.  There were ideas of bringing Austro-Hungarian forces to the west, as well, but the low opinion of Hapsburg troops along with Austrian hopes for another offensive against the Italians in 1918 led that idea to be a non-starter.  German command thought the Austrians were better off fighting their offensive in Italy, hoping that would pin more Allied troops down south while German offensives tore through the West.

The huge gamble made by Ludendorff in the spring of 1918 failed.  A lot of ground was won, but at a huge cost.  Over a million German casualties resulted from the multiple offensives launched.  By June 1918, Germany was no longer capable of massive offensive action, just as American numbers started to weigh in on the matter.  The call for Austrian troops to help in the west took on another timbre.

italy first

Italy had sent a corps of troops to France in response to the massive beating the Allies had taken in defending the German spring offensives.  With those offensives stopped, it was now time to make good German losses in any way possible.  One of those avenues was to bring in Hapsburg troops.

Austria-Hungary tried to put off the decision first by launching their own spring offensive across the Piave River.  That offensive went nowhere, only demonstrating the further decline of the Hapsburg armies after the horrible winter of 1917-1918.  Events within the empire worsened with strikes and shortages of everything.  On top of a bad situation, Emperor Karl was shown to be a cad in seeking a separate peace from her German ally through the Sixtus Affair.  An inconclusive offensive, internal problems galore and the need to get back on the good side of their ally led the Austrians and the emperor to finally release Austrian divisions to serve in the west.

WEST IS BEST?

Germany requested six divisions to help make up for the losses of the 1918 spring.  Eventually, four came, with only two making it into the front lines in France, the 1^st K. u. K. (Köngliche und Kaiserliche – Royal and Imperial) and the 35^th K. u. K. Infantry Divisions along with a corps command, the 18^th Korpskommando led by Feldmarschalleutnant  – FML – Ludwig Goiginger.  They arrived in France between 19 and 21 July, just as events in the west took a definite turn for the worse. 

The two divisions sent west came from battle-tested units, Austria High Command – AOK – did not want to send troops incapable of honoring the reputation of the K. u. K. Armee.  Goiginger was also one of the better Austro-Hungarian commanders having served on the Eastern and Italian Fronts.  Recently, his corps command had achieved the only significant gains in the Piave Offensive capturing the heights of Montello only to have to retreat following failures elsewhere.  Goiginger earned a promotion to Military Order of Maria Theresa for his leadership.

GERMAN SUPERVISION

Thoughts of the two Austrian divisions working under Austrian leadership in France were soon dashed, however.  German command had seen enough of the army of Austria by the summer of 1918.  Even though they were cognizant of Goiginger’s abilities, they parceled the two Austrian divisions out into two different areas of the French front with the 1^st Division going to the eastern heights above the Meuse River to the north of Verdun and the 35^th Division heading out into the western part of the Saint-Mihiel Salient to the south of Verdun.  Goiginger’s abilities were not completely wasted.  He was given several German divisions to command in a special group, Gruppe Combres, working out of the town of Sorbey to the northeast of Verdun.

35^th DIVISION

By the time of the transfer of the 35^th Division from Italy to France, division strength had dropped considerably.  The best officers and NCOs long gone by this point in the war.  Yet, the division still showed no outward signs of war weariness and had a strong history of successful battles on the Italian front.  About 10,500 men came west in two brigades each made up of two regiments – the 62^nd Infantrie-regiment (IR), 64^th, 51^st and 63^rd.  Officers and NCOs were mainly German and Hungarian while rank and file were Romanian – except the 62^nd which was Magyar.  Most of the soldiers came from Transylvania, home of the Siebenbürger Saxon communities.

The Saint-Mihiel Salient had come about during the offensives of 1914, a 520-square kilometer protrusion which the French had tried to reduce in 1915 at heavy cost for little gain.  The area had been relatively quiet from late 1916 until September 1918, a good place for new forces to get a taste of the Western Front for little cost. 

After a short training period of a couple weeks, the 35^th went into the line as part of the Gruppe Combres along a nine-kilometer front of the Côtes Lorraines near Vigneulles, three regiments wide along a hastily constructed defensive front with the 62^nd Regiment in reserve.  Thick forests and ravines made for confusing grounds to cover.  Patrols sent out by both the 35^th and the German 13^th Landwehr Division to the immediate north had little contact with the opposing French 2^nd Cuirassier Division because of the terrain.  Some men got lost in the woods, not heard from again.

SAINT-MIHEIL

German High Command – OHL – ordered the salient evacuated on 8 September to shorten the lines to better defend the industrial areas of Metz to the east.  The withdrawal was still ongoing as over 600,000 American and 110,000 French troops went on the attack against a disorganized German strength of less than a tenth of the Allied strength.  The main Allied prongs attacked from the west and south parts of the salient.  The idea was to pinch off as many German troops as they could. 

At 0200 12 September, the Allied attack began.   Heavy artillery fired focused on the right side of the 35^th Division’s front sectors near where it bordered against the German 13^th Landwehr Division, the primary target of the Allied push in the northwest.  The Austrians repelled three assaults that morning, but the 13^th Landwehr overrun by the early afternoon threatened the 35^th‘s right flank.

coming apart

About 1330, the German 192^nd Infantry Division to the immediate south began to withdraw further exposing the 35^th on the left flank.  Field communications already suffered destruction fromthe artillery barrages.  Close support between units was difficult because of the terrain and extensive vegetation.  By late afternoon, the 35^th began a fighting withdrawal receiving the order to withdraw to new fortifications built along the base of the salient – the Michelstellung.  Luckily for the Germans and Austria, the Allies did not vigorously pursue them as they withdrew. Their new position covered four and a half kilometers from Jonville north to Harville.  So ended the first and final battle the 35^th Division would take part in.  American interests shifted north to the upcoming Meuse-Argonne Offensive and the frontlines remained unchanged until the 11 November armistice.

The one short sharp engagement cost the 35^th Division 3,367 casualties or 33% of the division strength.  Along with the troop losses, several guns, howitzers and many machine guns were lost in the fight.  Most of the casualties listed as “missing” showing the confusion and disorder of the battle.  Many of those men, luckily for their units, simply stragglers lost in the confusion.  They would return to their units and 634 other soldiers from Austrian reserve battalions helped to reestablish the division.

1^ST DIVISION

The 1^st Division, like the 35^th had been very active on the Italian Front, fighting from the Tirol and Carinthia to the upper Isonzo during the 12^th Isonzo breakthrough at Caporetto.  Division commander, FML Josef Metzger – former chief of the Army High Command Operations Department – earned entry into the Order of Maria Therese for his leadership during the Caporetto campaign.  Just before the division transferred to the Western Front, they took place in an offensive at Tonale Pass on the far west side of the Italian Front.  German officers held Metzger in good esteem because of his constant need to smooth the disputes between German and Austrian high commands during the days of Conrad von Hötzendorff.

Between 21 July and 1 August, the division arrived bringing 8,400 men.  Unlike the 35^th Division, this division represented a wide range of ethnic backgrounds with men of IR 5 coming from Transylvania – Magyar and Romanian; IR 61 from Temesvár in the Banat – German and Romanian with some Magyar and Serb soldiers thrown in to mix things up representative of the mixed ethnicity of the Banat; IR 112 came from the modern-day Bratislava area with German, Magyar and Slovak soldiers; other battalions cam from Brno in Moravia – Czech and German, and from Zagreb – Croat and Serb.

After receiving some basic indoctrination to the Western Front, the division replace the German 232^nd Infantry Division on the right bank of the Meuse, a seven-kilometer zone from Sivry to just west of Beaumont.  The area was highly defensible starting with the unfordable river and then the heavy forests and height standing behind the east bank of the river.

MEUSE-ARGONNE

The second massive American offensive began 26 September pushing against German elements mostly on the west side of the Meuse.  Supporting French troops pushed against sectors of the 1^st Division lines overrunning some outposts, but counterattacks eventually threw them back.  The first week of the offensive involved the division mostly indirectly, however, with 503 casualties, mostly from gas.  On 8 October, the division came into the main mix with the French 17^th Corps – US 29^th and 33^rd Divisions plus the French 18^th and 26^th Divisions pushing against the Austrians.  After three tries, men of the US 33^rd finally pushed across the Meuse near Consenvoye advancing into the heights beyond.

With the Allied forces pushing up Malbrouck and Haumont Hills, the 1^st Division faced isolation.  The division’s final reserves, along with German reinforcements were thrown into the fray stopping the Allied push at a secondary defensive line.  Attempts at erasing the Allied successes the following day only used up the last reserves of the German 5^th Army.  Remnants of IR 5 with units of IR 112 and a few German companies had retreated on 8 October to Hill 371.  They were able to resist the American attacks from three sides of the hill before withdrawing to a more secure position the next day.  Commander of IR 5, Oberstleutnant Rudolf Popelka gained decoration with the Pour le Mérite for his efforts, the only Austria-Hungarian officer to receive this highest Prussian award.

first ending for the 1st division

The two days of battle weakened the 1^st Division as the American assault continued.  The division finally became replaced early in the afternoon of 10 October by the German 228^th Division with the Austrians going to the rear to regroup.  Because of the ongoing attacks, the last groups of the 1^st were only able to disengage by the evening of 12 October.  Casualties for the 1^st Division from its two-day battle included 3,730 casualties or 40% of its 1 October strength.  In addition, the supporting field artillery brigade lost 22 of 64 artillery pieces during the battle.

Shortly after, 14 October, the IR 112 and another field battalion were removed from 1^st Division command and given to the German 228^th Infantry Division which replaced the 1^st Division.  The 1^st Division became reinserted along the Meuse River on a 1.6-kilometer front at Vilosnes-sur-Meuse on 18 October.  Fortifications in this area still very undeveloped.  This situation became worse on 22 October as the division of the right wing – German 7^th Reserve Division – withdrew in face of the US 5^th Division. 

Fortunately, for the Austria, the heavy part of the final weeks of the war took place further to the west of its position.  Even with not being in the direct line of battle, artillery fire, especially mustard gas, continued to cause attrition to the division.  Gassing caused 382 casualties between 21 and 23 October with 109 suffering on the 23^rd alone.  Division strength ebbed to about 2,700 men by that time.

106^th LANDSTURM INFANTRY DIVISION

With the German situation on the West Front deteriorating quickly in August, German requests for more Austro-Hungarian divisions came.  The Hapsburg command was reluctant at first to shed any more divisions since things were becoming critical both on the home front and in Italy by this time.  With support from the Commander of the 18^th Corps FML Goiginger and the Austro-Hungarian delegate to the OHL, FML Alois Klepsch-Kloth von Roden, AOK relented.  The 106^th Lansturm and 37^th Honved Infantry were sent to France with the 9^th Corps Command.  AOK let the Germans know that no more men could be spared.  The Germans continued to press until 16 October, by which time collapse of the Hapsburg Empire made such demands mute.

bottom of the barrel

The 106^th led by FML Karl Kratky arrived in Montmedy in the middle of September.  This division was a Landsturm division made of older soldiers – 34 – 55 years old – originally intended to provide replacements for first and second-line units or perform home defense, but the Landsturm was needed to form field units, as well, with the manpower losses of Austria-Hungary. 

The 106^th had fought in both the East and Italy taking heavy casualties fought between Asiago and Brenta in December 1917 and January 1918.  Rebuilt in April in Bozen, the division went to Lublin to help with the Polish harvest in the summer of 1918.  There were about 10,200 soldiers making up the division with its four regiments.  The soldiers were mostly of Polish and Czech ethnicity with some Germans thrown in.  The Landsturm 6^th Regiment was entirely German speakers, the only such K. u. K. unit on the West Front.

limited duty

The division came to the West without its normal complement of artillery and was assessed “cannot under any circumstance be employed as a counterattack division.”  Much of the division ended up broken up, used as security units in rear position to free up German units for frontline duty.  Only the Landsturm 25^th Regiment and the division’s Sturmbattalion saw frontline action inserted into gaps near Sivry-sur-Meuse 8-9 October.  These units came under the control of the 1^st Division after that division returned to the Meuse in the Vilosnes sector on 16 October.  The three other regiments of the division saw no combat employed for labor and security activities.  Two of the regiments planned to join German forces on the front 28 October, but the imminent Austria-Hungarian armistice muted these plans.

37^th HONVÉD INFANTRY DIVISION

The 37^th Honvéd was a formation of the Hungarian Honvéd a formation similar to the K.K. Landwehr in the Austrian half of the empire.  The Honvédség originally planned for use in territorial defense and as a reserve, though by 1914, they were integral units in the field army on par with normal divisions of the K. u, K, Armee.   Under the command of FML Johann Háber, the division, 15,000 strong, arrived in France in late September. 

Soldiers of the 37^th came mainly from the Bratislava – Preßburg – area made of a mix of Magyar and Slovaks with a few Germans thrown in.  The division fought earlier in Poland, Galicia and the Carpathians moving to Italy in the late summer of 1918 as a reserve unit.  Unlike the other divisions of the other Austro-Hungarian divisions, the 37^th saw no combat during their time in the west.  They served mainly to help build combat fortifications, first around Strasbourg and later Saarburg.  They remained in France a little longer than the other Hapsburg units only finishing their work on 6 November, a couple days after the armistice in Italy.

CORPS COMMANDS

FML Goiginer arrived with his staff 21 July along with the 1^st and 35^th Infantry Divisions.  Not trusting the K. u. K. to command troops at a corps level on the Western Front, they gained no command over Austria-Hungarian divisions in the west.  The 18^th Corps did take over command of Gruppe Ornes with command of three German divisions – Prussian 33^rd Infantry, Saxon 32^nd Infantry and the Badener 28^th Reserve.  Only the 106^th Landsturm was occasionally under the 18^th Korps command. 

The 9^th Korps command led by FML Edler von Manns-Au dispatched along with the 37^th Honvéd and the 106^th Landsturm in September.  This command was based out of Strasbourg never receiving an area of command.  They did, however, help in the orderly withdrawal of the 37^th Honvéd back to Hungary in November.

THE END

Throughout the month of October, the Hapsburg Empire was coming apart at the seams, militarily and politically.  On 29 October, Austrian army chief of staff Arhur Arz von Straußenburg notified Field Marshal von Hindenburg of the final defeat of Hapsburg arms in Italy – this was after the earlier collapse of the Austrian-Bulgarian Salonika front further south in the Balkans.  At this point, OHL instructed German railways to arrange the transport of K. u. K. troops back to Austria-Hungary.  By 4 November, most Hapsburg troops were off the front except for a few artillery units and men of the 37^th Honvéd continuing construction works.  18^th Corps was given control of the 1^st and 35^th Divisions and 106^th Lansturm during the withdrawal.  The 37^th Honvéd was helped back home through the efforts of the 9^th Korps command.

march to the trains home

Evacuation was organized and orderly though rail transport was not possible on the west side of the Rhine because of the confused rail situation in early November.  The divisions under 19^th Corps marched to cross over the Rhine at Mannheim and Karlsruhe between 18-24 November.  After the Western Front armistice on 11 November over 1,200 men of IR 64 deserted – almost half – fearing internment.  Rail problems within Germany led the Austrian divisions to continue their march south to Heilbronn with desertion and discipline problems coming about as a result.

The 37^th Honvéd left Germany to return to Hungary as a coherent unit.  The other divisions formed into ethnic-based transport groups and finally got rail transportation back to their new respective countries.  Evacuation from Heilbronn began 27 November with the last to leave going out 4 December.  The Austria-Hungarian divisions in France were the last remnants of the Habsburg Monarchy except for Karl von Pflanzer-Baltin’s army in Albania.

RESULTS?

Relations between Austrian and German soldiers deteriorated with time worsening in the last weeks of the war.  Many German soldiers already realized the war lost by the time the Hapsburg divisions came west.  They asked Czech infantrymen “why are you’re here prolonging the war?”  Many Austro-Hungarian soldiers, especially Magyars wondered the same thing exiled to serve a foreign power.  German authorities were mixed upon their Austro-Hungarian counterparts especially junior officers and NCOs who “utterly failed”.

By entering the Western Front so late in the game, the Austria-Hungarian divisions simply did not have the manpower nor the arms to properly defend against the massive weight thrown against them, much the same as what was happening to the German army by this time.  Americans realized a three to one advantage concentrating 97 artillery guns for each kilometer of front.  The Hapsburg army could many times not even muster 10 guns over the same distance.  Supply was totally dependent upon German sources.  Neither the 1^st nor the 35^th Divisions were able to restore their strength after the initial battles.  Nor was enough time given to retrain the Austrian troops in the latest German small-unit tactics before getting put onto the front.

Official statistics list Austria-Hungarian losses on the Western Front as 779 dead, 2,139 wounded, 10,974 sick (many of these cases were from gassing) and 5,403 missing or captured.  Unlike in Italy, the Hapsburg forces did not disintegrate though helped by the fact they avoided the main Allied onslaught after 11 October.  Their move to the Western Front changed absolutely nothing in the long run.  The only reason they were there was because of political processes leading up to the events of 1918.

MEMORIES

There is a recent small memorial erected in 2013 by several French government agencies in concert with the Austrian Black Cross.  It stands in a little roadside turnoff French highway D964 with a few trees and picnic tables just south of Brabant-sur-Meuse.  There is a road going up into the hills and forests formerly defended by the 1^st Division.  The destroyed village of Haumont sits atop surrounded by humped ground from the shells from over a century ago.

the graves

At the German military cemetery at Consenvoye located north about ten kilometers of Verdun just above the right bank of the Meuse River, 62 Austro-Hungarian graves lie.  They are located within a total of 11,148 graves dating from early battles in August 1914 up until October 1918.  The 62 came from the ranks of the 1^st K. u. K. Division.  Forty-three lay with 2,457 graves at Montmédy German military cemetery. Four more lie among 3,017 at Pierrepont.  Two lie among the 1,748 dead at Longuyon.  Two more out of 1,664 are at Dun-sur-Meuse.  Four Austro-Hungarians lie in the cemetery at Damvillers among 1,113 dead.  One Hapsburg grave can be found among the 3,589 at Mangiennes. 

The 35^th K. u. K. Division suffered their losses further to the south.  You find their dead scattered across several German military cemeteries.  Three Austro-Hungarians lie among the 2,880 dead at the Maizeray German military cemetery 15 kilometers east of Verdun on the road to Metz. Another three are among the 1,179 dead at Viéville-sous-les-Côtes.  Nine are among the 822 of Lissey.  Fourteen are found among the 1,789 at the cemetery of Saint-Maurice-sous-les-Côtes.  Two more lie within the 6,046 graves of the Saint-Mihiel cemetery.  Eight lay among the 1,002 graves of Labry, the site of a former German rail hub about 20 kilometers east of Verdun. 

One lone Hapsburg soldier lies among the 2,056 burials at Metz-Chambière.  Three lie at Féy among 2,005.  Thirty-eight men working with the 37^th Honvéd lie in the German cemetery at Thanvillé in the Alsace among the 645 dead.  That makes a total of 199 of the 779 K. u. K. soldiers accounted for.

Further information on the travails of Austria-Hungary in France, see the online thesis by Ian Jones.