Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt in World War II

Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt in World War II Gerd von Rundstedt - Early Career: Born December 12, 1875 at Aschersleben, Germany, Gerd von Rundstedt was a member of an aristocratic Prussian family. Entering the German Army at age sixteen, he began learning his trade before being accepted into the German Armys officer training school in 1902. Graduating, von Rundstedt was promoted to captain in 1909. A skilled staff officer, he served in this capacity at the beginning of World War I in August 1914. Elevated to major that November, von Rundstedt continued to serve as a staff officer and by the end of the war in 1918 was chief of staff for his division. With the conclusion of the war, he elected to remain in the postwar Reichswehr. Gerd von Rundstedt - Interwar Years: In the 1920s, von Rundstedt rapidly advanced through the ranks of the Reichswehr and received promotions to lieutenant colonel (1920), colonel (1923), major general (1927), and lieutenant general (1929). Given command of the 3rd Infantry Division in February 1932, he supported Reich Chancellor Franz von Papens Prussian coup that July. Promoted to general of the infantry that October, he remained in that rank until being made a colonel general in March 1938. In the wake of the Munich Agreement, von Rundstedt led the 2nd Army which occupied the Sudetenland in October 1938. Despite this success, he promptly retired later in the month in protest of the Gestapos framing of Colonel General Werner von Fritsch during the Blomberg–Fritsch Affair. Leaving the army, he was given the honorary post of colonel of the 18th Infantry Regiment. Gerd von Rundstedt - World War II Begins: His retirement proved brief as he was recalled by Adolf Hitler the following year to lead Army Group South during the invasion of Poland in September 1939. Opening World War II, the campaign saw von Rundstedts troops mount the main attack of the invasion as they struck east from Silesia and Moravia. Winning the Battle of Bzura, his troops steadily drove back the Poles. With the successful completion of the conquest of Poland, von Rundstedt was given command of Army Group A in preparation for operations in the West. As planning moved forward, he supported his chief of staffs, Lieutenant General Erich von Mansteins, call for a swift armored strike toward the English Channel which he believed could lead to the strategic collapse of the enemy. Attacking on May 10, von Rundstedts forces made swift gains and opened a large gap in the Allied front. Led by General of Cavalry Heinz Guderians XIX Corps, German troops reached the English Channel on May 20. Having cut off the British Expeditionary Force from France, von Rundstedts troops turned north to capture the Channel ports and prevent its escape to Britain. Traveling to Army Group As headquarters at Charleville on May 24, Hitler urged its von Rundstedt, to press the attack. Assessing the situation, he advocated holding his armor west and south of Dunkirk, while utilizing the infantry of Army Group B to finish off the BEF. Though this allowed von Rundstedt to preserve his armor for the final campaign in France, it allowed the British to successfully conduct the Dunkirk Evacuation. Gerd von Rundstedt - On the Eastern Front: With the end of fighting in France, von Rundstedt received a promotion to field marshal on July 19. As the Battle of Britain began, he assisted in the development of Operation Sea Lion which called for the invasion of southern Britain. With the Luftwaffes failure to defeat the Royal Air Force, the invasion was called off and von Rundstedt was instructed to oversee the occupation forces in Western Europe. As Hitler began planning Operation Barbarossa, von Rundstedt was ordered east to assume command of Army Group South. On June 22, 1941, his command took part in the invasion of the Soviet Union. Driving through Ukraine, von Rundstedts forces played a key role in the encirclement of Kiev and capture of over 452,000 Soviet troops in late September. Pushing on, von Rundstedts forces succeeded in capturing Kharkov in late October and Rostov in late November. Suffering a heart attack during the advance on Rostov, he refused to leave the front and continued to direct operations. With the Russian winter setting in, von Rundstedt advocating halting the advance as his forces were becoming overextended and hampered by the severe weather. This request was vetoed by Hitler. On November 27, Soviet forces counterattacked and forced the Germans to abandon Rostov. Unwilling to surrender ground, Hitler countermanded von Rundstedts orders to fall back. Refusing to obey, von Rundstedt was sacked in favor of Field Marshal Walther von Reichenau. Gerd von Rundstedt - Return to the West: Briefly out of favor, von Rundstedt was recalled in March 1942 and given command of Oberbefehlshaber West (German Army Command in the West - OB West). Charged with defending Western Europe from the Allies, he was tasked with erecting fortifications along the coast. Largely inactive in this new role, little work occurred in 1942 or 1943. In November 1943, Field Marshal Erwin Rommel was assigned to OB West as commander of Army Group B. Under his direction, work finally began on fortifying the coastline. Over the coming months, von Rundstedt and Rommel clashed over the disposition of OB Wests reserve panzer divisions with the former believing they should located in the rear and the latter wanting them near the coast. Following the Allied landings in Normandy on June 6, 1944, von Rundstedt and Rommel worked to contain the enemy beachhead. When it became obvious to von Rundstedt that the Allies could not be pushed back into the sea, he began advocating for peace. With the failure of a counterattack near Caen on July 1, he was asked by Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel, head of the German armed forces, what should be done. To this he brusquely replied, Make peace you fools! What else can you do? For this, he was removed from command the next dayand replaced with Field Marshal Gunther von Kluge. Gerd von Rundstedt - Final Campaigns: In the wake of the July 20 Plot against Hitler, von Rundstedt agreed to serve on a Court of Honor to assess officers suspected of being opposed to the fà ¼hrer. Removing several hundred officers from the Wehrmacht, the court turned them over to Roland Freislers Volksgerichtshof (Peoples Court) for trial. Implicated in the July 20 Plot, von Kluge committed suicide on August 17 and was briefly replaced by Field Marshal Walter Model. Eighteen days later, on September 3, von Rundstedt returned to lead OB West. Later in the month, he was able to contain Allied gains made during Operation Market-Garden. Forced to give ground through the fall, von Rundstedt opposed the Ardennes offensive which was launched in December believing that insufficient troops were available for it to succeed. The campaign, which resulted in the Battle of the Bulge, represented the last major German offensive in the West. Continuing to fight a defensive campaign in early 1945, von Rundstedt was removed from command on March 11 after again arguing that Germany should make peace rather than fight a war it could not win. On May 1, von Rundstedt was captured by troops from the US 36th Infantry Division. During the course of his interrogation, he suffered another heart attack. Taken to Britain, von Rundstedt moved between camps in southern Wales and Suffolk. After the war, he was charged by the British for war crimes during the invasion of the Soviet Union. These charges were largely based on his support of von Reichenaus Severity Order which led to mass murders in occupied Soviet territory. Due to his age and failing health, von Rundstedt was never tried and he was released in July 1948. Retiring to Schloss Oppershausen, near Celle in Lower Saxony, he continued to be plagued by heart problems until his death on February 24, 1953. Selected Sources JVL: Gerd von RundstedtGeneralfeldmarschall Gerd von Rundstedt Lone Sentry: von Rundstedt Explains

Laura Clay, Southern Womens Suffrage Leader

Laura Clay, Southern Womens Suffrage Leader Laura Clay Facts Known for: major Southern woman suffrage spokesperson. Clay, like many Southern suffragists, saw womens suffrage as reinforcing white supremacy and power.Occupation: reformerDates: February 9, 1849 - June 29, 1941 Laura Clay Biography Laura Clay Quote: Suffrage is Gods cause, and God leads our plans. Laura Clays mother was Mary Jane Warfield Clay, from a wealthy family prominent in Kentucky horse racing and breeding, herself an advocate of womens education and womens rights. Her father was the noted Kentucky politician Cassius Marcellus Clay, a cousin of Henry Clay, who founded an anti-slavery newspaper and helped found the Republican party. Cassius Marcellus Clay was the United States ambassador to Russia for 8 years under Presidents Abraham Lincoln, Andrew Johnson and Ulysses S. Grant. He returned from Russia for a time and is credited with talking Lincoln into signing the Emancipation Proclamation. Laura Clay had five brothers and sisters; she was the youngest. Her older sisters were involved in working for womens rights. Mary B. Clay, one of her older sisters, organized Kentuckys first womens suffrage organization, and was president of the American Woman Suffrage Association from 1883 to 1884. Laura Clay was born at her familys home, White Hall, in Kentucky, in 1849. She was the youngest of four girls and two boys. Lauras mother, Mary Jane Clay, was largely in charge, during her husbands long absences, of managing the family farms and property inherited from her family. She saw that her daughters were educated. Cassius Marcellus Clay was from a wealthy slaveholding family. He became an anti-slavery advocate, and among other incidents where he was met with violent reactions to his ideas, he was once nearly assassinated for his views. He lost his seat in the Kentucky state House because of his abolitionist views. He was a supporter of the new Republican Party, and nearly became Abraham Lincolns vice president, losing that spot to Hannibal Hamlin. At the beginning of the Civil War, Cassius Clay helped organize volunteers to protect the White House from a Confederate takeover, when there were no federal troops in the city. During the years of the Civil War, Laura Clay attended Sayre Female Institute in Lexington, Kentucky. She attended a finishing school in New York before returning to her family home. Her father opposed to her further education. The Reality of Womens Rights From 1865 to 1869, Laura Clay helped her mother run the farms, her father still absent as ambassador to Russia. In 1869, her father returned from Russia and the next year, he moved his four-year-old Russian son into the family home at White Hall, his son from a long affair with a prima ballerina with the Russian ballet. Mary Jane Clay moved to Lexington, and Cassius sued her for divorce on grounds of abandonment, and won. (Years later, he created more scandal when he married a 15 year old servant, probably against her will as he had to restrain her from leaving. He divorced her after she attempted suicide. That marriage ended in divorce just three years later.) Under existing Kentucky laws, he could have claimed all the property his ex-wife had inherited from her family and he could have kept her from the children; he claimed his wife owed him $80,000 for her years living at White Hall. Fortunately for Mary Jane Clay, he did not pursue those claims. Mary Jane Clay and her daughters who were still unmarried lived on the farms she inherited from her family, and were supported by the income from these. But they were aware the under the existing laws, they were able to do so only because Cassius Clay did not pursue his rights to the property and income. Laura Clay managed to attend one year of college at the University of Michigan and one semester at State College of Kentucky, leaving to put her efforts into working for womens rights. Working for Womens Rights in the South Laura Clay Quote: Nothing is so laborsaving as a vote, properly applied. In 1888, the Kentucky Woman Suffrage Association was organized, and Laura Clay was elected its first president. She remained president until 1912, by which time the name had changed to the Kentucky Equal Suffrage Association. Her cousin, Madeleine McDowell Breckinridge, succeeded her as president. As head of the Kentucky Equal Suffrage Association, she led efforts to change Kentucky laws to protect married womens property rights, inspired by the situation in which her mother had been left by her divorce. The organization also worked to have female doctors on staff at state mental hospitals, and to have women admitted to State College of Kentucky (Transylvania University) and Central University. Laura Clay was also a member of the Womens Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) and she was part of the Womans Club movement, holding state offices in each organization. While Laura Clays father had been a liberal Republican and perhaps in reaction to that Laura Clay became active in Democratic Party politics. Elected to the board of the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA), newly merged in 1890, Clay chaired the new groups membership committee and was its first auditor. Federal or State Suffrage? Around 1910, Clay and other Southern suffragists began to be uncomfortable with efforts within the national leadership to support a federal woman suffrage amendment. This, they feared, would provide a precedent for federal interference in the voting laws of Southern states which discriminated against African Americans. Clay was among those who argued against the strategy of a federal amendment. Laura Clay was defeated in her bid for reelection to the board of the NAWSA in 1911. In 1913, Laura Clay and other Southern suffragists created their own organization, the Southern States Woman Suffrage Conference, to work for state-level womens suffrage amendments, to support voting rights only for white women. Probably hoping for compromise, she supported federal legislation to allow women to vote for members of Congress, providing the women otherwise qualified as voters in their states. This proposal was debated at NAWSA in 1914, and a bill to implement this idea was introduced into Congress in 1914, but it died in committee. In 1915-1917, like many of those involved in womens suffrage and womens rights, including Jane Addams and Carrie Chapman Catt, Laura Clay was involved in the Womans Peace Party. When the United States entered World War I, she left the Peace Party. In 1918, she briefly joined in supporting a federal amendment, when President Wilson, a Democrat, endorsed it. But then Clay resigned her membership in the NAWSA in 1919. She also resigned from the Kentucky Equal Rights Association that she had headed from 1888 to 1912. She and others formed, instead, a Kentucky-based Citizens Committee to work for a suffrage amendment to the Kentucky state constitution. In 1920, Laura Clay went to Nashville, Tennessee, to oppose ratification of the woman suffrage amendment. When it (barely) passed, she expressed her disappointment. Democratic Party Politics Laura Clay Quote: I am a Jeffersonian Democrat. In 1920, Laura Clay founded the Democratic Womens Club of Kentucky. That same year was a delegate to the Democratic National Convention. Her name was placed in nomination for President, making her the first woman so nominated at a major partys convention. She was nominated in 1923 as a Democratic candidate for the Kentucky State Senate. In 1928, she campaigned in Al Smiths presidential race. She worked after 1920 for repeal of the 18th Amendment (prohibition), even though she herself was a teetotaler and a WCTU member. She was a member of the Kentucky state convention that ratified repeal of prohibition (the 21st Amendment), primarily on states rights grounds. After 1930 After 1930, Laura Clay led mostly a private life, focusing on reform within the Episcopal church, her lifelong religious affiliation. She interrupted her privacy to oppose a law paying male teachers more than female teachers would be paid. She worked mostly within the church on womens rights, especially on allowing women to be delegates to church councils, and on permitting women to attend the Episcopal churchs University of the South. Laura Clay died in Lexington in 1941. The family home, White Hall, is a Kentucky historical site today. Laura Clays Positions Laura Clay supported womens equal rights to education and to the vote. At the same time, she believed that black citizens were not yet developed enough to vote. She did support, in principle, educated women of all races getting the vote, and spoke at times against ignorant white voters. She contributed to an African American church project aimed at self-improvement. But she also supported states rights, supported the idea of white superiority, and feared federal interference in Southern states voting laws, and so, except briefly, did not support a federal amendment for woman suffrage. Connections The boxer Muhammed Ali, born Cassius Marcellus Clay, was named for his father who was named for Laura Clays father. Books About Laura Clay Paul E. Fuller. Laura Clay and the Womans Rights Movement 1975.John M. Murphy. Laura Clay (1894-1941), a Southern Voice for Womans Rights. Women Public Speakers in the United States, 1800-1925: A Bio-Critical Sourcebook. Karlyn Kohrs Campbell, ed. 1993.