Battle
1940 battle
The Battle of Rotterdam was a Second World War battle fought during the Battle of the Netherlands. Fought between 10 and 14 May 1940, it was a German attempt to seize the Dutch city. It ended in a German victory, following the Rotterdam Blitz.
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Text from the Wikipedia article “Battle of Rotterdam”, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
The Battle of Rotterdam was a Second World War battle fought during the Battle of the Netherlands. Fought between 10 and 14 May 1940, it was a German attempt to seize the Dutch city. It ended in a German victory, following the Rotterdam Blitz.
Rotterdam had no prepared defences and had not been included in any strategic defence plan. It was relatively far from the boundaries of Fortress Holland and some distance from the coast. The troops stationed in Rotterdam belonged to training establishments and some smaller miscellaneous units. A modern artillery battalion with twelve 105 mm (4.1 in) guns (10.5 cm Cannon Model 1927) was located in Hillegersberg. Its guns had a range of over 16,000 m (17,000 yd), sufficient for almost anywhere around Rotterdam. The garrison commander was a military engineer, Colonel P. W. Scharroo. The garrison consisted of about 7,000 men; only 1,000 had a combat function (Marines, 39RI). Around the Nieuwe Maas seven platoons of light anti-aircraft artillery (AAA) were deployed; they were equipped with heavy machine guns (Vickers machine gun or MG 08) and Oerlikon 20 mm cannons and Scottis. One battery of heavy AAA was stationed north of the Nieuwe Maas. There were also two more batteries of heavy AAA and four AAA platoons in the Waalhaven area. The Waalhaven Airbase was also the home of the "3rd Java" squadron of the Royal Netherlands Air Force equipped with Fokker G.I heavy fighters. Eleven operational G.Is, fully armed and fueled, were stationed at Waalhaven on 10 May. During the bombing of the airfield, nine of these managed to take off and attack the German bombers resulting in the loss of 167 Luftwaffe's Junkers Ju 52s, scoring up to 14 claimed aerial kills.
The original German plan called for a task force from Waalhaven to attack the town and seize the bridges over the Nieuwe Maas using the advantage of surprise. When the plans were evaluated, it was decided that the chances of the taskforce being able to achieve success were rated below the acceptable level, so the Germans devised a new plan. Twelve specially adapted floatplanes—Heinkel He 59Ds—would land on the Nieuwe Maas with two platoons of the 11th Company of the 16th Air Landing Regiment, plus four engineers and a three-man company troop. These 90 men would seize the bridges. They would be reinforced by a 36-man platoon of airborne soldiers (3rd platoon 11./Fjr1). They were scheduled to land at the Feyenoord football stadium, close to the Nieuwe Maas. Subsequently, units from Waalhaven would be sent in with additional support weapons.
In the early morning hours of 10 May, 12 Heinkel He 59 seaplanes landed on the Nieuwe Maas. Rubber dinghies were launched. Each could carry six soldiers and their equipment; about 80 German soldiers landed on both banks of the river and an island. The Germans quickly seized some of the bridges, which were not guarded. The only resistance they met was from some Dutch policemen.
Oberstleutnant Dietrich von Choltitz, the commander of the 3rd Battalion of the 16th Air Landing Regiment, began to organise his troops after landing them at Waalhaven Air Force Base. He sent them to the bridges in Rotterdam. The Dutch had not stationed many soldiers in the southern part of the city. One unit was made up of butchers, bakers and about 90 infantrymen, the latter being reinforced by riflemen who had withdrawn from the airfield. The Dutch troops hid in houses that were on the route to the bridges. There they ambushed the approaching German troops. Both sides suffered casualties. The Germans managed to bring up a PaK anti-tank gun. The Dutch had to yield under the ever-increasing pressure. The German force then moved on to the bridges, quickly followed by the bulk of 9th Company of the 16th Air Landing Regiment.
Meanwhile, the staff of 3rd Battalion of the 16th Air Landing Regiment had run into the Dutch in the square. Oberstleutnant von Choltitz's adjutant took charge of an assault on the Dutch position but was mortally wounded in the process. When the Germans looked for another route to the bridges to bypass the Dutch stronghold, they managed to find a wedge that advance troops had created along the quays. It was at about 09:00 when the bulk of the 3rd Battalion made contact with the defenders of the bridges.
The Dutch company in the south of the city was able to stand its ground until well into the afternoon of 10 May. It was then assaulted by the newly landed 10th Company of the 16th Air Landing Regiment, assisted by mortars. The Dutch surrendered when they ran out of ammunition.
The Dutch troops in the north of town were alerted by the roaring of planes overhead. The garrison headquarters were temporarily manned by only a captain, who had the troops assemble and coordinated the distribution of ammunition. Many small detachments were sent out to the bridges, the three railway stations nearby, and areas around the Nieuwe Maas where landings had been reported. The Germans noticed the activity on the Dutch side and the first contacts with the Dutch forced them to consolidate their forces around the bridges.
The first Dutch countermeasures were executed by a small delegation of Dutch Marines and an incomplete army engineers company. The Dutch took positions around the small German pocket north of the bridges and started deploying machine guns at numerous strategic points. Soon, the first serious fire exchanges between the invaders and regular Dutch army units were seen and heard. Gradually, the Germans were pushed back to the confines of the narrow perimeter around the traffic bridge. Both sides suffered considerable losses.
Gradually, the Dutch forced the German troops at the bridgehead into a quickly shrinking pocket. Many civilians watched the battle. Halfway through the morning, the Dutch Navy assigned two small navy vessels—a small obsolete gunboat and a motor torpedo boat (Z 5 and TM51)—to assist the defenders at the bridges. Twice, the gunboat attacked the Germans at the traffic bridge on the north side of the Noordereiland (an island in the river), the second time accompanied by the motor torpedo boat. About 75 shells of 75 mm (2.95 in) were unleashed on the invaders, but with little effect. During the second attempt, the Luftwaffe dropped a number of bombs on the navy ships that caused substantial damage to the motor torpedo boat. Both ships retired after the bomb attack. They had suffered three men killed in action.
Meanwhile, the Germans had been reinforced with a number of 37 mm (1.46 in) PaK 36 anti-tank guns and a few infantry guns (7.5 cm leichtes Infanteriegeschütz 18). They manned the houses along the north side of the island with heavy machine gun (MG 34 in Lafette 34 tripod) crews and placed a few 80 mm (3.15 in) mortars (8 cm Granatwerfer 34) in the center of the island. The continuous battle for the northern river bank caused the Germans to withdraw to the large National Life Insurance Company building, at the head of the traffic bridge. Due to the bad firing angles, the Dutch had on the building, the Germans were able to hold the building without much difficulty. Dutch troops occupying nearby houses were forced to fall back, due to accurate and sustained mortar fire. That stalemate—commencing in the afternoon of 10 May—would remain unchanged until the surrender of the Netherlands on 14 May.
Colonel Scharroo—aware that his small garrison was dealing with a serious German attack—had requested substantial reinforcements in The Hague. Many reinforcements would be sent, all coming from the reserves behind the Grebbe line or from the eastern front of the Fortress Holland.
During the night and into the early morning, the garrison commander Scharroo received reinforcements from the northern sector of Fortress Holland. Colonel Scharroo reorganised his defences. He deployed troops along the entire river and to the west, north and east of the city. The latter was done because the Colonel feared actions from landed Germans against the city from these directions. His small staff was very much occupied with the numerous reports about phantom landings and treacherous civilian actions. These activities occupied the staff to such an extent that no plans for organised counter-measures against the German bridgehead were drawn up for 11 May.
At 04:00, the fighting resumed around the bridgehead. The German spearhead was still formed by their occupation (about 40 to 50 men) of the National Life Insurance building north of the traffic bridge. This building and its occupation had become isolated from the balance of the German forces by Dutch progress on 10 May. All Dutch attempts to seize the building failed, but so did all German attempts to resupply or reinforce the occupants. Germans that tried to reach the building by crossing the bridge by motorbike or car were either shot or forced back. The bridge had become a no-go area, dominated by machine guns from both sides.
The Royal Netherlands Air Force assisted the ground forces upon request from Scharroo. Dutch bombers began dropping bombs on the bridges, and although all of them missed, stray bombs did hit German positions near the bridge, taking out a number of machine gun nests. Another raid followed, but the Luftwaffe responded by means of 12 Messerschmitt Bf 110s patrolling the skies overhead. The Dutch bombers attacked the bridges but were immediately jumped on by the German fighters. The Germans lost five planes compared to three Dutch losses, but to the small Dutch air force that was a heavy toll.
The Germans used the Holland America Line ship SS Statendam for positioning some of their machine guns. These positions attracted Dutch attention; soon, mortar and machine gun fire was aimed at the German positions on the ship and the adjacent installations. Many fires broke out and the ship itself caught fire as well. The Germans quickly evacuated the vessel that would continue to burn until well after the capitulation on 14 May.
On 12 May, fighting continued where it had ended the previous day. Although the Dutch did not regain control of the city, the Germans were suffering from continuous assaults on their positions. Casualties mounted up on both sides and the German command grew increasingly worried over the status of their 500 men in the heart of Rotterdam. Oberstleutnant von Choltitz was allowed by Generalleutnant Kurt Student to withdraw his men from the northern pocket should he consider the operational situation required it.
To the northwest of Rotterdam, at the village of Overschie, forces that had been involved in the air landings at Ockenburg and Ypenburg assembled. General Graf von Sponeck had moved the remainder of his force from Ockenburg to Overschie, negotiating between Dutch forces in the area. In the village of Wateringen, the Germans bumped into a guard squad of a Dutch command post and when two armoured cars appeared to support the Dutch defenders, the Germans backed off and took a detour. The majority of von Sponeck's group succeeded in reaching the village Overschie, where they joined up with German survivors of the Ypenburg battle.
On the evening of 12 May, Colonel Scharroo received orders from General Headquarters to put all his efforts into clearing the German resistance at the northern approaches to the bridges, and eventually to destroy the bridges. That order was a direct consequence of the arrival of the 9th Panzerdivision at the Moerdijk bridges, which threatened the Dutch defence of Fortress Holland. The commander of the local marines—Colonel Von Frijtag Drabbe—was ordered to destroy every German pocket of resistance on the north end and next occupy the northern bridge approach in order to secure the area and prepare the bridge for destruction. He formed a company—a little over 100 men—of his most experienced marines. Another company of navy auxiliary troops—also with a strength of about 100 men—was provided as back-up. These two companies were supported by two batteries of 105 mm howitzers and two armoured cars. A company of six 81 mm mortars was also attached to the task force.
Text from the Wikipedia article “Battle of Rotterdam”, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.