Wilhelm Heye
August Wilhelm Heye ( born January 31, 1869 in Fulda, † March 11, 1947 in Brown situation ) was a German officer, last Colonel-General and Chief of the Army Command in the Weimar Republic.
Life
Heye was born as the son of the Prussian Lieutenant Colonel Wilhelm Heye and his wife Charlotte, née von Finck.
Career in the Empire
He joined on 22 March 1888 by cadet corps in the Prussian army over and initially served in the infantry. With his move to the general staff in the spring of 1900 he began his career as a staff officer. From 1906 to 1908 Heye belonged to the stage command for the force in German South West Africa, which was reflected the Hereroaufstand at this time. From 1910 to 1913 he headed the Division III b (Intelligence) in the General Staff
At the start of World War Heye was appointed as Lieutenant Colonel Chief of the General Staff of the Landwehr Corps of Remus Woyrsch later the army department or army group Woyrsch emerged from the. He proved himself in the changing fighting on the Eastern Front. In September 1917 he moved to the Western Front and was Chief of Staff of Army Group Duke Albrecht.
Now Colonel - - On September 21, 1918 Heye was appointed to the General Staff of the Army and appointed there to the Chief of Operations. He had direct contact with the highest military decision-makers. When Erich Ludendorff was released on October 26 as Quartermaster General, Heye took over, despite its relatively low degree of service temporarily its tasks until Ludendorff's successor, Wilhelm Groener could take office.
Career in the Reichswehr
After the defeat and the Armistice of Compiègne Heye in 1919 Chief of the General Staff of the AOK Border Patrol North in East Prussia, who coordinated the military operations against the Red Army in the Baltic in April. He was the successor Hans von Seeckt, with whose life Heyes military career should remain linked in the following period at the hip. In East Prussia Heye first learned of the coup plans conservative officers and politicians led by Wolfgang Kapp and Walther Luttwitz, which he did not connect because of a lack of success.
For October 1, 1919 changed Heye as Chief of Staff of the Office of troops into the Defense Ministry in Berlin. Chief of the Office (and secret chief of staff ) was Seeckt turn, the Heye made her his right hand. When it actually came out in March 1920 to the Kapp Putsch and Seeckt withdrew as a precaution in his private apartment, took him Heye in the ministry. How Seeckt he also had the intention on the one hand not to take part in the coup, on the other hand also not militarily to knock him down to true in any case the cohesion of the Reichswehr.
Was appointed as Seeckt in the wake of the coup attempt as head of the army command, Heye was in June 1920, his successor as head of the troops Office. At the same time he was promoted to Major General. In 1922 he was promoted to Lieutenant General Chief of Army Staff Office and in 1923 commander in the military district I ( Königsberg ).
Chief of the Army Command
As Minister of Defence Otto Gessler in October 1926 took advantage of a really trivial reason to dismiss the had become too powerful and headstrong Seeckt, he decided to Heye as his successor. The government hoped that the Reichswehr Heye finally be able to control politically, because he was considered a weak personality and did not pursue their own political plans. This goal was not achieved, because the Reichswehr now came under the influence of the chief of the newly created Office Minister Kurt von Schleicher. This pulled strings in the background while Heye was limited to his actual service shops. At the beginning of his ministry promoted as Chief of the Army Command to General of Infantry, Heye was the beginning of 1930, Colonel General and adopted in October of the same year in retirement. His successor was Kurt von Hammerstein - Equord.
Family
Heye 1894 married Else Karcher, daughter of industrialist Fritz Karcher, with whom he had three sons and two daughters. The son Hellmuth (1895-1970) later became Vice- Admiral of the Navy and Military Representative of the German Bundestag.
Awards
- Iron Cross (1914 ) II and I. Class
- Knight's Cross of the Royal House Order of Hohenzollern with Swords
- Pour le Mérite with oak leaves Pour le Merite on August 20, 1916
- Oak Leaves on April 3, 1918