Wilhelm Ritter Von Thoma - First World War

First World War

At the outbreak of the First World War on 2 August 1914, von Thoma took to the field with the Bavarian 3rd Infantry Regiment. On 25 September 1914 he was grazed by a shot to the head during a battle on the Somme in France. He was treated at the front and remained with the troops. On 28 September he was ordered to command his regiment's 11th Company. On 2 October he was wounded again, hit by shrapnel in the right elbow.

On 24 January 1915 he was made regimental adjutant of the Bavarian 3rd Infantry Regiment, which was transferred east to the Russian front, being based initially in Galicia, Austria-Hungary. Here von Thoma participated in many actions, including the taking of Brest Litovsk. In October 1915, he was sent to the Serbian front to assist Austro-Hungarian forces in their offensive against Serbia. On 12 October 1915, von Thoma was wounded by a gunshot to the chest and spent five days in hospital.

Von Thoma was sent back to France in early 1916 and fought from 28 February to 17 May in the Battle of Verdun—often described as one of the most brutal battles of modern times. In June, Thoma was sent east again, to fight in the German conquest of Romania. On 4 June 1916, the Russians unleashed the Brusilov Offensive against the Austro-Hungarian and German forces on the Eastern Front. It was during this offensive, leading a rearguard action on 5 July 1916, that Leutnant von Thoma performed the deed that garnered him the Knight's Cross of the Bavarian Military Max Joseph Order, the highest purely military decoration that could be bestowed on Bavarian officers for bravery in war. The appointment was announced on 11 November 1916.

Returning to the Western Front, von Thoma was withdrawn for a time from front-line service to undertake various training courses in preparation for the great German offensive in the west of spring 1918. From 4 to 8 April 1917, he was attached to a training course with Field Airship Detachment 14, Colmar. From 4 to 9 February 1918, he was attached to the 62nd Course at the Army Gas School in Berlin, and from 23 to 27 March 1918, he attended the 6th Leader Course in Wörth.

Returning to the front on 25 April 1918, von Thoma was wounded by a grenade fragment in the right wrist during the Battle of Kemmel, Belgium. On 2 May 1918 he was appointed leader of the 3rd Machine Gun Company of the Bavarian 3rd Infantry Regiment, and on 14 May was put in command of his regiment's I Battalion. After the failure of the fifth and last of the German Ludendorff Offensives in July 1918, the French and Americans, backed by heavy French tank support, launched the first phase of the Aisne-Marne Counteroffensive against the German lines southwest of Soissons on 18 July. On this date, von Thoma was captured by American troops, probably Major General Charles P. Summerall's U.S. 1st Infantry Division, while leading the I Battalion in a bitter defence of his division's right flank. He remained in French/American captivity until 27 October 1919.