48th Reserve Division (German Empire) - Combat Chronicle

Combat Chronicle

The 48th Reserve Division initially fought on the Western Front, entering the line in October between the Meuse and Moselle. It then moved to the Flanders and Artois regions in the drive northwards known as the Race to the Sea. It fought at Lille in late October and at Ypres into November. At the end of November, the division was transferred to the Eastern Front. It fought in a number of engagements, including the winter 1914 Battle of Łódź, and then participated in the pursuit of the Russians from Carpathia and Austrian Galicia known as the Gorlice-Tarnów Offensive after the major battle at Gorlice and Tarnów. The division remained in positional warfare and various engagements on the Eastern Front thereafter, and faced part of the Brusilov Offensive in 1916. From October 1916 to April 1917, the division was attached to the Austro-Hungarian 3rd Army, and was then attached to the Austro-Hungarian 2nd Army. In May 1917, the division returned to the Western Front, and occupied the line near Verdun, facing the French offensive there in August and September. The division was in the trenches in Lorraine from the end of September to the beginning of December 1917, and then in Upper Alsace until mid-February 1918. It then went into army reserve until April, when it went into the line in the Flanders and Artois regions. It remained in the fighting in the northern part of the Western Front until the end of the war. In 1917, Allied intelligence rated the division as a mediocre division. In 1918 it was rated second class.