Leo Ludwig August Eugen Sontag  
(08.06.1857 - 13.07.1929)
place of birth:  Minden, Westfalen
Königreich Preußen:  Div-Kdr,  Generalleutnant


Prussian Generalleutnant Leo Sontag served during the Great War as commander of several different infantry divisions, as well as commander of Germany's Alpen-Korps. Sontag was commissioned in 1874 as he joined Füsilier-Regiment Nr. 40 in Cologne. He did not attend Prussian War Academy nor did he serve on the Great General Staff, but rather spent much of his peace-time career administering NCO training academies and the firearms training facility in Spandau.

With August 1914 mobilization, Generalmajor Sontag was sent to the Eastern Front to lead 41. Infanterie-Division. He thus led his soldiers in fighting the invading Russian Army at Tannenberg and during the First Battle of Masurian Lakes. In October 1914, he was transferred to the Western Front to command 18. Reserve-Division in support of Max von Boehn's IX. Reserve-Korps engaged west of Roye-Noyon, France. In March 1915 he was promoted to Generalleutnant and in June returned east to take command of 56. Infanterie-Division. After fighting for about a month near Lemberg (Lviv, Ukraine) the division was transported to France and engaged in trench warfare in and around the Champagne region. In the summer of 1916, Sontag replaced General Wienskowski as 113. Infanterie-Division commander. In addition to fighting during the Battle of the Somme, these troops were also subsequently in the trenches between the Maas and Moselle rivers, as well as in Upper Alsace.

In early 1917, Sontag replaced General Krafft von Dellmensingen who was leading the German Alpenkorps in Romania. The division-sized formation of mountain-trained experts were redeployed for engagement in Upper Alsace, France in the summer of 1917, before returning to the front in northern Romania. In the fall of 1917, Generalleutnant Sontag briefly headed up the 5. Ersatz-Division in the Latvian region, but was soon returned back to Germany to spend the remainder of the War as acting commander of IV. Armee-Korps headquarters in Magdeburg. After the War, Sontag was awarded the brevet promotion to General der Infanterie officially dated at 3 December 1918.

	Generalleutnant	23.03.1915