The 716th Infantry Division was mobilized for occupation duties in the 15th Wave
Replacement Army on 2 May 1941 in
Wehrkreis VI in Munster. After formation in
Bielefeld, and transfer to Occupied France, it was assigned to
AOK 15 in June 1941 and employed at Saint-Lo and Soissons. It was transferred to the 7th Army in June 1942 and relocated to
Normandy, with duties including coastal defence, air raid protection and defensive fortification construction. After short movements to
Amiens and
Brussels it returned to the divisions in Normandy. The 716th Division had no combat experience, and was one of the weakest divisions in the area. On
D-Day, the division was responsible for the Divisional Coastal Defensive Section
KVA Caen. Having the task of defeating landings, it manned an extended line of defensible posts, along its assigned 47 km of Normandy Coast, and deployed all other unit resources then available above the Lower Normandy Calvados-Seine Bay Coastal Plain. Fighting with additionally allocated LXXXIV Corps resources, the tactical situation and the terrain saw the Division 'split' across two Regimental Coastal Defensive Sections: Coastal Defense Group Courseulles and Coastal Defense Group Riva-Bella. To the west, Coastal Defense Group Courseulles commanded all divisional troops from Asnelles to Saint-Aubin-sur-Mer, seeing it attempt to defeat landings at
Gold Beach and
Juno Beach. In the east up to the AOK 7 / AOK 15 Boundary, Coastal Defense Group Riva-Bella commanded the tactical situation from Langrune-sur-Mer to Le Home Varaville, becoming responsible to defeat landings at
Sword Beach and by the
British 6th Airborne Division; astride the River Orne. During the fighting after D-Day, the division fought defensively around Caen and
Villers-Bocage. According to the commanding officer
Generalleutnant Wilhelm Richter,
"My division had been defeated and badly beaten up in Normandy". The division was removed from frontline duty on July 10, 1944, and was able to avoid the carnage of the
Falaise Pocket. Redeployed to
southern France, the division took up coastal security positions in the region of Salses-Perpignan-Elne, close to the
Spanish border. Thereafter, the division was ordered to withdraw on August 19, 1944, and retreated through
Languedoc to the region around
Lyon. After this movement the division was engaged by the
French resistance before later arriving in the area of
Sélestat in
Alsace. In October 1944, the 716th Infantry Division was in the region of
Oberrhein (near
Colmar) where it fought at
Neunkirch-Obenhein and was nearly wiped out in heavy fighting in January 1945. The remains of the division was reconstituted as the 716th
Volksgrenadier Division in April 1945 before surrendering to American troops at
Kempten in May 1945. == Order of battle ==