Freikorps in the Baltic After 1918 , the term Freikorps was used for the anti - communist paramilitary organizations that sprang up around the German Empire , including in the Baltic states as soldiers returned in defeat from World War I . It was one of the many Weimar paramilitary groups active during that time . 1917 - Russia cedes the Baltic to Germany . In 1917 the Russian Bolsheviks ceded the Baltic areas to Germany under the Treaty of Brest - Litovsk . The Imperial German government established occupation governments in Estonia and Latvia and granted independence to a puppet government in Lithuania on March 25 , 1918 . The German Ober Ost occupation authorities under command of Prince Leopold of Bavaria favored the Baltic Germans , who had been the dominant social , economic , and political class in Courland , Livonia , and Estonia since the 13th century . On March 8 and April 12 , 1918 the local Baltic German - dominated Land Council of Courland and the United Land Council of Livonia , Estonia , Riga and Ösel had declared themselves independent states , known as the Duchy of Courland and the Baltic State ( " Baltischer Staat " ) , respectively . Both states proclaimed themselves to be in personal union with Prussia , although the German government never responded and acknowledged that claim . The Baltic lands were nominally recognized as a sovereign state by Kaiser Wilhelm II on September 22 , 1918 , half a year after the newly Soviet Russia had formally relinquished all authority over its former Imperial Baltic provinces in the Treaty of Brest - Litovsk . On November 5 , 1918 , a temporary Regency Council ( " Regentschaftsrat " ) for the United Baltic Duchy , led by Baron Adolf Pilar von Pilchau , was formed on a joint basis from the two local Land Councils . 1918 - Germany loses World War I , Red Army threatens . Under the terms of the November 11 , 1918 Armistice the German Army was required to withdraw its troops from all other countries on a timetable established by the Allied Control Commission . As elsewhere , pro - socialist soldiers ’ councils controlled many German troop units in the Baltic area , but the Allied Control Commission insisted that the German troops remain to prevent the region from occupation by the Russian Red Army . The Red Army , led by the Latvian Riflemen was making serious inroads into Estonia and Latvia . The Estonians offered tough resistance to the Red Army and refused to ask for , or accept , German Army support . Instead , Scandinavian soldiers from Finland , Sweden , and Denmark came to their support . The Estonians , with this help and naval support from the British , were able to prevail over the Red Army after a year long fight . Meanwhile the Latvian People ' s Council ( Tautas Padome ) proclaimed Latvia ' s independence from Russia on November 18 , 1918 . Latvian leader Kārlis Ulmanis requested German Freikorps support for assistance against the Bolsheviks . The British observer , General Sir Hubert Gough , invoked Article 12 of the Armistice Agreement which provided that German troops must evacuate all territories belonging to the Russian Empire , but only " as soon as the Allies shall consider this desirable , having regard to the interior conditions of these territories " . 1919 - Iron Brigade . As many of the demoralized German soldiers were being withdrawn from Latvia , Major Josef Bischoff , an experienced German officer , formed a Freikorps unit called the Eiserne Brigade ( translated : " Iron Brigade " ) . This unit was deployed to Riga and used to delay the Red Army advance . Meanwhile , volunteers were recruited from Germany , with promises of land , a chance to fight Bolshevism , and other enticements of dubious veracity . These soldiers , along with remnants of the German 8th Army and the Eiserne Brigade , were reconstituted into the Eiserne ( Iron ) Division . Also , the Baltic Germans and some Latvians formed the Baltische Landeswehr . The official mission assigned to this force was to prevent any Red Army advance into East Prussia , but its real mission was to help the Baltic Germans re - establish their own state or dominance in Latvia . Initially , the Iron Division was commanded by Bischoff , and the Baltische Landeswehr by Major Alfred Fletcher , a German of Scottish ancestry . In late February , only the seaport of Liepāja and surroundings remained in the hands of the German and Latvian forces . In March 1919 , the Iron Brigade helped the German detachments win a series of victories over the Red forces . The main blow in the campaign was delivered by the " Baltische Landeswehr " , which first occupied port of Ventspils and then drove south to Riga . This attack appears to have been coordinated with the Estonians who drove the Bolsheviks from the northern part of Latvia . The Allies ordered the German government to withdraw its troops from the Baltic after defeat of Bolsheviks . The German forces attempted to seize control of Latvia with the assistance of the local ethnic German population . On April 16 he organised a coup d ' état in Liepāja , the provisional national government of Latvia took refuge aboard steamship " Saratow " . A new puppet government headed by Pastor Andrievs Niedra was proclaimed . Pastor Niedra was a Latvian Lutheran minister with pro - German sympathies . The Germans convinced the British to postpone the withdrawal of the German Freikorps units because this would give the Bolsheviks a free hand . Britain backed down after recognizing the gravity of the military situation , and the Freikorps moved on and captured Riga on May 23 , 1919 . Conflict with Estonia and Latvia . After the capture of Riga , the Freikorps were accused of killing 300 Latvians in Jelgava , 200 in Tukums , 125 in Daugavgrīva , and over 3 , 000 in Riga . The Latvian nationalists had turned against the German Freikorps and sought assistance from the Estonian troops who had occupied Latvian territory north of the Daugava River . The German forces advanced north towards the Latvian city of Cēsis . The objective of the German forces had now clearly become the establishment of German supremacy in the Baltic by eliminating the Estonian military and Latvian national units , not the defeat of the Bolsheviks . The Estonian commander General Johan Laidoner insisted the Germans withdraw to a line south of the Gauja river . He also ordered the Estonian 3rd division to seize the Gulbene railroad station . On June 19 , 1919 , the Landeswehr and the Iron Division launched an attack to capture Cēsis . Initially , the Freikorps captured the town of Straupe and continued their advance toward Limbaži . The Estonians launched a counterattack and drove the Freikorps out of Limbaži . On June 21 , the Estonians received reinforcements and immediately attacked the Landeswehr under Fletcher , who was forced to withdrawn from an area to the northeast of Cēsis . The Iron Division attacked from Straupe towards Stalbe in an effort to relieve pressure on the Landeswehr . On the morning of June 23 , the Germans began a general retreat toward Riga . The Allies again insisted that the Germans withdraw their remaining troops from Latvia , and on June 3 intervened to impose an armistice between Estonia , Latvia , and the Landeswehr and Freikorps when the Latvians and Estonians were about to march into Riga . Major Bischoff created a German Legion from over a dozen Freikorps units and turned the units over to the West Russian Volunteer Army . In all , the Iron Division transferred over 14 , 000 men , 64 aircraft , 56 artillery pieces , and 156 machine guns . Six cavalry units and a field hospital also went over . The offensive by the reformed German army was subsequently defeated by the Latvian Army , which received assistance from British and French warships and Estonian armoured trains . Retreat . The Freikorps had saved Latvia from capture by the Red Army in the spring of 1919 . However , the Freikorps ' goal of creating a German dominated state in Courland and Livonia failed . Many of the German Freikorps members who served in the Baltic left Latvia with the belief that they had been " stabbed in the back " by the Weimar Republic under president Friedrich Ebert . Hundreds of Baltic Freikorps soldiers had planned to settle in Latvia , and for those who had fought there , the land made a lasting impression and many of them longed for the day that they could return there . The Baltic Freikorps characterized their struggle against the Reds as the " Drang nach Osten " , ( the ride towards the East ) , and more than one Freikorps unit returned to Germany and planned for the day of their return . According to historian Robert GL Waite , while retreating from the Baltic , discipline amongst the Freikorps broke down and many fighters " ran wild through the country side marauding in complete disorder " Ernst von Salomon , who was in a Freikorps , fictionalized it as follows . They drove the Latvians ' like rabbits across the fields ' . They burned houses , destroyed bridges and telephone poles . They threw bodies into wells , followed by hand grenades : " We killed what fell into our hands , . . . We saw red , we had nothing in the heart of human emotions . . . what were earlier houses , were rubble , ash and smoldering beams , like festering sores in the bare field . . . We had lit a bonfire , there was burning more than dead material , there also was burning our hopes , our desires , . . . the laws and values of the civilized world . . . We retreated , bragging , intoxicated , loaded with booty " - - Ernst von Salomon , Die Geächteten