From this campaign the Chapter learned the value of loyalty, honour, courage and sacrifice. During this campaign they saw much disloyalty from those too weak to stand up for themselves and bowed down to the yoke of their xenos rulers. The Knights of Death purged the bloodthirsty xenos. One of their first campaigns was for the Chapter to liberate the lost Unalium Sector from the Ork. After the Chapter was fully manned at 1,000 Battle-Brother and deemed fit for active service, they were finally assigned an active role. The first members came from the Salamanders, to act as the initial cadre of officers and sergeants to help stand up the chapter and bring it to nominal numbers. The chapter was founded after the War of the Beast. The Knights of Death show all the qualities of sons of Vulkan and continue to stand their eternal vigil watching over the realm of the Emperor of Mankind. Since their creation, the Knights of Death have shown excellent adaptability and flexibility in several fields of warfare, including armoured and siege warfare, mass theatre operations, bike assaults, xenos purgation and the elimination of enemy command cadres. They claimed this world and its surrounding planets as a part of their domain and began the construction of their mighty fortress-monastery, 'The Festung'. After raising their numbers to nominal strength over several decades, the fully operational Chapter searched for, and eventually discovered, the world of Cathea. Their gene-seed hailed form the lineage of the ancient Salamanders Chapter, and their initial command cadre was made up of some of the Salamanders' finest warriors.
Once the Adeptus Mechanicus had raised enough gene-seed to provide for the initial inception of several Space Marine Chapters of what would eventually become the 4 th Founding, with the blessing of the High Lords of Terra, several dozen new Chapters were created, including the Knights of Death. To make up for these losses, every Chapter was ordered to double their gene-tithe in order to compensate for these losses and to utilise the extra gene-seed to raise new Chapters. The military forces of the Imperium had sacrificed much, including severe losses suffered by several Chapters of the Adeptus Astartes. This was the largest founding since the Second Founding, when the Space Marine Legions were broken down into separate Chapters. This founding took place in the wake of the near-disastrous War of the Beast, when the Imperium of Man was brought to its knees by the largest Ork WAAAGH! seen since the waning years of the Great Crusade. They were created during the 4 th Founding in 546.M32. The Knights of Death is a Loyalist Codex Astartes- compliant Successor Chapter of the Salamanders.