During August 1944 SS-Rottenführer Rudi Splinter of the 10.SS-Panzer-Division Frundsberg was left behind inside a house with a number of other German wounded in the Falaise Pocket:
They came into the room, heavily armed with Sten guns, and one asked: Are there any SS troops here? I should explain that a few days earlier I and another comrade had passed a destroyed German column, we discovered a supply of new tunics, unissued with no insignia. As our tunics were very shabby and tattered, we helped ourselves to the new ones. Because my uniform had no insignia, they had not realized I was Waffen-SS. They checked the other room. In there were two wounded Panzer soldiers from the Army (Wehrmacht). Both were seriously wounded. They took one look at their black uniforms with the traditional panzer death´s head collar tabs, assumed they were Waffen-SS and emptied their Sten gun magazines into them, slaughtering them as they lay there helpless. Despite his very junior rank Rudi Splinter was awarded the German Cross in Gold during the fighting in Normandy. Taken POW there, he settled in England after the war and turned his hand to farming. Source: Gordon Williamson;
Loyalty Is My Honor. Top image: a dead and looted young SS volunteer lies on top of a belt of unspent MG ammunition with an SS eagle added to his camouflage smock; though against regulations, this was commonly seen. With his helmet firmly in place, the MG spare barrel carrying case still slung around his lifeless body, this young member of a machine gun unit lies on the edge of a sunken lane somewhere in Normandy. Around him are the contents of his pockets, his cigarette case and playing cards, thrown away as just so much rubbish not wanted by the U.S. GIs who have searched through his pockets. USASC. Middle image: POWs of the 12.SS-Panzerdivision Hitlerjugend photographed by their American captors in Normandy. Normandy was lost and their sacrifice had been in vain. U.S. NARA. Bottom image: a captured youngster of the Hitlerjugend brought in by Privates Gaston Daigneault and Robert Bonneau of the Canadian Régiment de la Chaudière. The Chaudière was assigned to the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division in Normandy. The official Public Archives of Canada caption for this photo contains no information on the POW other than his division. By early Sept. 1944 the Hitlerjugend numbered only some 600 fit men and no tanks. Credit: Mateusz Pietruszkiewicz. Library and Archives Canada.
I sure hope those boys used their rifle butts on his face and not their knuckles! I suppose he's lucky with just a broken arm and a smashed face. It's not generally being talked about, but there were many instances where allied troops would shoot prisoners, but the 12th SS were fanatic murderers. Literally the worst of the worst. No sympathy for them.
ReplyDeleteThe worst of the worst!? What a simple-minded comment. Just a load of rubbish and spouting bias.
DeleteYes, it is very sad. These were just children. Teenage boys fighting a lost war.
DeleteThe photograph of the injured 12 SS Panzer Division youth is not evidence of the boy having been beaten. In the extant video of this arrest, there is also no indication of abuse. In that footage the boy is seen drinking from his flask. The visible injuries are consistent with common battlefield injuries.
ReplyDelete