SS-Obergruppenführer Walter Krüger (1890-1945)

Walter Krüger was a German Waffen-SS general during the Nazi era who rose to the rank of SS-Obergruppenführer und General der Waffen-SS. Born on 27 February 1890 in Straßburg in Alsace-Lorraine within the German Empire, he was the son of a Prussian army colonel and the elder brother of Friedrich-Wilhelm Krüger, who later became another prominent SS general and Ritterkreuzträger. Krüger served with distinction in both world wars, commanding large formations on the Eastern Front in the second conflict and earning the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords for his leadership in critical defensive and offensive operations. He committed suicide on 22 May 1945 in a forest near Sulęcin close to Liepāja in the Courland Pocket, choosing death over capture by advancing Soviet forces just days after the German surrender in Europe.

Krüger entered the Prussian cadet corps in 1900 and attended institutions in Karlsruhe and Berlin-Lichterfelde before being commissioned as a Leutnant in 1908 with the 2nd Badisches Grenadier-Regiment Nr. 110. During World War I he served initially as a battalion adjutant and later as a company and battalion commander on the Western Front, where he was wounded twice and accumulated a series of Imperial German decorations including both classes of the Iron Cross, the Knight's Cross of the Order of the Zähringer Lion, and the Prussian House Order of Hohenzollern with Swords. After the armistice he joined Freikorps units in the Baltic region in 1919, fighting Bolshevik forces in Kurland with formations such as Abteilung Pfeffer and the Westfälisches Freikorps. He briefly returned to the Reichswehr as a machine-gun company commander before leaving active service in 1920 to join the Stahlhelm veterans' organization, where he remained active until the early 1930s.

In December 1933 Krüger entered the Sturmabteilung as a Standartenführer and transferred to the SS-Verfügungstruppe in April 1935 with the rank of SS-Obersturmbannführer, taking command of the second battalion of SS-Standarte Germania. He served as an instructor at the SS-Junkerschule Bad Tölz and held various regimental commands before becoming operations officer of the SS-Polizei-Division in 1939, a role in which he helped prepare the unit for the Western Campaign. His steady rise through the SS ranks reflected both his Imperial Army experience and his early commitment to the National Socialist movement, including joining the NSDAP in 1937. By January 1940 he had reached SS-Oberführer and was positioned for higher field commands as the war expanded eastward.

Krüger assumed command of the SS-Polizei-Division on 10 August 1941 while it was engaged with L. Armeekorps of the 18. Armee on the Leningrad front during Operation Barbarossa. In the dense forests and marshy terrain south of the city, Soviet forces had constructed formidable defensive lines along the Luga River supported by artillery, minefields, and repeated armored counterattacks. Under his direction the division fought through these positions in grueling close-quarters combat, securing the key town of Luga by late July despite heavy losses from sniper fire and determined Red Army resistance. By late August the unit captured Krasnogvardeisk, a vital road and rail junction that facilitated the German encirclement efforts around Leningrad. Krüger's calm coordination of infantry assaults, artillery barrages, and rapid exploitation of breakthroughs turned repeated stalemates into measurable advances, tying down large Soviet formations and contributing directly to the isolation of the city; for this leadership he received the Knight's Cross on 13 December 1941 as the 734th recipient.

In March 1943 Krüger took command of the SS-Panzergrenadier-Division Das Reich within II. SS-Panzerkorps and led it through the opening phases of Operation Citadel, the German offensive at Kursk. Amid torrential rains that transformed roads into quagmires and thick belts of forest bristling with anti-tank guns and bunkers, his grenadiers and panzers smashed through the first Soviet defensive line on 5 July in fierce hand-to-hand fighting under constant artillery and air attack. The second line fell the following day, enabling thrusts that seized villages such as Lutschki and Kalinin after bitter street battles. When strong Soviet tank waves threatened the open right flank, Krüger directed reserves from forward positions, wheeling his panzer regiment to strike the enemy armor in the flank and rear while defensive strongpoints absorbed the main assault; the division destroyed 212 Soviet tanks in the resulting melee and turned a potential rout into a local victory. Later actions on the Mius front saw his forces break through hilltop positions on 2 August, capture Stepanowka, pursue the retreating enemy across the river, destroy 26 tanks, and take 1,400 prisoners while restoring the German line. These achievements earned him the Oak Leaves on 31 August 1943 as the 286th recipient.

Krüger subsequently commanded IV. SS-Panzerkorps before serving as inspector general of Waffen-SS infantry troops and then taking charge of VI. SS-Freiwilligen-Armeekorps, composed largely of Latvian and Estonian volunteers, in the Courland Pocket. During the Third Battle of Courland in late December 1944 his sector faced a devastating Soviet artillery barrage followed by a breakthrough by the 19th Tank Corps that reached German artillery positions. Krüger committed his scant reserves into savage close-quarters fighting, thinned his own lines to free forces, and launched a counterattack with army-level reserves into the deep right flank of the penetration, relieving encircled troops in Trenci and sealing the gap overnight amid freezing snow. When another Soviet tank corps advanced through forest and swamp toward Lestene, he threw his final reserve—a Kampfgruppe from the 4. Panzer-Division—directly against the enemy main effort. Coordinated counterattacks across snow-covered terrain destroyed more than 100 Soviet tanks in running battles and re-established a continuous defensive line, blunting eleven days of assaults and preventing the collapse of the northern wing of 16. Armee. A telex from the army commander explicitly credited Krüger's unyielding personal leadership for the corps' success against vastly superior forces; for this he was awarded the Swords on 11 January 1945 as the 120th recipient. Surprised by Soviet troops while attempting to evade capture in a forest near Sulęcin on 22 May 1945, he ended his life rather than face imprisonment.

Source:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Krüger_(SS_general)
https://www.tracesofwar.com/persons/34579/Krüger-Walter-Waffen-SS.htm
https://grokipedia.com/page/Walter_Krüger_(SS_general)
https://www.lexikon-der-wehrmacht.de/
https://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?t=22259
https://en.namu.wiki/w/발터_크뤼거
https://www.geni.com/
https://rk.balsi.de/index.php?action=list&cat=300
https://www.unithistories.com/units_index/index.php?file=/officers/personsx.html
https://web.archive.org/web/20091027052912fw_/http://geocities.com/orion47.geo/index2.html
https://www.wehrmacht-awards.com/forums/

SS-Obergruppenführer Felix Steiner (1896-1966)

Felix Martin Julius Steiner was a German SS commander during the Second World War who rose to the rank of SS-Obergruppenführer und General der Waffen-SS and became one of the most prominent leaders in the multinational volunteer formations of the Waffen-SS. Born on 23 May 1896 in Stallupönen in East Prussia, a region now part of modern Russia, he grew up immersed in the Prussian military tradition and entered the Royal Prussian Army as an infantry cadet in March 1914. His early service in the First World War took him through the brutal fighting on the Western Front where he distinguished himself repeatedly, earning the Iron Cross Second Class in October 1914 and the First Class in November 1917 while also receiving the Wound Badge in Black for injuries sustained in 1918. After the armistice Steiner joined the Freikorps in Memel and participated in the suppression of communist uprisings during the German Revolution of 1919 before being integrated into the Reichswehr in 1921. He advanced steadily through the ranks of the small professional army of the Weimar Republic, reaching the position of major by 1933 when he retired from regular service and briefly served in the Landespolizei. In January 1934 he joined the Nazi Party with membership number 4,264,295 and shortly afterward transferred to the SS with the number 253,351, beginning a new phase of his career that would see him shape some of the most elite and controversial units of the Third Reich. A devout Evangelical by upbringing, Steiner remained unmarried throughout his life and had no children, devoting himself entirely to his military vocation.

Steiner’s entry into the SS-Verfügungstruppe in 1935 quickly propelled him through the ranks as he demonstrated exceptional organizational talent and a modern approach to training. By June 1936 he commanded the SS-Standarte Deutschland, transforming it into a highly disciplined motorized regiment known for its aggressive tactics and esprit de corps. When the Second World War erupted in September 1939 his regiment spearheaded the SS-Verfügungs-Division through the Invasion of Poland, earning him the Clasps to both classes of the Iron Cross within weeks. The real test came during the Battle of France in 1940 when Steiner’s men were tasked with the rapid capture of the Zeeland islands in the Netherlands. Under constant enemy fire he personally directed a lightning three-day thrust westward to Vlissingen, coordinating infantry assaults with Stuka dive-bomber support while his soldiers waded through waist-deep water at the Beveland Canal and stormed fortified French positions in savage hand-to-hand combat along the narrow causeway. The regiment cleared two major defensive lines and took thousands of prisoners, isolating Allied forces and contributing decisively to the collapse of resistance in the region. For this masterful leadership and personal bravery at the front Steiner was awarded the Knight’s Cross of the Iron Cross on 15 August 1940, one of the earliest such decorations granted to a Waffen-SS officer, cementing his reputation as a bold and innovative commander who could achieve rapid victories even against determined opposition.

Following the French campaign Heinrich Himmler personally selected Steiner to form and lead a new division that would embody the Waffen-SS ideal of a multinational elite force. On 1 December 1940 he assumed command of what became the SS-Division Wiking, a motorized formation initially built around the Germania regiment and later reinforced with Scandinavian, Dutch, Flemish and Baltic volunteers. The division crossed into the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941 as part of Army Group South and fought its way through Tarnopol and across the Dnieper River toward Dnepropetrovsk amid ferocious Soviet counterattacks. Through the muddy autumn and the brutal winter of 1941-1942 Steiner kept the formation cohesive despite heavy losses, repulsing repeated Red Army assaults on the Mius River line where one regiment alone suffered fifty percent casualties yet held its ground. In the summer of 1942 Wiking participated in the capture of Rostov-on-Don and then raced across the steppes into the Caucasus, reaching the Terek River in September. There Steiner ordered a daring river crossing under intense artillery fire, after which his panzergrenadiers and attached tanks battled for weeks in the rugged foothills around Mosdok and Alagir, holding mountain ridges against wave after wave of Soviet infantry in freezing nights and close-quarter fighting. The division’s deep penetration to the southernmost point of the German advance and its tenacious defense of the Terek bridgehead earned Steiner the German Cross in Gold in April 1942 and ultimately the Oak Leaves to the Knight’s Cross on 23 December 1942 while he was still commanding the now redesignated 5th SS-Panzergrenadier Division Wiking.

In April 1943 Steiner relinquished direct command of Wiking to take charge of the newly formed III (Germanic) SS Panzer Corps, a larger combined-arms formation that incorporated Nordic and Western European volunteer units including Nordland, Nederland, Wallonien and Langemarck. After initial anti-partisan operations in Yugoslavia the corps was rushed to the Leningrad front in late 1943 where it faced the Soviet 2nd Shock Army. On 13 January 1944 the Red Army unleashed a massive artillery barrage followed by overwhelming infantry and tank assaults that shattered several Luftwaffe field divisions, yet Steiner’s SS troops conducted a disciplined fighting withdrawal over 150 miles westward, reaching the Narva River just ahead of the pursuers. He immediately established a bridgehead on the eastern bank while positioning artillery inside the city itself on the western side, turning the narrow strip of land and the subsequent Tannenberg Line in the Blue Hills of Sinimäe into a formidable fortress. For six months Soviet attacks came daily, often hourly, supported by hundreds of tanks and endless waves of infantry; Steiner shifted his multinational battalions like a chess master, launching precise counterattacks to retake lost heights and channeling the enemy into killing zones in the marshy forested terrain. At one critical point a single reconnaissance company of Nordland destroyed forty-eight Soviet tanks in a single engagement while the defenders held against overwhelming odds, stalling the Red Army’s drive on the Baltic for half a year. These epic defensive battles earned Steiner promotion to SS-Obergruppenführer und General der Waffen-SS in July 1943 and the Swords to the Knight’s Cross on 10 August 1944, the eighty-sixth recipient of this highest grade.

By late 1944 Steiner’s corps was withdrawn from the Baltic and reassigned to the Eleventh SS Panzer Army under Army Group Vistula, though the army existed largely on paper and his forces were soon placed in reserve with the Third Panzer Army. In January 1945 he briefly commanded the Eleventh SS Panzer Army before it was inactivated near the Oder River. During the final Soviet Berlin Offensive in April 1945 Adolf Hitler personally designated the remnants of Steiner’s units as Army Detachment Steiner and ordered an ambitious pincer attack northward from Eberswalde against the flank of Marshal Zhukov’s 1st Belorussian Front. Assembling a motley force that included the 4th SS Panzergrenadier Division Polizei, the 5th Jäger Division and the 25th Panzergrenadier Division, Steiner assessed the situation with brutal realism during a conference at the Führerbunker on 22 April. With only two understrength battalions available, virtually no heavy weapons and no prospect of adequate support, he informed his superiors that the planned counterattack was militarily impossible and refused to launch what he viewed as a suicidal operation. Hitler’s subsequent outburst, declaring the war lost and his intention to remain in Berlin, marked a dramatic turning point, yet Steiner’s pragmatic stance preserved what little remained of his command and prevented further pointless slaughter in the final days of the Reich.

After Germany’s capitulation on 8 May 1945 Steiner was taken into British captivity and held until his release in 1948 following investigations that ultimately dropped any war-crimes charges against him at the Nuremberg proceedings. In the postwar years he became a founding member of the HIAG veterans’ organization and emerged as one of its most influential figures, advocating for the rehabilitation of former Waffen-SS soldiers while distancing himself from the most fanatical elements of the Nazi regime. He authored two widely read memoirs, Die Freiwilligen der Waffen-SS: Idee und Opfergang in 1958 and Die Armee der Geächteten in 1963, in which he defended the combat record of the multinational SS divisions and portrayed their soldiers as idealistic volunteers rather than ideological fanatics. Living quietly in Munich, Steiner suffered from declining health and died of heart failure on 12 May 1966 at the age of seventy. His legacy remains complex: revered by some as a brilliant tactician who forged effective multinational units under extreme conditions, yet condemned by others for his senior role in an organization deeply implicated in the crimes of the Nazi regime.

Source:
https://www.lexikon-der-wehrmacht.de/
https://en.wikipedia.org/
https://www.tracesofwar.com/
https://grokipedia.com/
https://rk.balsi.de/index.php?action=list&cat=300
https://www.unithistories.com/units_index/index.php?file=/officers/personsx.html
https://web.archive.org/web/20091027052912fw_/http://geocities.com/orion47.geo/index2.html
https://forum.axishistory.com/
https://www.wehrmacht-awards.com/forums/
https://www.bundesarchiv.de/en/
https://www.geni.com/
https://books.google.com/
https://ww2gravestone.com/people/steiner-felix-martin/
Felix Steiner, Die Armee der Geächteten (1963)
Felix Steiner, Die Freiwilligen der Waffen-SS: Idee und Opfergang (1958)

SS-Gruppenführer Hermann Fegelein (1906-1945)

Hermann Fegelein, born Hans Georg Otto Hermann Fegelein on 30 October 1906 in Ansbach in the Kingdom of Bavaria within the German Empire, was a high-ranking commander in the Waffen-SS during the Nazi era who rose to prominence through a combination of equestrian expertise, frontline combat leadership and close personal ties to the inner circle of Adolf Hitler. He commanded cavalry formations on the Eastern Front, participated in brutal anti-partisan operations and later served as Heinrich Himmler's liaison officer at the Führerbunker in Berlin. Fegelein married Gretl Braun, sister of Hitler's mistress Eva Braun, in June 1944, which further elevated his status within the regime. His military career included notable bravery that earned him Germany's highest decorations, yet it ended in disgrace when he was arrested, court-martialed and executed by firing squad on 28 April 1945 in the Reich Chancellery gardens for desertion as Soviet forces tightened their grip on the capital. Fegelein had one younger brother, Waldemar, and his father Hans ran a prominent riding school that shaped his early passion for horses, though details of his mother remain scarce in historical records.

Fegelein's path into the military began in the interwar period when he enlisted in the Reiter-Regiment 17 of the Reichswehr in 1925 at the age of eighteen. By 1933 he transferred to the SS with the number 66 680 and the NSDAP membership number 1 200 158, quickly advancing through ranks due to his riding skills. He led the Reiter-SS equestrian group, organized events for the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games and became head of the Haupt-Reitschule München in 1937. These early roles blended sportsmanship with paramilitary training, earning him various civilian and party awards including the German Olympic Honor Badge First Class and the German Riding Badge in Gold. When war broke out in 1939 Fegelein commanded the SS-Totenkopf-Reiterstandarte during the Polish campaign, where his unit operated from Warsaw and engaged in security duties that foreshadowed the more ruthless operations to come. In 1940 he saw action in Belgium and France with the SS-Verfügungstruppe before being reassigned to the East in 1941, first with reconnaissance elements attached to the 87th Infantry Division near Białystok and then taking charge of SS-Kavallerie-Regiment 1.

The brutal realities of the Eastern Front transformed Fegelein into a seasoned combat leader during Operation Barbarossa. In 1941 his brigade played a central role in the large-scale sweeps through the Pripyat Marshes, where mounted SS troopers conducted mass executions of suspected partisans and civilians under direct orders aimed at securing the rear areas for advancing German armies. These actions involved riding through swampy terrain, setting ambushes and coordinating with infantry to encircle villages, often resulting in thousands of deaths in what later historians described as early genocidal warfare tactics. By late 1941 Fegelein had risen to command the full SS-Kavallerie-Brigade, which was thrown into the defensive meat grinder northwest of Rzhev as part of the 9th Army in Army Group Center. The winter of 1941-1942 brought blizzards, temperatures plunging to minus forty degrees and Soviet assaults that turned the landscape into a frozen wasteland of snowdrifts and icy trenches, where horses and men alike struggled to move yet Fegelein maintained mobility through skillful use of mounted patrols and rapid counterattacks.

Fegelein's leadership at Rzhev directly secured his first major decoration when, in January and February 1942, wave after wave of Red Army infantry and cavalry hammered the German lines north of Malo Nikolskoye, Polovino, Saizewo, Dmitrowo and Sokolowo. On 5 February 1942 he personally directed a lightning assault that encircled elements of the Soviet 381st Rifle Division at Chertolino, with his troopers charging through deep snow in close-quarters fighting to overrun positions, seize a critical road junction and capture the railway station supplying the enemy spearhead. Nine days later, on 14 February, his regiments stormed the village of Yershovo under artillery barrages, sealing the pocket and annihilating trapped Soviet units in hand-to-hand combat amid burning buildings and drifting smoke. Through relentless personal bravery, iron discipline and clever exploitation of cavalry speed even in arctic conditions, Fegelein prevented any decisive breakthrough, stabilized the entire sector for the 9th Army and inflicted devastating losses on the attackers, actions that earned him the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross on 2 March 1942 as SS-Standartenführer der Reserve.

By December 1942 Fegelein was rushed south to command an ad-hoc Kampfgruppe in the great bend of the Don River during the Soviet winter offensive following Stalingrad. In one of the most audacious operations of his career, on 20 December he led a tiny reconnaissance force consisting of himself, an Oberscharführer and just two Sturmgeschütze assault guns deep behind enemy lines through snow-covered steppe shrouded in darkness and fog. The group surprised an entire Soviet corps headquarters, bursting into the command post in a short, sharp firefight that captured the commanding general, his chief of staff, several senior officers and the full staff intact along with operational maps, orders and two additional assault guns. This spectacular coup decapitated Soviet command in the sector, plunged the enemy offensive into immediate chaos and bought vital time for German defenses to hold, even though Fegelein himself was wounded by a sniper the same day. The strategic impact and sheer boldness of the raid resulted in the award of the Oak Leaves to his Knight's Cross on 22 December 1942.

As commander of the newly formed 8th SS Cavalry Division Florian Geyer throughout 1943, Fegelein orchestrated a series of grueling anti-partisan sweeps and defensive battles that culminated in his final decoration. In May through July his horsemen cleared dense forests and marshes southwest of Gomel during Operations Weichsel, Zeithen and Seydlitz, riding at dawn to encircle partisan bands, burning hideouts and securing supply routes with ruthless efficiency amid ambushes and hand-to-hand clashes. Transferred to the blazing Kharkov sector in August, the division repelled furious Soviet tank and infantry assaults near Bespalovka and Bolshaya Gomolsha on 26 August in savage close combat. On 8 September Fegelein personally directed a fierce counterattack that recaptured the dominating Hill 199.0 at Verkhniy Bishkin under heavy artillery fire, his men storming the slopes through smoke and explosions to restore the line. Even after sustaining a serious wound to his left arm on 13 September while fighting for Hill 208.5, he refused evacuation until the position was secured. These repeated defensive victories and captures of enemy personnel and equipment were cited when the Swords to his Knight's Cross with Oak Leaves were awarded on 30 July 1944.

After his wounding in September 1943 Fegelein was reassigned to a staff role as Himmler's liaison officer at Hitler's headquarters, where he became a fixture in the shrinking inner circle of the Führerbunker by early 1944. His marriage to Gretl Braun on 3 June 1944 in Salzburg and the birth of their daughter Eva Barbara on 5 May 1945 tied him inextricably to the Braun family and Hitler's personal life. Yet as the Soviet offensive closed on Berlin in April 1945 Fegelein attempted to flee the capital, leading to his arrest on 28 April, immediate demotion and a summary court-martial ordered by Hitler himself. Executed by SS firing squad in the Reich Chancellery garden that same evening, his death symbolized the collapsing discipline of the regime in its final days. Fegelein left behind a legacy of combat skill intertwined with the atrocities of the Eastern Front campaigns, remembered both for battlefield audacity and for his proximity to the Nazi leadership's downfall.

Source:  
https://en.wikipedia.org/  
https://www.tracesofwar.com/  
https://www.lexikon-der-wehrmacht.de/  
https://rk.balsi.de/index.php?action=list&cat=300  
https://www.geni.com/  
https://forum.axishistory.com/  
https://www.wehrmacht-awards.com/forums/  
https://www.bundesarchiv.de/en/  
https://web.archive.org/web/20091027052912fw_/http://geocities.com/orion47.geo/index2.html  
https://www.unithistories.com/units_index/index.php?file=/officers/personsx.html  
Padfield, Peter: Himmler: Reichsführer S.S. (1991)  
Various archival documents from Bundesarchiv and unit histories on Waffen-SS cavalry formations.

SS-Gruppenführer Hermann Priess (1901-1985)

Hermann August Fredrich Priess (24 May 1901 - 2 February 1985) was a German general in the Waffen-SS and a convicted war criminal during World War II. He commanded the 3rd SS Panzer Division Totenkopf following the death of Theodor Eicke in February 1943 and later led the I SS Panzer Corps from October 1944 until the end of the war. Priess was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords for his leadership on the Eastern Front. During the Ardennes Offensive, units under his command were involved in the Malmedy massacre, leading to his postwar conviction and imprisonment. He served in various artillery and divisional roles throughout the conflict, rising to the rank of SS-Gruppenfuhrer and Generalleutnant of the Waffen-SS.

Priess was born on 24 May 1901 in Marnitz, a small town in Mecklenburg, German Empire, to Ernst Priess, a butcher, and Dorothea Thiede. Raised in a Protestant family, he completed his schooling and worked on his family's farm until January 1919, when he volunteered for service in the German army amid the chaos following World War I. Although the war on the Western Front had ended, threats persisted on Germany's eastern borders. His initial unit was disbanded due to the Treaty of Versailles restrictions, prompting him to join the Freikorps von Brandis, where he fought in the Estonian War of Independence from 1919 to 1920. Returning to the Reichswehr in 1920, Priess served a 12-year term, advancing to the rank of Oberfeldwebel before being discharged in June 1931 due to military downsizing. During this interwar period, he maintained a low profile, but his early military experience laid the foundation for his later career in the SS.

In the early 1930s, Priess aligned himself with the rising Nazi regime, joining the NSDAP on 1 December 1933 with membership number 1,472,296, and the SS on 10 July 1934 with number 113,258. He entered the SS-Verfugungstruppe as an SS-Hauptsturmfuhrer and took command of the 13th Company of SS-Standarte Germania. By June 1939, he was involved in establishing an artillery department for the new SS-Verfugungsdivision, earning promotion to SS-Sturmbannfuhrer on 20 April 1939. Priess led this unit during the invasion of Poland in September 1939, followed by participation in the Western Campaign in 1940. Promoted to SS-Obersturmbannfuhrer on 1 August 1940, he assumed command of the SS-Artillerie-Regiment Totenkopf, which he led into the invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941. His rapid promotions continued, reaching SS-Standartenfuhrer on 21 June 1941, reflecting his specialization in artillery tactics and his integration into the Waffen-SS elite.

On the Eastern Front, Priess's artillery regiment played a crucial role in the brutal campaigns of 1941-1943. During the defense of the Demyansk Pocket from February to April 1942, his coordinated fire support repelled sustained Soviet assaults along a 41-kilometer front, earning him the German Cross in Gold on 6 January 1942. Following Theodor Eicke's death on 26 February 1943, Priess took command of the SS-Panzergrenadier-Division Totenkopf, redesignated as the 3rd SS Panzer Division. He led it through the Third Battle of Kharkov in March 1943, contributing to the destruction of the Soviet 3rd Tank Army and the recapture of the city. Promoted to SS-Oberfuhrer and later SS-Brigadefuhrer and Generalmajor of the Waffen-SS on 15 July 1943, Priess commanded during Operation Citadel (Battle of Kursk) in July 1943, engaging in fierce tank battles around Prokhorovka. Despite heavy losses, his leadership maintained divisional cohesion against superior Soviet forces.

Priess's command extended into the defensive retreats of late 1943 and early 1944. After Kursk, the division held against Soviet counteroffensives on the Mius River and during the Fourth Battle of Kharkov in August 1943, facilitating German withdrawals to the Dnieper River. In November-December 1943, he orchestrated counterattacks in the Krivoi Rog sector, stabilizing lines amid the Dnieper-Carpathian Offensive. During the Korsun Pocket relief in January-February 1944, Priess's forces broke through to evacuate survivors under harsh winter conditions. Relieved of divisional command on 21 June 1944, he briefly led the XIII SS Army Corps from 7 August to 24 October 1944 before taking over the I SS Panzer Corps on 30 October 1944. Promoted to SS-Gruppenfuhrer and Generalleutnant on 20 April 1944, he commanded this corps during the Ardennes Offensive in December 1944, where subordinated units like Kampfgruppe Peiper committed the Malmedy massacre, murdering 84 American POWs.

In early 1945, the I SS Panzer Corps was redeployed to Hungary, participating in Operation Southwind in February, which destroyed the Soviet Hron Bridgehead near Esztergom. Priess then led the corps in Operation Spring Awakening, the last major German offensive, centered around Lake Balaton from 6 to 16 March 1945, ending in defeat and retreat toward Vienna. Surrendering to American forces in May 1945, Priess was initially held at Camp King, where he contributed to U.S. Army historical studies. From May to July 1946, he stood trial in the Malmedy massacre proceedings at Dachau, one of 73 defendants charged with the deaths of over 300 American POWs and 100 Belgian civilians. Convicted for issuing orders that encouraged "reckless brutality" and terror tactics, he received a 20-year sentence on 16 July 1946 but was released early from Landsberg Prison in October 1954. Priess lived quietly in Ahrensburg until his death on 2 February 1985 at age 83, married to Hildegard Schmidt with three children.

Priess's military decorations highlighted his combat effectiveness, particularly on the Eastern Front. He received the Iron Cross 2nd Class on 22 September 1939 and 1st Class on 15 October 1939, followed by the Wound Badge in Black and Demyansk Shield. The Knight's Cross was awarded on 28 April 1943 for his artillery leadership in the Demyansk Pocket and early Kharkov battles. The Oak Leaves (297th recipient) came on 9 September 1943 for successes during Kursk and the Mius River defenses. The Swords (65th recipient) were granted on 24 April 1944 for defensive actions in the Korsun Pocket and Krivoi Rog. These honors underscored his tactical acumen but were overshadowed by his association with SS atrocities, including the Totenkopf Division's origins in concentration camp guards and the war crimes under his corps command. Post-release, Priess avoided public life, with no further notable activities recorded before his passing.

Source:
https://www.lexikon-der-wehrmacht.de/
https://en.wikipedia.org/
https://www.tracesofwar.com/
https://grokipedia.com/
https://rk.balsi.de/index.php?action=list&cat=300
https://www.unithistories.com/units_index/index.php?file=/officers/personsx.html
https://web.archive.org/web/20091027052912/http://geocities.com/orion47.geo/index2.html
https://forum.axishistory.com/
https://www.wehrmacht-awards.com/forums/
https://www.bundesarchiv.de/en/
https://www.geni.com/
https://books.google.com/
https://ww2gravestone.com/people/priess-hermann
Books: "Waffen-SS Knights and their Battles" by Peter Mooney (Schiffer Publishing, 2010); "The Waffen-SS: A European History" edited by Jochen Boehler and Robert Gerwarth (Oxford University Press, 2017); "Totenkopf: The Structure, Development and Personalities of the 3.SS-Panzer-Division" by Mark C. Yerger (Bender Publishing, 2000)

Bio of SS-Obergruppenführer Leonardo Conti (1900-1945)

SS-Brigadeführer Leonardo Conti (left)

Leonardo Conti (24 August 1900 – 6 October 1945) was the Reich Health Leader and an SS-Obergruppenführer in Nazi Germany. He was involved in the planning and execution of Action T4 that murdered hundreds of thousands adults and children with severe mental and physical handicaps. On 19 May 1945, after Germany's surrender, Conti was imprisoned and in October hanged himself to avoid trial.

Conti was born to a Swiss Italian father, Silvio, and a German mother, Nanna Pauli; his mother later became the Reich Midwifery Leader in Nazi Germany. He attended elementary school in Switzerland and the Friedrich Wilhelm Gymnasium in Berlin. In the summer of 1918, he volunteered for military service in the First World War with the Imperial German Army's 54th Field Artillery Regiment in Küstrin (today, Kostrzyn nad Odrą). However, he did not see any combat before the war ended in November.

Returning to school, Conti then studied medicine at the Humboldt University of Berlin and the University of Erlangen–Nuremberg. He was active in the national student movement and in right wing politics. He became involved in the völkisch movement and co-founded the antisemitic combat association, Deutscher Volksbund. He took part in the Kapp Putsch in 1920 as a member of the Marinebrigade Ehrhardt. After it was disbanded in May 1922, he followed its leader Hermann Ehrhardt into the ultra-nationalist and antisemitic terrorist organization Organisation Consul. After this organization was banned by the government in July 1922, Conti enrolled in the Viking League, another right wing group committed to the overthrow of the Weimar Republic. He was also involved with the Deutschvölkischer Schutz- und Trutzbund, the largest and most active antisemitic organization in Germany. He passed his state medical examinations in November 1923 and joined the Sturmabteilung (SA) in Erlangen that year, becoming their first physician in Berlin. He obtained his license to practice medicine in 1925 and moved to Munich where he worked as a general practitioner and a pediatrician.

In 1927, Conti moved back to Berlin and joined the Nazi Party on 20 December (membership number 72,225). He was appointed the SA physician for Standarte V and was placed in charge of organizing the SA medical services in Berlin. From 1929 to 1930 he was the senior physician in SA-Gruppe Ost. He also founded the Berlin branch of the National Socialist German Doctors' League, (NSDÄB). In February 1930, he was called upon to treat Horst Wessel, an SA member who was shot by members of the Communist Party of Germany and whose death was exploited by Joseph Goebbels in a propaganda campaign to elevate him into a martyr of the Nazi movement. However in September 1930, Conti, who had reached the rank of SA-Oberführer, was expelled from the SA when he came into conflict with Walter Stennes, at that time the commander of SA-Gruppe Ost.

Conti joined the SS on 16 November 1930 (member number 3982) and became the senior doctor for SS-Gruppe Ost. In May 1932, Conti was elected as a Nazi deputy to the Landtag of Prussia where he served until it was dissolved on 14 October 1933. After the Nazi seizure of power, Conti was given a number of official positions in the German government, mostly in the areas of medicine and health. On 12 April 1934 he was appointed by Hermann Göring to the Prussian State Council. He was placed in charge of all medical arrangements for the 1936 Berlin Olympics. On 1 April 1936, he was assigned to the personal staff of Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler. In 1937 Conti was elected to the presidency of the FIMS, the International Federation of Sports Medicine. The FIMS today considers this to have been "a black page" in their history. Conti also played a role in the banning of Jewish physicians from medical practice. In an interview in 1938, he declared: "It is only the elimination of the Jewish element which provides for the German doctor the living space due to him."

On 20 April 1939, Conti was appointed Reich Health Leader, President of the NSDÄB and head of the Main Office of Public Health; he was granted the Party rank of Hauptdienstleiter. This was followed on 28 August by Adolf Hitler appointing him State Secretary for Public Health and Nursing in the Reich and Prussian Ministry of the Interior. Conti attempted to have the use of the methamphetamine Pervitin restricted by the Wehrmacht, which had been issuing millions of tablets to their soldiers and airmen. In July 1941 Conti succeeded in having Pervitin added to the list of restricted substances but only a warning was issued to the military. In August 1941, Conti was elected to the Reichstag. On 1 October 1941 he was promoted to SS-Gruppenführer and attained the rank of SS-Obergruppenführer on 20 April 1944.

Conti was a staunch promoter of a public medical administration strongly controlled by the Nazi state. Under his leadership, local health offices were further expanded to allow for a genetic control and selection of the population in order to remove "weak" elements for the improvement of the German race, a doctrine known as eugenics. The various programmes were the basis for "racial hygiene" a lethal part of the Nazi philosophy. Conti worked with Dr. Karl Brandt to draft plans for the extermination of all Germany's mental patients along with those suffering from severe physical handicaps. This program, known euphemistically as Action T4, is estimated to have killed over 200,000 adults and children between 1939 and 1945. Conti was initially placed in charge of this initiative but soon was replaced by Philip Bouhler.

Accordingly, he was co-responsible for the forced sterilization program, the racially motivated forced pregnancy interruptions, and ultimately the Action T4 euthanasia program. It is also undisputed that Conti participated in human experiments. Conti was also involved in the forensic investigation into the Katyn massacre, and received a detailed report, known as the Katyn Commission on the discovery from an international team of experts.

On 19 May 1945, after Germany's surrender, Conti was arrested by the British in Flensburg and was imprisoned and held as a witness for the Nuremberg trials. He would have been brought to the Doctors' Trial for his involvement in Action T4. However, on 6 October 1945, Conti hanged himself in his Nuremberg cell. On 1 May 1959, his estate was fined 3000 Deutsche Marks by the Berlin denazification tribunal.

Source :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonardo_Conti
https://index.hu/fortepan/2015/05/30/usznak_el_a_felmalhazott_nepek/
https://milosvojinovic.substack.com/p/11-nacisticki-kamp-u-beogradu-1940

German Officials during Legion Condor Welcoming Ceremony

German high ranking officials stands during the welcoming ceremonies for the Legion Condor, which were held at the Lustgarten Square, Berlin, June 6, 1939. For the identification:

1.Unidentified SS General,
2.SA-Obergruppenführer Wilhelm Brückner (Chefadjutant Führer und Reichskanzler),
3.Großadmiral Erich Raeder (Oberbefehlshaber der Kriegsmarine),
4.Generaloberst Walther von Brauchitsch (Oberbefehlshaber des Heeres),
4a.Generaloberst Wilhelm Keitel (Chef Oberkommando der Wehrmacht),
5.General der Flieger Bernhard Kühl (Offizier z.b.V. des Reichsluftfahrtministerium und Obersluftfahrtministerium und der Luftwaffe),
5a.Generalmajor Karl-Heinrich Bodenschatz (Chef Ministeramts im Reichsluftfahrtministerium und Verbindungsoffizier Görings zu Hitler),
5b.Oberst Walter Warlimont (Stellvertreter Chef Wehrmachtsführungsamt),
6.General der Flieger Hugo Sperrle (former 1st Commander of the Legion Condor),
7.SS-Gruppenführer Karl Wolff (Chefadjutant Reichsführer-SS),
8.Generalleutnant Hubert Weise (Kommandierender General Luftgau-Kommando III),
9.Oberstleutnant Rudolf Schmundt (Chefadjutant des Heeres beim Führer und Oberbefehlshaber der Wehrmacht),
10.Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler (Chef der SS und Polizei),
11.SS-Gruppenführer Dr.rer.pol. Otto Dietrich (Staatssekretär im Reichsministerium für Volksaufklärung und Propaganda),
12.SS-Obergruppenführer Josef "Sepp" Dietrich (Kommandeur "Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler").

Source :
https://artsandculture.google.com/entity/m064km4b?hl=en

SS General Karl Wolff in Italy 1944

SS-Obergruppenführer und General der Waffen-SS Karl Wolff (Höhere SS und Polizeiführer Italien und Bevollmächtigter General der deutschen Wehrmacht in Italien) in a ceremony in Italy, October 1944. The picture was taken by Walter Frentz.

Autoblindo fiat-ansaldo

Source :
https://www.facebook.com/groups/691098008051629/posts/1461330584361697/?__cft__[0]=AZUBmDqMXNf_IXm28f7flb_XoOyQrTQa2HdYvqQtp-c6Y9FRoSok2KAsdHetzqocPo1w3NQ-NkC-IDQf_x-rrSiEOQkI8wzu6E3SOCHWdpi_KW8o1K6aPM23KtKf1o7pRvfyExQuG6U0mt0ucEr6ptFY&__tn__=%2CO%2CP-R

Bio of SS-Obergruppenführer Karl Wolff

SS-Obergruppenführer und General der Waffen-SS Karl Wolff (Höhere SS und Polizeiführer Italien und Bevollmächtigter General der deutschen Wehrmacht in Italien) in Northern Italy, late 1944. The picture was taken by Walter Frentz.

Karl Friedrich Otto Wolff (13 May 1900 – 17 July 1984) was born the son of a wealthy district court magistrate in Darmstadt on 13 May 1900. During World War I he graduated from school in 1917, volunteered to join the Imperial German Army (Leibgarde-Infanterie-Regiment Nr. 115) and served on the Western Front. He rose to the rank of lieutenant and was awarded both the Iron Cross second class and first class.

After the war, Wolff was forced to leave the army because of the reduction of the German armed forces following the terms imposed by the Treaty of Versailles. Wolff was in the paramilitary Freikorps from December 1918 to May 1920. He started a two-year apprenticeship at the Bethmann Bank in Frankfurt and married Frieda von Römheld in 1923. The couple moved to Munich, where Wolff worked for Deutsche Bank. In June 1924 he was laid off and joined a public relations firm. Wolff may also have studied law, but never took any state exams. In 1925 he started his own public relations company which he operated in Munich until 1933.

Wolff joined the Nazi Party with card number 695,131 and the SS in October 1931. His SS membership number was 14,235 and he was commissioned as an SS-Sturmführer in February 1932.

From March 1933, after the Nazi Party had obtained national power, Wolff served as an adjutant to Franz Ritter von Epp, then-governor of Bavaria. Here he came to the attention of the head of the SS Heinrich Himmler who appointed Wolff his personal adjutant in June 1933. In 1936 Wolff became a member of the Reichstag. The same year Himmler named him chief of Personal Staff Reichsführer-SS to coordinate all contact and correspondence within the SS at both party and state levels.

By managing Himmler's affairs with the SS, the Nazi Party, state agencies and personnel, the eloquent and well mannered Wolff rose to become one of the key figures in Himmler's power regime. In addition, Wolff oversaw the economic investments made by the SS, was responsible for saving funds among Himmler's circle of friends and for connections to the SS organizations Ahnenerbe and Lebensborn. In 1939 he retroactively became head of the Main Office and SS liaison officer to Hitler. In 1936, Wolff left the Protestant Church. On 30 January 1937, he was promoted to the rank of SS-Gruppenführer (major general).

As was later revealed in the 1964 trial, during the early part of the Second World War, Wolff was "Himmler's eyes and ears" in Hitler's headquarters. He would have been aware of significant events or could easily have access to the relevant information. Apart from the information passing across his desk, Wolff received (as Chief of Himmler's Personal Staff) copies of all letters from SS officers, and his friends at this point included Odilo Globocnik, the organiser of Operation Reinhard. His later denial of knowledge of Holocaust activities may be plausible only at the detailed level, but not of the extent of atrocities by the Nazi regime.

Incriminating letters show that Wolff was involved in the Holocaust. On 8 September 1939, shortly after the invasion of Poland, Wolff wrote to the Gestapo office in Frankfurt (Oder) and ordered the immediate "arrest of all male Jews of Polish nationality and their family members" and the confiscation of any wealth. In 1942 Wolff oversaw the deportation transports during "Grossaktion Warschau", the mass extermination of Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto. When rail transport bottlenecks occurred, Wolff communicated repeatedly with Reich Railway Director Albert Ganzenmüller. In a letter sent from the Führer Headquarters, dated 13 August 1942 and referring to transports of Jews to Treblinka extermination camp, Wolff thanked Ganzenmüller for his assistance:

"I note with particular pleasure from your communication that a train with 5,000 members of the chosen people has been running daily for 14 days and that we are accordingly in a position to continue with this population movement at an accelerated pace. I have taken the initiative to seek out the offices involved, so that a smooth implementation of the named measures appears to be guaranteed. I thank you once again for the effort and at the same time wish to ask you to continue monitoring these things. With best wishes and Heil Hitler, yours sincerely W."
    — Karl Wolff to Albert Ganzenmüller, 13 August 1942 —

In August 1941, Himmler and Wolff attended the shooting of Jews at Minsk which had been organized by Arthur Nebe who was in command of Einsatzgruppe B, a mobile killing unit. Nauseated and shaken by the experience, Himmler decided that alternative methods of killing should be found. On Himmler's orders, by the spring of 1942, the camp at Auschwitz had been greatly expanded, including the addition of gas chambers, where victims were killed using the poison gas Zyklon B.

After the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich in June 1942, Wolff developed a strong rivalry with other SS leaders, particularly with Heydrich's successor at the Reich Security Main Office (Reichssicherheitshauptamt), Ernst Kaltenbrunner, and with Walter Schellenberg of the foreign intelligence service in the RSHA. His position was weakened by his frequent absence from Berlin, in part due to his suffering from pyelitis and renal calculus (kidney stones), which required surgery. Wolff fell out of favour with Himmler and was dismissed as his chief of staff. In April 1943, he was relieved of his duties as liaison officer to Hitler. Himmler announced he would temporarily take over Wolff's duties. A new replacement as liaison officer to Hitler's HQ did not occur until the appointment of Hermann Fegelein, who assumed the duty in January, 1944. Wolff had particularly angered Himmler by his divorce and remarriage in March 1943. Himmler, who believed the family to be the nucleus of the SS, had denied Wolff permission to divorce, but Wolff had turned directly to Hitler. Himmler still appears to have considered Wolff a loyal member of the SS, for in September 1943 Wolff was transferred to Italy as Supreme SS and Police Leader.

In that position, Wolff shared responsibility for standard police functions such as security, maintenance of prisons, supervision of concentration camps, and forced labor camps as well as the deportation of forced laborers with Wilhelm Harster, who was the Commander in Chief of the Security Police. When Wolff became Plenipotentiary General of the German Wehrmacht in July 1944, he also became responsible for anti-partisan warfare in occupied Italy. By now Wolff commanded the police and the entire rear army in Italy. So far Wolff's involvement in war crimes in Italy remains largely unclear, partially because source material on the degree to which SS units participated in Nazi security warfare is lacking. Although it seems as if US investigators were in possession of incriminating material in 1945, that indicated Wolff's approval of the executions that became known as the Ardeatine massacre, this evidence was deemed not sufficient for criminal charges. On 9 December 1944, Wolff was awarded the German Cross in Gold for using Italian units, with secondary German units, to destroy partisans and for the "maintenance of war production in the Italian territory". During this period he approved the project of the Marnate's Bunker, close to the German command of Olgiate Olona. By 1945 Wolff was acting military commander of Italy.

In 1945, Wolff, under Operation Sunrise, took over command and management of intermediaries including the Swiss Intelligence officer, Captain Max Waibel, in order to make contact in Switzerland with the headquarters of the US Office of Strategic Services, under Allen W. Dulles, as to the surrender of German forces in and around Italy. After initially meeting with Dulles in Berne on 8 March 1945, Wolff negotiated the surrender of all German forces in Italy, ending the war there on 29 April, before the war ended in Germany on 2 May 1945. Wolff's capitulation of Italy to the Allies upset Admiral Karl Dönitz who had otherwise planned a staged series of surrenders designed to give the troops and refugees more time to make their way west.

Arrested on 13 May 1945, he was imprisoned in Schöneberg. During the Nuremberg trials, Wolff was allowed to escape prosecution in exchange for the early capitulation in Italy and by appearing as a witness for the prosecution at trial. Although released in 1947, he had been indicted by the post-war German government as part of the denazification process. Detained under house arrest, after a German trial, Wolff was sentenced in November 1948 and served four years' of imprisonment. After his release, Wolff worked as an executive for an advertising agency.

He took up residence with his family in Starnberg. In 1962 during the trial in Israel of Adolf Eichmann, evidence showed that Wolff had organized the deportation of Italian Jews in 1944. Wolff was again tried in West Germany and in 1964 was convicted of deporting 300,000 Jews to the Treblinka extermination camp, which led to their murder. Sentenced to fifteen years' imprisonment in Straubing, Wolff served only part of his sentence and was released in 1971 following a heart attack.

After his release, Wolff retired to Austria. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Wolff returned to public life, frequently lecturing on the internal workings of the SS and his relationship with Himmler. This resulted in his appearing in television documentaries including The World At War saying that he witnessed an execution of twenty or thirty partisan prisoners in Minsk in 1941 with Himmler.

In the early 1970s, Wolff promoted the theory of an alleged plot to kidnap Pope Pius XII. Most other allegations of such a plot are based on a 1972 document written by Wolff that Avvenire d'Italia published in 1991, and on personal interviews with Wolff before his death in 1984. Wolff maintained that on 13 September 1943, Hitler gave the directive to "occupy Vatican City, secure its files and art treasures, and take the Pope and Curia to the north". Hitler allegedly did not want the Pope to "fall into the hands of the Allies".

Wolff's reliability has been questioned by Holocaust historians, such as István Deák, a professor of history at Columbia University. Reviewing A Special Mission by Dan Kurzman, a promoter of the theory, Deák noted Kurzman's "credulity" and that the latter "uncritically accepts the validity of controversial documents and unquestioningly believes in the statements made to him by his principal German interlocutor, the former SS General Karl Wolff". He further criticized the book's "modest documentation" containing "a great number of vague or inaccurate references".

In the late 1970s Wolff also became involved with Stern journalist Gerd Heidemann. Together with Heidemann, he travelled through South America, where he helped to locate, among others, Klaus Barbie and Walter Rauff, with whom Heidemann conducted interviews for a series of articles. Wolff served as a consultant for the alleged Hitler Diaries and was upset when they turned out to be forgeries by Konrad Kujau. Asked to attend the trial of Heidemann and Kujau, Wolff declined; on 17 July 1984, he died in a hospital in Rosenheim. He was buried in the cemetery at Prien am Chiemsee on 21 July 1984.

SS-Obergruppenführer und General der Waffen-SS Karl Wolff (Höhere SS und Polizeiführer Italien und Bevollmächtigter General der deutschen Wehrmacht in Italien) in Northern Italy, late 1944. The officer behind him is his adjutant, SS-Sturmbannführer Eugen Wenner. The picture was taken by Walter Frentz.

Source :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl_Wolff
https://twitter.com/nickfshort/status/1213392477144698880/photo/1

Bio of SS-Oberstgruppenführer Josef "Sepp" Dietrich

 

SS-Obergruppenführer und General der Waffen-SS Josef "Sepp Dietrich" posed in a photo studio by Hitler's private photographer, Walter Frentz. He is wearing fur mantel and Russian traditional hat called ushanka. In this picture, he is wearing the Eichenlaub zum Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes, which he received on 31 December 1941 as SS-Obergruppenführer and Kommandeur SS-Division (motorisiert) "Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler".

Josef -Sepp- Dietrich was born May 28th, 1892, in Hawangen, Bavaria, Germany. He started his military career in the Bavarian army. During World War 1 he served as a gunner and was injured several times. After WW 1 he joined the Bavarian State Police. In 1928 he joined the NSDAP (National-Socialist Workers Party) where he came to know Hitler personally. His agressive spirit was highly appreciated and he became Hitler's personal bodyguard. Once Hitler had assumed power in 1933, Dietrich established Hitler's personal guard detail, a unit that would later be known as the Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler and became part of the Waffen-SS, the military section of the SS. Its original complement of 120 men increased during the course of the war to that of an armoured division. Dietrich, together with Hitler and six other men, was involved in the arrest and subsequent liquidation of Ernst Röhm, at the time the head of the SA (Sturm Abteilung)and Hitler's Chief of Staff, in what later became known as the Night of the Long Knives on June 30th, 1934, in Bad Wiessee.
During the Polish campaign, the Leibstandarte saw action for the first time as part of the Panzerdivision (Armoured division) Kemp. The unit committed the first warcrime before the war had even begun: in a synagogue, 50 Jews were murdered.

In the battle for Lodz, the Leibstandarte was deployed as an independant unit for the first time and later in Warsaw. Hitler took a keen interest in Dietrich's battle actions. When Germany invaded France and the Low Countries in 1940, the Leibstandarte, commanded by Dietrich pushed head-on through the Netherlands; the unit also participated in the encirclement of Dunkirque. Once again, the unit was involved in warcrimes by murdering 80 British POW's. Dietrich later maintained not to have been present nor to have given the order for the massacre. After the battle for France, Dietrich was awarded the Ritterkreuz (Knight's Cross). In April 1941, the unit participated in the invasion of Yugoslavia and Greece.

At the start of Operation Barbarossa, Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union, the Leibstandarte was assigned to Heeresgruppe Süd (Armygroup South). During an offensive action, six mutilated bodies of SS soldiers were discovered by the unit. Dietrich ordered all Russian POW's to be shot in reprisal for three days; the number of victims was estimated to be 4.000.

In December 1942, he was awarded the Eichenlaub zum Ritterkreuz (Oak Leaves to the Knight's Cross). That year, the Leibstandarte was stationed in France for rest and refit after the battles on the Eastern front. In the spring of 1943, Dietrich's division took part in the brilliant recapture of the Russian city of Charkow and again, the Leibstandarte commanded by Dietrich committed warcrimes by murdering 700 Russian POW's. For his achievements, Dietrich was awarded the Schwerten zum Ritterkreuz (Swords to the Knight's Cross). He then left the Leibstandarte temporarily for a period of rest and recuperation.
June 1944, saw Dietrich promoted to commander of the 1 SS Panzerdivision (SS Armoured division) that was stationed in France. During the Allied invasion in Normandy, the Leibstandarte did not succeed in driving the Allies back into the sea but they did prevent an Allied breakout for three weeks. Afterwards, Dietrich was promoted to SS-Oberstgruppenführer (SS General) and Generaloberst der Waffen-SS (approx. Commander in Chief), after Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler, the highest rank in the Waffen-SS. He was awarded the Brillianten zum Ritterkreuz (Diamonds to the Knight's Cross).
In November 1944, Dietrich was given command of 6 Panzerarmee (Tank Army). During Operation Wacht am Rhein, the Ardennes offensive, Dietrich's divisions encountered fierce resistance by the Americans who managed to prevent Dietrich from breaking through. Once again, the SS was involved in warcrimes: near the Belgian town of Malmédy, 100 American POW's were butchered.

After the failure of the Ardennes offensive, Dietrich was ordered to lead the last German offensive of the war: the capture of the oilfields near Budapest but in this, he failed.
In the wake of the armistice in May 1945, Dietrich and his wife surrendered to the American general Patton. Dietrich was imprisoned and brought before the Neurenburg wartribunal in 1946. He was charged with various warcrimes and sentenced to 25 years imprisonment.
After haveng been released prematurely from the Landsberg prison in 1955, he was indicted again for his participation in the Night of the Long Knives in 1934 and sentenced to another year and a half imprisonment.
Josef Dietrich died in Ludwigsburg, Germany on April 21st, 1966 at the age of 74.

Source :
http://www.historicalwarmilitariaforum.com/search/?q=sepp%20dietrich&type=forums_topic&item=6937
https://www.tracesofwar.com/persons/213/Dietrich-Josef-Sepp.htm

Bio of SS-Oberstgruppenführer Kurt Daluege

 

 

SS-Oberstgruppenführer und Generaloberst der Polizei Kurt Daluege. The picture was first published in "Signal" magazine, in the second February issue of 1943.

Kurt Max Franz Daluege (born September 15, 1897 in Kreuzburg (Upper Silesia), German Reich; † October 23, 1946 in Prague, Czechoslovak Republic) was a German police general, most recently SS-Oberst-Gruppenführer and colonel-general of the police in the National Socialist German Reich of the Second World War. Daluege was chief of the regulatory police and Heinrich Himmler's deputy in the police department.

In July 1930, in accordance with Hitler's wishes, Daluege resigned from the SA and joined the SS with the rank of SS-Oberführer and membership number 1,119. His main responsibility was to spy on the SA and political opponents of the Nazi Party. Berlin SS headquarters was strategically placed at the corner of Lützowstrasse and Potsdamerstrasse, opposite the SA headquarters.

In August 1930, when Berlin SA leader Walter Stennes had his men attack the Berlin Party headquarters, it was Daluege's SS men who defended it and put the attack down. Sometime afterwards in an open letter to Daluege, Adolf Hitler proclaimed "SS Mann, deine Ehre heißt Treue!" ("SS man, your honour is loyalty"). Then, the slogan "Meine Ehre heißt Treue" (My honour is loyalty) was duly adopted by the SS as its motto. Hitler promoted both Daluege and Heinrich Himmler to SS-Obergruppenführer, with Daluege the SS leader of northern Germany while Himmler controlled the southern SS units out of Munich in addition to serving as national leader for the entire SS. In 1932 Daluege became a Nazi Party delegate in the Prussian state Parliament, and in November 1932 was elected to the Reichstag representing the Berlin East electoral district, a seat he retained until 1945. At the same time, Hermann Göring moved Daluege to the Prussian Interior Ministry, where he took over the nonpolitical police with the rank of General der Polizei. Intrigues created by Göring, Himmler and Heydrich surrounding Ernst Röhm led to Daluege's playing an important role in the infamous "Night of the Long Knives". In that operation Röhm along with other leading members of the SA were killed between 30 June and 2 July 1934, thus neutralizing the SA and shifting the balance of power within the party to the SS.

Evidence of Daluege's ruthlessness goes beyond his intrigue against his former SA comrades, and is discernible in his remarks about anyone he considered a threat to society. He once argued that "the consciously asocial enemies of the people (Volksfeinde)" must be eliminated by state intervention "if it hopes to prevent the outbreak of complete moral degeneration." Historian George Browder claims that Daluege "bragged that the Police Institute for detective training had especially been reorganized according to NS viewpoints", and that advancement within this organization was contingent to a considerable degree on the internalization of Nazi ideology.

By November 1934, Daluege's authority over the uniformed police was extended beyond Prussia to include all of Germany. That meant he commanded municipal police forces, the rural gendarmerie, traffic police, the coastguard, the railway police, the postal protection service, fire brigades, the air-raid services, the emergency technical service, the broadcasting police, the factory protection police, building regulations enforcement, and the commercial police.

In 1936, the entire German police force was reorganized with the administrative functions previously exercised by the now largely defunct federal states reassigned to the nominal control of the Reich Interior Ministry, but under the actual control of Himmler's SS. Making the most of his police expertise and coinciding with his appointment, Daluege wrote and published a book entitled National-sozialistischer Kampf gegen das Verbrechertum (NS Struggle against Criminality). That same year, Himmler appointed Daluege as chief of the Ordnungspolizei (ORPO), which gave him administrative, though not executive, authority over most of the uniformed police in Nazi Germany. He commanded the ORPO until 1943, rising to the rank of SS-Oberst-Gruppenführer und Generaloberst der Polizei. Reinhard Heydrich, who took control of the SIPO (Security Police) at the same time that Daluege took control of the ORPO, thought very little of Daluege, as he was a former rival in the early struggle for power, and was contemptuously referred to by Heydrich as 'Dummi-Dummi', or 'the idiot'.

By August 1939, the strength of the ORPO under Daluege's command and control had reached upwards of 120,000 active-duty personnel. Further indications of the brutality coming from Daluege's office (Chief of the Ordnungspolizei), are shown in a report dated 5 September 1939, outlining the methods to be employed during pacification operations in Poland. Regarding uniformed police battalions for planned reprisal actions around the Polish town of Czestochowa, the report gave the following instructions: "[t]he leader of this battalion is ordered to take the most drastic actions and measures such as those in the upper Silesian industrial area, the hanging of Polish franc-tireurs from light poles as a visible symbol for the entire population."

During the war in 1941, he attended a mass shooting of 4,435 Jews by Police Battalion 307 near Brest-Litowsk and a mass shooting of Jews in Minsk. Furthermore, in October 1941 Daluege signed deportation orders for Jews from Germany, Austria and the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, to Riga and Minsk. On 7 July 1942, he attended a conference led by Himmler which discussed the "enlargement" of Operation Reinhard, the secretive Nazi plan to mass-murder Polish Jews in the General Government district of occupied Poland, and other matters involving SS and police policies in the east.

Source :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Daluege
https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=413928726542624&set=gm.1643715855813831

12. SS-Panzer-Division "Hitlerjugend" Photo Collection by SS-Kriegsberichter Wilfried Woscidlo

  SS-Brigadeführer und Generalmajor der Waffen-SS Fritz Witt (27 May 1908 – 14 June 1944), commander of 12. SS-Panzer-Division "Hitlerjugend", photographed by SS-Kriegsberichter Wilfried Woscidlo on his 36th birthday celebration which held at Tillierès-sur-Avre, France, on May 27, 1944. Witt first joined the SS in 1933, serving in the SS-Stabswache Berlin, an élite guard formation of only 117 men. In 1938, as commander of the 3rd SS-Standarte Deutschland, he took part in the annexation of Austria, marching into that country with his unit. In March 1939, Witt served with the SS Standarte during the bloodless annexation of Bohemia and Moravia. During the Polish campaign, Fall Weiss, Witt’s SS-Standarte Deutschland was subordinated to Panzerverband Kempf, based in East Prussia. Witt's company saw some heavy fighting and he served well during this campaign. For personal bravery in combat, he was awarded both the first and second classes of the Iron Cross within. In October 1939, with the rank of SS-Hauptsturmführer, Witt was appointed commander of the 1st Battalion of the Deutschland. He fought with bravery during the Invasion of France, again showing skill commanding his unit. For example, On 27 May 1940, 20 British Matilda tanks attacked Witt’s battalion. Despite the fact that his unit had no anti-tank weapons, Witt rallied his battalion and they held, destroying nine of the British tanks with grenades and other improvised methods. Witt was the model of the young leader, never retreating in the face of anything. In April, 1941, he participated with his unit in Operation Marita, which was the invasion of the Greece. His unit saw ferocious fighting, playing an important role. The 1st Battalion had been tasked with clearing resistance from the Klidi Pass, just south of Vevi and opening the way to the heart of Greece. Clashing with a hastily-assembled Australian-British-New Zealand-Greek force, under an Australian, Major General, Iven Giffard Mackay, Witt and his men were engaged in heavy fighting for three days before the pass fell. Witt’s brother, SS-Untersturmführer Franz Witt, died during the battle. Witt’s battalion itself had wreaked havoc on their enemy, causing a high number of casualties and capturing over 520 prisoners for the loss of only 37 dead and 95 wounded. From 22 June 1941, Fritz Witt and his unit fought in Operation Barbarossa, participating in the encirclement of 600.000 men near Kiev. Then his unit now moved south, to join the German 14. Armeekorps. Witt’s battalion fought fiercely for the town of Perekop, later advancing across the Perekop Isthmus and launching the assaults on the Soviet defensive positions near the Tarter Ditch. In spring 1943, after being engaged in heavy fighting on the Eastern Front, Witt was transferred to the newly created 12. SS-Panzer-Division "Hitlerjugend". he continued training exercises for his division, allowing his troops to familiarise themselves with the terrain around Caen. This training would later prove vital.  On 6 June 1944, the Western Allies landed on the Normandy beaches. Witt ordered his division to form up north of Caen, defending the city and the Carpiquet Aerodrome. Over the next weeks, Witt’s division managed to hold the line above Caen despite incessant Allied attacks and constant air, artillery and naval bombardments. The Hitler Youth inflicted devastating losses on the British and Canadian forces, the training which Witt had developed maintaining his unit’s morale and fighting ability. On 14 June 1944, a British naval bombardment hit the divisional command post in Venoix. Fritz Witt, age 36, was hit in the face by shrapnel and killed instantly. He was buried on the war cemetery St André Champigny (France).

  SS-Brigadeführer und Generalmajor der Waffen-SS Fritz Witt (27 May 1908 – 14 June 1944), commander of 12. SS-Panzer-Division "Hitlerjugend", receives a model of an 8-wheel armoured scout car Sd.Kfz.232. The model was a birthday present by the division’s reconnaissance battalion (led by SS-Sturmbannführer Gerhard Bremer) to their divisional commander’s 36th birthday on May 27, 1944. To the left of Witt, his adjutant SS-Sturmbannführer Heinrich "Hein" Springer (3 November 1914 - 27 October 2007), followed by - possibly - SS-Obersturmführer Heinz Ritzert (Chef 15.Kompanie / SS-Panzergrenadier-Regiment 25 / 12.SS-Panzer-Division "Hitlerjugend"). The birthday celebration itself was held in Tillierès-sur-Avre, France. Over the next week, Witt’s division managed to hold the line above Caen despite incessant determined attacks and constant air, artillery and naval bombardments. On 14 June 1944, a British naval barrage hit the divisional command post in Venoix. Witt was hit in the face by shrapnel and killed instantly. The 12th SS-Hitlerjugend and his former 1st SS-Leibstandarte comrades mourned his loss. Kurt Meyer, as the next highest ranking officer, was promoted to divisional commander; at 33 years of age. Fritz Witt, recipient of the Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes mit Eichenlaub (Knight’s Cross with oakleaves), was buried with full military honours at Champigny—Saint-André-de-l’Eure in France.

Men of SS-Panzergrenadier-Regiment 25 / 12.SS-Panzer-Division "Hitlerjugend" erect temporary grave crosses for SS-Oberscharfuhrer Helmut Belke along the walls of Abbaye d'Ardenne (Ardenne Abbey) during the first days of the Normandy Invasion. Those who fell were generally buried first at site in the blood-drenched soil of Normandy. During the few pauses in the battle, members of the division cared for the graves of their fallen comrades. Belke himself was the driver for the Regimentskommandeur, SS-Standartenführer Kurt "Panzermeyer" Meyer. He was killed in action in the attack on Bretteville on June 9, 1944. As you can see the soldier on the left is wearing Italian camo (M1929, "telo mimetico"), the right one has a smock in Rauchtarn-Muster (blurred edge, spring version).

 At the building of l'Abbaye d'Ardenne (Ardenne Abbey), regimental command post of the SS-Panzergrenadier-Regiment 25 / 12.SS-Panzer-Division "Hitlerjugend" in Caen, Normandy, late June 1944. On the left wearing Italian Telo Mimetico M29 camo is the regimental commander SS-Obersturmbannführer Heinz Milius, who was to report the recent battle situation to SS-Sturmbannführer Hubert Meyer (Ia Erster Generalstabsoffizier of 12. SS-Panzer-Division "Hitlerjugend", Chief of staff). On the right wearing Demjanskschild is SS-Obersturmführer Bernhard-Georg Meitzel (Ib Quartiermeister of 12. SS-Panzer-Division "Hitlerjugend", Supply Officer in the Division staff), while the NCO behind Meyer is SS-Oberscharführer Herbert Reinecker (1914-2007), who served as an SS-Kriegsberichter. He started writing for nazi magazines in 1935 and was a writer for "Das Schwarze Korps" during the war years. He became a famous crime writer for TV series in Germany after the war, and never made a secret about his Waffen-SS membership though.

 The strain of battle is evident in the face of SS-Sturmbannführer Johann "Hans" Waldmüller (13 September 1912 – 8 September 1944), commander of I.Bataillon / SS-Panzergrenadier-Regiment 25 / 12. SS-Panzer-Division "Hitlerjugend" while fighting in Normandy, June 1944. He is wearing the Italian M29 Telo Mimetico camo smock. Waldmüller joined the SS at an early stage in 1933. After started the career in SD (Sicherheitsdienst), during World War II he was transferred to the elites, the Leibstandarte-SS Adolf Hitler, in the Summer of 1940. When a new Waffen-SS division was to be formed in 1943, the 12. SS-Panzer-Division "Hitlerjugend", he was selected to be transferred over from the LSSAH as a Bataillonskommandeur. Waldmüller would take part in the fierce fighting in Normandy, where the "Baby Milk" Division would distinguished themselves for their outrageous fighting behavior. An account on one of the fighting: "During the fighting of 8 and 9 June 1944, I. Bataillon lost one NCO and four men killed. Four NCOs and sixteen were wounded. Of them, four NCOs and five men remained with the unit. The following days were remarkable mainly because of the industrious buildings of positions. The numerous fire attacks by enemy artillery forced the Panzer shelters to be constructed like bunkers. They were propped up on the inside with railroad ties from the close-by line Cane-Luc-sur-Mer. Trees had to be cut down to open up fields of fire. Sturmbannführer Waldmüller himself was on his feet day and night, to the point of dropping dead, to supervise and direct the building of the positions. His Bataillon command post, too, was an earth bunker in the open field, just behind the front line. His example, his inexorable insistence saved the lives of many of his men at the time." A second account on the fighting: "SS Major Johann Waldmüller, now the chief of the l. Battalion, stood in the midst of his men, the very soul of resistance," according to Kurt Meyer, his superior. For his bravery and excellent leadership he was recommended and awarded the Ritterkreuz des Eisernes Kreuzes on 27 August 1944. But he was killed not long after that, gruesomely mutilated by the Belgian partisans. On 8 september, 1944, while driving on his sidecar together with SS-Untersturmführer Karl Marquard, he got ambushed near Basse-Bodeux on the road from Werbomont to Stavelot. The belgian partisans had positioned a rope on the road and when the vehicle neared they tightened the rope. The cycle was brought to a halt - either stopped or caught in the cable - and was immediatly put under fire. Soon later, horse-drawn carriages from Waldmüller's unit discovered the horror. The driver of the cycle was found, seriously wounded, on the left side of the road. In the cycle itself sat SS-Untersturmführer Marquard dead in the rear seat. He was shot in the head. SS-Sturmbannführer Waldmüller was discovered a little further, mutilated and dumped. His belly had been slit open, genitals cut off and dumped in a drainage pipe of a small lake. Both men were buried in Düren and still are.

SS-Untersturmführer Willi Klein, Adjutant of SS-Sturmbannführer Hans Waldmüller (Kommandeur I.Bataillon [motorisiert] / SS-Panzergrenadier-Regiment 25 / 12.SS-Panzer-Division "Hitlerjugend") in his foxhole near Cambes/Normandy, summer of 1944. Klein (SS number 456 070) was born in 4 August 1921 in Grenzhausen. He started his career in 1.Kompanie / Bataillon der Waffen-SS z.b.V. as SS-Unterscharführer (July 1941), followed by a tour of duty in 2. SS-Infanterie-Brigade (March 1943) and SS-Panzergrenadier-Regiment 25 (June 1944). He was killed in action in 1945 as an SS-Obersturmführer and Chef 10.Kompanie / SS-Panzergrenadier-Regiment 25.

SS-Untersturmführer Franz-Josef "Franzl" Kneipp (19 September 1911 - 12 October 2002) in Normandy front, June 1944. He was a signal officer (Nachrichtenoffizier) in the III.Bataillon / SS-Panzergrenadier-Regiment 25 / 12.SS-Panzer-Division "Hitlerjugend". The picture was taken by Wilfried Woscidlo. Kneipp was originally a signaler in the police on the staff of the High SS and Police Leader Rhein in Wiesbaden until he joined the Aufklärungs-Abteilung of the Totenkopf division in 1939. He was a signal platoon NCO as an Oberscharführer in the SS-Flak Abteilung “Ost” from August 1941 thru April 1943. Despite being kicked out of the officer course at the signal school in Metz near graduation for an affair with a French girl, he was promoted to Untersturmführer in April 1944 upon the recommendation of his regimental commander, Kurt Meyer. He was wounded on July 8, 1944 as signal officer of III./SS-Panzergrenadier Regiment 25 in Normandy. He was sent out on a reconnaissance mission in a tank to look for the enemy. He was standing in the tank turret looking through his binoculars and the next thing he remembers is waking up while some Canadian soldiers were pulling him out of the tank with his arms streaming blood. His tank had taken a hit from a Canadian tank and he had been wounded in both arms. Following a brief hospitalization in Scotland, Kneipp was handed over to the Americans and transported by ship to the United States where he was brought to Washington, D.C. for questioning about his knowledge of German code machines. He had also been interrogated by the British about code machines and threatened with being shot if he did not tell what he knew. Kneipp refused. After his return to Germany Kneipp ended up on the staff of the US Air Force Wiesbaden air base commander. For many years Kneipp was the chairman of the Wiesbaden HIAG veterans association.

During a break in the fighting, SS-Untersturmführer Franz-Josef "Franzl" Kneipp (Signal officer of III.Bataillon / SS-Panzergrenadier-Regiment 25 / 12.SS-Panzer-Division "Hitlerjugend") plays his guitar in the trenches with the battalion adjutant, SS-Untersturmführer Kurt Bergmann, and just out of sight to the left is Battalion Commander SS-Obersturmbannfuhrer Karl-Heinz Milius. In this picture, Kneipp is playing Dm6 chord. He’s an accomplished player, using chords like that, plus playing a classical guitar. Kneipp is wearing a Waffen-SS Plane Tree pattern tunic (Platanenmuster), while Bergmann is wearing Italian M29 Telo Mimetico camo. This color photo was taken near Buron in Normandy (France), June 1944, and are originally produced by Wilfried Woscidlo, a Kriegsberichter attached to the "HJ" Division. Bergmann would be MIA (Missing in action) on 8 July 1944, while Kneipp survived the war.

This picture was taken in Normandy front (France) in June 1944 by SS-Kriegsberichter Wilfried Woscidlo and showing a young Grenadier from 12. SS-Panzer-Division "Hitlerjugend" wearing pea dot camouflaged cloth and headgear. The division fought superbly throughout the Normandy campaign, its performance a testimony to the training it had received, its leaders and the calibre of its individual recruits. However, its fighting qualities were to no avail in the face of the Allies so-called ‘materialschlacht’, their overwhelming strength in tanks, aircraft, motorised infantry and artillery.

A grenadier from 12. SS-Panzer-Division "Hitlerjugend" in Normandy (France), summer 1944. He is wearing italian Telo Mimetico M29 camo trousers that were common throughout the 12th SS in normandy. Note that he is also holding a 15 cm sIG 33 (schweres Infanterie Geschütz 33), a heavy infantry support gun. It was the standard German heavy infantry gun used in the Second World War. It was the largest weapon ever classified as an infantry gun by any nation. Sources differ on the development history, but the gun itself was of conventional design. Early production models were horse-drawn, with wooden wheels. Later production models had pressed steel wheels, with solid rubber tires and air brakes for motor towing. The sIG 33 was rather heavy for its mission and it was redesigned in the late 1930s to incorporate light alloys in an effort to save weight. This saved about 150 kilograms (330 lb), but the outbreak of war forced the return to the original design before more than a few hundred were made, as the Luftwaffe had a higher priority for light alloys. A new carriage, made entirely of light alloys, was tested around 1939, but was not accepted for service.

Junior leaders and men of the 12. SS-Panzer-Division "Hitlerjugend" in Normandy, summer 1944. The relentless fighting has already left its traces on the young faces. These "Crack Babies" held their position in the trenches tenaciously, defying all attacks by the enemy who was superior in numbers and materials. The division itself was formed around a nucleus of experienced officers and NCOs from the Leibstandarte Division, such as Fritz Witt, Kurt Meyer, Max Wünsche and Wilhelm Mohnke. It would be up to these men to mould the Hitlerjugend into a potent combat unit. They knew how to soldier the Waffen-SS way: aggressively, taking risks to achieve victory.

 Men of the 12. SS-Panzer-Division "Hitlerjugend" in Normandy, summer 1944. Many of the youngsters were smoking cigarettes to steady their nerves. The majority of its junior enlisted men were drawn from members of the Hitler Youth, while the senior NCOs and officers were from other Waffen-SS divisions. Many of the recruits were so young that they were supplied with sweets instead of the standard tobacco and alcohol ration!

A Grenadier from 12. SS-Panzer-Division "Hitlerjugend" lit a cigarette during a pause in the battle. The picture was taken in Normandy front (France) in June 1944 by SS-Kriegsberichter Wilfried Woscidlo. Described as a "Crack Babies" division, the Hitlerjugend was unique because the majority of its junior enlisted men were drawn from members of the Hitler Youth born in 1926, while the senior NCOs and officers were generally veterans of the Eastern Front. The division, with 20,540 personnel, first saw action on June 7, 1944 as part of the German defense of the Caen area during the Normandy campaign. The battle for Normandy took its toll on the division and it came out of the Falaise pocket with a divisional strength of 12,500 men. The division has been criticized for performing inadequately in the opening days of the Normandy campaign. Following the invasion battles, the division was sent to Germany for refitting. On 16 December 1944, it was committed against the US Army in the Battle of the Bulge. After the failure of the Ardennes offensive the division was sent east to fight the Red Army near Budapest. The 12th SS Division eventually withdrew into Austria; on 8 May 1945, the surviving 10,000 men surrendered to the US Army at Enns.The reputation of Hitlerjugend has been affected by war crimes committed by members of the division during the early battles in Normandy.

A Flak (AA or Anti-Aircraft) MG-42 team of 12. SS-Panzer-Division "Hitlerjugend" in Normandy, summer 1944. They are using a standard bipod and not a special anti-aircraft tripod or mount (Zwillingssockel), a desperate attempt to fight allied low-flying fighter bombers (The MG-42 or MG-34 is used for close-in AA support whenever 20mm or 30mm AA guns are few or nonexistant.). Very occasionally a rifle-calibre MG like the MG 42 managed to shoot down an aircraft, but it was mostly a waste of ammunition. Even the .50 Browning wasn't that effective (some sources said that it need a 50,000 rounds fired for every plane shot down!). 20mm was really the smallest calibre to be worth bothering with, which is why it was the smallest gun used by German FlaK units. Towards the end of the war even the 20mm was seen as too weak, according to Fridolin von Senger und Etterlin's 'Die deutschen Geschütze'. The focus on damage capability does of course ignore the deterrant effect on the pilots, who may not have been very keen to expose themselves to even quite ineffective fire. So it was maybe less the idea to shoot them down, and more to keep them away, that made use of the weapons seem attractive.

Source :
"The History of the 12. SS-Panzerdivision Hitlerjugend" by Hubert Meyer
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Photographs_by_Wilfried_Woscidlo
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/12th_SS_Panzer_Division_Hitlerjugend
https://military.wikia.org/wiki/12th_SS_Panzer_Division_Hitlerjugend