SS Soldiers Slaughtered 97 British Prisoners after Dunkirk Rescue

[Sergeant Boot]

Slaughtered in cold blood - the brave British soldiers who were Dunkirk's TRUE heroes

By HUGH SEBAG MONTEFIORE

10:10 PM on 26th May 2010

Their bodies lie piled outside the French farm where the Nazis shot them as prisoners.
Now, 70 years on, we reveal the unflinching valour of the British soldiers who stayed behind to let their comrades escape at Dunkirk.
Bloody corpses lay spreadeagled on the sand, and all around them there was devastation.
Beside the burned-out ships that had made it to the shore, the beach was littered with decaying horses, charred lorries and scattered items of clothing.
This was the apocalyptic scene that greeted German soldiers when they finally made it to the Dunkirk beaches on June 4, 1940 - 70 years ago.


There was not a living British soldier to be seen.
The last Tommies had been spirited away 24 hours earlier, a miraculous result given that only a few days before, British generals had been predicting a disaster.
Their extraordinary evacuation is usually hailed as a miracle won by the Royal Navy and the civilian sailors who manned an extraordinary rescue armada, the 'little ships'.
And this morning, when more than 50 of the original ships set sail from Ramsgate to Dunkirk as part of the 70th anniversary celebrations, most of us will be filled with pride.
But this most British of achievements is only part of the story. For the bulk of the British Army would never have escaped had it not been for the valiant soldiers who stayed behind to hold back the advancing Germans and buy their comrades valuable time.

These troops vowed they would 'give such an account of ourselves that the enemy would never forget'. And that is precisely what they did.


Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1281673/Slaughtered-cold-blood--brave-British-soldiers-Dunkirks-TRUE-heroes.html?ito=feeds-newsxml#ixzz0p4c46rZF

ARTICLE LINK: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1281673/Slaughtered-cold-blood--brave-British-soldiers-Dunkirks-TRUE-heroes.html?ito=feeds-newsxml

[Corrupt]

RIP to those who died in such a horrible manner. Shocking behavior from the germans, but luckily, quite out of character for those taking brits prisoner. Good to see those left behind gave a good account for themselves.

[dudski]

Shocking behavior from the germans

Really?.....

[Corrupt]

Really?.....

Well on the Western Front, British Canadian and American troops/aircrew who were captured were treated reasonably well (by and large. There were exceptions such as the commandos)
What I meant was this seems excessively bad given these were not jews, resistance members or any other group hated by the Germans

[Shark with freaking laser]

Really?.....

Yes, it is in fact shocking behavior from the German side.

[Shark with freaking laser]

However, this was common behavior among the soldiers of SS-Totenkopf in France 1940.


Known war crimes
Soldiers from SS-Totenkopf-Infanterie-Regiment 1 killed 92 civilians in Aubigny-en-Artois in France 22 May 1940.

45 civilians in Vandelicourt / Berles-Montchel were killed by soldiers from SS-Totenkopf-Infanterie-Regiment 2 22 May 1940.

Soldiers from SS-Totenkopf-Infanterie-Regiment 1 and SS-Pionier-Bataillon Totenkopf killed 48 civilians in Beuvry 24 May 1940.

On 27 May 1940 at Le Paradis 4th company of the 2nd regiment, commanded by SS-Obersturmführer Fritz Knöchlein, killed 100 Brittish POWs.

Soldiers from Totenkopf were involved in the killings of black French colonial POWs at Lyon during the invasion of France 1940.

Generalmajor Otto Lancelle, commander of 121. Infanterie-Division (http://www.axishistory.com/index.php?id=2201), on 5 July 1941 made an official complaint to LVI Panzerkorps (http://www.axishistory.com/index.php?id=1659) about soldiers of SS-Totenkopf-Infanterie-Regiment 1 looting the town of Kraslau (Krāslava) after it was captured by the German forces.
Link:
http://www.axishistory.com/index.php?id=1980

[dudski]

I had the SS in mind

[LineDoggie]

Douchebag..........

[specialweapons]

This should be in the history section.

[Kilgor]

Well on the Western Front, British Canadian and American troops/aircrew who were captured were treated reasonably well (by and large. There were exceptions such as the commandos)
What I meant was this seems excessively bad given these were not jews, resistance members or any other group hated by the Germans

That was with the Luftwaffe, and apparently the Germans allowed red cross packages into the flyer POW camps and that made a huge difference in quality of life.

The SS butchering people in cold blood shouldn't surprise anyone.

[Shark with freaking laser]

I had the SS in mind

Hi Dudski!

While you are entirely correct that atrocities were, mildly spoken, common in many branches of the SS (the SS is a complicated organization), in particular the SS-Einzatsgruppen and the concentration camp guards, that does not necessarily apply to the organization as a whole.

Certainly, many Waffen-SS division committed numerous atrocities during the war, far more often than the German Army. However, there are also examples of Waffen-SS units that did commit atrocities, for example the 17th SS-Panzergrenadier-Division. Why is that so, I often ask myself. Well, IMHO that is probably because the 17th, as well as many other Waffen-SS units at the time (1944), consisted of ordinary conscripts. In fact, even the 1st SS-Panzer-Division, had make due with conscripts during the latter parts of the war. Many of these conscripts came from Eastern Europe and were designated “Volkdeutsche” (ethnic Germans i.e. second rate Germans).

Just to give an image of how complicated the issue really is. ;)



Sincerely,
Shark, the one who has bought too many Osprey books last summer.

[Corrupt]

That was with the Luftwaffe, and apparently the Germans allowed red cross packages into the flyer POW camps and that made a huge difference in quality of life.

The SS butchering people in cold blood shouldn't surprise anyone.

I meant the majority of the German Army too. Im not surprised by SS massacres. I am shocked that it happened to white European uniformed POW's though, who werent on the overall nazi hitlist of untermensch

[PhillyMobster]

the one who has bought too many Osprey books last summer.

Nonsense. One can never have too many Osprey books. When I was little I picked them off my Dad's bookshelf and spent hours looking at them, and trying to recreate the paintings on my own sheets of paper with limited success. Meanwhile my peers were watching Sesame Street and other insipid mind rotting offerings of the general masses.

Thanks for the link, Sgt Boot (interesting name...). The first book I ever read on Dunkirk was Walter Lord's excellent "Miracle at Dunkirk" which mixed a degree of engaging narrative with authoritative historical commentary, without becoming boring. I still find it fascinating that one of the rescue boats that navigated the Channel was the Sundowner, the personal Yacht of Charles Lightoller, whose previous claim to fame was as 2nd Officer on the RMS Titanic. Dammit! I love history woot

[Maverick77]

This should be in the history section.

Don't worry it will be locked soon enough.

[gaijinsamurai]

Nonsense. One can never have too many Osprey books.

x2. I have easily over a hundred.


Rest in Peace to the murdered British soldiers.

[nemowork]

On the plus side the survivors of LeParadis managed to have the SS commander Fritz Knochlein tracked down and he was hung in 1949.

The last survivor of both massacres is Bert Evans who was at Wormhoud, he's 89 and still going relatively strong.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/world-war-2/7753912/Wormhoudt-Every-day-I-thank-God-we-did-our-duty.html

Herded inside the stinking, airless cowshed, with barely room to stand upright, the 100 British soldiers, many wounded after five hours of fierce fighting, called out to their captors for water. Captain Lynn-Allen, the most senior officer, banged on the bolted door, shouting: ‘‘For the love of God, there is no more room in here.’’ Outside, in the sweltering May sunshine, a German officer laughed and told him: ‘‘Where you are going there will be a lot of room.’’

At that moment Captain Lynn-Allen can have had little doubt as to what their fate would be. What remained of his men, the 2nd Battalion The Royal Warwickshire Regiment – along with remnants of The Cheshire Regiment and The Royal Artillery – had been crammed into the tiny barn by an elite squad of the SS Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler regiment, whose orders, Lynn-Allen must have realised, would have been to take no prisoners. The Geneva Convention had little meaning here.



Lynn-Allen asked that his men be allowed a final smoke and, with a calm dignity, he doled out Players cigarettes to his shocked soldiers: men who had fought to the last clip of ammunition before capture. He must have known his mission, though crucial, was nigh-on impossible. When he had arrived at Wormhoudt, a small village on the road from Cassel to Dunkirk, two days before on May 26, 1940, his orders had been clear: ‘‘Tell your men, with our backs to the wall, the division stands and fights.’’ It was imperative they hold Wormhoudt, pancake-flat with little surrounding cover, so that thousands of British Expeditionary Force soldiers who were encircled by advancing German units could be evacuated from Dunkirk. The longer he kept the crack SS squads at bay, the more allied soldiers the Royal Navy and flotilla of little ships could save.
Crushed behind Lynn-Allen by the barn door, Private Bert Evans, just 19, shared his cigarette with his friend Charlie. As they drew deep, Charlie turned to him and said: ‘‘This is it, Bert. We’re finished.’’ They were to be his last words. A few seconds later two grenades were lobbed into the barn and it was raked by machine-gun fire.
When it stopped, only a handful of survivors, many of them hideously wounded, lay amid the bodies of their dead comrades. The barn door was yanked open and, one by one, those still alive were pulled out and shot in the back of the head. Inside, his right arm all but blown off by the blast, Bert Evans watched in horror as the bodies piled up by the door. Lynn-Allen, miraculously unscathed, saw their chance. He grabbed Pte Evans and made a run for it, dragging him behind.
Lynn-Allen could have bolted alone. He could have run, literally, for his life. Instead he stayed with his wounded and barely conscious private, refusing to leave him. It cost Lynn-Allen his life. When the pair staggered into a pond, an SS officer who had pursued them fired at his forehead from point-blank range, and shot Pte Evans in the neck. As both men disappeared under the water, they were left for dead.
‘‘And that’s how he died. That’s how my captain died. Saving my life,’’ Bert says, nodding his head slowly. ‘‘Charlie knew. When he said we were finished, I knew too. But my captain died saving my life. He was a fine man and a fine soldier. There isn’t a day that I don’t thank God for it. And thank God too that we did our duty. Those men who died in that shed. They gave their lives so that the men could be taken off the beaches of Dunkirk. They did it because it was their duty. And they did it for their comrades. You fight for your King. You fight for your country. But most of all you fight for your brothers. The men who stand shoulder to shoulder.’’
Today Bert, the sole survivor of the Wormhoudt massacre, is 89. His cornflower-blue eyes are clouded with cataracts and he isn’t as steady on his feet as he once was. But each year, on May 28, as the nation salutes the evacuation of Dunkirk during which 340,000 British and allied soldiers were plucked from the beaches, Bert’s thoughts are with the brothers in arms he lost that day.
In recent years the French authorities and British veteran associations have restored the barn at Wormhoudt, and today it is a shrine to the men murdered inside. It stands in the middle of open fields: a small, thatched building, its flimsy walls festooned with wreaths, crosses and faded photographs, testimony that it was the site of one of the most horrific massacres of the War. Bert last visited on May 28, 2007; he is now too frail to make the trip, but the memories of that day, though painful, are clear.
Born and brought up in Redditch, he enlisted with the Gloucestershire Regiment in November 1938. He was transferred to The Warwickshires on February 24, 1939, a day after his 18th birthday, and was shipped to France in April 1940.
When the 2nd Battalion arrived at Wormhoudt on May 26 they were told it was imperative they stall the advancing Germans so that the evacuation could get underway. Holed up in nearby farmhouses, they attacked repeatedly, though heavily outnumbered. The SS Leibstandarte Adolf Hilter regiment was drafted in to repel them, and by early afternoon on May 28 the British were out of ammunition and overrun.
"The fighting was non-stop. Mortar attack after mortar attack. The noise, the fire, it was endless,’’ Bert recalls. ‘‘I was captured with a group of ‘D’ company soldiers. We knew we were up against Hilter’s elite. But we could never have expected the treatment they would mete out.
"First they took all our personal effects - my letter, my photographs of my mum and dad and my two sisters, even the photograph of Elizabeth my wife, who was serving with the ATS. They were torn up and burned. They didn’t want any of us identified.
"Then some were rounded up and driven into the town square, where Germans with our Tommy guns opened fire. Then 15 or 20 of our boys were stripped to the waist and lined up. Opposite them were four machine guns mounted on stands. Then the guns fired and the men fell down like rag dolls. We were marched about a mile out of the village to the barn.
‘‘It was bedlam. They were shouting, pushing us with the butts of their guns. We were jammed inside the barn. They pushed more and more in. No one could breath. Our wounded were falling and we were falling over them. When the captain called out that there was no more room we knew from that German’s answer that this was where we would die.’’
Bert barely remembers the explosions: only the smell of sizzling flesh and the terrible moans. Two soldiers – Corporal Moor and Company Sergeant Major Jenkins – heroically threw themselves on top of the grenades to minimise the carnage. But scores died. When the smoke and machine-gun fire stopped, Bert looked down and saw that his right arm was horribly mutilated, hanging from his shoulder by mangled and bleeding muscle.
‘‘The captain pulled me out. We stumbled along but I collapsed. He could have got away. But he didn’t leave me. The bullets were flying around us and I dropped in the water.’’
After Lynn-Allen was killed, Bert crawled to the pond’s edge and across open fields where he lay for hours. Eventually he was captured by a German Ambulance Unit.
Bert’s arm was amputated and he spent the next four years in prisoner of war camps. He was repatriated and discharged from the army late in 1944 with a disability pension. He spent much of his working life with Birmingham council and, since his wife died in 1999, he has lived in sheltered accommodation in Redditch.
‘‘There has been much that has been good in my life over the years. I’m thankful for that,’’ he says. ‘‘But it’s important that we continue to remember the men who died. The young men whose lives were cut so short.’’
On Friday Bert will once again pin his medals to his chest, tighten his regimental tie and don the beret he has worn with pride at more than half a century of Dunkirk memorial ceremonies. As he salutes the soldiers who lived and died on the beaches of Dunkirk he will think, too, of his comrades who were slaughtered that day in a tiny barn in the corner of a foreign field. As their memorial says: ‘‘Let us forgive. But never forget.’’
Until the Last Post sounds for him he will, he is determined, continue to pay tribute and mourn their memory. As the now fading ink on his service discharge records: ‘‘Private Albert Evans. Military conduct: exemplary.’’

[rgjbloke]

Rest in Peace to those British Soldiers who were killed.

[CaptMorgan68]

hate to say it but these things were pretty common in the Eastern Front... with many crimes committed against not only soldiers but the civ population as well....

123377

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_YYMeAu4i7gA/S0Gi0MXG5BI/AAAAAAAAHfA/xgi0RWg4-6A/s1600-h/russian-under-german-occupation-nazi-rule-ww2-second-world-war-rare-images-pictures-photos-005.jpg

[Sergeant Boot]

This should be in the history section.

My bad >.< Can anyone move this?

[custodes]

R.I.P.The Brave British men who stayed behind.

Dunkirk always impressed me.

[Hollos]

My grandfather was part of the rear gaurd he was in the gloucestershire regiment (gooogle it) they fought to the last round he survied and was taken prisoner he is still alive and kicking

[Atlantic Friend]

Say it ain't so, I thought the Waffen-SS were just swell fellows doing their bit for Germany and all that!

[Alfacentori]

There were several small (compared to Eastern front) massacres carried out during/after the fall of Dunkirk, most by SS units like the SS Leibstandarte who was enraged by the stubbron resistance of several British units who were the rear guard. See the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wormhoudt_massacre as mentioned in nemowork's post.

Also see a documentary done by the BBC called 'Dunkirk'
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0400391/

Alfa

[socom6]

Always heard of this massacre but never read any details about it. The SS command was malicious and downright evil to issue the order to kill their prisoners. They should have known what stubborn defenses the British soldiers are always liable to put up from their WW1 experiences. RIP to the murdered soldiers at Wormhoudt. May God bless Mr Bert Evans.

[RallyeSport]

My Grandfather was one of the lucky ones..

His unit was one of the rear guards and was caught in a mortar barrage badly wounding both his legs, he was laying in the middle of a farm track unable to move. Some time later a german panzer came down the track, he thought it was going to run him over but it stopped just short. They loaded him on the engine deck and took him to an aid station. He never spoke in great detail about his experiences before his capture, he said he thought the German troops who helped him were SS. He also spoke of one of his buddies who what shot thru the mouth in a barn and survived I don't know if it was in one of the incidents spoken of in the article.. He was repatriated in 1944 thru sweden.

[Euroamerican]

RallyeSport, Hollos,

A big Cheers to your grandfathers. Hollos, buy your granddad a big pint on me. Well at least say "Thanks from one distance American". Your granddad too, RallyeSport, if he's still kicking.

[tazjet]

I don't mean to depreciate the cruelty of the Nazis, nor vindicate them but there are untold stories of Allied massacres of surrendered Axis forces too. My father was a signalman on LCH-187 at Arromanches on D-Day. All the invasion forces were under orders not to take prisoners.

My father's landing craft however was a Headquarter's ship for co-ordinating naval gunnery with shore forces. A number of german prisoners were brought abord for interrogation and afterwards were led out to the bows. My father recalled they were machine gunned.

LCH-187 was later sunk by 88mm gunfire in support of landings at Westkappelle.

[Sergeant Boot]

My father's landing craft however was a Headquarter's ship for co-ordinating naval gunnery with shore forces. A number of german prisoners were brought abord for interrogation and afterwards were led out to the bows. My father recalled they were machine gunned.

That's poor..but it was a brutal war I guess

[BLUE THOR]

RIP to the victims of a horrid crime. Generally the treatment of Commonwealth soldiers by the Germans was decent.
and like-wise, Aussies in Nth Africa generally had ut-most respect for their German enemy, and it was reciprocated.
Sadly, it was a shyt time in history, many did in-excusable things that they had to live the rest of their lives with.
It was absolutely wrong, but my Grandfather slotted surrendering Japs, never gave them a chance.
Japanese soldiers routinely tortured/ killed captured surrendered allies and civies.
A nieghbour of mine on the farm was a German Tank driver on the Russian Front, he remembers when they were forced to retreat past a Red Cross post full of Italian and Hungarian Doctors and Nurses, When they fought the Russians and regained that territory, the Russians had tied down all the german patients, doctors and nurses and either machine gunned them or drove tanks over them.
he cries every time he thinks of it.
Im not trivialising what happened there, but it was a horrific time and many horrific things were common-place.
We like to blame the Nazis for the horrid stuff and forget to look into our own forces and their actions.
My Grandfather was haunted by some of the things he did, and I imagine those who committed atrocities and lived past the war had to deal with what they did.

the best thing we can do is learn from it, its not on, and often hard to control when men are emotional, upset and angry having lost mates and others they care about.
Soldiers have to be cognisent that this is something they will always face and must be professional enough to suppress the urge for revenge.

[MoFo]

Bloody Terrible, such an awful crime...murdering bastards.

Those men who were killed on that day are the real hero's and I am forever grateful for what they did...never ever forget.

R.I.P to all of them.

[intrinsic]

What has failed to be mentioned in the article is the fact that the british soldiers had been using dum dum rounds, banned under the Geneva and Haig conventions, members of the Waffen SS had been killed and very seriously wounded with the illegal use of this ammunition. Another thing that had not been mentioned is that a large number of T-Division soldiers were massacred by british troops. The german soldiers had been captured in earlier fighting and the retreating british soldier were unable to take the PoW's with them so gunned them down in cold blood.
Is it not strange that the victor gets to write the history of war.

[Hollos]

What has failed to be mentioned in the article is the fact that the british soldiers had been using dum dum rounds, banned under the Geneva and Haig conventions, members of the Waffen SS had been killed and very seriously wounded with the illegal use of this ammunition. Another thing that had not been mentioned is that a large number of T-Division soldiers were massacred by british troops. The german soldiers had been captured in earlier fighting and the retreating british soldier were unable to take the PoW's with them so gunned them down in cold blood.
Is it not strange that the victor gets to write the history of war.Really ? where is the evidence, the only good SS soldier was a dead one and both my grandfathers helped to put a fair few of them that way

[martinexsquaddie]

come up with some evidence or stfu.
thing is hitlers samurai got given a bloody noise repeatidly by british county regiments and decided to take it out on safely disarmed POWs fortunaly most of them got killed later or ended there days in a gulag the only good ss man is a dead one.

[gaijinsamurai]

x3 what martinexsquaddie and Hollos wrote, intrinsic.

I'm not so naive to think that the Allies were perfect angels 100% of the time, and that every German soldier was evil, but I have never heard the claim you are making. I would appreciate a link to something credible to back up your claim, which unless is true, spits in the face of those who were murdered.

[nemowork]

The massacre claim goes back to the battle of Arras, The Royal Tank Regiment attacked a column of Totenkopf who's performance was less than impressive, general reports are that they broke and ran. Units of the Durham Light infantry (6th and 8th) then moved in behind them. The accusation is that they and French units took a graveyard in which Totenkopf stragglers were sheltering or that prisoners taken by the RTR were handed over to the DLI and 400 of them subsequently vanished.

Since Totenkopf casualties, once they'd stopped running and could be counted were about 40 dead and 2 missing its a hard one to believe, particularly since if mass numbers of Himmlers prized SS had been massacred then Goebbels would have been shouting about it for years in every international media he could find. The DLI were mainly recruited from miners at the time but even they would be hard pressed to dig a pit big enough for 400 men in and hour while under fire and then hide it.

It did mean that the SS troops had been humiliated once before and there were rumours of a massacre to get their blood up, not that it made much difference they'd already quite happily executed French Senegalese prisoners without an excuse.

[therifleman]

It's war. It happens on all sides. I fail so see much discussion value out of what is a terrible reality.

[specialweapons]

It's war. It happens on all sides. I fail so see much discussion value out of what is a terrible reality.


It takes a intelligent person to see the truth for what it is. The Waffen SS was just another army. It had good and bad people just like every other army in the world. I met plenty of lowlifes my time in the American army.

[gaijinsamurai]

I can see this thread is going down the toilet, as do all that mention the Waffen SS.......

[Hollis]

It takes a intelligent person to see the truth for what it is. The Waffen SS was just another army. It had good and bad people just like every other army in the world. I met plenty of lowlifes my time in the American army.


Waffen SS were the bad the guys and more than that, they were among the worse, there may have been some ok people in it, but the SS were hard corps nazis as a group. You must have missed the many duties the SS was involved in.

The low lifes that you probably met, where individuals and did not represent the rest of the soldiers. The SS on the other hand as a group where the lowlifes, any individual was a exception to the rule.

[nemowork]

It takes a intelligent person to see the truth for what it is. The Waffen SS was just another army. It had good and bad people just like every other army in the world. I met plenty of lowlifes my time in the American army.

In most other armies the lowlives are looked down on, in the SS they were sanctioned at the highest level.

Fritz Knochlein the commander at Le Paradis was apparently detested by his fellow officers who found him truculent and troublesome, to the point that after the massacre some of them attempted to challenge him to a duel. They felt that while they had taken prisoners and behaved with all the military standards they expected the SS to live up to Knochlein had let them down.

Unfortunately for that rosy view Knochlein WAS living up to the standards senior leadership like Himmler expected of them, he had apparently recently transferred from actions in Poland with the SS-Totenkopfstandarte "Oberbayern" where he was responsible for the killing of Polish leaders and intellectuals and had been responsible for a massacre of French civilians at Aubigny-en-Artois on 21st May, killing 98 in reprisal for British resistance outside Arras and then attempting a massacre of 30 Scots prisoners the day before when he was stopped by a senior Wehrmacht officer.

He had past history, in fact his Polish murders were not only forgiven by the state they were actively encouraged.

[Shark with freaking laser]

It should be clear, that the Waffen-SS was no ordinary army and the fact that is was labeled a criminal organization after the war indicates that well enough. The Waffen-SS was first and foremost the political army of the NSDAP and thus represented some of the greatest evil we have ever seen in history.

However, I disagree in the assessment that there were only few members who were involuntarily in the Waffen-SS. In fact, during the latter stages of the war*conscripts made up the majority of several Waffen-SS division, making nonsense of the 'Volunteer' title many of these divisions carried, an example being the 18th SS-Volunteer-Panzer-grenadier-Division.

An interesting fact is that these Waffen-SS conscripts were allowed war pensions after the war, granted they had not committed atrocities.

* During 1944-1945 there was simply no manpower left in Germany. In additions, there were fewer and fewer volunteers, Germanic or not, signing up for Waffen-SS service, which is logical considering the status of the war at the time. Therefore the Waffen-SS started conscripting Ethnic Germans from Eastern Europe, and after the failed assassination attempt at Hitler in mid-1944, Himmler was also given the control over the Home Army. This pretty much put an end to the personnel shortage of the Waffen-SS.

Another interesting fact is that the Germans along with NS also planned to start conscription in Norway, but luckily the Norwegian resistance put an end to that (they destroyed the documents containing the names of approx. 50 000 Norwegians).

[Salonen]

Don't forget the French. It is in the book by Rafael Scheck, Hitler's African Victims: The German Army Massacres of Black French Soldiers in 1940.

[martinexsquaddie]

up until they had to take conscripts the SS were not an normal army weren't even that impressive on the battlefield.
preferred there targets unarmed
fan boys of the SS and the scum who re-enactment them have issues

[LineDoggie]

What has failed to be mentioned in the article is the fact that the british soldiers had been using dum dum rounds, banned under the Geneva and Haig conventions, members of the Waffen SS had been killed and very seriously wounded with the illegal use of this ammunition. Another thing that had not been mentioned is that a large number of T-Division soldiers were massacred by british troops. The german soldiers had been captured in earlier fighting and the retreating british soldier were unable to take the PoW's with them so gunned them down in cold blood.
Is it not strange that the victor gets to write the history of war.
DumDum Ammunition? in 1940? I'd like to to source where they were using Mk.4 & 5 .303 since the rounds were withdrawn in 1900 for Combat use. What I believe is this

Waffen-SS Troops who were inexperienced in battle and not very well trained at the time. And seeing casualties of comrades for the first time, believed the damage done was caused by "Dum-Dums" when in reality it was FMJ Mk.VII. I've seen an Iraqi Hit with 4X 5.56 M855 in the guts and the size of the exit hole and the yellow body fat and liver tissue was no pencil hole like on TV and Movies.


As to British Soldiers executing Totenkopf men, Show me, as not saying your a Liar, but I need a Verifiable source, not some dude on Axis Forums says.....

[Hollos]

up until they had to take conscripts the SS were not an normal army weren't even that impressive on the battlefield.
preferred there targets unarmed
fan boys of the SS and the scum who re-enactment them have issuesCould not of put it better myself, anybody who either likes or tries to justify what they were or even dress up as them are total choppers, definitely have never done a day in uniform

[Hollis]

What has failed to be mentioned in the article is the fact that the british soldiers had been using dum dum rounds, banned under the Geneva and Haig conventions, members of the Waffen SS had been killed and very seriously wounded with the illegal use of this ammunition. Another thing that had not been mentioned is that a large number of T-Division soldiers were massacred by british troops. The german soldiers had been captured in earlier fighting and the retreating british soldier were unable to take the PoW's with them so gunned them down in cold blood.
Is it not strange that the victor gets to write the history of war.


How about providing acceptable documentation to your CLAIMS............ If you do, I will reverse the infraction, Other wise Martinexsquaddie's opinion applies.

[Kitsune]

Wikipedia is a good place to start if one wants to inform oneself:
About the Waffen SS in general: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waffen-SS
and about the Les Paradis massacre: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Le_Paradis_massacre

[Shark with freaking laser]

up until they had to take conscripts the SS were not an normal army weren't even that impressive on the battlefield.
preferred there targets unarmed

I wouldn't say they turned 'normal' even when they started conscription.

Other than that, I think that most would agree that the Waffen-SS performed well at Kharkov and Kursk in 1943.


fan boys of the SS and the scum who re-enactment them have issuesToo right mate!

R.I.P. to the brave British troops that were murdered by the SS. Lest we forget.

[martinexsquaddie]

dressing up in Nazi gear for weird fetish *** is acceptable but doing it in public not

[Mr.K]

I think there was a war going on at that time. So people were killing eachother.

[therifleman]

I think there was a war going on at that time. So people were killing eachother.

x2.

Funny how we're getting all hyped up over this when this kind of stuff was happening on a weekly basis over on the Eastern Front on both sides.

[Connaught Ranger]

x2.
Funny how we're getting all hyped up over this when this kind of stuff was happening on a weekly basis over on the Eastern Front on both sides.

B O LL O X sonny :bash::-


1940 Return to Top of Page (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/ww2time.htm#top)

January 8, 1940 - Rationing begins in Britain.
March 12, 1940 - Finland signs a peace treaty with Soviets.
March 16, 1940 - Germans bomb Scapa Flow naval base near Scotland.
April 9, 1940 - Nazis invade Denmark and Norway.
May 10, 1940 - Nazis invade France, Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands; Winston Churchill becomes British Prime Minister.
May 15, 1940 - Holland surrenders to the Nazis.



May 26, 1940 - Evacuation of Allied troops from Dunkirk begins.

May 28, 1940 - Belgium surrenders to the Nazis.



June 3, 1940 - Germans bomb Paris; Dunkirk evacuation ends. (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/dunkirk.htm)

(http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/dunkirk.htm)
June 10, 1940 - Norway surrenders to the Nazis; Italy declares war on Britain and France.
June 14, 1940 - Germans enter Paris. (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/enter.htm)
June 16, 1940 - Marshal Pétain becomes French Prime Minister.
June 18, 1940 - Hitler and Mussolini meet in Munich (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/hitmuss.htm); Soviets begin occupation of the Baltic States.
June 22, 1940 - France signs an armistice with Nazi Germany.
June 23, 1940 - Hitler tours Paris. (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/paris.htm)
June 28, 1940 - Britain recognizes General Charles de Gaulle as the Free French leader.
July 1, 1940 - German U-boats attack merchant ships in the Atlantic.
July 5, 1940 - French Vichy government breaks off relations with Britain.
July 10, 1940 - Battle of Britain begins.
July 23, 1940 - Soviets take Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.
August 3-19 - Italians occupy British Somaliland in East Africa.
August 13, 1940 - German bombing offensive against airfields and factories in England.
August 15, 1940 - Air battles and daylight raids over Britain.
August 17, 1940 - Hitler declares a blockade of the British Isles.
August 23/24 - First German air raids on Central London.
August 25/26 - First British air raid on Berlin.
September 3, 1940 - Hitler plans Operation Sea Lion (the invasion of Britain).
September 7, 1940 - German Blitz against Britain begins. (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/london-blitz.htm)
September 13, 1940 - Italians invade Egypt.
September 15, 1940 - Massive German air raids on London, Southampton, Bristol, Cardiff, Liverpool and Manchester. (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/children-shelter.htm)
September 16, 1940 - United States military conscription bill passed.
September 27, 1940 - Tripartite (Axis) Pact signed by Germany, Italy and Japan.
October 7, 1940 - German troops enter Romania.
October 12, 1940 - Germans postpone Operation Sea Lion until Spring of 1941.
October 28, 1940 - Italy invades Greece.
November 5, 1940 - Roosevelt re-elected as U.S. president.
November 10/11 - Torpedo bomber raid cripples the Italian fleet at Taranto, Italy.
November 14/15 - Germans bomb Coventry, England.
November 20, 1940 - Hungary joins the Axis Powers.
November 22, 1940 - Greeks defeat the Italian 9th Army.
November 23, 1940 - Romania joins the Axis Powers.
December 9/10 - British begin a western desert offensive in North Africa against the Italians.
December 29/30 - Massive German air raid on London. (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/stpaul.htm)

http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/thin-blue-700.jpg
1941 Return to Top of Page (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/ww2time.htm#top)

January 22, 1941 - Tobruk in North Africa falls to the British and Australians.
February 11, 1941 - British forces advance into Italian Somaliland in East Africa.
February 12, 1941 - German General Erwin Rommel arrives in Tripoli, North Africa.
February 14, 1941 - First units of German 'Afrika Korps' arrive in North Africa.
March 7, 1941 - British forces arrive in Greece.
March 11, 1941 - President Roosevelt signs the Lend-Lease Act.
March 27, 1941 - A coup in Yugoslavia overthrows the pro-Axis government.
April 3, 1941 - Pro-Axis regime set up in Iraq.
April 6, 1941 - Nazis invade Greece and Yugoslavia.
April 14, 1941 - Rommel attacks Tobruk.
April 17, 1941 - Yugoslavia surrenders to the Nazis.
April 27, 1941 - Greece surrenders to the Nazis.
May 1, 1941 - German attack on Tobruk is repulsed. (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/rommel.htm)
May 10, 1941 - Deputy Führer Rudolph Hess flies to Scotland.
See also: The History Place - Biography of Rudolph Hess (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/biographies/hess-tline.htm)
May 10/11 - Heavy German bombing of London; British bomb Hamburg.
May 15, 1941 - Operation Brevity begins (the British counter-attack in Egypt).
May 24, 1941 - Sinking of the British ship Hood by the Bismarck.
May 27, 1941 - Sinking of the Bismarck by the British Navy.
June 4, 1941 - Pro-Allied government installed in Iraq.
June 8, 1941 - Allies invade Syria and Lebanon.
June 14, 1941 - United States freezes German and Italian assets in America.



June 22, 1941 - Germany attacks Soviet Union as Operation Barbarossa begins. (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/russia.htm)

(http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/russia.htm)
In June - Nazi SS-Einsatzgruppen begin mass murder. (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/einsatz.htm)
June 28, 1941 - Germans capture Minsk.
July 3, 1941 - Stalin calls for a scorched earth policy.
July 10, 1941 - Germans cross the River Dnieper in the Ukraine.
July 12, 1941 - Mutual Assistance agreement between British and Soviets.
July 14, 1941 - British occupy Syria.
July 26, 1941 - Roosevelt freezes Japanese assets in United States and suspends relations.
July 31, 1941 - Göring instructs Heydrich to prepare for the Final Solution. (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/order1.htm)
August 1, 1941 - United States announces an oil embargo against aggressor states.
August 14, 1941 - Roosevelt and Churchill announce the Atlantic Charter. (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/atlantic-chart.htm)
August 20, 1941 - Nazi siege of Leningrad begins.
September 1, 1941 - Nazis order Jews to wear yellow stars. (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/star.htm)
September 3, 1941 - First experimental use of gas chambers at Auschwitz.
September 19, 1941 - Nazis take Kiev.
September 29, 1941 - Nazis murder 33,771 Jews at Kiev.
October 2, 1941 - Operation Typhoon begins (German advance on Moscow).
October 16, 1941 - Germans take Odessa.
October 24, 1941 - Germans take Kharkov.
October 30, 1941 - Germans reach Sevastopol.
November 13, 1941 - British aircraft carrier Ark Royal is sunk off Gibraltar by a U-boat.
November 20, 1941 - Germans take Rostov.
November 27, 1941 - Soviet troops retake Rostov.
December 5, 1941 - German attack on Moscow is abandoned.
December 6, 1941 - Soviet Army launches a major counter-offensive around Moscow.
December 7, 1941 - Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/pearl.htm); Hitler issues the Night and Fog decree. (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/nacht.htm)
December 8, 1941 - United States (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/declare.htm) and Britain declare war on Japan.
December 11, 1941 - Hitler declares war on the United States. (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/germany-declares.htm)
December 16, 1941 - Rommel begins a retreat to El Agheila in North Africa.
December 19, 1941 - Hitler takes complete control of the German Army.




As the timeline clearly shows this execution in cold blood was carried out LONG before any German soldier ever set foot in the Soviet Union, and just because it was happening there on a weekly basis, by both sides does not give it any legitimation, what it does show is the Nazis were prepatred to kill out of hand any who got in the way of their plans of world domination.

And we "British" reserve the right to get "hyped" up about this.

Connaught Ranger.

[therifleman]

B O LL O X sonny :bash::-




As the timeline clearly shows this execution in cold blood was carried out LONG before any German soldier ever set foot in the Soviet Union, and just because it was happening there on a weekly basis, by both sides does not give it any legitimation, what it does show is the Nazis were prepatred to kill out of hand any who got in the way of their plans of world domination.

And we "British" reserve the right to get "hyped" up about this.

Connaught Ranger.


I am well aware that Dunkirk happened well before Operation Barbarossa and I was using the word "was" in regards to the length of the war as a whole.

And what are you? Irish or British? Pick one and stick with it?

And does this mean the Germans should get hyped up over the bombing of Dresden? The Dachau massacre? These were no more warranted than the Dunkirk massacre. The point is that it's war and and sh*t happens.

[Shark with freaking laser]

Therifleman, should the poor families of those that were murdered at Dunkirk not get hyped up about it since "it's war and sh!t happens"?

You are ****ing idiot!

Atrocities were committed by all sides during WW2, but that doesn't make it OK. The scumbag, whatever nationality, who committed atrocities, deserves his punishment.

[therifleman]

Therifleman, should the poor families of those that were murdered at Dunkirk not get hyped up about it since "it's war and sh!t happens"?

You are ****ing idiot!

Atrocities were committed by all sides during WW2, but that doesn't make it OK. The scumbag, whatever nationality, who committed atrocities, deserves his punishment.




Are you f*cking kidding me? Where did I say that they were acceptable?

Obviously this went way over your head:


These were no more warranted than the Dunkirk massacre.




My argument is directed at earlier posts in the thread that express sudden revisionist outrage and act as if the SS were the only who perpetrated this kind of stuff.

[Hollis]

up until they had to take conscripts the SS were not an normal army weren't even that impressive on the battlefield.
preferred there targets unarmed
fan boys of the SS and the scum who re-enactment them have issues



My argument is directed at earlier posts in the thread that express sudden revisionist outrage and act as if the SS were the only who perpetrated this kind of stuff.

I think we are all aware of history. BTW the SS was ................ as Martinexsquaddie says. besides SS did this stuff with the approval of and orders from it's leadership and they enjoyed it.

[Shark with freaking laser]

The SS committed atrocities and people are rightfully angry, but everyone knows that the SS weren't the only one to commit atrocities during WW2. But with these kinds of comments


Funny how we're getting all hyped up over this when this kind of stuff was happening on a weekly basis over on the Eastern Front on both sides.
And does this mean the Germans should get hyped up over the bombing of Dresden? The Dachau massacre? These were no more warranted than the Dunkirk massacre. The point is that it's war and and sh*t happens. you are pissing people because it sounds like you trying to make this event look unimportant as there was way much more happening on the Eastern Front etc. "What's the fuzz about? It's war and **** happens". Have you ever watched the testimonials of German war criminals? Almost every one of them brought up the last comment of yours in their defense.

[Connaught Ranger]

And what are you? Irish or British? Pick one and stick with it?



If only life were so simple old tosser,

My Mother was English Anglican (note NOT British, her family were of old English stock that could trace their ancesteral line back to the Doomsday book.)

My Father was Irish Catholic, met and married my Mother while working in Nottinghamshire,

I was born in Nottingham, (and have a British Birth Certificate) lived the frst 10 years of my life there before moving to live in Ireland.

I served over 21 years with the Irish Defence Forces (and with U.N.I.F.I.L. in South Lebanon) I use a Irish European Union Passport.

I refer to myself as being ANGLO-IRISH

With the

And what are you? Irish or British? Pick one and stick with it?

sounds like the typical mentality of your average BNP member to me.

The Nazis went into W.W.2. quite happily to kill those who did not follow their sick way of Racial and Political-military supremecy thinking,

regardless of if they were helpless civilians machine-gunned on the roads of Belgium, British P.O.W.'s, Extermination Camps, Forced Labour,

so on and so forth, as for the Dresden bombing it was part of a war that Nazi Germany started.

And by the way Dachau, was a Nazi concentration larger, your "massacre" reference

I believe is to the ss thugs who were shot out of hand by the US Forces when they came upon the camp,

gee, I can honestly say I have no compassion for the scum who purportrated such acts against innocent civilians

as no doubt the men of the US forces felt when they saw what was in and around the camp at that time.

However if Adolf Hitler had kept his mudering scum inside Germany's borders between 1939-45

then none of the events would have taken place would they?

Connaught Ranger.

[therifleman]

sounds like the typical mentality of your average BNP member to me.


roflNot really. Despite the fact that I also have Irish citizenship (my mother is from Sligo) I simply refer to myself as American because it seems the terms "Irish-American" has become a laughable term.




The Nazis went into W.W.2. quite happily to kill those who did not follow their sick way of Racial and Political-military supremecy thinking,

regardless of if they were helpless civilians machine-gunned on the roads of Belgium, British P.O.W.'s, Extermination Camps, Forced Labour,

so on and so forth, as for the Dresden bombing it was part of a war that Nazi Germany started.

And by the way Dachau, was a Nazi concentration larger, your "massacre" reference

I believe is to the ss thugs who were shot out of hand by the US Forces when they came upon the camp,

gee, I can honestly say I have no compassion for the scum who purportrated such acts against innocent civilians

as no doubt the men of the US forces felt when they saw what was in and around the camp at that time.

However if Adolf Hitler had kept his mudering scum inside Germany's borders between 1939-45

then none of the events would have taken place would they?




It is also arguable that none of this would have taken place if it weren't for the harsh reparations of the Treaty of Versailles which certifiably paved way for Hitler's rise to power. Yes, the Nazis initiated the war but that is just the tip of the iceberg. Europe's fate was first sealed in 1919, not 1933.

I sense a double standard in your argument. The Dresden bombing was terror bombing. Just like what the Germans did in the London Blitz. There is no way around that. There were no military targets that warranted that kind of destruction. But you say it's just "part of a war?" Yes, but except of course, when the allies are on the receiving end.

As for the Dachau massacre. All right, I can accept that fact that some of the guard who were murdered probally deserved it.

But do you realize that most of the soldiers who were put up against that wall had absolutely nothing to do with the camp? They were Waffen SS soldiers who were recovering from battle wounds in the nearby hospital. Soldiers, not Totenkopfverbande guards. Do you think that wounded soldiers deserved to be machine gunned? It's no different from what the SS did to the British- killing unarmed soldiers. Ah, but I guess you are just going to assume that each one of these guys was a rutheless murderer of civilians.

[Connaught Ranger]

roflNot really. Despite the fact that I also have Irish citizenship (my mother is from Sligo) I simply refer to myself as American because it seems the terms "Irish-American" has become a laughable term.

If born in the States of Irish parents, or with Irish ancestory you would be more rightly known as an "American-Irish" the derogatory term being "Plastic-Paddy".

It is also arguable that none of this would have taken place if it weren't for the harsh reparations of the Treaty of Versailles which certifiably paved way for Hitler's rise to power. Yes, the Nazis initiated the war but that is just the tip of the iceberg. Europe's fate was first sealed in 1919, not 1933.

The Treaty of Versailles at the time seemed more than just to the victims of Prussian aggression, what would you expect a slap on the wrist and naughty-boy do not do that again,off to bed with only bread and water for supper.

I sense a double standard in your argument. The Dresden bombing was terror bombing. Just like what the Germans did in the London Blitz. There is no way around that. There were no military targets that warranted that kind of destruction. But you say it's just "part of a war?" Yes, but except of course, when the allies are on the receiving end.

No double argument at all, the U.K. was subject to fire-bombing by the Luftwaffe, (again attacking civil targets seemed to cause them no problems even as far back as Guernica in Spain by the German Condor Legion, it appears to be an accepted part of the modern warfare of the time, but just because later on the tables are turned and you (Germany) are on the receiving end does not give you the right to shout "Foul!"

Dresden was a major transportation hub, and had many military instalations and war industry factories, the fact it was flooded with refugues from the East, well one has to wonder what was the prime cause for them being there, I'll give a hint Germanys failed invasion of the Soviet Union.

The Nazi's had an option of declaring it an open city, all they had to do were move the military forces including Anti-Aircraft Units from within it and cease war production and have the City inspected by the International Red Cross.

As for the Dachau massacre. All right, I can accept that fact that some of the guard who were murdered probally deserved it.

But do you realize that most of the soldiers who were put up against that wall had absolutely nothing to do with the camp? They were Waffen SS soldiers who were recovering from battle wounds in the nearby hospital. Soldiers, not Totenkopfverbande guards. Do you think that wounded soldiers deserved to be machine gunned? It's no different from what the SS did to the British- killing unarmed soldiers. Ah, but I guess you are just going to assume that each one of these guys was a rutheless murderer of civilians.

The record of the ss (more like political cadre soldiers) and their treatment of innocent civilians and P.O.W.'s on all fronts is well documented, they went into the war from the very begining paying little or no attention to the Geneva convention, or the commonly accepted Rules of Warfare I shed no tears for them.

Whereas the Allies on the Western Front fought without relience on killing civilians out of hand (that does not count collateral damage such as those killed in Air raids or fighting in built-up areas, but mostly they did their best to ensure there was as little civil casualties as possible, and the record shows the intances of German POW being shot out of habd were minute compared to the German way of doing things.

So it seems we will agree to disagree on the subject.

Connaught Ranger.

[Domen]

As the timeline clearly shows this execution in cold blood was carried out LONG before any German soldier ever set foot in the Soviet Union, and just because it was happening there on a weekly basis, by both sides does not give it any legitimation, what it does show is the Nazis were prepatred to kill out of hand any who got in the way of their plans of world domination.


The campaign in the USSR in 1941 was not the first German campaign full of atrocities.

Recommended reading on Wehrmacht & Waffen SS crimes in the early WW2:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51H8R8MFQ3L._SS500_.jpg

According to Jochen Bohler, during the Polish Campaign of 1939:



Abseits der Kampfhandlungen wurden mehr als 3.000 polnische Soldaten von deutschen Soldaten ermordet.


"Apart from combat actions more than 3.000 polish soldiers were murdered by german soldiers".

And also this:

http://s2.alejka.pl/i2/p/23/47/d32525ee9b744_0_b.jpg

And also this publication, originally published in 1942 and available online:

Part One - http://felsztyn.tripod.com/germaninvasion/id4.html

Part Two - http://felsztyn.tripod.com/germaninvasion/id7.html

And also:

http://motoallegro.pl/item1049865212_zbrodnie_wehrmachtu_na_jencach_wojennych_datner.html

http://4imgs.com/306/x/bk2372_FULL.jpg

http://www.polishlibrary.org/review/hitler_strikes_poland.htm

These books show that Wehrmacht was not much worse in commiting war crimes than the Waffen SS, at least on the Eastern Front.

Some examples German mass murders of Polish military POWs in 1939 (others than well-known Ciepielow (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massacre_in_Ciepiel%C3%B3w)):

1. During the night from 4 to 5 September 1939 604. lei. Straßen-Bau-Btl. murdered 84 Polish POWs as revenge for the Polish attack on the battalion which took place on 04.09.1939 near Serock (in that combat Btl. lost 6 soldiers).
2. On 10.09.1939 in Piaseczno 15 Polish POWs were executed.
3. On 20.09.1939 as revenge for the death of one killed in combat German, 40 POWs were executed.
4. In late September in the village of Urycz ca. 100 Polish POWs were imprisoned and then burnt alive in a burn.
5. On 11.09.1939 in Zambrow 100 (German sources) or 200 (Polish sources) Polish POWs were murdered.
6. Polish POWs in Szczucin were massacred with use of hand grenades and machine guns on 12.09.1939 (40 of them died in the process as well as 30 civilian refugees). 25 Jews were forced to bury them and after that murdered as well. This happened in revenge for the fact that one Lt. (POW) during investigation pulled out a pistol from the holster of Gefreiter (and Kompaniechef) Golla who was investigating him and killed him, commiting suicide after that.
7. During the Spring of 1940 ca. 25,000 Polish POWs of Jewish nationality were murdered or died from exhaustion.

Source: Jochen Boehler, "Auftakt zum Vernichtungskrieg: Die Wehrmacht in Polen 1939", pp 183 - 192 (of Polish edition).

Some other mass murders are mentioned by Szymon Datner in "Zbrodnie Wehrmachtu na jeńcach wojennych [...]" (link above):

8. In Sladow on 18.09.1939 soldiers of Schtz.Rgt.12 (4. Pz.Div.) murdered 150 POWs and 150 civilians.
9. 400 POWs + 100 civilians were murdered in Zakroczym on 28.09.1939 (most probably by SS "Deutschland"). Murdered soldiers were from the crew of Fort I of Fortress Modlin - this was in revenge for fierce resistance.
10. On 17.09.1939 in Terespol around 100 POWs were killed (units of Guderian are to be blamed).
11. Around 100 POWs were murdered in Trzebinia on 23.09.1939.
12. In Opatowiec, poviat Pinczow, soldiers of 2. Leichte-Division executed 45 POWs on 04.09.1939.
13. On 20.09.1939 (after the capitulation of Army "Cracow") in Majdan Wielki near Tomaszow German soldiers tortured and then massacred 42 Polish POWs from 20. Inf.Rgt. (as revenge for German losses on 19.09.1939).
14. On 08.09.1939 public execution of 11 Polish POWs took place in Mszczonow (by soldiers of 4. Pz.Div.).

---------------------------------------

Jochen Bohler describes a situation when soldiers of 19. Infanterie-Division murdered a group of Polish civilians in the village of Parzymiechy.

When one German soldier protested against murdering civilians, his commanding officer said:

"This is Polish ****. Execute all of them tomorrow morning."

Similar situation was in village Julianpol, where the Germans lead a group of civilians from the neighbouring village of Zimnowoda, ordered them to form a line in front of a ditch, directed MGs towards them and started to laugh at them and to call them "a band of Polish ****." When one soldier protested against such behaviour, others told him:

"Halt dein Maul, du kannst auch hier liegen bleiben so wie der polnische Mist!" ("Shut up, if not you will soon lie here like this Polish garbage!").

Even in letters to their families German soldiers were showing their real face - a letter of regimental doctor of Inf.Rgt.101 (14. Infanterie-Division) to his family from 7 September 1939:

"We received an order for further march - it's a pity because I already managed to domesticate in Raczki in a house of a Polish teacher, who even had got some concept of culture, at least if this is possible at all in this disgusting country [...] Polish houses are usually small, very dirty, covered with straw and their milk is sour and stinking. In fact we did well that we burnt these houses" And when the doctor saw several unburied dead horses on the battlefield, he noticed: "What a nation of sluts!".

Account of German soldier (probably an NCO or low ranking officer) from 29. Infanterie-Division (mot.) who wanted to stay anonymus:

"A day before yesterday some Gefreiter from a slowly driving car using his Walther pistol shot a Polish 60 or 70 years old peasant who wanted to lead his cow to the cowshead, probably because he didn't want it to wander along the road. Gefreiter was very proud of this shooting achievement, which was achieved - we should remember about it - from the driving car from a distance of 12 metres. I just can't understand this. Just several weeks ago he got married and he was so tender for his wife, so nice for his old parents-in-law. Or maybe he just wanted to shot this cow? Unfortunately, pride didn't allow him to stay silent about this shooting achievement.

[...]

On that day we still didn't participate in any combat action. Only from the right and from the left side of the road some single wounded Polish soldiers with put up arms could be seen. Oberjager K. killed a seriously wounded Polish soldier just because he put up only one arm. It could be precisely seen, that the right arm of this soldier was chaotically dangling, because his entire right shoulder was crushed. Oberjager did it because of simple greed of shooting. I could see when he was aiming at this man from his rifle and I screamed towards him with indignation: "Oberjager!". Then he leaved his rifle. But just some 10 seconds later, when I was not observing them, I could hear a shoot. The Pole was dead. How will I manage to understand this? Such were heroic deeds of our company yet before any single bullet was fired towards us."

In the Lodzkie Voivodeship alone, 163 executions of civilian population took place in September of 1939 (2387 persons were murdered in these 163 executions). Of them 142 (87,2%) were commited by the Wehrmacht and only 10 were commited by the Waffen SS. But on the other hand - only one Waffen SS regiment fought there (Leibstandarte).

Source: Szymon Datner, "55 dni Wehrmachtu w Polsce" ("55 days of the Wehrmacht in Poland").

Several more numbers from this book (now concerning the entire Poland):

In period 1 IX - 25 IX 1939 in total 714 executions were commited (and 16,336 civilians killed)

On 1 IX 1939 in total 15 executions were commited (and 139 civilians killed)
On 4 IX 1939 in total 46 executions were commited (and 1,693 civilians killed)

Jochen Bohler, "Auftakt zum Vernichtungskrieg [...]", writes about the order of the HQ of the German 14. Army to divisional commanders from 18.09.1939, in which the HQ of the German 14. Army notices, that during the recent days:

"[...] numerous cases of lack of discipline, abuses and lawless actions against the civilian population were reported in the operational area of the army, among them also rapes [...]"

According to "Prześladowania ludności żydowskiej w okresie hitlerowskiej administracji wojskowej na okupowanych ziemiach polskich 1.9.-25.10.1939" ("Persecutions of Jewish minority in the period of Nazi military occupation on the occupied areas of Poland 1.9.-25.10.1939") by T. Berencstein and A. Rutkowski, numerous cases of rapes commited on Jewish girls and women by German soldiers took place during the Polish Campaign of 1939.

Jochen Bohler mentions the court trial of three German soldiers (they were from 14. Army) - Andreas Kerner, Siegfrid Baudisch and Franz Rothea - who were for three days plundering Jewish houses in the town of Busko (Southern Poland). While plundering these Jewish houses, they were raping all encountered Jewish women. One of Jewish families reported their crimes to the German martial court. The trial took place but the verdict is unknown.

---------------------------------------------

Jochen Bohler established, that at least 1/3 of all soldiers of an average Wehrmacht division in 1939 had belonged to different Nazi paramilitary organizations before entering the army. 1/7 belonged to SA, 1/5 belonged to Hitlerjugend and around 1/3 belonged to RAD. They were seriously influenced by the Nazi ideology.

[Mordoror]

Generally the treatment of Commonwealth soldiers by the Germans was decent.

i take that thread on the run but what was the treatment of non european soldiers
the treatment of colonial french soldiers was awfull even as early as the first days of the war
they were very often killed on the spot or, if not, used as propaganda tools

it happened often also that if french officers wanted to help them, they got killed alongside them

IIRC there is a known story of a platoon of captured Senegalese soldiers that were mashed by Panzer tracks (just to fix the ideas, here)

[nemowork]

TO be honest that was predictable in a way, the average German had a deep rooted hatred of French colonial troops going back to the period after WW1 when they were used in the occupation of Germany. Not counting the usual political and social repression the colonial troops were highly visible, well paid and well fed in comparison to Germans on the verge of starvation. To the local women after four years of misery having a bunch of well paid and exotic foreigners wandering round was way too tempting and they cut something of a dash with the single German women much like GIs did after WW2. You can imagine what this did to German men whos pride had already been kicked into the dirt by military defeat and the collapse of their economy.

Check the German nationalist propaganda of the 20s and 30s, french colonial troops raping and abusing local women is a staple image along with the Bolshevik and the Jewish profiteer.

Add some notably hard fought defences by the colonial troops to dent the Germans pride and some long held grudges and your going to have bad results.

[Mordoror]

TO be honest that was predictable in a way, the average German had a deep rooted hatred of French colonial troops going back to the period after WW1 when they were used in the occupation of Germany. Not counting the usual political and social repression the colonial troops were highly visible, well paid and well fed in comparison to Germans on the verge of starvation. To the local women after four years of misery having a bunch of well paid and exotic foreigners wandering round was way too tempting and they cut something of a dash with the single German women much like GIs did after WW2. You can imagine what this did to German men whos pride had already been kicked into the dirt by military defeat and the collapse of their economy.

Check the German nationalist propaganda of the 20s and 30s, french colonial troops raping and abusing local women is a staple image along with the Bolshevik and the Jewish profiteer.

Add some notably hard fought defences by the colonial troops to dent the Germans pride and some long held grudges and your going to have bad results.

Yes Nemo these are the deep roots (among others like the deep disdain in Nazi's culture for anything not "aryan" .... remember the Olympic Games in Munich and that afroamerican runner event)
but was this attitude extended to others colonial troops (like Commonwealth indians or black skinned troops) in the early stages of the war (i know that the Reich became friendly with Indians because of Chandra Bose (IIRC)) but i don't know how it behaved before that episode

[Sergeant Boot]

I think we've done this thread to death now..