The Battle of the Bulge

Franek,

Thanks for sharing your memories, sometimes painful no doubt.
This makes it even more special for us.

Regards
Tom

 

the Battle of the Bulge near the Belgian town of Malmedy. (Photo credit: U.S. Army)
The Malmedy Massacre
In the last German offensive of World War II, three German Armies conducted a surprise attack along a 50 mile front in the Ardennes beginning on Dec. 16, 1944, and quickly overtook thin U.S. lines.
On the second day of the 'Battle of the Bulge,' a truck convoy of Battery B of the 285th Field Artillery Observation Battalion was intercepted southeast of Malmedy by a regiment of the 1st SS Panzer Division of the Leibstandarte-SS, under the command of 29 year old SS Lt. Col. Jochen Peiper. His troops had earned the nickname "Blowtorch Battalion" after burning their way across Russia and had also been responsible for slaughtering civilians in two separate villages.
Upon sighting the trucks, the Panzer tanks opened fire and destroyed the lead vehicles. This brought the convoy to a halt while the deadly accurate tank fire continued. The outgunned Americans abandoned their vehicles and surrendered.
The captured U.S. soldiers were herded into a nearby field. An SS tank commander then ordered an SS private to shoot into the prisoners, setting off a wild killing spree as the SS opened fire with machine guns and pistols on the unarmed, terrified POWs.
Survivors were killed by a pistol shot to the head, in some cases by English speaking SS who walked among the victims asking if anyone was injured or needed help. Those who responded were shot. A total of 81 Americans were killed in the single worst atrocity against U.S. troops during World War II in Europe.
After the SS troops moved on, three survivors encountered a U.S. Army Colonel stationed at Malmedy and reported the massacre. News quickly spread among U.S. troops that "Germans are shooting POWs." As a result, the troops became determined to hold the lines against the German advance until reinforcements could arrive. Gen. Eisenhower was informed of the massacre. War correspondents in the area also spread the news.
By January of 1945, the combined efforts of the Allied armies drove the Germans back to their original starting positions in the Battle of the Bulge. U.S. troops then reached the sight of the massacre, now buried under two feet of winter snow.
Mine detectors were used to locate the 81 bodies, which had rested undisturbed since the day of the shootings and by now had frozen into grotesque positions. Forty one of the bodies were found to have been shot in the head. As each body was uncovered it was numbered, as seen in the photo above.
While the U.S. medical teams performed this grim task, columns of German POWs being led by Americans passed by, with the bodies in plain view, however, no act of vengeance was taken.
Following the defeat of Nazi Germany, 74 former SS men, including Jochen Peiper and SS Gen. Sepp Dietrich, were tried by a U.S. Military Tribunal for War Crimes concerning the massacre.
The two month trial began May 16, 1946, in a courthouse at Dachau. But controversy soon arose. The defense team raised allegations of mistreatment including physical abuse by the U.S. Army and cited the use of mock trials in obtaining SS confessions as improper. The defense also complained that the court's legal expert, a Jew, constantly ruled in favor of the prosecution.
The trial included testimony by a survivor of the massacre who was able to point out the SS man that actually fired the first shot.
On July 11, 1946, the Judges returned a verdict after two and a half hours of deliberation. All of the SS were found guilty as charged. Forty three, including Peiper, were sentenced to death, and 22, including Dietrich, were sentenced to life imprisonment. The others got long prison terms.
They were taken to Landsberg Prison, the same prison where Hitler had served time following the failed Beer Hall Putsch of 1923.
Controversy continued, however, as various U.S. Army Boards conducted critical reviews of the trial process and methods used during pretrial interrogations. As a result, most of the death sentences were commuted and over half of the life sentences were reduced.
Political complications arose after the Soviets blockaded Berlin in May of 1948. The strategic importance of post-war Germany in the emerging Cold War became apparent to the U.S. amid public outcry in Germany against war crime trials being conducted by the U.S. Army.
In 1949, following a series of public charges and counter charges by trial participants and further investigations over whether justice had been served in the conduct of the trial, six of the remaining death sentences were commuted. A U.S. Senate Armed Services Subcommittee then began an investigation, led by Sen. Joseph McCarthy, concerning the U.S. Army's overall handling of the case. The Senate investigation heightened the controversy surrounding the trial, due in part to the aggressive behavior of Sen. McCarthy.
By the early 1950s, following years of accusations, denials, investigations, controversy, and political turmoil, the final remaining death sentences were commuted and release of all of the convicted SS men began.
In December of 1956, the last prisoner, Peiper, was released from Landsberg. He eventually settled in eastern France. On July 14, 1976, Bastille Day in France, Peiper was killed when a fire of mysterious origin destroyed his home. Firefighters responding to the blaze found their water hoses had been cut.

 

Actually Peiper wasn't the last of the group who was released from prison. That's just another myth. It was Hubert Huber who was released in January 1957.

 

Thanks for your posts, but are these your own words, from a book or another website?

 

A researcher has shown me detailed information from Bouck himself, German Fallschirmjäger veterans and primary sources from archives. There are many improbabilities and inaccuracies in the commonly accepted story. The story of Bouck and his men in their manholes fighting hundereds of German Fallschirmjäger is said to be historically impossible. The secretary of the Kameradschaft of the 3. FJD pointed out that the Americans abandoned their positions and that they captured Bouck and his comrades in a little chapel or church in Lanzerath, which contradicts the version of Bouck that they were captured at the hill. The Germans also give conflicting numbers regarding their casualties that day but all in all the German paratroopers lost 45 men (not 450)

After the war, Bouck's men told fishermans tales about Lanzerath. Their friends believed these tales and decided these men should be awarded medals and books should be dedicated to their actions, these veterans did not have the guts to admit the truth - mainly because they had made their statements under oath. The matter will allways remain controversial. The most decorated American unit ever but probably based on dubious facts and untruthful accounts. I guess it must have been hard for Bouck himself: he knew most of the things they were awarded for are bollocks, he was not the one who made up the stories but he kept silent because he did not want to compromise his comrades.

 

Sorry, I was referring to Franek.

 

No problem, I was also referring to a post from Franek. To what he wrote about Bouck earlier in this discussion

 

Thanks for your posts, but are these your own words, from a book or another website?

No Paul, the account that I posted was from my division paper. (The Checkerboard). This happened about an hour after I repaired their communication with Battalion. It was not until after the war when I pieced together what happened. I can only attest to what happened in my sector. I was at the Loshiem Gap repairing communications. There were skirmishes within a half mile from me that I never found out until after the war.

Read my story. It will explain a lot.http://franek.webs.com

 

This is really inspiring, I want to go write a story. Good Night and Thanks Franek!!

Jess.

 

This is really inspiring, I want to go write a story. Good Night and Thanks Franek!!

Jess.

Jess; DO IT; I never wrote a story in my whole life.. if it were not for my youngest Grand Daughter I would never have wrote mine. She begged me to write my memoirs, so she could show it to her children. I am living on borrowed time so at least this is the least that I can do for them.

 

No problem, I was also referring to a post from Franek. To what he wrote about Bouck earlier in this discussion

Be advised, that these are not my words. Since I was not there at the time of the Battle I am not qualified to comment on it. My information comes from my division newspaper. The aftermath of WW2 is up to historians. I can only go by what they say.

 

Analysts of coalition warfare and Allied generalship may find much to criticize in the Ardennes-Alsace Campaign. Often commonplace disputes over command and strategy were encouraged and overblown by newspaper coverage, which reflected national biases. Predictably, Montgomery inspired much American ire both in revisiting command and strategy issues, which had been debated since Normandy, and in pursuing methodical defensive-offensive tactics. Devers and de Lattre, too, strained coalition amity during their successful retention of liberated French terrain. But in both cases the Allied command structure weathered the storm, and Eisenhower retained a unified command. Preservation of a united Allied command was perhaps his greatest achievement. In the enemy camp the differences between Hitler and his generals over the objectives of the Ardennes offensive were marked while the uncoordinated efforts of Obstfelder's First Army and Himmler's Army Group Oberrhein for the Alsace offensive were appalling. The Ardennes-Alsace battlefield proved to be no general's playground3 but rather a place where firepower and bravery meant more than plans or brilliant maneuver. Allied and German generals both consistently came up short in bringing their plans to satisfactory fruition. That American soldiers fought and won some of the most critical battles of World War II in the Ardennes and the Alsace is now an indisputable fact.

 

exhausted division was pulled out of the battle. Panzer Lehr had once again been virtually annihilated.

[edit] The Netherlands - Remagen - Ruhr Pocket

After the failure of the Ardennes offensive, Panzer Lehr was refitted once again, though not to anywhere near the lavish standard of its earlier incarnations. Many of the veterans were dead, and the Panzer Lehr of early 1945 bore little resemblance to that of June 1944.
The division was moved north, into the Rhineland, where it was engaged fighting Bernard Montgomery's Anglo-Canadian 21st Army Group during Operation Veritable. Panzer Lehr saw very heavy fighting, and again sustained heavy losses. When the U.S. 9th Armored Division captured the Ludendorff Bridge at Remagen, Panzer Lehr was sent to crush the bridgehead. The attack was unsuccessful, though the division fought well and inflicted many casualties.[citation needed] The Allies' overwhelming numbers and constant air cover had reduced Panzer Lehr to a weak shadow of a division. Engaged in a fighting retreat across northwestern Germany, the division was trapped in the Ruhr Pocket and the remnants of the once powerful division were taken prisoner by the Americans when the pocket surrendered in April.

 

Last Days of the Battle of the Bulge

See page 69

LIFE - Google Books