SS-Panzer-Division Das Reich
Ian Baxter recounts the infamous story of Das Reich, the Waffen-SS Division that sought to counter the invasion of France
Just two days after the Allied invasion of northern France on 8 June 1944, some 15,000 soldiers and 209 panzers and selfpropelled guns began pulling out of the town of Montauban in southern France to begin an arduous northward march across 450 miles of French countryside towards the shores of Normandy. These were not just normal soldiers of Hitler’s Army, these were the troops of the 2.SS-Panzer-Division Das Reich. The men were a group of Waffen-SS soldiers which had earned a reputation on the battlefield for fighting with great courage and military skill. However, they would also share the responsibility of making some units of the Waffen-SS synonymous with Nazi brutality and evil.
The Reich’s march through France was bathed in blood. The elite band of soldiers who had seen some of the heaviest fighting on the Eastern Front were hounded every mile by members of the French resistance movement and agents of the Allied Special Forces. Consequently, what followed was a series of savage reprisals that were some of the most appalling atrocities committed during World War II.
When the Allies finally unleashed Overlord along the shores of Normandy on 6 June 1944, British intelligence assumed that the elite panzer division Das Reich would quickly be sent to the Normandy battle front by at least 10 June. Even the majority of Commanders of Das Reich Division expected to see action within days. In fact, the soldiers had been waiting to entrain for a move 450 miles north to support a counteroffensive that was expected somewhere in Northern France. Yet, when the Allied landings finally did come, no orders were issued from Heeresgruppen. G to Das Reich Division. It was not until late the following day on 7 June that signals were dispatched to all units of
Das Reich, warning them to prepare for the long journey to the Normandy sector. Despite the fact that the Division was not needed urgently at first, all unit Commanders were summoned for a conference at Brigadeführer Heinz Bernard Lammerding’s headquarters on the edge of Montauban. For the Commanders of Das Reich, movement created huge logistical problems. Armour, for instance, had to be moved over long distances either by rail or transporter. What made problems even worse was that requisitioned French vehicles,
sufficient to move entire battalions, had never actually materialised, so the troops had to improvise very quickly. Over the next 24 hours, the planning had become immensely complex, especially moving out some 15,000 soldiers and more than 1,350 vehicles in march order.
Resistance begins
On the day the division left Montauban, it traversed Cahors and then, just outside St Etienne, divided. The main drive continued pushing northward, led by SS-Sturmbannführer Ottom Diekmann the 1.Battalion der Führer. The armour swung east towards Figeac, whilst some elements continued across the country towards Causse de Gramet. During this early period of the march, the Division rolled relatively freely and without incident. Here the countryside was open, and unsuitable for sniping or ambushing. However, their peace would soon be brought to an abrupt end as French resistance groups and various saboteurs and partisans took to the countryside to hinder Das Reich’s drive on Normandy. As with Russia, partisans were referred to as ‘bandits’ and there was no place in the ordered German military mind to deal with civilian irregulars. Every Waffen-SS soldier had been trained to deal with resistance uprising with counter-terror. It was here, in the tiny hamlet of Groslejac, that Das Reich Division began to first spill blood on its journey to Normandy. In the heavy fire fight that ensued, the soldiers killed a number of civilians where they stood. With Groslejac pacified, the Das Reich Division moved on through the hamlet of Carsac. Once again, they were fired at by a small group of resistance fighters, and once more the SS took out severe reprisals by murdering civilians. In the hamlet of Gabaudet, just south of the village of Gramet, the blood lust of the Das Reich continued to intensify. An unidentified unit from the right flank of the SS division murdered 10 boys and men together with one girl, who was shot at point blank range for being suspected resistance members. 80 other civilians were seized and deported to Germany but, fortunately for them, they were later released on the road to Tulle. Despite the fact that the French saboteurs had failed to slow the march of Das Reich, they had nonetheless inflicted hundreds of casualties on the Division between Montauban and Brive/Tulle on 8 and 9 June. The whole region seemed to have ignited into partisan warfare with SS troops fighting for possession in a number of areas.
On 8 June in Tulle, Das Reich units fought in the streets to secure the town as French resistance fighters tried to disrupt the advancing columns.
Slowly and methodically, the SS took full control of the town, leaving only isolated pockets of resistance to fire off the last of their ammunition, before being killed. What followed was a series of savage reprisals against the Tulle community for their resistance. A German announcement was made across the town condemning the ‘Indescribable murder of 40 German soldiers by communist maquisards’. It declared, ‘The German authorities have decided that three Frenchmen will pay for each German killed, as an example to all France’. Within the hour, the proclamation was printed and hastily distributed across the town. As a result of the soldiers being killed, the first group of some 50 victims were herded into a courtyard and hanged from lamp posts as a warning. Within a few hours some 99 men had been hanged.
Massacre at Oradour-sur-Glane
With the area still swarming with partisans, Das Reich Commanders decided it was time to teach the local population of other towns and villages, what it means to collaborate with the resistance. One such village chosen on the road north was Oradour-sur-Glane. It was in this village that Sturmbannführer Ottom Diekmann’s battalion of SS decided to unleash a bloodbath of vengeance. On the afternoon of 10 June, the population of some 650 watched as Diekmann’s armour poured up the main street. With horror, the village folk witnessed camouflage-smocked infantry of the SS fan out through the village firing wildly into the air like wild tribesmen. Shouting and screaming at the civilians they went from door to door dragging families out into the street. Further up the road, SS soldiers burst into a school classroom. One boy who attempted to escape was immediately cut down, riddled with bullets in his back.
By 2.24pm, the entire population of Oradour, except for those still hiding, like the old and sick, were dragged away and assembled in the Championship de Foire, the little central square. Both men and women were separated, men on one side of the square and woman and children on the other. Mothers and their children could be heard crying, but this was quelled as the soldiers herded them into the church. The men were ordered to face the walls of the house flanking the square. An SS soldier then shouted at them in fluent French telling them, “There are concealed weapons and stocks of ammunition in this town that have been hidden by terrorists. A house-tohouse search will be conducted. While we carry out this search you will be assembled in barns and garages.” One by one the men were led away and huddled together. The soldiers then opened fire and shot them in the legs. As they fell they were then doused in fuel and set alight. The building was then burned.
The soldiers ran from house to house, starting others fires. From time to time, they came across the odd fugitive who had escaped the initial round-up. These were either shot at point blank range or pushed into a burning building. At the church, over 400 woman and children had been crammed inside. A group of soldiers who had remained with them then produced a heavy box with a fuse and proceeded to dump the load at the intersection of the nave and chancel.
One SS trooper lit the fuse and the rest of his comrades left.
Outside the church, other soldiers prepared themselves for the massacre. With machine guns and rifles loaded and stick grenades at the ready, the soldiers were given the order to hurl grenades into the church and fire into the great throng of women, children and babies. When the church door suddenly swung open, as mothers tried desperately to
escape the slaughter, the SS men surged forward, firing wildly as they came. Those crouching at the doorway were machine gunned and kicked back into the church. Soldiers continued shooting at random. Prams, chairs and masonry were riddled with bullet holes. The corpses were then covered with straw and the badly injured were finished off. Within minutes the entire church was a raging inferno.
Next morning, Diekmann’s men left Oradour, their armoured vehicles loaded with loot. The very next day, on 12 June, a Wehrmacht convoy drove into Oradour and were appalled by the carnage and death inflicted by their SS counterparts. As a mark of respect, they dug two huge graves and carried some of the charred remained to their resting place. Later that afternoon they left, taking with them some live stock.
Slow progress
By 10 June, the Das Reich Division received urgent movement orders. Among the panzers, more than half were unserviceable including towing vehicles and half-tracks. Only the Division’s wheeled vehicles were able to move to Normandy on schedule. Panzer and towering vehicles required at least four days spare parts, assuming that the parts could reach the division by 11 June. Normally, the panzers would be transported by rail, but the rail system had been crippled by the resistance. A number of areas en route were in the hands of partisans, which resulted in SS units organising several sweeps of the region before it was finally regarded relatively safe to pass through. The task of committing an SS panzer division like the 2.SS.Panzer-Division Das Reich to anti-resistance operations was a major error by the German high command. Even Brigadeführer Lammerding’s himself filed a report condemning the use of a panzer division for partisan sweeps, stating: ‘The panzer division in the fifth year of the war are too good for this. In the Division’s opinion, the local forces are quite capable of maintaining order if they are pulled together sharply, given transport, and led energetically. Their present isolation is a standing invitation to the terrorists.’ Whilst the Division’s armour awaited essential parts to be transported, it continued to organise a series of sweeps north and south of the town of Tulle. SS troopers indiscriminately continued burning farmsteads and executing anyone they deemed were partisans.
Final drive on Normandy
Within a few days, Das Reich was on the move once more, making a determined drive northwards. Resistance against the division ended at Bella, near Poitiers. Partisan warfare had not been effectively extinguished in the area. The Division arrived exhausted in the rear areas of the battlefront between 15 and 30 June, nearly three weeks behind schedule. The units were not inserted into the battle line until 10 July, by which time it had already suffered heavy losses. Despite its severe mauling by Allied bombing, the Division was far from beaten but its reputation would now forever be associated with the atrocities that took place at Tulle and Oradour.