Veterans’ entrance into school made easy
…
WLB provides ‘loophole’ in wage ceiling
Potent argument foundry pay raise
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Crowd runs wild in Detroit store
Ward’s and union blame each other
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Perkins: Lawsuits ask union equality for Negroes
Supreme Court opens way for action
By Fred W. Perkins, Pittsburgh Press staff writer
…
Gracie Allen Reporting
By Gracie Allen
Well, the cutest invaders you ever saw arrived in California this week – the members of the Tennessee football team who are here to play the University of Sothern California at the Pasadena Rose Bowl on New Year’s Day.
I don’t know much about football, but when I saw those tall, handsome fellows with the magnolia blossoms in their voices, I knew football was one of my favorite sports.
I went to a game once, and really, football’s very simple. About forty-four men sit on a bench with blankets over their heads and talk about girls. Then eleven fellows who can’t find seats have to go out on the field to meet eleven other fellows who can’t find seats. One fellow is chosen as “it” and he runs with the ball like everything. Someone trips him; the players jump on one another; someone blows a whistle, and the people in the stands go wild. That’s all.
Oh, yes, the Tennessee football team is called “the Volunteers.” Governor Prentiss Cooper of Tennessee came along with the team and he’s the nicest “volunteer” of all, girls. He happens to be unmarried.
U.S. Navy Department (December 27, 1944)
Press Release
For Immediate Release
December 27, 1944
Data on Japanese losses inflicted by U.S. submarines
Navy Department communiqués and Press Releases to date have reported the following losses inflicted on Japanese shipping by U.S. submarines:
COMBATANT SHIPS
| Sunk | Probably Sunk | Damaged | Totals | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Battleships | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| Aircraft Carriers | 1 | 2 | 2 | 5 |
| Cruisers | 14 | 2 | 6 | 22 |
| Destroyers | 44 | 5 | 6 | 55 |
| Submarines | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Tenders | 3 | 1 | 1 | 5 |
| Others | 37 | 1 | 0 | 38 |
| Totals | 99 | 11 | 16 | 126 |
NON‑COMBATANT SHIPS
| Fleet Tankers | 89 | 1 | 18 | 108 |
| Transports | 133 | 5 | 8 | 146 |
| Cargo & Supply | 575 | 17 | 71 | 663 |
| Miscellaneous | 38 | 3 | 6 | 47 |
| Totals | 835 | 26 | 103 | 964 |
| TOTAL SHIPS OF ALL TYPES | 934 | 37 | 119 | 1,090 |
The above announcements cover the sinking of more than 3,500,000 tons of Japanese shipping by U.S. submarines.
CINCPAC Communiqué No. 215
Surface units of the U.S. Pacific Fleet bombarded Iwo Jima in the Volcanos on December 26 (West Longitude Date).
Targets included coastal defenses and airstrip installations. An enemy landing ship was set afire and an enemy gunboat was blown up by gunfire. Two of our ships suffered slight damage from enemy coastal guns.
The attack was a joint operation with the Strategic Air Force, Pacific Ocean Areas.
STRAIRPOA Liberators bombed Iwo Jima airstrips on December 25. Two enemy fighters were seen in the air. Several of our aircraft suffered minor damage due to anti-aircraft fire but all returned safely.
Neutralization attacks were continued on enemy‑held bases in the Marshalls on December 25 by planes of the 4th Marine Aircraft Wing. Fleet Air Wing Two made similar attacks on December 25 and 26.
Address by Economic Club President Allen B. Crow
December 27-28, 1944
Delivered at Michigan Conference on Higher Education, Ann Arbor, Michigan
I am very grateful for the honor and the privilege of having been asked to participate in this Michigan Conference on Higher Education because of certain guideposts to my thinking and my attitudes toward the future, which have become firmly implanted as a result of having earned my own way, as well as that of my children, through the colleges and the universities, and of more than 35 years’ experience – both personally and in cooperation with others – as an employee and as an employer – in the field of H-I-R-E education.
Also, I am pleased that I am here among friends. Certainly, no other group is so dependent upon and so indebted to the prosperity of American industry as are all of those who are engaged in the pursuit of higher education, whether it be as students, instructors or administrators.
The schools, colleges and universities of the United States, and those who participate in their affairs, are supported from one or more of the following sources: Taxes, gifts and tuition fees. All of this money is derived and can be maintained only to the extent that American industry is profitable to those who own and operate the business.
Further, only prosperous industries can provide jobs in sufficient number, variety and with adequate vocational opportunities to employ the graduates, not only of Michigan’s institutions of higher learning, but also of the much larger number who come from its primary and secondary schools.
If you ask for proof of this, let me refer you to those states and to those communities of the United States and of other nations, which in relation to their population have not become highly industrialized and whose industries are not being conducted upon a profitable basis. There I will show you schools, colleges and universities which are below standard in every particular, because the taxes and the gifts derived directly and indirectly from those industries which have not been sufficiently developed along modern lines and which are not prosperous, are inadequate to provide those educational institutions with the funds necessary for their support and enlargement, for adequate salaries for their instructors, for the maintenance of their buildings and equipment, as well as jobs for the students who graduate from their classes.
Also, wherever industries are not prosperous, gifts and bequests to institutions of higher learning are not numerous nor can they be, since self-preservation is the first law of life and of industry.
Taxes which cannot be paid out of the profitable earnings of industry and of those employed by it, are confiscatory, and under such conditions both the educator and the taxpayer awaken to discover that “the power to tax is the power to destroy.”
Further, the amount and the security of the income to be derived from whatever endowment funds generous alumni and friends have donated in the past to the colleges and universities of Michigan are also entirely dependent upon the prosperity and the profits of the industries, the railroads, the utilities and the real estate into which these funds have been invested.
I am quite aware that there are some among us who are clamoring to have our institutions of higher education more largely subsidized by appropriations from our federal government. I ask you, however, do you want the control of our Michigan educational institutions to pass on to Washington? Where is such great wisdom for training the youth of Michigan to be found, outside the State of Michigan? What money has Washington to give to our colleges and universities, which it has not already taken away more than a hundredfold from the taxpayers of Michigan? How can the schools, colleges and universities of Michigan accept money from Washington in larger and larger amounts and still maintain their “academic freedom”? Rather let us help the industries of Michigan to become prosperous for the years that lie ahead. Then, and then only, will our educational institutions be assured of abundant income from endowment funds, taxes, gifts and tuitions to maintain their operations on higher levels of accomplishment and efficiency, and also to provide worthwhile jobs and advancement for their students upon graduation.
Do you, as the administrators and the faculty members of the institutions of higher learning in Michigan, want your courses, your textbooks and your lectures to be supervised and censored by an omnipotent centralized government, where three percent or less of the population control the life, the liberties and the limits on the pursuit of happiness of every citizen of the state; where those in control determine what is to be printed; what books are to be destroyed; what subjects are to be taught; which schools and libraries are to be closed or torn down and which professors are to be banished or liquidated as political exiles?
Where the people are regimented and rationed by the edicts or the ruler of a highly centralized government, whether he reigns in his own right or as the puppet of a group without regard to constitutional limitations on his authority, of what avail is the study of law? Where the weak and the aged are lulled or allowed to starve, of what avail is the practice of medicine? Where the sciences and the arts of engineering are directed primarily to the instruments and methods of war, of what avail is industry? Where the family and the worship and the laws of God are of no concern to the state, of what avail is education, religion and even life itself?
What shall we say of the future of education if it is to be determined by those who aspire to change our nation from a government of, by and for all our people to a government of, and for only those who work with their hands – regardless of their educational and character qualifications and their willingness or unwillingness to assume responsibility for the consequences of their own acts, upon the welfare of our people as a whole?
You tell me that they are now organizing the office workers, the professional workers and the teachers of our elementary and secondary schools and of our institutions of higher education. May I ask you, is it not about time that we begin to recognize that there is room only for one big union in America – “E Pluribus Unum” – “an indissoluble union” for the common purpose of achieving and maintaining peace, freedom and prosperity for all, and not to permit American men and women to become the pawns of any group, class or business agents who cannot agree among themselves, so that production must be stopped while they engage in wildcat or in jurisdictional strikes?
Also, is it not about time for those who are seeking “security from the cradle to the grave” to be told that we must first lift some of the shackles which have been imposed by both government and by organized labor upon industry in the hope of catching a few rascals, but which have been holding all business down?
How can our industries provide jobs and maintain our American standards of living, in which our “barest necessities” constitute “the luxuries” for almost all the other countries of the world, unless labor and government first unite with industry in taking steps immediately to insure the greatest possible production, prosperity and security for those industries upon which we must all depend, if we are to survive in the fierce post-war competition against lower-cost-production areas in Europe and in the Far East for the trade and commerce of the world?
Back in 1912 and 1913, while a student at Columbia University in the classes of that great philosopher and teacher, John Dewey, I learned, “Nothing is good in itself. To be good, anything and everything must be good for something.”
Now let us examine three specific problems which the colleges and universities of Michigan should recognize in planning their policies and their programs in the fields of higher education during the years that lie immediately ahead.
Following the war, the American people will not be satisfied to drive automobiles of 1942 and prior vintage, very long.
They are awaiting only victory, to begin spending billions now held in cash, bank accounts and war bonds with the producers of new automobiles, houses, furnishings, radios, television, airplanes, travel and whatnot, more than ever before in the history of mankind.
Competition is the life of trade in America. Those industries prosper most which give most to their customer for his dollar. The growth and the profits of every industrial concern in the United States is ultimately the measure and the reward for values which their customers have received for the money which they have paid for what they could buy from those firms rather than from their competitors.
You men award the highest degrees and honors of your colleges and universities to those members of your faculties, your students and to those citizens of the world who have “made a contribution to knowledge,” or who have stood out among their fellows because of distinguished and unselfish service to mankind.
Daily in your classroom and in your laboratories the work of each student is graded “Average,” “Above Average” or “Below Average.”
On athletic fields and in your gymnasiums, your students train for months as individuals and as teams to win in competition. You and those whom you instruct, are not satisfied to be listed as among those who “also ran.” Every one of you on the campus is there to win, and each of you want each and every team of your alma mater to win.
Breathes there even a Professor, with soul so dead,
Who never to himself has said
(As he grades the examination papers
Of the stars on your football and track teams)
That it is far better to pass said stars
Than for said stars
Never to have played at all.Further what does “making the team” and “winning one’s letter” mean, except that you are promoting loyalty to “the old college spirit,” whereby each of your students will highly resolve that he,
In the world’s broad field of battle,
In the bivouac of Life,
Be not like dumb, driven cattle!
Be a hero in the strife!Now suppose we follow one of these young potential industrial heroes, after he has listened to your commencement address, and after you have given him his sheepskin, perhaps inscribed with a summa cum laude, or perhaps after he has come back from World War II with a Congressional Medal and the Purple Heart. We shall watch him as he goes into one of our industrial plants to land a job, and to win new laurels in his chosen life career, as well as the wherewithal to provide a home for himself and his loved ones.
It will not be long, however, until our young hero will find himself confronted with some of those who are working, “tooth and toenail,” to put every employee in every industrial plant in America into a situation of which this is typical:
“Which union do you belong to, Buddy?”
“Well, if you don’t join our union right now, and hurry up and pay your initiation fees and dues, it’s just going to be too bad, for you ain’t going to get and keep any job around here.”
“Anyhow there’s too many ahead of you now what’s got seniority.”
“Why work so hard and show up the rest of us?”
“Just take it easy now, young man. Make your job last longer, so that all of us will get more overtime pay.”
“Also don’t you dare ask anybody what we are going to do with your money, either.”
“Don’t you know that the only way to get what we want, around here, is to have the shop steward call a strike?”
Presidents, deans and faculty members of the colleges and universities of Michigan, what I have just recited to you is not imagination, nor is it fiction. To make it very concrete, you, yourselves, realize what it means when the students of your schools of music are not permitted to play in hotels or over the radio, or when those who have to earn their way through college cannot work in a restaurant as a waiter to secure their own food without a union card.
Instances like the above are occurring day after day in industrial plants all over the United States.
While we have laws to punish any industrial concern which operates under “cartels” in international commerce, and laws to abolish “monopolies” and “combinations in restraint of trade” upon the part of any corporations or individuals doing business and providing employment here in America, such monopolies and restraints on trade practiced by the representatives of organized labor are apparently still “above the law,” or as in the case of Mr. Petrillo, they have not yet been made to “come under the law.”
Consequently, freedom in competition, especially to secure employment and to advance one’s self on the job, constitutes one of the major “new problems which colleges should recognize in planning for the years that lie ahead.”
So, I ask you – what do you think should be done about it?
It is the squeaking axle that gets the greaseThe above is the very practical slogan of certain pressure groups which crowd the Halls of Congress, of our State Legislatures and of our City Halls.
Although this slogan is quite prevalent in the ranks of organized labor, it is by no means confined there. Trade associations, business and industrial organizations as well as the representatives of the farmers, the professions, of various racial and other minority and class-conscious groups have become equally proficient in maintaining large and aggressive lobbies to “get what they want, when they want it.” Accordingly, never has it been more true than in this year of our Lord, that “eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.”
Also, in too many instances it has become a case of–
If you will scratch my back, I will scratch yours–
and this has been further supplemented with–
It is not so important what you know
As who you know.Because of the above, your students must learn a lot more than they can ever discover in books or on the University Campus. In fact, the world is moving so fast, that most of our books are out of date even before their authors can get them printed. Life has become so complex, and so technical that it may well be said of almost any of our leaders of industry,
…still the wonder grew,
That one small head could carry all he knew.Indeed, is not the genius of America’s top industrial executives, and of those who assist them in directing their affairs, to be found in their ability to make progress by cooperating with others who know more about a given subject than they do themselves?
If you can ever get an industrialist to admit that he knows a subject, you will find that he means that he has, after long and laborious research and experiment, been able to invent or create something. He has been able to put it together and to make it work so that his fellow men want to use it and will buy it. Thus, it has come to make him, as its producer, enough profit whereby he can remain in business as long as he keeps at least a jump ahead of his competitors, who are constantly galloping close at his heels with improvements.
Now the main difficulty with many of our institutions of higher learning, is that their students too frequently have gained the impression that if they can tear something to pieces, which God or man has originally put together, and then give names to its various component parts that they know a subject. Also, such students somehow have gained the impression after they have crammed enough courses with sufficient points to graduate that they have been fully educated, “once and for all time.”
To correct this, a few colleges and universities have been selecting their instructors from among those who have had some actual experience in business or in industry in addition to their academic or technical training. Further, the subject matter of the courses in these college and university classrooms and laboratories is geared in directly, but not so as to overlap, with the responsibilities which their students later will be called upon to assume following graduation.
Finally, as the third and most important step, the students themselves alternate their time between their studies in their classrooms and laboratories and their work in actual production in the shops or offices of the industrial plants, commercial establishments or financial institutions.
Consequently, upon graduation they will be able to continue their work-study program, so as to learn while they earn. Such graduates are respected by their fellow workmen for what they know how to use in production, as well as for what they have studied. More important, such graduates have acquired sense enough to ask intelligent questions. They are able to find out what they do not know, from those who do know. They do not claim themselves to “know it all,” and false pride will not make them afraid to reveal what they do not know because of the questions that they ask.
Rather than being defeated at the outset, by “an inferiority complex” which arises from having to work alongside of men and women who unblushingly declare that they themselves “know a damn sight more about the job, because they have not been educated,” the graduates from such courses of industry-education cooperation, at the beginning of their permanent jobs are ready, and unafraid, to make progress through gaining the cooperation of those with whom they are working. Certainly, in an industrial plant in particular… It is always better not to know so much than to know so much that ain’t so.
During a recent conference which I was privileged to have with an instructor who had the responsibility for arranging a schedule of courses for one of our Engineering Schools, I gained the impression that educators frequently find it necessary to proceed like the dermatologist who shoots 100 irritants into our body in the hope that he will discover at least one to which the student is allergic, or will “get excited about” – knowing full well that most students so injected will not produce any distinctive reaction whatever – and that the percentage of negative reactions will greatly increase with the number of injections inserted into either the curriculum or the cranium. Or to phrase it differently, if our children are to be expected to learn to swim to save their lives and those of others, perhaps the sooner and the more frequently both they and their instructors wet at least their feet, in the world of actual experience in the production of goods and services, the better, regardless of whether the water in which they are learning to swim has 98 degrees or not.
Hence progress through cooperation between industry and education presents not only one of the newest problems, but also one of the most potentially fruitful opportunities which “colleges should recognize in planning for the years that lie ahead.”
In far too many instances, have we not been content to let our educational processes atrophy at the childhood, “Gimme,” or “Letter to Santa Claus” stage? Are we not inclined to refer to ourselves, as being educated, because of the “breadth of our culture,” and the “heights and depths of our appreciation.”
Accordingly, another problem which our colleges and universities must not only recognize, but also one with which they must wrestle and finally solve in the years that lie ahead, is how to make education function more largely in providing all the people of America, with both the “knowhow,” and the means by the time they have reached voting age or before, to discover that “There is no Santa Claus.” Hence, higher education, if it has not been learned before, must include among its primary functions, the instruction of folks in how to acquire what they need and what they want, by taking care of themselves.
In international affairs, we roughly divide the world into “The Have” and “The Have Not” nations.
International security may mean, therefore, any one of three things:
A. Shall we attempt to set up a permanent arrangement in the hope of maintaining the “status quo”? Call it by whatever name you please – this will not work in the future, as it has not worked in the past, since the nations which are now big and strong, will want to stay big and strong. Also, one or more of the nations which are now small and weak, will want to become big and strong, so that shortly "power politics” will begin its devilish work of destruction. Shall we attempt to take away from the nations which are big and strong, and distribute what they have acquired, by means which have been both fair and foul, among the nations which are now small and weak? This is the process of war, from which the pages of history are still dripping, red with human blood.
B. Shall we educate those nations which are big and strong, to the point where they will finally discover that they may enjoy their greatest prosperity for themselves, not by exploiting but rather by industrializing and trading with those which are small and weak. This is our hope for achieving freedom, peace and higher standards of living for all the nations after victory in World War II, not by America providing a bottle of milk for every Hottentot, but by our helping every Hottentot to become a capitalist, an industrialist and a businessman.
Regarding the desirability of our attaining the above very worthy objective, there can be no question. As to the possibility and probability of America soon participating in such a program of world development, prosperity and peace, however, there is now arising in the minds of some of us a very serious question. That question in substance is this:
How can American industry pay its labor increasingly higher wages for less and less work and continue to sell its products in the markets of the world, particularly during the postwar period? We are advised by those who have recently returned from abroad that England’s labor cost in production, is about one-half that now prevailing in the United States; that Russia’s is also considerably less than England’s because of Russia’s lower basic wage rates, their wide adoption of various types of incentive payments, longer hours of employment and centralized control and regimentation, not only of production and of the living conditions of their people but of their markets as well?
Then add to this, that Germany’s and Japan’s costs of production on manufactured items are about one-third to one-sixth of our own, and that unless we destroy both Germany and Japan they will destroy us, industrially and commercially, as well as by force of arms.
Further, let us consider the competition which we must face through industrialization of India, China and of Latin America to whom we are now making available our products, our machines and our equipment, together with our engineering genius, our manpower and our capital funds.
How are we to engage in international trade and raise the standards of living of the people of the backward nations, while we at the same time are promoting their further industrialization by teaching and equipping them to manufacture products which will compete with our own, not only here in America but also in our other markets around the world? As things are now tending, will it not shortly be labor, rather than industry, which will be asking for higher and higher tariffs to maintain present and prospective wage levels here in America, and thereby promote general nationalistic isolation and restrictions on world trade? May not this unbalanced international situation provide American capital with strong inducements to leave high-cost production areas, such as Michigan, and to decentralize its operations through the establishment of new plants in the south, and in the west of the United States, where labor and living costs are lower, if not indeed to invest its money beyond the boundaries of the United States, as England and other colonizing countries have done for years? By doing this they will be able to compete in larger measure in raising the standards of living of the backward nations and to develop their own trade, employment and prosperity, because of the lower unit-costs of production which such foreign investments may make possible for them? In other words, how shall we be able to provide increased postwar employment in the United States by raising the standards of living from improved methods of production by the backward peoples of the earth, without incurring the risk of lowering the levels of our own “American way of life” to theirs, through the channels of free competition in international trade, because of the higher and higher costs for labor, and for taxes which the industries of the United States are being called upon to assume?
Likewise in our efforts to provide security for our individual citizens and in our national affairs, are we not brought back to the same alternatives which we face if we are to obtain peace, prosperity and security in international affairs?
A. Shall we attempt to maintain the “status quo,” whereby those industries and those individuals which are today big and strong, and those industries and individuals that are small and weak, shall continue as such? Human nature and progress being what they are, this is both inadvisable and impossible.
B. Shall we follow the injunction of the Apostle Paul, that those who are strong among our industries and our individual citizens “should bear the infirmities of the weak”? If this is to be our answer, shall the many be taxed for the benefits of the few, or shall the few be taxed to provide benefits for the many? Assuming that we enforce by taxation or otherwise such a distribution of this world’s goods, rather than to depend upon the voluntary basis recommended by St. Paul, upon what theory of law and equity shall we proceed, and be justified, and how long will such equal benefits be held or enjoyed by those to whom they are so distributed?
C. Our only remaining alternative then, if America is to attain security for all, in its relation with its corporations and its individual citizens, appears to be to proceed as in the case of its international affairs referred to above, viz: with incentives for performance and penalties for failure, to educate those corporations and those individuals which are big, strong and efficient, as well as those corporations and those individuals which are small, weak and inefficient, until they can be made to understand, that their highest obligation and their greatest opportunity for prosperity for themselves, and for all our peoples, is to dedicate and to employ themselves, and all that they have, so as to produce in fair competition in the markets of America and of the world, the highest possible volume of goods and services which their customers want, and at prices which their customers are willing to pay.
Here is an uncharted sea for adult education, as the colleges and universities of Michigan look to the future. Universal education therefore remains as the only lasting hope for security in our democracy and in a war-torn world. It must be the kind of education, however, which promotes freedom in competition, progress through cooperation, and security for all peoples around the world. Further, unlike the education of ancient China, it must provide instruction which deals directly with the world in which we are living and as we find that world today.
When a great man dies, we are accustomed to ask “What did he leave?” and the answer always comes back, “He left all that he had.” You, as educators, however, are the trustees of the ageless past for the eternal future.
To you educators, we look for “survival of the fittest.” To you is given the challenge of leading us on to new and better days. You carry the torch to guide us, for “without a vision, the people perish.”
The problems I have enumerated above have been set forth only because you have asked for them. I also have kept constantly in mind that you are in the business of making men and that when strong men appear, big problems disappear.
To each of you in attendance at this conference I am, therefore, making available a copy of Victory for Freedom.
Also, in the event that anything which I have said may prove worthy of further consideration by any of you, I have in this loose-leaf binder which I hold before you, letters which I shall be pleased to make available to a committee which Superintendent Eugene B. Elliott may care to appoint, bearing upon the subject that I have attempted to discuss today, and which I have received in answer to my requests during the past ten days, from leaders in every phase of the industrial life of the State of Michigan and beyond. The observations and recommendations of these men are given in a way which I am confident will stimulate not only your interest but also your constructive and vigorous further investigation and cooperation, in working out a program, particularly among the colleges and universities of Michigan, which will enable us all to measure up increasingly to the responsibilities which business, labor, education and government will be called upon to face during the months and years immediately ahead.
Because of the outstanding contribution which the colleges and universities of Michigan, and you men in particular who are responsible for conducting their affairs, have made in the past in training and equipping the men and women of Michigan for leadership in every field of endeavor, in the arts and in the sciences, I am sure that insofar as you, your students and all of the people of America have the zeal to discover the facts, and the courage to deal with them, that we shall be able to work out together the answers to these problems and that again out of the agony of war, “this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people and for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”
If we are to avail ourselves fully of the benefits of civil aviation, and if we are to use the automobiles we can produce, it will be necessary to construct thousands of airports and to overhaul our entire national highway system.
The provision of a decent home for every family is a national necessity, if this country is to be worthy of its greatness – and that task will itself create great employment opportunities. Most of our cities need extensive rebuilding. Much of our farm plant is in a state of disrepair. To make a frontal attack on the problems of housing and urban reconstruction will require thoroughgoing cooperation between industry and labor, and the federal, state and local governments.
An expanded social security program and adequate health and education programs must play essential roles in a program designed to support individual productivity and mass purchasing power. I shall communicate further with the Congress on these subjects at a later date.
Völkischer Beobachter (December 28, 1944)
Falsche Propheten, Lügner, Betrüger –
Das Kartenhaus der US-Illusionen
Von unserem Berichterstatter in Portugal
…
Luftangriff auf Wien
In den gestrigen Vormittagsstunden führten viermotorige amerikanische Bombenflugzeuge bei unsichtigem Wetter einen Angriff auf das Gebiet des Reichsgaues Wien durch. Durch Bombenabwürfe, größtenteils am äußersten Stadtrand, wurden Wohn- und Siedlungshäuser zerstört beziehungsweise beschädigt. Durch wirksames Flakfeuer wurden die feindlichen Flugzeuge abgedrängt, so dass weitere Bombenabwürfe größtenteils in unverbautes Gelände oder freie Felder erfolgten, wo nennenswerte Schäden nicht entstanden. Einige feindliche Flugzeuge wurden abgeschossen.
Führer HQ (December 28, 1944)
Kommuniqué des Oberkommandos der Wehrmacht
Der tiefe Einbruch unserer Angriffsverbände in den belgisch-luxemburgischen Raum hat neben der Entlastung der gesamten übrigen Westfront zu einer Begegnungsschlacht größten Ausmaßes mit den inzwischen von anderen Abschnitten abgezogenen feindlichen Divisionen geführt. An der Nordwestfront des Kampfraumes schreitet unser Angriff gegen zähen feindlichen Widerstand langsam vorwärts. An der gesamten Südfront hält der Gegner seinen starken Druck aufrecht. Gestern wurden erneut 21 feindliche Panzer abgeschossen. Die Beute an Geschützen und Panzerabwehrkanonen seit dem 16. Dezember ist nach bisherigen Feststellungen auf über 300 gestiegen.
Längs der lothringisch-elsässischen Front setzen unsere Truppen die Säuberung des Vorfeldes der Westbefestigungen fort. Aus dem Oberelsass werden lebhafte Stellungskämpfe beiderseits Kaysersberg gemeldet.
In heftigen Luftkämpfen über der Westfront vernichteten deutsche Jäger gestern 23 feindliche Jagdflugzeuge.
Lüttich und Antwerpen lagen auch am vergangenen Tag unter stärkerem Beschuss.
In Mittelitalien festigten die deutschen und italienischen Truppen im Angriffsraum von Gallicano ihre neu gewonnenen Stellungen und hielten sie gegenüber feindlichen Gegenangriffen. Im Kampfraum von Faenza und in der Romagna unternahmen die Briten nur vereinzelte erfolglose Vorstöße.
In Nordostkroatien kam es in den letzten Tagen zu heftigen Kämpfen mit den zwischen Donau und Save angreifenden Banden und Bulgaren. Der in den Raum der Stadt Otok vorgedrungene Feind wurde im Gegenangriff geworfen und erlitt dabei schwere Verluste.
In Ungarn nahm die Schlacht zwischen Plattensee und der Südgrenze der Slowakei an Umfang und Härte noch zu. Der Feind drehte aus dem Raum Stuhlweißenburg–Felsögalla und nördlich mit verstärkten Kräften nach Westen ein und griff außerdem Budapest heftig von Westen, Südosten und Nordosten an. Die deutsch-ungarische Besatzung gleistet den anstürmenden Bolschewisten am inneren Verteidigungsring erbittertsten Widerstand. Nördlich der Donau kämpfen sich unsere Truppen, starke feindliche Angriffe abwehrend, auf das Westufer des Gran zurück. Zwischen der Eipel und dem Quellgebiet des Sajó wurden zahlreiche Angriffe der Bolschewisten zurückgeschlagen, einige Einbrüche abgeriegelt.
In Kurland setzten die Sowjets ihre Angriffe nach Zuführung von Verstärkungen in den bisherigen Schwerpunkten fort. Abgesehen von geringen Geländeverlusten nördlich Doblen blieb die Hauptkampflinie auch gestern fest in unserer Hand. In den schweren Abwehrkämpfen des 26. und 27. Dezember wurden 210 feindliche Panzer abgeschlossen.
Der Schwerpunkt der anglo-amerikanischen Luftangriffe lag am gestrigen Tage auf dem Gebiet westlich des Rheins. Außerdem war Fulda das Ziel eines Terrorangriffes. Nordamerikanische Verbände warfen Bomben auf Orte in Südostdeutschland. Nach vereinzelten nächtlichen Störflügen über dem nordwestdeutschen Raum griffen die Briten in den frühen Morgenstunden westdeutsches Gebiet an.
Durch den Verrat der finnischen Regierung war es im September notwendig geworden, die in Mittel- und Nordfinnland stehenden deutschen Divisionen auf norwegisches Gebiet zurückzuführen. Diese Absetzbewegung über viele Hunderte von Kilometern auf wenigen Straßen versuchte die sowjetische Führung, unterstützt von den verratenen finnischen Truppen, zu verhindern. Alle diese Versuche sind an der Tapferkeit unserer Truppen und der vorzüglichen deutschen Führung unter Generaloberst Rendulic zunichte geworden. Die feindliche Absicht, sich dem Rückmarsch der kampfgewohnten und durch die Natur gehärteten deutschen Wald- und Tundrakämpfer vorzulegen, scheiterte unter schwersten Verlusten der sowjetischen und finnischen Truppen. Die aus Finnland zurückgekehrte deutsche Armee steht heute in voller Kampfkraft im nordnorwegischen Raum, bereit für jede Aufgabe, die Ihr gestellt wird.
In den harten Kämpfen der dritten Kurlandschlacht haben sich die norddeutsche 225. Infanteriedivision unter Führung von Generalleutnant Risse und die pommersche 12. Panzerdivision unter Führung von Generalleutnant Freiherrn von Bodenhausen durch hervorragende Standhaftigkeit ausgezeichnet.
Supreme HQ Allied Expeditionary Force (December 28, 1944)
FROM
(A) SHAEF MAIN
ORIGINATOR
PRD, Communique Section
DATE-TIME OF ORIGIN
281100A December
TO FOR ACTION
(1) AGWAR
(2) NAVY DEPARTMENT
TO (W) FOR INFORMATION (INFO)
(3) TAC HQ 12 ARMY GP
(4) MAIN 12 ARMY GP
(5) SHAEF AIR STAFF
(6) ANCXF
(7) EXFOR MAIN
(8) EXFOR REAR
(9) DEFENSOR, OTTAWA
(10) CANADIAN C/S, OTTAWA
(11) WAR OFFICE
(12) ADMIRALTY
(13) AIR MINISTRY
(14) UNITED KINGDOM BASE
(15) SACSEA
(16) CMHQ (Pass to RCAF & RCN)
(17) COM ZONE
(18) SHAEF REAR
(19) NEWS DIV. MINIFORM, LONDON
(REF NO.)
NONE
(CLASSIFICATION)
IN THE CLEAR
Communiqué No. 264
Allied forces in Holland continued to encounter active patrolling by the enemy along the Maas River north of Tilburg and north of Venlo.
The enemy made a small local attack at Gebroek, three miles southeast of Maaseik. Our troops after a slight withdrawal counterattacked and regained their original positions.
The Monschau–Malmedy sector remains quiet, with both sides carrying out active patrolling.
The enemy attacked at a number of places on the northern flank of his salient. Heavy fighting continues at Grandmenil and Manhay, and we repulsed strong German attacks two miles northwest of Lierneux and near Humain and Havrenne.
Small groups of enemy tanks have been observed in the triangle Rochefort–Beauraing–Saint-Hubert, but enemy armored patrols pushing from Rochefort towards Celles have been less active. Those that have been encountered have been severely dealt with. In the area of Saint-Hubert which is in enemy hands, we encountered mines, road blocks and blown bridges.
Allied forces advancing from the south have made contact with units holding Bastogne, at a point about three miles south of the town. During the period of encirclement, the units in Bastogne inflicted severe damage on the enemy, and on the day before their relief, they repulsed two German attacks. In the first attack, made by an estimated two regiments of infantry and a large number of tanks, an estimated 27 enemy tanks were destroyed and 250 prisoners taken. A similar attack contained later, and in a third attack the enemy lost four out of five tanks taking part.
In the area southeast of Bastogne, we have cleared the enemy from Bonnal and Insenborn and have crossed the Sure River in three places near Bonnal. Eschdorf was cleared of the enemy after heavy fighting, and a strong enemy counterattack with infantry was repulsed in the vicinity of Ringel. Northwest of Echternach, we have encircled Beaufort and are mopping up in Berdorf.
Strong formations of fighters and fighter-bombers operated in close support of our ground forces and attacked German armor, troops, gun positions and road and rail transport.
Medium bombers attacked a railhead at Kall and railway bridges at Ahrweiler, and at Nonnweiler southeast of Trier. Light bombers went for objectives at La Roche and Houffalize.
More than 600 heavy bombers with an escort of over 400 fighters attacked railway communications in western Germany. The targets included a railway junction at Gerolstein, 40 miles west of Koblenz and marshalling yards at Euskirchen, Andernach, Kaiserslautern, Homburg and at Fulda, 60 miles south of Kassel. Some of the escorting fighters also strafed railway transport near Trier and east of Bonn.
Fighter-bombers attacked railway transport and communications over the area from Sankt Wendel southeast to Stuttgart and struck at road bridges at Colmar and Endingen and an ammunition dump at Freiburg.
Road and rail transport in the Rheine area were targets for fighter bombers and rocket-firing fighters. Yesterday afternoon, escorted heavy bombers made a concentrated attack on the railway center at Rheydt.
During the night, our intruder aircraft were over the battlefront attacking railway and road transport.
In day and night operations, according to preliminary reports, 90 enemy aircraft were destroyed in the air. Five heavy bombers and 23 fighters are missing.
Ground action in the Wissembourg area near the Rhine River was limited to patrol clashes and artillery exchanges.
North of Colmar, we made local gains.
COORDINATED WITH: G-2, G-3 to C/S
THIS MESSAGE MAY BE SENT IN CLEAR BY ANY MEANS
/s/
Precedence
“OP” - AGWAR
“P” - Others
ORIGINATING DIVISION
PRD, Communique Section
NAME AND RANK TYPED. TEL. NO.
D. R. JORDAN, Lt Col FA2409
AUTHENTICATING SIGNATURE
/s/U.S. Navy Department (December 28, 1944)
Communiqué No. 564
The submarine USS SEAWOLF (SS-197) is overdue from patrol and presumed lost.
Next of kin of casualties have been informed.
CINCPAC Communiqué No. 216
Enemy aircraft attacked U.S. air installations on Saipan and Tinian in the Marianas on December 26 (West Longitude Date) in two separate raids of five and two planes respectively and inflicted minor damage. Our fighters shot down two enemy aircraft.
Liberators and Lightning fighters of the Strategic Air Force made bombing and strafing attacks on air installations on Iwo Jima in the Volcanos on December 26. An enemy fighter was destroyed in the air. Two other enemy aircraft were destroyed and two were damaged on the ground. Moderate anti-aircraft fire was encountered.
A Navy search plane shot down an enemy bomber near the Bonins on the same date.
STRAIRPOA Liberators bombed air installations and shipping on and around Chichijima in the Bonins on December 26. A direct hit was scored on a coastal cargo ship.
Fighters of the 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing bombed enemy installations on Babelthuap in the Palaus on December 26.
Fourth MARAIRWING fighters continued neutralizing attacks on enemy-held bases in the Marshalls on December 27.
G-2 Periodic Report (December 28, 1944)
Incl 2 to VII Corps
December 28, 1944
The following information was obtained on Dec 25, 1944, as a result of personal observation and interrogation by 1/Lt Frank B. Craig, IPW Team #93, attached to the 30th Infantry Division.
Ten or twelve completely burned bodies which were charred black were seen at RENARDMONT (K-70250090) where a small shed had once stood. This shed has been completely destroyed by fire. The burned bodies of the civilians were piled up on one another. It was impossible to determine their age or sex. In the adjacent house, there was a middle-aged woman who had been stabbed with a knife and then shot. Two boys between age of 6 and 10 were seen with bullet holes in their foreheads. Outside this house, and within a radius of 30 yards, there were several other dead civilians. One old woman had been killed by a smash over the head, probably with a rifle butt. There was a body of a young man with his boots taken off who had been killed by being shot through the back of the head. Another young man whose wrists looked as though they had been tied, had been similarly killed. A married couple had been shot in a house little farther to the north, at K-70350192. Near a foxhole were the bodies of a 13-year-old boy and a 15-year-old girl who had been shot, apparently as they tried to escape.
Two Belgian civilians who live in the vicinity gave the following information. Mme. L.F. states that some SS men came to the house where she was staying, and asked for American soldiers. After being told that there were no Americans nearby, the SS men left. Two SS men came to the house a little later and searched it. When this had been completed, they asked one of the officers whether the people should be shot. The officer left it up to the men. The SS men took one man from the house with them. Mme. L.F. states she saw other SS men bringing men, women and children from their houses and shooting them in the street. Mrs. M.P. states that the SS men killed her husband, together with her sister and brother-in-law. One man came into her room, searched it thoroughly and left. Mrs. M.P. then went to the window where she saw the soldiers herding the people together. Some people were shot as they tried to escape. One was knocked down with rifle butts and shot. After the people had been put into the shed in RENARDMONT (K-7025009), she heard shots coming from there shed, and saw the shed go up in flames. Mrs. M.P. believes that about 25 to 30 civilians were killed in the vicinity. (30th Infantry Division)
STORY AS TOLD BY GERMAN PRISONERS
On December 18, the Engineer Platoon of HQ Company, 1.SS-Panzer-Recon-Battalion (Pionierzug, Stabskompanie, Aufklärungs-Abteilung LSSAH), while on reconnaissance in the STAVELOT area prior to attack, were ordered by their platoon leader, SS-Untersturmführer Heinrich Dröge, to do away with all civilians who came in sight. Dröge is in our hands, either seriously wounded or dead. An identical order was given by the platoon leader of the bicycle platoon, SS-Untersturmführer Erich Kollaschny. Further, one Prisoner of War heard a company commander SS-Obersturmführer Heinrich Goltz, deliver the same instructions from a vehicle. The men carried their orders well, even exceeding them in their zeal to do their German duty. In the village of PARFONDRUY (K-705005), twenty civilians of all ages and sexes were slaughtered. Some were shot on the street. Others were assembled in a barn and butchered there. After the blood bath, a match was put to the barn and the contents consumed. It is believed that the Prisoners of War hoped in this way to hide what they had done.
SAMPLES OF CONFESSIONS OBTAINED
The civilians were picked up on the streets and brought into a barn, then they were shot.
I myself, SS-Unterscharführer Richard Rosenke (Annex I), shot two civilians. They were a man and a woman, about 45 years old.
These civilians were then shot and the barn was set afire. All members of the platoon participated in the action.
When both Belgians noticed that they were to be shot, they tried to escape. Therefore I, and several of my friends, shot and killed the fleeing Belgians.
We had the mission to reconnoiter Stavelot. Before we could march into the village, we had to advance to the left of it to find out how strong and where the American artillery was. We had to pass through a village. Before we got into it, SS-Untersturmführer Heinrich Dröge gave the order to shoot everybody there. I was at the end of the platoon. I know that many civilians were herded into the barn and then shot. As I followed the platoon to the scene of the incident, I received the order from the Untersturmführer to burn the barn down with the help of another soldier, a Fallschirmjaeger. (1st Canadian Army)
FIRST ARMY IPW REPORT
Consolidated Report on 13 Prisoner of War
Unit: 25.SS-Panzergrenadier-Regiment, 12.SS-Panzer-Division
Captured: SADZOT (P-4787) (Sheet 13 1:100,000), Dec 28, 1944
Preamble: It seems to have trickled through that the SS does not enjoy a great deal of popularity outside Germany. All the Prisoners constantly apologize about their membership of this hated organization. In general, losses seem to be about 50% and more.
Strength:
1.Co: Before Combat, 65 men; Today, 25 men
2.Co: Before Combat, 105 men; Today, 50 men
3.Co: Before Combat, 80 men; Today, 40 men
4.Co: No figures available.
5.Co: Before Combat, 120 men; Today, 50-60 men
6.Co: Before Combat, 120 men; Today, 55 men
7.Co: Before Combat, 120 men; Today, 30 men
8.Co: Before Combat, 120 men; Today, 100 men
10.Co: Before Combat, 100 men; Today, 15 men
PW states this to be a very conservative estimate.
Additional Order of Battle: 8.Heavy-Mortar-Company. The composition of the Heavy Mortar Companies is reported as follows, 1 Medium Mortar Platoon with 6 Medium Mortars (81-MM), 1 Heavy Mortar Platoon with 6 Heavy Mortars (120-MM), 1 AT Platoon with 3 Panzeschrecks AT-gun. (8.Co in its last engagement is reported to have lost 3 medium 81-MM mortars and 2 of the 120-MM heavy mortars.
Personalities:
CO 2.Bn, SS-Osbf (Lt Col) Shulze
CO 1.Co, SS-Usf (2/Lt) Schulz
CO 6.Co, SS-Usf (2/Lt) Pohle
CO 7.Co, (Acting), SS-OSF (T/Sgt) Doernhamke
(CO of the 7.Co wounded is evacuated)
CO 8.Co, SS-Usf (2/Lt) Fritsch
CO 10.Co, Lt (Wehrmacht) Huebner
Mission: To take SADZOT in order to create an advanced HQ
Retreat-Tactics: The Regiment used the following methods in order to safe guard itself in the event of a necessity for an Absetzmanoeuver (disengagement). Each Company sent only 2 platoons into lines, the 4.Heavy-Mortars Platoon remained in reserve and the 3.Platoon was employed to prepare a secondary line of defense.
Signal Equipment: The Prisoner from the Battalion’s Signal Platoon reports the employment of a radio-set called DORA-2. It differs, according to the Prisoner, from the old DORA-set in that it can operate with ultra-shortwaves, which is supposed to interfere with enemy sound location.
Morale: A marked drop in the last 4 days.
HUMAIN (P-2381) – FIVE DAYS GERMAN OCCUPATION
(Report from a reliable civilian source)
December 23, 1944: First German spearhead composed of 15 camouflaged Mark VI-2 Tiger tanks, 30 reconnaissance cars, about 100 half-tracks, trucks and jeeps, passed through the town from 0900 to 1100, going in the direction of HAVRENNE (P-2181). Many of the men were dressed in American uniforms with armored combat hats. About 1/3 of the spearhead consisted of American vehicles.
December 24, 1944: Convoy consisting of trucks loaded with Wehrmacht infantry, and about 25 105-MM Guns on wooden wheels pass through the town going West. Troops were Alsatian, Polish, and Czech origin. None of the vehicles were American. The Germans on the other hand had plenty of captured American rations. 3 tanks stopped in the town for repairs.
December 25, 1944: Very little enemy activity in the town.
December 26, 1944: 8 Tiger tanks, several trucks, and small groups of soldiers on foot retreat through HUMAIN towards HARGIMONT (P-2679). The 8 Tiger tanks remain in the town, where they are attacked by our Army Air Force. 1 Tiger exploded. At 1630, informant overhears following message being sent over wireless by the Officer in charge ‘Only 300 men left, send help.’ In the afternoon of Dec 26, Germans ran out of supplies, and as usual, decide to loot the town.
December 26, 1944: Early in the morning, informant overhears another message being sent over wireless: ‘Enough ammunition left to cover retreat only’. In reply, the Officer in charge was ordered to fight to the last man. Soldiers, disgusted, throw arms away, and hide in basements. Officers, armed with machine-pistols, chase soldiers out of basements, and force them to fight the arriving Americans. Germans depart. (First United States Army)
OTHER INTELLIGENCE NOTES
(1) Draft Order
This document was found on a German soldier belonging to the 1.Co Panzer-Regiment Der Führer. The original was written in German and Slovenian.
It is hereupon stated that the service to which you are called is not voluntary, but based on the interstate conventions of June 7, 1944. Based on these Conventions, people of German nationality are called upon to serve in the Wehrmacht or in the Waffen-SS. Any disobedience to the call to arms will be punished by law. Application at deferment from serving in the German Army will be directly dealt with by the draft board, and only exceptional and critical cases: students, supporters of families, and essential war workers; documents to prove such are to be brought along. Examples: Report cards or statements showing continuation in the next higher class, family statements, and tax reports. Should an applicant claim a change of nationality other than German, a statement to corroborate such must be obtained from the Statistical Bureau based on the census of 1940, and presented to the present Officer of the Slovakian Army. If you are so sick that you are unable to be transported, a statement from a city doctor or hospital is to be presented, proving such claim.
(2) Use of Towns
Cases have been reported where Germans permitted unopposed the occupation of a town by our troops in order to cause casualties by artillery fire when mass lines were formed or reliefs were in progress. Observation posts on nearby heights eliminated any guesswork in the timing. (Operation Notes XII Corps)
(3) Security
Don’t learn security the hard way. During a conference, three of our experienced company commanders and one artillery observer were surrounded and captured because they failed to provide a security guard. (CO, 414th Infantry Regiment, 104th Infantry Division)
(4) Training Foils German Trick
We have trained our men to know that the Germans put mortar fire just behind our artillery fire to make us think our own artillery is falling short. This instruction has increased our troops’ confidence in their own artillery so that they keep going close with the enemy before he recovers from the effects of our artillery fire. (S-3, 60th Infantry Regiment, 9th Infantry Division)
(5) Atrocities against U.S. Prisoners of War
It has been determined that the mass murder of American PWs on December 17, 1944, southwest of MALMEDY, was committed by the spearhead of the Combat Team Peiper. PW states that the man responsible for the murders is SS-Unterscharführer Persin of the Penal Platoon of the 9 (Engr) Co, 1.SS-Pz-Regt. Persin and 18 men under his command were the one who actually carried out these killings. This was told to IPW by SS-Sturmman Berger and another comrade, both of his Company.
Description of Persin: He is an uncontrollable rowdy whose bad reputation won him considerable notoriety. His age is 25-26; eyes, brown; height, 6 feet; hair, brown; weight, 180 lbs; smooth-shaven, slim, wiry build. (FUSA IPW Reports)
(6) Wanted for Further Interrogation
1/Lt Stach, formerly CO of I/149.VGR, has now been identified as CO of I/689.VGR (246.VGD). This character, whom our forces captured in the vicinity of Würselen on October 24, escaped from one of our Prisoners enclosures and several days later, made a stinging denunciation over the air of the treatment afforded him as a captive by US guards and interrogators. Bring him back alive. (FUSA)
(7) Order of Hitler On the morning of December 16, 1944, a Fuehrerbefehl (Order of the Leader) was read to the 14.Company, 915.Regiment. It said among other things This is the decisive battle, all newly formed divisions are taking part. You will have the support of the new Luftwaffe units and your tank formations. No wounded should be carried back by the men. No one has any right to move back, and both squad and platoon leaders have the right to shoot anyone who retreats. (FUSA)
(8) The Evils of Strong Drink US Troops along the MOSELLE RIVER, saw two enemy revelers full of Christmas cheer, stagger down the opposite bank and search for a small boat. One collapsed on the bank; the other managed to climb into a boat, row to the friendly shore, and fall into the arms of the captors. He begged them to go back for his friend, so the Americans rowed over and picked the other drunk. Both gave information of value, including the password and one offered to lead a combat patrol back to his comrades. The offer was accepted and mission accomplished. (XII Corps)
(9) Enemy Looting Civilian reports that enemy troops thoroughly looted ESCHDORF before retreating from the town; taking everything that ran on wheels, including carts, bicycles, carriages, and even a wheelbarrows. hey told the civilians that they had been informed that once the counteroffensive started, they could not expect any supplies from the rear and that it would be necessary to forage for food and equipment from the land. Sheets were a very popular item of loot, as they were used as camouflage for vehicles and personnel. (III Corps)
ORDER OF BATTLE NOTES
(1) Identifications
a. The 85.ID commands several combat groups, among which are remnants of its two infantry regiments. These are located generally in the sector from OBERMAUBACH (F-1037) to the south of VOSSENACK (F-0331). (V Corps)
b. The 79.VGD is also a newly-committed division on the US Third Army front. The division is commanded by Oberst Weber. Its Infantry Regiments are numbered 208., 212. and 226. (XVIII Corps [Airborne])
c. Although it still consists of only weakened regiment, (1126.IR), the 559.ID appears to have reverted, in name at least, to divisional status. A Prisoner who was formerly with the map section of the division headquarters states that the designation Kampfgruppe von Muehlen was dropped about December 14. (12-AG)
(2) RESERVES
17.SS-Panzer-Grenadier Division was in contact on the XV Corps front in the vicinity of SARREGUEMINES as late as December 24. The Division apparently has been favored with a steady flow of replacements which accounts for the maintenance of its identity in spite of continuous heavy losses. It appears from PW statements that the Division received, during the month of November, about 2000 replacements, losing 50% of this complement in PWs. The Sixth Army Group (6-AG) reported on December 23, that the Division was once more at low ebb and its combat effectives were estimated at 2000, including personnel from Trains and QM services, which were being used as Infantry Replacements.
FUSA reported on December 30, Prisoners taken but the US 7-A state that 50-60 tanks were unloaded at LAUTZKIRCHEN (Q-6573) on December 24. All men in 17.SS-PG.Div.
Annex 1
I, SS-Untersturmfuehrer Richard Rosenke, being duty sworn, make this deposition under oath.
During the winter offensive in December 1944, I was Schuetze in the Engineer Plat., HQs Co, 1.SS Pzr Div (LSSAH) (Pionierzug, Stabskompanie, Aufklärungs-Abteilung LSSAH). On the morning of December 16 1944, SS-Obersturmführer Heinrich Goltz, my company commander assembled the HQs Company for a lecture at which occasion he expressed himself about as follows:
This offensive will be of great importance. The Luftwaffe will support us and we have to do everything to make this offensive a success. In this offensive, civilians and prisoners of war will be shot.
I am not certain whether Goltz used the same words which I used, but their meaning conforms to the truth and are the same. Also, I would like to add, that Goltz read this speech from a sheet of paper.
We then drove to the offensive and reached STAVELOT during the night, December 18, 1944. We drove through this village and reached another one, the name of which I cannot tell. However, I can remember that in this village was a large double span railroad bridge, the spans on which did not run parallel, so that empty space was between these two spans through which one could see through. We passed this bridge and drove to another large bridge where we turned around and drove back almost to STAVELOT where we turned left, driving on a small road for approximately 1,000 meters, until we reached a village where we spent the night.
As we dismounted from our vehicles, I noticed two elderly male civilians, which were bumped off right close to this bridge by SS-Untersturmführer Heinrich Dröge, my platoon leader. We then marched along the roadbed back to Stavelot at which occasion Dröge gave us the order to clean out the house and to herd together all civilians. This was done by us. The civilians were herded to the vicinity of a shed which was located on the right side of the road as one goes from STAVELOT in the direction of the railroad bridge mentioned above. Immediately thereafter, Dröge issued the order to herd those 20 civilians into this shed. I don’t know for sure whether there were 20 or more, or less.
At first, the civilians offered resistance, therefore more or less, we had to use force by treating them with rifle butts. Thereupon, Dröge gave the order to shoot these civilians inside the shed. SS-Schuetze Alfred Führer was the first to shoot into the civilians with his MG. Later, however, he had a stoppage so that SS-Rottenführer Hartmut Strauss relieved him by firing into the civilians with his MG. After the MG firing was over, one woman was brought in whose age I can no longer estimate. Dröge personally pushed this woman into a house on the right of the shed and was shot by him with shot into the back. For this, Dröge used an American weapon, the name of which I do not know. As we were about 130 meters away already, we heard cries and moans coming from this shed. I then received from SS-Unterscharfuehrer ‘Hedwig’ the order to go back and see what was the matter. When I got there, I saw as two people, one man and one woman, mortally wounded, were still shrieking. I gave them a few shots into the head and liquidated them. I then returned again and saw how two young civilians of about 18 to 20 years of age were shot by Dröge as well as by others. One of them, as I can recall, wore a blue lochsmith overall and one had red hair. In my opinion, these civilians wanted to run away which was the reason why they were shot.
We then went into the woods to reconnoiter an artillery position and at night, we went into the vicinity of the railroad station where we quartered ourselves in a cellar. Diagonally across a sawmill was located and right close to the sawmill was a house into which SS-Obersturmfuehrer Manfred Coblenz had moved with a part of his unit. On December 21, this house became uninhabitable. Therefore, Coblenz moved to us into the cellar and was subsequently captured with us.
The Pittsburgh Press (December 28, 1944)
THOUSANDS OF NAZIS IN TRAP
Yanks advancing on flanks
Enemy fights to hold sensational gains in Belgium, Luxembourg
By J. Edward Murray, United Press staff writer
…
2,000 PLANES ROCK GERMANY
Rail targets ripped despite poor weather
RAF bombers join in daylight raids
…