Village at start of 'World at war'

jonniebgood1

The start of the World at war series that most people are familiar with shows a flyover of the village of Oradour-sur-Glane in France. The village in France is preserved after its destruction in WWII. I recently came across an alternative to the accepted version of events (i.e. that of the victors). There does not seem to be much to back it up but I would be interested if anyone had more information on the village and what happened there or if anyone had visited it.

Version 1 of events:

In the afternoon of 10th June 1944 a detachment of SS troops arrived in Oradour-sur-Glane, a peaceful town near the city of Limoges in central France. The troops sealed off the entrances to the town and rounded up the inhabitants, including those they had collected from nearby farms on their way in.

The assembled residents were initially told that this was to be an identity check. However the women and children were then separated from the men folk and the (200 or so) men were split up into smaller groups and taken to various barns or warehouses around the town centre where SS troops set up machine guns facing them. The women and children (approx 450 of them) were taken to the church and locked in.

On a pre-determined signal the machine gunners opened fire on all the men, slaughtering them in cold blood. Once the firing had ceased the troops covered the dead and dying with wood and straw and set fire to them. At the church, soldiers brought in a box containing some sort of explosive device and detonated it amidst the terrified women and children. It is believed that this was supposed to produce an asphyxiating gas rather than being purely explosive, however its effect was to set the women and children into a screaming panic. The SS then started firing their machine guns into the church through the doors and windows and also threw in hand grenades to murder the women and children. As with the barns where the men were held, the SS then piled in wood and straw and set light to the church. They then proceeded to loot the town and burn down all the buildings.

http://www.secondworldwar.co.uk/ora_tour/oradour.html

Version 2 of events:

......
As they entered the village, the SS soldiers encountered resistance from the partisans. One SS soldier was killed and another was wounded. After closing off all the access roads and surrounding the village, Diekmann ordered the SS soldiers to round up everyone in the village and bring them to an assembly point on the village green, called the Fairgrounds. The population of the village was only 330 people but there was an equal number of refugees hiding there, including 26 "Red Spaniards" who were Communist veterans of the Spanish Civil War.

When everyone had been assembled, Diekmann explained to the mayor of the village that they were looking for weapons and also for the missing Kämpfe. Diekmann asked for hostages and the mayor offered himself and his four sons, but the offer was declined and the hostage request was dropped. The assembled villagers were asked to volunteer any information about weapons stored in Oradour-sur-Glane. Getting a negative response, Diekmann ordered the village to be searched.

The women and children were separated from the men and taken to the local church for their own safety while the town was searched for weapons and ammunition. The bodies of a number of German soldiers were discovered during the search, along with weapons and ammunition in almost every house. The SS later learned that the village had been the weapons and ammunition supply point for the whole Dordogne area, which was the center of the Communist resistance movement.

While the search was being conducted, the men were held in six buildings, guarded by soldiers with machine-guns. At 4 p.m. a loud explosion was heard. The soldiers thought that they were being attacked by partisans hiding in the village and the execution of the 190 men in the six buildings began, all at the same time. At 5 p.m. the destruction of the whole village began, as all the buildings were set on fire, starting at the north end.

At 4 p.m. one or two of the partisans in the village, probably not Frenchmen, had entered the crowded church, located at the south end of the village, where the women and children were being held, and had set off a gas bomb. The partisans in the French resistance movement included Polish guerrilla fighters in the Polish Home Army and escaped Russian POWs. Their intention had been to kill the women and children by asphyxiation and blame the German army for this terrible atrocity. This would provide motivation for more people to joint the French Resistance movement. In fact, two of the survivors, Andre Desourteaux and Robert Hebras, did join the Maquis three weeks later.

Then a bomb exploded in the tower of the church, causing the bronze bells to melt. A woman who was hiding in a house near the church said that she had heard "detonation after detonation" in the church. What she heard was grenades and ammunition, that had been stored in the church, going off after a fire started in the church, wounding the women in the legs and killing the children and babies. SS soldiers risked their lives to enter the smoke-filled church in an attempt to rescue the women, but only a few could be saved. Years later, several women from the village told a visiting German army officer, Eberhard Matthes, that they had been rescued by SS men that day.

.......

http://www.scrapbookpages.com/Oradour-sur-Glane/Story/Synopsis02.html


All opinions on these stories (which to believe or not) or further information on the happenings in Oradour is welcomed.

Morlar

Here is some useful contextual informaiton :

Gregory L.Mattson's - SS-Das Reich - the History fo the second SS Division 1941-1945

Morlar

Part 2
Here is some useful contextual informaiton :

Gregory L.Mattson's - SS-Das Reich - the History fo the second SS Division 1941-1945

Morlar

Part 3
Here is some useful contextual informaiton :

Gregory L.Mattson's - SS-Das Reich - the History fo the second SS Division 1941-1945

Morlar

Here is another reference :
Das Reich - Waffen SS Armoured Elite :
Michael Sharpe & Brian L Davis

Oradour-sur-Glane
Meanwhile north of Limoges, 111./Der Fuhrer had shot several residents in Argenton-sur-Creuse, and executed 29 resistance fighters near Gueret. While pulling back to Limoges early on 10 June, 111.lDer Fuhrer CO SturmbannfUhrer Kampfe and ObersturmfUhrer Gerlach were captured by maquis.

At this time 1st Battalion Der Fuhrer, under SturmbannfUhrer Dickmann, was at St. Junien, a town to the west of Limoges. Dickmann, a close friend of Kampfe, was informed by two residents that a German officer was being held in a town called Oradoursur-Glane, a short distance from St. Junien.

In the afternoon of 10 June 3rd Company of Dickmann's battalion surrounded the village. At the sound of the village drum the inhabitants gathered on the village green, and any stragglers were rounded up, and were informed by the
soldiers that they were conducting a search for weapons. The women and children were separated from the men and led off to the church, after which Dickmann demanded hostages before making a search of the village. This completed, the men were divided into several smaller groups, and led into three barns, two garages, a warehouse and a hangar. Around 16.00 from inside the locked church, the women heard the rattle of machine guns and other small arms fire as the men were massacred almost simultaneously
in their places of confinement. Survivors reported that Das Reich troops fired first at the men's legs, and continued to fire until nothing moved. Then, according to the few men who survived, the soldiers covered the bodies with straw, hay, wood and anything else that could be used for fuel to burn the corpses. A small number of men managed to escape the bullets. According to their accounts, when the first volleys of machinegun and rifle fire began they threw themselves to the ground and feigned death.Then, extricating themselves from the piles of bodies above them, they made their way to a corner of the barn and waited while the inferno that had been set by the Germans raged around them. When they could no longer stand the flames and smoke, they made a break for the countryside where they hid until nightfall. Meanwhile, at the church, troops tossed grenades among the 400 people packed inside, before barricading the doors and setting the building ablaze. Other residents who h'·ad not complied with the order to gather at the square were shot, and their houses and" buildings burnt. Some 642 civilians, including 207 children, were massacred. Before they left the following morning, troops looted the village.

In the aftermath more senior German commanders considered instigating an enquiry into the events but Dickmann was killed in action before any proceedings could begin and the matter was allowed to drop.

In 1953 a French military court sentenced a number of the surviving members of the 55 detachment to death. None of the executions was carried
out. The gutted, abandoned village has been left unreconstructed; its ruins are still a memorial to the victims. Anew village, with astrikingly modern church, was built nearby.

This is also briefly covered in James Lucas' - Das Reich - The Military Role of the 2nd SS Division.

It is extensively covered in Max Hasting's, Das Reich: resistance and the march of the 2nd SS Panzer Division through France, June 1944.

I don't want to get dragged into a german-bashing thread but I would say that overall that division had an extremely impressive frontline wartime combat record throughout it's progress during the war, from Poland to the invasion of France to Yugoslavia, the Eastern front, back to North europe and then again once more to the Eastern Front. They were forever thrown into the worst of the fighting to save the day for the wehrmacht. The Tulle/Oradour Sur Glane incidents are not generally indicative of their wartime record and go completely against many other stories about them showing mercy to partisans and so forth.

jonniebgood1

Did this division fight on the eastern front? It seems more akin to the war in the east than western Europe.

BlaasForRafa

jonniebgood1 wrote: »

Did this division fight on the eastern front? It seems more akin to the war in the east than western Europe.

Yes, Das Reich fought at the battles of Smolensk, Kharkhov, Kursk among others and were considered to be one of the elite panzer divisions.

ollaetta

Ever since I first saw The World at War I wanted to visit Oradour and I've managed to get there three times, most recently in 2010. I hadn't been in a few years and it was interesting to find that some of the ruins which had been blocked off before were now accessible to visit.

It's often overrun by tourists but when you get there on a quieter day, the place is very eerie. Here's a few pics I took.

FiSe

Morlar wrote: »

Here is some useful contextual informaiton :

Gregory L.Mattson's - SS-Das Reich - the History fo the second SS Division 1941-1945

It could be a good book.

But jaysus, what a pity that someone couldn't be arsed to actually find a photograph of a SS handed over to the allies. This one is a beautiful shot of a member of LW field division or paratrooper in typical smock, camouflage pattern used by non SS divisions and LW eagle on the chest.

Morlar

FiSe wrote: »

It could be a good book.

But jaysus, what a pity that someone couldn't be arsed to actually find a photograph of a SS handed over to the allies. This one is a beautiful shot of a member of LW field division or paratrooper in typical smock, camouflage pattern used by non SS divisions and LW eagle on the chest.

Crikey, hadn't even noticed that but your right. I even have a few photos at home of LW field camo wearing units around normandy vicinity at that time. That LW field cammo is often confused for SS camo. In this case the eagle should have been a bit of a hint though.

Tony EH

FiSe wrote: »

But jaysus, what a pity that someone couldn't be arsed to actually find a photograph of a SS handed over to the allies. This one is a beautiful shot of a member of LW field division or paratrooper in typical smock, camouflage pattern used by non SS divisions and LW eagle on the chest.

I hate it when WWII books and documentaries do that :rolleyes: