Having annihilated its inhabitants, the German troops systematically pillaged the village and its environs, then drove away.
No official pretext for these outrages was ever given by the German military authorities. On the day following the massacre, it was merely reported without comment that in the course of military operations the locality of Oradour-sur-Glâne had been ‘reduced to rubble and ashes’.
A member of the Sicherheitsdienst, however, who visited the Prefecture of the Haute-Vienne to obtain a statement from the Préfet after his visit to Oradour following the outrage, told him that a German officer and his driver, who had been captured by the Maquis and were being led through the village, were attacked by some women who bound their wrists with wire: that they were then taken away to be shot but the officer managed to escape. He returned at once to Limoges where he organized a punitive expedition against the village by way of reprisal and in which he himself took part.
Exhaustive inquiries have never produced any corroboration of such an incident and it is more than doubtful whether it ever happened. In no circumstances, however, would it have justified so terrible a reprisal. Had such an incident taken place the persons responsible could, without great difficulty, have been discovered and brought to trial in accordance with International Law; but this massacre of hundreds of innocent people was an outrage on humanity and, when the details became known, horrified the civilized world.
A report of this outrage was sent by the Vichy Government to the German Commander-in-Chief in the West, who was requested to communicate the facts to the German High Command in France because of the ‘political importance which they will assume from their repercussion on the minds of the French people’. The investigation made by the French established that no member of the FFI was in the village nor within seven kilometres of it, and that the unit which committed this atrocity did so as an act of vengeance on this harmless community because of some attack made on one of its soldiers fifty kilometres away.
In June 1940 Italy came into the war on the side of Germany and fought as her ally until the armistice of September 1943, when a National Government was formed in Southern Italy under King Victor Emmanuel.
After the Allied forces landed in Italy a Republican Government was set up in the north under Mussolini.
During the winter and spring of 1943/4 partisan activity became widespread along the German lines of communica-’ tion, and drastic steps to suppress resistance were taken by the Supreme German Commander, Field-Marshal Albert Kesselring.
Kesselring himself said this about the German attitude to the Italians after the armistice:
Italy entered the war against Germany’s wish, and the support of the German Army, Air Force and Navy was required for the Italian forces. German armies came and fought for Italy’s vital interests. German sacrifices in Africa, Tunisia, Sicily, and Southern Italy were immense, but they were borne. Though numerically far superior, the Italians fought less strenuously than the Germans but this was tolerated for the sake of Italian friendship. This feeling changed into hatred when Italy, betraying the Axis policy, started partisan warfare.
In the afternoon of 23rd March 1944 an incident happened in Rome which led to fearful reprisals being taken by the Germans and the intensifying of terrorist measures against the civilian population in Occupied Italy.
Each afternoon about three o’clock it was customary for a detachment from one of the German Polizei regiments to march along the Via Rasella. As it did so on that day a bomb exploded causing thirty-two fatal casualties amongst the Germans and wounding many others. Obersturmbannführer Kappler of the SD soon reached the scene of the explosion and started making an investigation.
Meanwhile, the incident had been reported through the usual military channels to Hitler’s headquarters, whence orders were at once received by Field-Marshal Kesselring to shoot within twenty-four hours ten Italians for every German policeman killed. No details were given as to how these reprisal prisoners were to be selected.
This order was passed on through General von Mackersen, Commander of the Fourteenth Army, to General Maelzer, the Military Commander of the city of Rome, with instructions to ascertain whether there were enough prisoners under sentence of death to make up the required number.
Kappler informed the German garrison commander that in order to find the requisite total he would have to draw up a list of 280 people whom he described as ‘worthy of death.’1 This qualification was a wide one and included not only those who were undergoing long sentences of imprisonment, but many in arrest for alleged partisan activities and acts of sabotage, and all Jews who were in the custody of the SD in Rome at that time.
Kappler went round his prison in the Via Tasso but was unable to make up the numbers. He therefore obtained from another Roman jail other prisoners who were awaiting trial by German military courts.
The number finally put to death was 335. It included an old man of seventy, a boy of fourteen and a half, one man who had already been acquitted by a German court and, for good measure, fifty-five Jews, none of whom had any connection with the partisans and some of whom were not even Italian nationals. The victims were assembled in the Ardeatine Caves on the outskirts of Rome and the execution was carried out there by Kappler’s Sicherheitsdienst, the Wehrmacht having declined to perform it.
At the trial of Field-Marshal Kesselring in the Tribunale di Giustizia in Venice in February 1947,2 Kappler described the shooting of these unfortunate people. They were made to kneel down, five at a time, their hands were bound behind their backs and they were then shot in the back of the head. There were sixty-seven batches of five and all afternoon the slaughter went on. There was no medical officer present to see that one batch were all dead before the next came along. When the last victim had been despatched the cave was blown in to conceal all trace of the crime.
The Germans never even pretended that most of these people had anything to do with the bomb incident. Some had already been held in custody for a long time; many of them did not live near the Via Rasella; some did not even live in Rome at all and fifty-five of them had merely had the misfortune to be born Jews.
The bombing of the German police detachment was, of course, an offence against the Occupying Power and those responsible for it could have been tried by a German military court and doubtless sentenced to death. None of those who were put to death in the Ardeatine Caves had been even tried, let alone convicted. They were all shot as a reprisal. The word ‘reprisal’ can be widely interpreted but it cannot be properly contended that the arbitrary killing of innocent inhabitants becomes justifiable merely by calling it a reprisal.
The massacre in the Ardeatine Caves was only a precursor of what was to follow. On 17th June 1944 the Field-Marshal issued another order. It was drafted by Kesselring himself and was addressed, inter alia, to the Tenth and Fourteenth Armies, HQ Luftwaffe, and the Supreme Head SS and Police Italy, who was General Wolff.
It announced new measures in connection with operations against partisans and stated that the partisan situation in the Italian theatre, particularly in central Italy, had so deteriorated as to constitute a serious danger to the fighting troops and their lines of communication. ‘The fight against the partisans must be carried on with every means at our disposal and with the utmost severity. I will protect any commander who exceeds our usual restraint (sic), in the choice and severity of the methods he adopts against partisans. In this connection the old principle holds good, that a mistake in the choice of methods in executing one’s orders is better than neglect or failure to act.’
The order then went on to describe certain action which should be taken whenever a civilian implicated in partisan operations was apprehended. If shooting ten Italians for every German killed by the civilian population was their ‘usual restraint’, this new order was indeed an invitation to greater terrorism.
About the same time Kesselring issued an appeal to the Italians which is set out below.
The Supreme C
ommander of the German Armed Forces states:
Up to now the German Armed Forces have done all that they have had to do by the necessities of war, correctly and with the greatest consideration for the population. This friendly attitude is dependant upon absolute reciprocity on the part of the population. If criminal assaults and attacks by partisans until now isolated and individual, should increase, then the attitude of the Supreme Commander of the German Armed Forces must, perforce, change immediately. The people themselves will be responsible for the consequences of such a decision.
To guarantee the security of rear areas and lines of communication, I order at once that:
1. Anyone found in the possession of arms and explosives which have not been declared to the nearest German Command will be shot.
2. Anyone giving shelter to partisans or who protects them, or who assists them with clothing, food, or arms will be shot.
3. If any person is discovered who has knowledge of a group of rebels or even of a single rebel without giving such information to the nearest HQ, he will be shot.
4. Anyone giving information to the enemy or the partisans of the locality of German Commands or military installations will be shot.
5. Every village where it is proved there are partisans or in which assaults against German or Italian soldiers have been committed or where attempts to sabotage warlike stores have occurred WILL BE EURNED TO THE GROUND. In addition all male inhabitants of such a village over eighteen years of age WILL BE SHOT. The women and children will be interned in labour camps.
ITALIANS.
The welfare of your country and the fate of your families are in your hands. The German Armed Forces as stated in this order will act with justice but without mercy, and with such severity as the case may indicate.
Referring to this appeal in a further teleprint order dated istjuly 1944 the Supreme Commander said:
In my appeal to the Italians I announced that severe measures are to be taken against the partisans. This announcement must not represent an empty threat…. Whenever there is evidence of considerable numbers of partisan groups, a proportion of the male population of the area will be arrested, and in the event of any act of violence being committed these men will be shot…. Should troops be fired at from any village it must be burnt down and the ringleaders will be hanged in public. Nearby villages will be held responsible for any sabotage to cables or damage to tyres.
After this clear incitement to murder and arson the order sanctimoniously stated that plunder was forbidden and that all counter measures must be hard but just, because ‘the dignity of the German soldier demands it’.
The German forces needed little encouragement to exceed their ‘usual restraint’. Within ten days the following proclamation was pasted all over the walls of the little town of Covolo.
The Town Major of Covolo makes it known that:
For every member of the German Armed Forces, whether military or civilian who becomes injured FIFTY men, taken from the place where the act was committed, will be shot.
For every soldier or civilian killed, ONE HUNDRED men also taken from the place where the incident occurred will be shot.
Should several soldiers or civilians be killed or wounded ALL THE MEN OF THE PLACE WILL BE SHOT, THE PLAGE SET ON FIRE, THE WOMEN INTERNED, AND CATTLE CONFISCATED FORTH-WITH.
Nor were the German troops slow to implement such orders, and during the month of August a series of appalling reprisals were taken against the Italians.
In Borgo Ticino four German soldiers were wounded one morning by unknown people. A reprisal was immediately carried out by the German troops who first posted road blocks in the village streets. In an inn a game of boccia was in full swing attended by many from the neighbouring village as well as the local inhabitants.
The Germans surrounded the inn, arrested a large number of men, and selected thirteen of them, all under thirty years of age, to be shot. An Italian officer tried to intervene but he was only successful in obtaining the release of two Black Shirts who were amongst the intended victims. The reprisal prisoners were then shot, including a Fascist who had returned wounded from the Russian front and was only visiting the village by chance to see his fiancée. The village was blown up and set on fire.
Two days later the German Commander in Brescia sent a detachment of the Feld-Gendarmerie1 to Bovegno where it was suspected that there was a secret meeting of the partisans in the Hotel Brentana. As the detachment reached the outskirts of the village it was fired upon and three men were wounded.
By way of reprisal the detachment entered the village square and fired indiscriminately at everyone. None of those in the square can have been in any way responsible for the ambush of the German troops a few minutes earlier. During the firing at least six people were killed and others wounded. Amongst the dead was a member of the Republican National Guard and another member of Mussolini’s Republican Party, both of whom were still on the side of the Germans.
Several houses were set on fire including the local Cooperative Store and the bakery. Food in apartment houses, shops and hotels was seized and during the night eight more Italians were shot by German troops who remained in the village until dawn, when they withdrew. 11 was definitely established that all save two of the victims were ordinary peaceful citizens in no way connected with the partisan movement.
At this time a number of Russians were serving with the German forces in Italy. Four of them had deserted from their units which were stationed in the Region of Vicenza and had joined the partisans in the mountains of Posina. The inhabitants of Posina were totally unaware of this but the German Commander of the Russian Company at Mavano nevertheless decided to hold them responsible. He issued a proclamation warning the people of Posina that if the four Russians did not return by 17th August to their service the village would be shelled and then destroyed by fire. He also took about twenty hostages from Posina and the outlying district of Fusine. These included the parish priest, the Commissioner-Prefect and the secretary of the Commune.
The Russian deserters had not returned by the evening of the 17th and the centre of Posina was shelled for twenty minutes, and seven days later many houses were set on fire. Over 100 houses were destroyed and 120 families were rendered homeless and lost all their belongings.
Another outrage in Vicenza was committed a few days later in the little village of Valli di Pasubio where one of the inhabitants found at his place of work a letter written in Russian. As the finder could not read Russian he gave it to another Russian soldier to read. The letter, it appeared, had been written by one of the Russians serving nearby with the German forces and was an incitement to some of his comrades to desert and come and join him with the partisans.
The innocent Italian was at once arrested and his house burned to the ground and that same day the neighbouring village of Gortiana was set on fire. Thirteen families were rendered homeless and fifteen men taken away and never seen again.
On 1st September 1944, in the Padua district, a clash took place between three German soldiers and a like number of partisans near Montecchia di Crossara. Two of the Germans were killed, and vengeance was wreaked on the village. All the houses were searched and the contents of any value removed: clothing, bedding, wireless sets, typewriters, bicycles, and livestock.
The German troops then set fire to the houses which they had looted. Forty houses were thus completely destroyed and in one were found the charred remains of a young woman and a child of three both of whom had first been shot. Amongst the other victims was a girl of nine and an old woman of eighty-four.
Throughout the month of August this reign of terror continued in the Province of Venezia. But perhaps the most terrible of all these reprisals was made at Torlano, near Udine, after a lively skirmish between German troops and partisans had taken place not far from the outskirts of the village.
Some of the people who had been working in the fields when the fight began took cover in the village itself which the German troops then e
ntered. They found several Italians hiding in the cellars, killed them all, and set fire to the houses after looting their contents. Thirty-two men, women, and children were murdered in this way and ten members of one family, named De Bortoli, were all shot in one house. Virginio De Bortoli the head of the family; his son Silvano, who was a war cripple, another son, a daughter and six grandchildren between the ages of two and fourteen. Several more young children were also shot. Many of the corpses were charred by fire and some could not be identified.
These atrocities made a deep impression in northern Italy and the Duce himself complained bitterly to Dr Rahn who was the Ambassador and Plenipotentiary of Germany with the Italian Republican Government. On receipt of the Duce’s letter Dr Rahn forwarded a copy to Kesselring who replied that in future offenders would be dealt with by court martial.
Reprisals should not be undertaken before there has been an inquiry and a genuine effort made to apprehend those responsible for the incidents which justify reprisals being taken. They must never be excessive and should not exceed the degree of violation committed by the enemy.
All the above reprisals were undertaken arbitrarily without any adequate steps being taken to discover the offenders, and far exceeded in their severity what was either proper or necessary. They were not really reprisals as the term is understood by international jurists. They were nothing more nor less than brutal acts of indiscriminate vengeance which both violated the unchallenged rules of warfare and outraged the general sentiment of humanity.1
The Scourge of the Swastika Page 13