Penal battalions, consisting of former criminals or fined soldiers and officers, are known mainly from the historiography of the Red Army. Nevertheless, during the Second World War, similar units existed in the armies of other countries. And most of all, the penalties of the SS troops under the command of Oscar Paul Dirlewanger became famous for their cruelty.
From the hunt to the front
During a discussion of what kind of guilty soldiers and officers should form the backbone of the penal special forces, Dirlewanger suggested that Himmler focus on former poachers. The proposal turned out to be eminently reasonable. These people were well oriented in the forest, knew how to move around without unnecessary noise, and also shoot accurately.
The final decision in favor of Dirlewanger's proposal was made after the wife of a prominent party official convicted of poaching approached Hitler in 1940. The wife asked to give her husband the opportunity to rehabilitate himself at the front. The Fuhrer responded favorably to the request, saying that the former comrades-in-arms had nothing to do in the concentration camps, it would be better if they were fighting.
Soon, the first batch of 84 prisoners arrived from the Sachsenhausen concentration camp in Oranienburg to form a Sonderkommando called the Oranienburg Poaching Team. Subsequently, recruits for the penalty unit of the SS under the command of Oskar Dirlewanger were recruited on a voluntary basis exclusively in concentration camps and prisons of the Third Reich.
Poachers against partisans
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The scope of the penal unit of the SS troops was determined quickly enough. First of all, it was used during punitive operations against partisans on the Eastern Front. Indeed, who better than the former hunters-poachers will be able to find the guerrilla's hideouts and, stealthily approaching, destroy them.
Nevertheless, the first assignment of the Sonderkommando in 1940 was to guard the Jewish ghettos in Poland. Dirlewanger's subordinates blocked the Jews in Lublin, Krakow and Dzikow. At the same time, despite the effective performance of the tasks assigned to them by the SS penalties, signals of terrible atrocities committed by former criminals in SS uniforms were regularly received in Berlin.
To verify this information, SS Untersturmführer Konrad Morgen was sent from Berlin to the General Government, who was literally shocked by what he saw.
According to the inspector, it was impossible to even roughly calculate the number of extortions, robberies, rapes and murders regularly committed by Dirlewanger's subordinates. In his memo sent to the command, Morgen proposed to immediately arrest the head of the Sonderkommando, and send his subordinates back to the camps. But that did not happen.
Instead of arrest, Dirlewanger was given the next rank of SS Sturmbannfuehrer, giving him new combat missions. His unit was called upon to fight the partisans in Belarus (on the territory of the USSR, by 1942, their movement had acquired a truly grandiose scale). Some partisan detachments included several hundred and sometimes thousands of people. Only former Dirlewanger poachers could really resist them.
Eastern Front Hell
As soon as Dirlewanger's Sonderkommando was transferred to Belarus, its members were amazed at the conditions in which they had to conduct hostilities. All around were dense forests and swamps. There were practically no roads, and the use of aircraft against partisans had no practical sense. At the same time, in the local forests behind every tree there was a mortal danger for the Germans.
In the war against the partisans, Dirlewanger and his subordinates showed even greater cruelty than during the actions against the Jewish population in Poland. In Belarus, often, having identified two or three partisans, Derlivanger's soldiers shot an additional hundred more people who were only suspected of sympathizing with the forest rebels.
Not surprisingly, most of the punitive operations against the partisans were entrusted precisely to the Derlivanger unit, whose strength by the summer of 1943 was 760 people.
Fortunately, at this time an active offensive of the Red Army began. After the Soviet troops approached Vitebsk, Derlivanger's criminals found themselves in an unusual situation, having found themselves on the real front line. These were full-fledged hostilities, not the punitive operations they were used to.
Quickly enough, the SS penalty box regiment was reduced by almost half. Realizing that the punitive unit could disappear altogether, the German command transferred it back to Poland to suppress the Warsaw Uprising of 1944.
Despite heavy losses, the Sonderkommando completed the task assigned to it. Derlivanger received the title of SS Oberfuehrer, and the military unit received the status of an SS brigade. In 1945, the unit tried to surrender to the Americans. However, the allies, who had heard about the cruelty of Derlivanger's former subordinates, did not take them prisoner, but shot them without trial or investigation.
The leader of the punishers, Derlivanger, was not destined for a better fate either. He ended up in a prison guarded by Poles. One night they took him out into the corridor and just smashed his head with rifle butts.
Dmitry Sokolov