The Malmédy Massacre

All night Peiper's men forged on, with two Panthers leading the way until they surprised an American scout company parked up in a village just before dawn. Running short of fuel, Peiper now made a diversion to raid a large US fuel dump. His tanks were soon being refuelled by sullen American prisoners. The Germans turned north towards the town of Malmédy.

When the lead Panzer IVs approached a crossroads in the hamlet of Baugnez they spotted a column of US soft-skinned vehicles ahead of them. They immediately started firing on the Americans, then raced at full speed towards them. Outgunned, the Americans offered no resistance, and in a few minutes, Waffen-SS men had herded almost 100 stunned Americans into a nearby field. Peiper then passed by in his armoured command halftrack and ordered the advance to continue, racing off westwards with his lead tanks. Back at Baugnez, the captured Americans were being machine-gunned by Peiper's men in an incident that would become notorious as the "Malmédy Massacre", even though it occurred several kilometres outside the town. Peiper and more than 70 other members of the Leibstandarte would later face war crimes charges for their involvement in this incident.

Behind Peiper's spearhead, the Leibstandarte's other kampfgruppe, led by SS-Standartenführer Max Hansen, had already managed to break free and was advancing west. Containing the bulk of a panzergrenadier regiment and most of the division's Panzerjöger IVs, it was operating south of Peiper on a parallel Rollbahn.

Heavy losses for the Leibstandarte

The Hitlerjugend Division was not faring so well in its attempt to open up the northern Rollbahn and seize the strategic Elsenborn ridge. The US 99th Infantry Division put up stiff resistance and held off the attacks by the 277th Volksgrenadier Division. Rather than being used to exploit a breach in the American line, the division's two lead kampfgruppen had to be committed to the assault. Although the Waffen-SS Panthers inflicted heavy losses on the few American tanks barring their way, soon GIs with bazookas were picking off the German tanks at an alarming rate. This fierce fighting in a string of border villages allowed time for the Americans to form a firing line with their Shermans, M10 and M18 tank destroyers, and 105mm howitzers in the anti-tank role.

When the Hitlerjugend's Panthers rolled forward on the morning of 18 December, they ran into a hail of well-aimed anti-tank fire. They made it to the American lines but soon 15 Panthers, 1 Panzer IV and 2 Panzerjöger IVs were ablaze. Kraas and Dietrich ordered a rethink, and the division's schwerpunkt was now shifted south in order to try to bypass the strong defence on Elsenborn ridge. Dietrich concentrated four corps artillery regiments to support a large attack on 21 December, but the Americans were fighting stubbornly and were not to be moved. When the panzer regiment attacked, it lost 11 more tanks. A further attack the following day met a similar fate, and the division was pulled out of the line to be re-assigned to push through behind the Leibstandarte Division.

prev | next