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Wilhelm Bittrich (26 February 1894 – 19 April 1979) was a high-ranking Waffen-SS commander of Nazi Germany. Between August 1942 and February 1943, Bittrich commanded the SS Cavalry Division Florian Geyer , in rear security operations ( Bandenbekämpfung , literally: "gang fighting") in the Soviet Union.
The II SS Panzer Corps was a German Waffen-SS armoured corps which saw action on both the Eastern and Western Fronts during World War II.It was commanded by Paul Hausser during the Third Battle of Kharkov and the Battle of Kursk in 1943 and by Wilhelm Bittrich on the Western Front in 1944.
The 8th SS Cavalry Division "Florian Geyer" was a German Waffen-SS cavalry division during World War II.It was formed in 1942 from a cadre of the SS Cavalry Brigade which was involved in the Bandenbekämpfung ("bandit-fighting") operations behind the front line and was responsible for the killing of tens of thousands of the civilian population. [1]
Wilhelm Bittrich: 14 October 1941 – 31 December 1941 SS-Obergruppenführer: Matthias Kleinheisterkamp: 31 December 1941 – 19 April 1942 SS-Obergruppenführer: Georg Keppler: 19 April 1942 – 10 February 1943 SS-Brigadeführer: Herbert-Ernst Vahl: 10 February 1943 – 18 March 1943 SS-Oberführer: Kurt Brasack: 18 March 1943 – 29 March 1943
The command headquarters was initially housed in Esquimalt Fortress near Victoria, but on 30 November 1942 it was moved to the Old Hotel Vancouver in downtown Vancouver. After the United States entered the war in December 1941 , Canada and the U.S. coordinated their defence of the west coast of North America .
During World War II, 457 servicemen of the Waffen-SS, including volunteers and conscripts from Belgium, Croatia, Denmark, Estonia, France, Hungary, Latvia, Netherlands and Norway, received the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross. Of these, 411 presentations were formally made and evidence of the award is available in the German Federal Archives.
Schweitzer was put on trial in 1948, found guilty of war crimes, and sentenced to death. However, in light of the controversy surrounding the Malmedy massacre trial, and that Markus Lienhart appeared to have shot two of the airmen entirely of his own volition, Schweitzer's sentence was commuted to life in prison. He was released in the 1950s ...
Wilhelm Bittrich: Commanding general II SS Panzer Corps: 1894–1979: also: General der Waffen-SS; interned in Marseille 1948–1953 Ernst Wilhelm Bohle: SS-Ehrenrang; Gauleiter of the NSDAP Auslandsorganisation (Nazi Party Foreign Organisation) 1903–1960: imprisoned until 1949 Martin Bormann