19th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (Latvian No. 2)

19th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (Latvian No. 2)
Troop registration
active	January 1944 to May 1945
Country	German Empire
Armed forces	Armed SS
Branch of service	Grenadiers
Type	division
structure	See outline
Butcher	Eastern Front Kurland boiler Courland battles
commander
list of	Commanders

The 19th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (Latvian No. 2) was a grenadier division of the Waffen SS during World War II . A large part of the troops and officers consisted of Latvian volunteers and Latvians drafted for military service.

The division was used in the German Army on the Eastern Front.

history

2nd SS Infantry Brigade

From 1942, the staff of the 2nd SS Infantry Brigade led various North and West European volunteer units of the Waffen SS deployed in Army Group North . In 1942, three already existing battalions of the Latvian security service were incorporated. In 1943 the brigade was reinforced with further Latvian units and called the "Latvian Volunteer Brigade".

The brigade was deployed as part of the 18th Army south of Leningrad , in the Battle of the Volkhov , near Oranienbaum and in the retreat in the direction of Pskov / Ostrow .

Lineup

From January 1944, the above-mentioned brigade became the “19th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (Latvian No. 2) ”reclassified. The division consisted of three regiments of infantry, an artillery regiment and additional divisional units. Most of the officers and men up to the regimental commanders were Latvians.

Calls

From March to July 1944, the division fought loss-making defensive battles south of Pskow . Here she was temporarily deployed alongside her sister division, the 15th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (Latvian No. 1) . The two divisions suffered such losses that remnants of the 15th were incorporated into the 19th.

By October 1944, further retreat battles followed through the eastern part of Latvia, until the division was enclosed in the Kurland pocket . This was followed by missions in all five battles of Courland. After the capitulation in May 1945, the majority of their soldiers were taken prisoner by the Soviets, while others continued to fight as Forest Brothers partisans.

captivity

Since the Latvian soldiers were considered Soviet citizens, they did not have the status of prisoners of war . In so-called filtration camps they were interrogated and death or imprisonment convicted. Professional careers were blocked for those who returned to their homeland.

Commanders

• September 5, 1943 to March 15, 1944: SS-Brigadführer Hinrich Schuldt
• March 15 to April 13, 1944: SS-Standartenführer Friedrich-Wilhelm Bock
• May 26, 1944 to May 1945 SS-Gruppenführer and Lieutenant General of the Waffen-SS: Bruno Linienbach

structure

• Waffen Grenadier Regiment of the SS "Voldermars Veiss"
• Waffen-Grenadierregiment of SS 43 "Hinrich Schuldt"
• SS 44th Waffen Grenadier Regiment
• SS 19 weapons artillery regiment

See also

• Foreign volunteers of the Waffen SS
• Latvian SS units
• 15th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (Latvian No. 1)

Web links

• Occupation Museum in Riga

literature

• Rolf Michaelis : The Grenadier Divisions of the Waffen SS. Part 1. Michaelis-Verlag, Erlangen 1995, pp. 50-97, ISBN 3-930849-04-6 .
• Rolf Stoves: The armored and motorized large German formations. Divisions and independent brigades. 1935-1945. Ed. Dörfler im Nebel-Verlag , Eggolsheim 2003, ISBN 3-7909-0279-9 .
• Georg Tessin : Associations and troops of the German Wehrmacht and Waffen SS in World War II 1939–1945. Volume 4. The Land Forces 15–30 . 2nd Edition. Biblio-Verlag, Osnabrück 1976, ISBN 3-7648-1083-1 .
• Igors Varpa: Latviesu Karavirs zem Kaskrusta Karoga (Latvian soldiers under the swastika), ISBN 9984-751-41-4 .