31st SS Volunteer Grenadier Division

31st SS Volunteer Grenadier Division
Troop registration
active	October 4, 1944 to May 1945
Country	German Empire
Armed forces	Armed SS
Branch of service	Grenadiers
Type	division
structure	See outline
commander
Current commander	commander

On October 4, 1944, the SS Leadership Office ordered the establishment of the 31st SS Volunteer Grenadier Division in Hungary . Under the leadership of SS-Oberführer Gustav Lombard , the formation of the remnants of the previously disbanded 23rd Waffen Mountain Division of the SS "Kama" took place in the area of ​​the commander of the Waffen-SS Hungary . The division consisted for the most part of so-called ethnic Germans from the Batschka , Banat and Transylvania , who were not infrequently forcibly recruited. Parts of the Volksdeutsche Heimatschutz in Hungary were also integrated into the division. Still incompletely trained and equipped (and therefore not yet ready for use), it was relocated to the Batina - Mohács - Bátaszék area to secure the banks of the Danube. As a result of the Red Army translating , fierce fighting developed, in which the division was completely crushed in December 1944. Dispersed troops arrived in the assembly room of the 31st SS Volunteer Grenadier Division west of Lake Balaton by December 20. The next day the SS-FHA ordered the march into Lower Styria to reorganize the division. On February 16, 1945, she was ordered to move to the Görlitz area. The division stayed in Silesia until May and began its retreat to Czechoslovakia on May 6, 1945, where it was taken as a Soviet prisoner of war near Königgrätz .

Intended structure

• SS Volunteer Grenadier Regiment 78
• SS Volunteer Grenadier Regiment 79
• SS-Freiwilligen-Grenadier-Regiment 80
• SS Volunteer Artillery Regiment 31
• Brixen Police Regiment
  • SS Volunteer Fusilier Battalion 31
  • SS volunteer tank destroyer division 31
  • SS Volunteer Engineer Battalion 31
  • SS Volunteer News Department 31
  • SS Volunteer Field Replacement Battalion 31
  • SS Volunteer Reconnaissance Department 31
  • SS Volunteer Economic Battalion 31
  • SS Volunteer Medical Department 31
    • SS Volunteer Veterinary Company 31
    • Workshop company 31
      • Replenishment train 31

commander

• SS Brigade Leader and Major General of the Waffen SS Gustav Lombard

literature

• Pencz, Rudolf: FOR THE HOMELAND! The History of the 31st Waffen-SS Volunteer Grenadier Division. Danubian-Swabian Grenadiers on the Danube and in Silesia Helion & Company, Solihull 2002, ISBN 1-874622-01-9 .
• Rolf Michaelis : The Grenadier Divisions of the Waffen SS. Part 2 , Michaelis-Verlag, Erlangen 1995, ISBN 3-930849-06-2 .