6th SS Gebirgsjäger Division Nord memorial and resting place Pfaffenheck – Germany

Johann Voss –  Paul Karl Schmidt – Black Edelweiss

After reading the book written by Johann Voss about his enduring in world war two, “Black Edelweiss”, we just had to visit the memorial site of the 6th SS Gebirgsjäger Division Nord at Pfaffenheck (Eng. 6th SS Mountain Division Nord). Johann Voss had his training in Austria, he joined the Waffen-SS in early 1943 at the age of seventeen. At first he and his unit had guard duties at the Obersalzberg in Berchtesgaden, where Hitler and his inner circle had their residences. Johann Voss wrote his memoirs during captivity as POW in an American prison in 1945-1946 with memories still fresh in mind. He used a pseudonym when publishing his memoirs, his real name was Paul Karl Schmidt. Johann Voss is initially shocked that the Nuremberg Trials deemed the SS as a criminal organisation but comes to accept the truth.

Training and fighting in the arctic

After his initial training with the Waffen SS he joined the 6th SS Gebirgsjäger division Nord and was assigned to the SS-Gebirgsjäger-Regiment 11 “Reinhard Heydrich”. They were sent to Finland, high in the arctic circle in the Murmansk area Karelia, where Johann fought for a year or two side by side with the Finnish forces against the Soviet Red army as a machine gunner with the MG42.

The 6th SS Gebirgsjäger division Nord had a high regard for the Finnish forces. The 6 SS Nord had to endure long and cold winters, days without darkness and saw the Northern lights, they endured freezing cold winters and crawled through mosquito infested marshes during the summer.
After the Finnish government turned side to the Soviets, the Germans forces had to leave Finland in a short period. But they lacked transport. Fighting off their old comrades, they had to walk to Norway and from the border of Norway way up north had to walk all the way south to the harbor where the transport ships were waiting. They walked for 1600 to 1700 kilometers (1000 to 1060 miles). before they reached Germany again.

Operation Nordwind – Battle of the Bulge

Back in Germany the division was sent to Trier, a town in south west Germany near the Luxembourg and French border.

They were put into action in the area around Trier during Operation Nordwind and in the French Voges mountains. After the defeat of the U.S. troops during the Battle of the Hürtgenforrest the German High Command saw an opportunity to launch a large-scale operation to stop the Allied advance. They launched Operation Herbstnebel better known as the Battle for the Bulge (Battle for the Ardennes). The original plan was named Wacht am Rhein (Watch on the Rhine, which is better known but it was changed before the start of the Operation to Operation Herbstnebel (Autumn mist). Unternehmen Herbstnebel as the Germans fully named it, had other operations in the same time period. These operations are a bit more unknown, but he goal was the same. To the North of the Battle of the Bulge the Germans launched Unternehmen Schneeman (operation snowman) on the 1st of January 1945 in the south of the Netherlands, and they launched Unternehmen Nordwind (operation north wind) on 31 December in France the Elsass and Lothringen.

After Nordwind they were deployed to defend the German Empire in the region between Trier and Koblenz on German soil. They fought against the American troops instead of the Red Army. They had a heroic moment in encircling and capturing a large portion of the U.S. units. After this success, they were ordered to defend other strategic locations in the same area and fought on the Westwall or Siegfried line. Around this time their commanding officer was replaced. A new C.O. with hardly any war experience gave them suicide orders, the division was well trained and had loads of combat experience to understand the lack of judgmen by this officer. They were beaten back and suffered such heavy casualties within a short time frame, it was at this point that the 6th SS Gebirgsjäger Division Nord ceased to exist.

In his book Black Edelweiss, Johann Voss mentions that he visits (or visited) this cemetery on a yearly basis to pay respect to his fallen comrades with other veterans from the 6th SS Gebirgsjäger division Nord. These memorial days were interrupted for a few years when the media got a notion of it. For a few years in a row it was hot news that SS veterans came together to pay respect to their lost comrades. In the years after, the media slowly lost interest and the ceremony is now held in silence once again. Every year there are less and less survivors, maybe reduced to none but family members or friends today.

6th SS Gebirgsjäger division Nord Cemetery Pfaffenheck

The Pfaffenheck cemetery contains most of the victims of the 6th SS Gebirgsjäger division Nord who died in the Pfaffenheck area between March and 1945. The cemetery was set up in 1957 after a mass grave, marked with a Wehrmacht helmet, had been present at this location for years. Around March 1945 Pfaffenheck was the center of the last front where SS units and Wehrmacht units fought on Vorderhunsrück. They fought against units of the 90th US infantry Division. From Thursday, March 14 to Saturday, March 16 1945, there was heavy house-to-house and hand-to-hand fighting. In American literature this is sometimes referred to as the Battle of Pfaffenheck where they lost 300 soldiers. The bodies were recovered as of Sunday, March 17, U.S. soldiers were taken back to the American cemetery in Luxembourg. The German victims were buried in a mass grave nearby, it was marked for years with a simple Wehrmacht helmet.

In 1956-1957, an “honorary cemetery” was constructed at the site of the mass grave, which shows the traditional image of adjacent graves in several rows. At regular intervals are simple, low stone crosses, typical of military cemeteries. Metal nameplates in the shape of a cross are embedded in the floor, each symbolizing a grave site. Near the entrance there is a memorial stone with the names of men from Pfaffenheck who were killed or were missing together with the number of unknown soldiers. Most of the burials in this cemetery belong to 6th SS Gebirgsjäger Division Nord who lost their lives here at the end of March 1945.

 

the 6th SS Gebirgsjäger Division Nord memorial and resting place Pfaffenheck

The memorial and cemetery can be found just south of Pfaffenheck in Germany. It is next to the road 327 leading through Pfaffenheck. The exact coordinates to the site are: 52.18958, 5.2952. The cemetery looks overgrown and unattended, but this is not true. It is just another style than the neatly trimmed lawns of the American or Commonwealth cemeteries.

Visit

The cemetery is open during daytime hours