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Malmédy massacre
Malmédy massacre, mass execution of US prisoners-of-war and local civilians which took place at Baugnez near Malmédy in pre-war Belgium on 17 December 1944. It was carried out by SS Standartenführer (colonel) Joachim Peiper's special Kampfgruppe (battle group) which penetrated US lines during the Ardennes campaign. There were 43 American survivors, but 86 were killed.
After the war, the commander of Sixth SS Panzer Army, General Dietrich, Peiper, and two others were charged with issuing illegal orders—the massacre had been only the largest of a number of similar incidents—and they and 69 other suspects were incarcerated in Dachau where their trial began in May 1946. The prosecution admitted that confessions had been abstracted by threatened execution, false witnesses, and mock trials, but all the defendants were found guilty. Peiper and 42 others were condemned to death; 22, including Dietrich, were sentenced to life imprisonment. Subsequent legal reviews and appeals reduced these sentences and they were further reduced when evidence emerged that the accused had been ill-treated. In March 1949 the Armed Services Committee of the US Senate started an investigation in which Senator Joseph McCarthy, the anti-communist crusader, accused the US Army of Gestapo tactics and the investigating sub-committee of whitewashing the army's conduct. None of the death sentences was carried out. Dietrich was paroled in 1955. Peiper, released in 1956, was killed in 1976 when his house was fire-bombed. See also atrocities. |
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I. C. B. DEAR and M. R. D. FOOT. "Malmédy massacre." The Oxford Companion to World War II. 2001. Encyclopedia.com. 12 Feb. 2012 <http://www.encyclopedia.com>. I. C. B. DEAR and M. R. D. FOOT. "Malmédy massacre." The Oxford Companion to World War II. 2001. Encyclopedia.com. (February 12, 2012). http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O129-Malmdymassacre.html I. C. B. DEAR and M. R. D. FOOT. "Malmédy massacre." The Oxford Companion to World War II. 2001. Retrieved February 12, 2012 from Encyclopedia.com: http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O129-Malmdymassacre.html |
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Malmédy Massacre
MALMÉDY MASSACREMALMÉDY MASSACRE (17 December 1944). During the Battle of the Bulge, the First SS Panzer Division under Lieutenant Colonel Joachim Peiper overran a convoy of Battery B, 285th Field Artillery Observation Battalion, in the Belgian Ardennes near the town of Malmédy. On 17 December 1944, the Germans marched approximately one hundred unarmed American prisoners into a field and systematically shot them. A few feigned death and escaped; eighty-six died. Peiper and seventy-two others were subsequently tried and convicted by an American tribunal. Forty-three, including Peiper, were sentenced to death by hanging, the others to imprisonment ranging from ten years to life. The death sentences were later commuted, and none of the convicted served a full prison sentence. Peiper was paroled after ten years. BIBLIOGRAPHYBauserman, John. The Malmédy Massacre. Shippensburg, Pa.: White Mane, 1995. Gallagher, Richard. The Malmédy Massacre. New York, 1964. Weingartner, James J. Crossroads of Death: The Story of the Malmédy Massacre and Trial. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1979. Whiting, Charles. Massacre at Malmédy: The Story of Jochen Peiper's Battle Group, Ardennes, December, 1944. New York: Stein and Day, 1971. Charles B.MacDonald/a. r. See alsoAtrocities in War ; Bulge, Battle of the ; Violence ; War, Laws of . |
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"Malmédy Massacre." Dictionary of American History. 2003. Encyclopedia.com. 12 Feb. 2012 <http://www.encyclopedia.com>. "Malmédy Massacre." Dictionary of American History. 2003. Encyclopedia.com. (February 12, 2012). http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1G2-3401802507.html "Malmédy Massacre." Dictionary of American History. 2003. Retrieved February 12, 2012 from Encyclopedia.com: http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1G2-3401802507.html |
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Malmédy
Malmédy , commune (1991 pop. 10,291), Liège prov., E Belgium, near the German border. Economic mainstays are tourism and the manufacture of beer, paper, and tanning fluid. The town and the surrounding district belonged to the abbey of nearby Stavelot until they passed (1815) to Prussia. Malmédy and Eupen were transferred to Belgium by the Treaty of Versailles after World War I. In World War II heavy fighting occurred at Malmédy during the Battle of the Bulge (Dec., 1944) and 72 U.S. prisoners of war were massacred by German troops. |
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"Malmédy." The Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th ed.. 2008. Encyclopedia.com. 12 Feb. 2012 <http://www.encyclopedia.com>. "Malmédy." The Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th ed.. 2008. Encyclopedia.com. (February 12, 2012). http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1E1-Malmedy.html "Malmédy." The Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th ed.. 2008. Retrieved February 12, 2012 from Encyclopedia.com: http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1E1-Malmedy.html |
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Malmédy
Malmédy, Belgium Malmundarium ‘Cleansed from Evil Ones’. Established around a 7th‐century monastery, it was an ecclesiastical principality before being awarded to Prussia after the Congress of Vienna in 1815 and to Belgium after the Treaty of Versailles in 1919.
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JOHN EVERETT-HEATH. "Malmédy." Concise Dictionary of World Place-Names. 2005. Encyclopedia.com. 12 Feb. 2012 <http://www.encyclopedia.com>. JOHN EVERETT-HEATH. "Malmédy." Concise Dictionary of World Place-Names. 2005. Encyclopedia.com. (February 12, 2012). http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O209-Malmdy.html JOHN EVERETT-HEATH. "Malmédy." Concise Dictionary of World Place-Names. 2005. Retrieved February 12, 2012 from Encyclopedia.com: http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O209-Malmdy.html |
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