„America ‚loaned‘ other types of military hardware too: aircraft, trucks, ammunition, explosives, and so forth. If not for this lavish aid, the Soviets would’ve lost the war and ceased to exist as a regime, likely a fatal setback for world Communism.“

Veröffentlicht am 19/06/2024 von Clarissa Schnabel

This is just another little side quest that I have been wanting to get into for several years. So far without success; therefore, I’m putting it out there in the hopes that the magic of the internet might prompt somebody who knows something to find this post and contact me. It has happened before.

Robert K. Wilcox wrote the book Target Patton, one of several authors who speculated that General George S. Patton’s accident in December 1945 (as a result of which he died about two weeks later) might not have been an accident at all. In fact, among Germans and especially German POWs at the time it was widely accepted that Patton had been murdered for political reasons, especially his anti-Soviet stance.
Others, including popular YouTuber Mark Felton, have rebuffed this theory. When an extraordinary person dies in ordinary circumstances, Felton argued, it is only natural that people should refuse to accept this simple explanation. Well, according to Wilcox, the circumstances were anything but ordinary – however, I don’t know and don’t really care either way. What I do care about is that there is still something to discover.

One of the passengers in the army truck that collided with General Patton’s car was a German civilian employee of the US army, and that is certainly something that I know how to research! Let’s see what Wilcox and his sources have to say about it.

It seems that Robert L. Thompson, about whom information is scarce, had no reason to be on the road that Sunday morning. Farago wrote, „Thompson was ‚in violation of the rules and his own routine. He had no orders to go anywhere … he had taken out the truck as a lark for a joyride with a couple of his buddies after a night of drinking … The three of them were in the cabin, in another infraction of the rules. Only two persons were allowed….'“

The same goes for his two unlawful passengers – if that was the number in his cab – one of whom was identified in a confidential Seventh Army Public Relations Officer (PRO) document as „Frank Krummer, a civilian employe [sic] of the signal company.“ Both Thompson and Krummer, according to the document, worked at the 141st Signal Company of the 1st Armored Division at Gmund, some fifty miles south of Mannheim, near Stuttgart. What were they doing that far north on a shutdown Sunday? According to Farago, Thompson was „in violation of the rules“ in having two passengers in the cab and „out of his own routine. He had no orders to go anywhere this Sunday morning.“

First of all, the place is „Gmünd“, not „Gmund“ – a not unimportant difference. (No, you Anglos out there: „ü“ is not pronounced „u“. That’s why there are two dots above the letter.) Second, the place is „Schwäbisch Gmünd“ by its full name. A town by the name of „Gmund am Tegernsee“ also exists, but is not the one we are looking for.

And what about Frank Krummer, the German civilian reported in the Seventh Army documents to have been in Thompson’s truck? Seventh Army had jurisdiction over the accident. The papers discuss an investigation of the crash that has never been found.
Are we just to dismiss the documents?
I have not been able to locate Krummer or any of his family, which is not surprising given the meager information I have and the fact that Krummer is a fairly common German name. It is also possible that whatever effort I did expend was for naught because, like „Spruce,“ the name might have been mistakenly or purposely misspelled.

Wilcox is certainly correct about that. Given the Gmünd/Gmund mixup and that fact that US Army papers at the time wrote „Schwabisch Gmund“, Mr Krummer’s name just might have been „Krümmer“. It might even have been „Krammer“ and simply been written down „by ear“, resulting in „Krummer“. („a“ in German is pronounced just that – „Aaah“. 🙂 )
Furthermore, his first name likely was „Franz“, not Frank. Frank was not a common first name in Germany at that time, and since his last name begins with a K, it is likely that whoever wrote the report didn’t pay attention. So what we are looking for is somebody named either Franz or Frank, with the surname of Krummer, Krümmer or Krammer, who worked for the 141st Signal Company and probably lived in Schwäbisch Gmünd in December 1945.

The problem is, there is no such person on record. I asked at the town archive of Schwäbisch Gmünd where the old registry is kept. It is possible that he didn’t live in Gmünd and so of course wasn’t registered there.
There are plenty of Franz Krümmers or Krammers at the Bundesarchiv, Ancestry, or the Volksbund, but without more information it’s impossible to say whether our man is one of them. To complicate matters,

What happened to Thompson’s mysterious passengers? Where is Frank Krummer? Who was Frank Krummer? Is that a real name or a cover? Who and where is the third unnamed passenger? Both are mentioned as being in the truck with Thompson in the formerly classified Seventh Army PRO documents, as well as to a lesser degree in Farago’s Last Days. Then they disappear. Were they also taken to London? One of them – it is not clear which – was described in the PRO documents as a „German civilian.“ It appears to be Krummer. What was a German civilian doing in an army truck?

So Wilcox is not even sure that Krummer was said German civilian. It might have been the third, unnamed person in the truck. Perhaps Frank Krummer was actually an American (there were quite a number of US civilians in the employ of the occupation authorities), and both Wilcox and subsequently myself have looked for him in the wrong places.

At any rate, maybe a chance find will help me out here. If you know something about the mysterious Mr Krummer or any other aspect of the whole affair, please let me know!

Voices from the past: An American in the Waffen-SS

Veröffentlicht am 02/05/2023 von Clarissa Schnabel

Every once in a while, I come across really interesting stories. Theodore „Teddy“ Walling was born in Chicago to German emigrants who, in 1938, returned to Germany as the US economy had still not recovered from the great crash and life in Hitler’s Germany offered better prospects. At age 17, Teddy volunteered for the Waffen-SS, mainly – as was probably the case with so many young men – because of the glamorous image he had in his head of the Panzer troops. Of course, things did not turn out quite as planned.
In 1945, after an odyssey from the eastern front to Bavaria, Teddy initially found himself in a good position – capable translators were in hot demand. But inevitably, his past got out, and he was interned in one of the special camps for SS personnel.

Years later I had to think of Otto Skorzeny. This Waffen-SS officer had founded a unit with English-speaking soldiers. They were dressed in US uniforms to cause confusion in the Allied lines during the Battle of the Bulge („Unternehmen Greif“). If they were captured, they would have been shot immediately as spies. Prisoner of war rights under the Geneva Convention ceased to apply in such cases. People who spoke particularly good English were selected. They all had to be well versed in American ways. They even had to learn how to stand and smoke „American“; all so that they would not attract attention. But I only found out about all that later.
I was glad that I did not belong to this unit and was never selected for such undertakings, although as a young adventurer and soldier I would have liked to play the role of the later James Bond. Perhaps this CIC man suspected that I had been in such a unit. […]

One day we heard that General George S. Patton, as military governor of Bavaria, had ordered that we be given better rations. „How can you win these people over to democracy if you lock them up in camps and let them starve?“ he is supposed to have said. This rumour reached us at the time. We were also told that he had visited the camps. When he found out that some of the inmates were 40 years old or older or had wives and children at home, he ordered the man to be released immediately. However, when these soldiers left the camp, they were picked up again by waiting trucks manned by CIC members and taken to another camp. Unfortunately, I never found out whether what we were told at the time was true.
But I know one thing, all of a sudden we got better food. We couldn’t believe it, we had suddenly been given American C rations. Instead of 300 calories, there were now, if I remember correctly, around 3600 calories. „Hooray, we are saved from starvation“, our people sang. Our men were insanely happy. The candles burned all night long. There was singing in all the barracks. In addition, there was something very special for everyone: chocolate and cigarettes. […]
Very soon the C-rations were replaced by good stew. At first it was 2400 calories and then it went down again to 1800. In the first weeks our emaciated bodies could not digest the rich food at all and many, including me, got rashes on their faces. My bedspread was all wet from the water that ran at night from the abscesses I had on my face. With time, however, it got better.
We were horrified to learn in December 1945 that General Patton had died in a car accident. We were all convinced that it was an assassination. This general knew world history too well. His statements against the Roosevelt policy and his pro-German remarks were not at all popular with the high authorities in Washington. He had recognised the great danger of communism and even then wanted to continue fighting the Soviets together with the Germans. Nowadays I think the general was right. The world would have been spared the Cold War and millions of people would have been freed from Stalin’s yoke sooner.
That this four-star general had just died in a traffic accident was a mystery to us soldiers. At that time, right after the war, there was almost no car traffic except for the Allies. When Patton drove through a town, the military police who always accompanied him had closed off all side streets. Most of the time, the sirens sounded too, and all traffic was stopped.

In front of our camp was a barrack occupied by some Americans. Over time, we became friends. They often invited me to visit them. They gave me better food and let me answer the phone for them, especially when they were out in the evening in the town of Auerbach looking for „Fräuleins“. Then they would shine up their civilian shoes, which they had traded for cigarettes from a German. Our women helped towards the Americans to get the friendship between our peoples going sooner. […]

Now this is an angle I’ve never considered before! 🙂

On Saturday evenings, when the Yanks went out, I often spoke on the phone with an American who was in charge of the switchboard at headquarters. His name was Max Berman. Max was often bored because there wasn’t much going on in the camp. All his comrades were dancing in Auerbach. Max and I became friends and we talked for hours when he wasn’t on duty. When I told him that I had no correspondence with my parents except for a postcard, he asked me if my parents had a telephone. My father had one in his Regensburg flat, but I didn’t know his number. Max said he could find out. It didn’t take long and I was able to speak to my father personally from the camp. […] I learned from him that he worked as an interpreter in Regensburg for the US military government. He also told me that he had recently had to travel to East Germany with his colonel to buy potatoes for the new spring tilling of the Bavarian fields. The two were arrested by the Russians and imprisoned for several days until they could be freed by top US officials in Berlin. That’s how „friendly“ the Russians were to the Americans. We know that without their material help they could not have won against us Germans.
The Russians were already doing everything to show the Americans that they were not wanted. This Soviet policy towards the USA only benefited us Germans. We Germans should be grateful to the Russians, because only through them had the Americans been able to determine who were actually their friends. […]

Quite. I’ve said it often, and I say it again in all seriousness: Thank God Almighty for the Cold War. Without it, I’m convinced my country would not have survived. Yes, things were that bad.

Soon the Yanks let me live with them fulltime. So I could often talk to my father in the evening with the help of my new friend Max. Max had fallen in love with a German girl and didn’t want to go back to the States without his Liesel. The US Army was already hard at demobilizing. But many Americans wanted to stay in Germany as civilians because they had fallen in love with German girls. If they didn’t have civil status here, they could apply and then get permission to work for the various US agencies.

(Theodore Walling: Junker Teddy)

Lauri Törni in Germany 1945 – Outtakes: The Goliath POW camp at Kalbe

Veröffentlicht am 18/07/2021 von Clarissa Schnabel

From the end of April 1945 until 1 July 1945, the fenced-in area of the Goliath transmitter served as a prison camp for German soldiers who were captured by the Americans. About 85,000 Germans are said to have lain here on the meadow grounds. Conditions in the camp were catastrophic, especially in the early days. There was no food, only some water; nettles and sorrel were delicacies. A few still had their „iron ration“ or some crispbread. Only gradually were small quantities given out. Potatoes and bread were brought in from all over the area, but with so many prisoners there was little for the individual.
It was reported that women from the surrounding villages went to the Goliath with handcarts full of mashed potatoes or turnips, often with a small child by the hand. Many simply wanted to help, and some of them usually had their father, husband, brother, son or uncle in mind. It was a case of, if I help here, maybe someone will also help my loved ones wherever they are. Solidarity was very important at that time.
Great care was taken to maintain hygiene. If this was not observed, the meagre daily rations were withheld. The first step was delousing in Red Cross tents, which was sometimes repeated several times. Latrines were set up for each section (100 men), which were about two spade holes wide, about half a metre deep and several metres long. After defecation, the latrine had to be covered immediately with earth. Later, chlorinated lime was given out to cover it. […] A German camp police was responsible for ensuring that these measures were observed. In this way, contagious diseases were largely avoided. Since most of the prisoners no longer had tents, they had to lie under the open sky. All the bushes and trees that still existed inside the camp fence had disappeared within a short time. They served as a base when lying down or as firewood.
Former SS soldiers were guarded separately behind barbed wire. Although the mood in the camp was not rosy for most prisoners, there were some who recorded camp life or wrote poems about it. During his internment, a trumpeter blew his bugle from the transmitter mast every evening at 10 p.m. for the last post. […]
As early as mid-May, labour crews were formed, which were mainly deployed in agriculture in the surrounding villages, this also served to better supply the prisoners with food.
At the same time the release began, the prisoners were brought in groups of 200 men to the release camp at the Kalbenser Trocknung. Since the release of the prisoners until 1 July 1945 could not be guaranteed, a few days before this date the transport of most of the prisoners began in long columns in open or tarpaulin-covered trucks, in day and night operations in the direction of Lower Saxony (British occupation zone). On 1 July 1945, Soviet soldiers and officers moved into Kalbe, also occupied the Goliath compound and took over the remaining prisoners. Some prisoners had voluntarily remained in the camp, wishing to be released into the Russian occupation zone. Documents exist according to which the last prisoners were not released until the beginning of September 1945.
(http://www.kalbe-milde.de/gol.php?pid=gol_4.php)

It has to be said that the Goliath camp was, all in all, exemplary for the times. Food was scarce in all POW camps, not to mention for most of the civilian population throughout Europe. The fact that the locals were allowed to provide the prisoners with food was not a given; in some other camps, they were actually turned away by the guards.
Conditions in POW camps depended to a large extend on who was running them, and also where they were situated. Goliath camp sat squarely in rural German territory, and apparently the US authorities in charge played firmly by the rules. They were not vicious or vindictive toward their charges – a marked difference to, for example, some camps on the western border of Germany or in formerly occupied countries. The food and housing situation was the same everywhere as there simply weren’t enough facilities to hold the huge number of POWs. Infrastructure had been destroyed. Cities lay in ruins. Considering the massive problems facing the occupying forces, the authorities at Goliath did everything right. They made use of all resources to provide food; they paid attention to hygiene; and they were quick to realise that sending the prisoners out to work was actually the only solution making sense: Why would you keep tens of thousands of hungry, bored men in cramped conditions when they could help on the surrounding farms where hands were badly needed? Again, I cannot help but draw comparisons to other, infamous camps where the prisoners were left for months to basically starve instead of either putting them to work or letting them go free so they could at least provide their own food and help with the rebuilding. That was either a result of bureaucracy, incompetence, or vindictiveness.
The Goliath authorities were also right on track of the terms of the Geneva Convention by starting to release their prisoners in May 1945. It either had to do with the upcoming transfer of jurisdiction for the area to Soviet authorities or, a more likely possibility that I haven’t looked into yet, Kalbe fell under the jurisdiction of Patton’s army, „the only [one] in the whole Theater to release significant numbers of captives during May 1945“, according to James Bacque.* The latest date of release, September 1945, was still early compared to many other camps, not only Soviet-, but also Western Allied-run ones from where soldiers did not return until more than one, two, five, or in extreme cases ten years after the war’s end.

Photographs: James M. Longacre

* (James Bacque: Other Losses, 3rd ed.)

As for the Goliath transmitter itself: Before it was dismantled, it was one of the most important radio transmitters in Germany, and there’s even a Törni connection.

With the transmitter, named „Goliath“ because of its size and technical complexity, fixed radio stations of the countries allied with Germany at the time could be reached safely and at any time.
For example, it was used for the Berlin-Tokyo connection because of its constant and absolute operational reliability and was involved in radio communication with the German embassies abroad.
However, it is best known for its radio communication with German submarines on all the world’s oceans. […]
Due to the aforementioned properties of the longitudinal waves, the submarines were able to receive transmissions at shallow depths even under water.
[…] In total, the navy had six main and five reserve transmitters during the war, which broadcast on longitudinal waves. The „Goliath“ was by far the most powerful.
(Friedrich-Wilhelm Schulz: „Funksendestellen in der Altmark“, in Altmark-Blätter, Vol. 10, no. 15 (1999))

So the submarine that brought Törni and Korpela to Germany in the first place possibly utilised Goliath.

The Lauri Törni in Germany 1945 series:

Introduction

Part 1

Outtake: Felix Steiner

Part 2

Part 3

Outtake: Odds and loose ends

Outtake: Riikka Ojanperä, and a visit from the beyond

More Törni-related blog content:

„Alles, was ich getan habe, geschah zum Wohle meines Landes.“

Operation Swift Strike III

Recovering the remains

Lauri Törni in Germany 1945 – Outtakes: Felix Steiner (1896-1966)

Veröffentlicht am 16/07/2021 von Clarissa Schnabel

Regard your soldiers as your children,
and they will follow you into the deepest battles.
Look upon them as your own beloved sons,
and they will stand by you even until death.

Sun Tzu: The Art of War

Felix Steiner was indeed a figure well known to Finnish SS volunteers, having commanded the SS Division Wiking, as part of which the Finnish SS battalion had fought. At this point, however, Steiner was no longer the commander of either the III (Germanic) SS Panzer Army Corps, which was made up mainly of foreign SS volunteers, or the 11th SS Panzer Army. Instead, on 21 April 1945, Steiner had taken command of the newly created Army Detachment (Armeeabteilung) Steiner. This was a group of hastily assembled understrength units intended to launch a light offensive against the Soviet forces of Zhukov’s 1st Belorussian Front in order to liberate Berlin from the blockades. However, Steiner, who had his command post near Eberswalde, north-east of Berlin, soon found that he did not have the troops or the armament to carry out the ambitious operation he had planned. Hitler realised the next day that Steiner would not follow the orders he had received.
(Juha Pohjonen & Oula Silvennoinen: Tuntematon Lauri Törni)

Felix Steiner, by all accounts, was revered by his men, and he cared for them. This is perhaps best reflected by the fact that Steiner later wrote two books trying to clear the name of the Waffen-SS and was working on a third (about his beloved Division „Wiking“) when he died in 1966. Whatever else might be said about Steiner and the Waffen-SS, it would appear that at least to his own men, Steiner was a good and considerate commander. If the story of Törni, Korpela and Sarasalo meeting Steiner on their journey toward Berlin is true, they would probably have been made welcome, both with quiet admiration for their foolhardy bravery and a bit of fatherly advice. „That fight is lost, lads. Better come westward with us.“ Offering them a place in his guard was perhaps his attempt of keeping them safe; however, it is equally possible that once he realised how determined they were to fight the Soviet advance, he would have sent them on, maybe even with some men – the prevailing rumour of a „unit“ under Törni’s command. Somebody had to try to hold the line in the east, after all, to allow as many soldiers and civilians as possible to escape to the western Allies.

As ordered, the 300 men lined up as the commander’s car drove up. And then he arrived, our revered „Felix“, as we all called him. After a warm welcome of the whole group, he walked down the ranks to greet everyone personally and say a few words to them. Then he was with me. I make my report. Steiner asks about unit, and being wounded, when and where. […]
Then he said to both of us: „After this, both of you get your luggage and go to my car.“ We can hardly believe it, our revered division commander wants to take us personally to the 13th [Company]. – Well, they’ll be in for a surprise! […]
We collected our luggage and reported to the Oberscharführer, who was driving the Gruppenführer’s Kübelwagen. Together we stowed what little luggage we had, but we didn’t dare get into the Kübel. Then Steiner came with a group of officers who took him to the car. Then to us: „What are you standing around for? Get in the car, I’m taking you to division headquarters as my bodyguard, there you can recuperate for a while.“ We were speechless, I quickly jumped into the car, Werner with his knee wasn’t so quick, the commander saw it and held the car door open for him!
(Günter Adam: „Ich habe meine Pflicht erfüllt!“)

It sounds trite to say that he was like a father to his soldiers, but if this could be said of any officer, it could be said of Felix Steiner! We idolised him and were blindly devoted to him. […]
When he reached me, his stern features lit up into a radiant smile. He had recognised me. And yet it had now been almost a year since I had taken part in a delegation of all ranks of the division that congratulated him at Narva on the occasion of his birthday. In the meantime, he had surely seen countless new faces and yet he recognised me. He called me by name! […] As if I belonged to his closest friends, he asked me the most personal questions, when I had last heard anything from home, how I had got through the last battles and whether I still felt comfortable in the comradeship of the Waffen-SS.
(Erik Wallin, quoted in Waldemar Schütz: General Felix Steiner)

It should be noted that I did not see our revered „Felix“ again until 1953 at the first meeting [of veterans] in Verden an der Aller. Steiner was standing on a street corner, elegantly dressed in a grey suit, surrounded by a circle of comrades. I thought it presumptuous to address him, but greeted him from a short distance. Steiner thanked me, looked at me, held out his hand and said, „Wait a minute, we know each other!“ – And before I could answer, his question came: „Guard unit, [under Unterscharführer] Surgau?“
(Günter Adam)

It’s easy to see how Steiner won the love and loyalty of his men. (In the words of Günter Adam: „We would let ourselves be torn to pieces for ‚our Felix‘.“) Of course, this did not endear him to his higher-ups.

[…] Steiner increasingly aroused the suspicion of Himmler and other senior SS leaders: Steiner had put too much focus on his own person and had seen the corps as his personal challenge, even speaking of „his troops“, Himmler disapproved. Likewise, the Reichsführer-SS knew about the constant mockery of his person in the casinos of the [Division] „Wiking“, which Steiner did not intervene against. SS-Obergruppenführer Gottlob Berger, head of the SS-Hauptamt, summed up in July 1943 that Steiner „simply cannot be taught“.
(Chris Helmecke: „Der Sturmsoldat“, in: Geschichte der Waffen-SS, Teil 4: 1945. Clausewitz Spezial)

Franz Riedweg recalled that stubborn, independent streak more nicely in his speech at Steiner’s funeral: „We all know that […] Felix Steiner has never been a convenient subordinate, and we openly state today that he has not always been the most convenient superior either.“ A trait that Steiner shared with a certain younger Finnish officer…

Steiner was also rather modern in his ideas of warfare which favoured well-trained teams assembled for specific tasks over large armies. Not quite special forces yet, but moving in that direction. There is a story about the first presentation of Steiner’s new style of combat to Hitler – who was bewildered, though impressed in the end.

[…] Steiner recognised that tactics which statically directed mass units in a war of material were bound to fail, whereas offensive operations by smaller, well-equipped assault battalions brought success. This experience shaped Steiner’s future thinking about military training. […] He placed great emphasis on shock troop training for his soldiers. Instead of barrack yard drills, the focus was on physically demanding combat exercises. […] „Sweat spares blood“ was Steiner’s motto; his goal was to develop an „assault trooper“ highly capable of fighting.
(Chris Helmecke)

One cannot help but feel Steiner would have done well in the US Army himself.
I wonder if Felix Steiner and Lauri Törni ever met after the war, especially in the late 1950s, when both were living in Bavaria. The chances aren’t great, but who knows? By some coincidence, they also died within less than a year from one another, Törni in October 1965, Steiner in May 1966.

Steiner’s grave (someone please correct me if I’m mistaken or just plain blind) appears to no longer exist by this point. It is still listed on Find A Grave, but when I went to Munich a few days ago, I could not find it on the plot named. There are a couple of new graves, and there are the broken foundations of where a headstone used to be. From the photos on Find A Grave, it could be the right place. (The bushes are taller now.) In absence of anything definitive, I chose to pay my respects there. I left some flowers – white and blue of course, the colours of both Finland and Bavaria! – and took one of the headstone shards as a memento.
Is it overkill, by the way, that the street that led me from the train station toward the cemetery is named Wikingerstraße?

There was always something going on at Gruppenführer Steiner’s in the evenings, so when we were on guard duty in front of his quarters we got to know almost all the higher leaders of the division. […]
There were also other illustrious guests at the division commander’s. Several times we were speechless when the Gruppenführer stepped out into the night and then made biting remarks about his guest to us. But we often saw our revered commander outgoing and cheerful. That probably infected us as well. We often celebrated.
One night I was standing in front of the commander’s bedroom window, which was on the smallish side but always open, when our platoon leader rode up on his little panje horse. He was quite juiced, dismounted and led the horse to the Gruppenführer’s window, and not exactly quietly. I tried to calm him down, but he insisted on showing his little horse the sleeping Gruppenführer, who was snoring loudly. Only with patience did I manage to get my superior to quiet down. Steiner hadn’t noticed anything, so all was well.
For Steiner could tolerate anything, only undisciplined behaviour and disorder were anathema to him. So our uniform always had to be impeccable and correct. At that time, there was no such thing as an open collar. He didn’t need us to accompany him often, and when he did, it was only to protect him from fighter planes. The commander was away a lot, often with the Fieseler Storch and often returned very late. Then we had to shoot flares so that the landing site could be found.
Eventually we got a new platoon leader. Untersturmführer G. was a little older, a reservist and a teacher in civilian life. He had no front-line experience yet. […] But he had other things on his agenda. Roll calls, drill, lessons, etc. – So duty during the day and guard duty at night!
He got on our hit list when he ordered a roll call and told us to open our flies to check whether we were wearing our long underwear as ordered. And this in front of the Russian women who were grinning broadly, since they knew all of us. […]
Then Rostov was taken. We advanced swiftly. First over the bridges and then further on. Gruppenführer Steiner is always on the move and now often takes one or two of us with him for safety. Once again I am the escort and sit in the back of the car with the machine gun. The division commander sits and sleeps in front. Suddenly he shouts: „Stop, we’re on the wrong road, turn left!“
It’s hard to believe, but I’ve seen Steiner react like that several times from half-asleep. And he was always right. It also happened that he spotted enemy planes or units before we did. Then he would just say: „Take the machine gun and shoot over there,“ while the car turned around.
We are advancing swiftly. The „Wiking“ is having great success, the Gruppenführer is in high spirits. Then the port city of Novorossiysk on the western foothills of the Caucasus on the Black Sea is taken. The Wehrmacht report says „by units of the army“ – the general flies into a rage. I experience it directly, because I am on guard duty at his command car. Something similar happens with Tuapse, the „Wiking“ is neglected. The division commander is also bitter about this.
(Günter Adam)

In the typology of Waffen-SS generals, he lay roughly between the warhorse Sepp Dietrich or Panzer-Meyer, and the more intellectual bosses like Hausser and Gille. […]
The agile gentleman impressed me. He looked like his East Prussian compatriot Paul Wegener, and seemed just as gnarled and sincere. He started by apologising for the sparse furniture and the many books lying around untidily. He kept an almost youthful firmness despite participation in two world wars, a 3-year imprisonment and internment. He was pleased to hear that I had also been with his „lost bunch“, as he called them, on the Eastern Front via the Nordland Division. He seemed natural and warm, neither chummy nor arrogant. However, one could tell from his voice that he was used to giving orders. […]
He made no secret of his aversion, almost hatred, toward Himmler. […] He lamented the betrayal of the [European Waffen-SS] volunteers, whose courage and willingness to make sacrifices had been abused by all; first the governments of the occupied countries, who almost urged them to join, and then the German authorities. He felt a certain complicity here, because he had not seen through the Himmlers and Company, as he called them, sooner. It literally brought tears to his eyes when he told of the hardships and harassment to which the volunteers were subjected in their homeland: „Look at Holland. A swine like Prince Bernhard sits there among the victors, pretends to have helped decide the battle, outbids others in vicious remarks, he, the former honorary member of the Reiter-SS. […]“
[…] Incidentally, I had to think of General Steiner recently when I read that during the war Prince Bernhard, sitting in London, is said to have advocated that the Americans should shoot a few hundred captured Dutch SS volunteers as a deterrent. […]
Surprisingly, Steiner considered the American tank general George Patton to be the most important army leader on the Allied side. He placed him above Eisenhower, Bradley, even Montgomery: „You know, this guy was a great sportsman in his youth. He had a feeling for the physical performance of his soldiers and above all he knew how decisive the personal example of an army commander can be in a battle. He was always in front. For me, he was an even greater master of the war of movement than Rommel. […]“
[…] In General Steiner I met one of the most remarkable people of my life. I was sorry then, and in a certain sense still am, that I turned him down for a journalistic collaboration, and I think I had to. I justified this to the General as follows: „Mr Steiner, I know what you want. You want to get the former Waffen-SS people out of the ghetto in which public opinion, partly formed by opportunism and partly by pandering to the victors, has placed them. I know that this is necessary. It must be said that in the Waffen-SS, the son of workers and farmers had the chance to become an officer, without A-levels and university degrees, by bravery and natural cleverness alone. It is also true that a future army would have to draw on just such people. But, Mr Steiner, they don’t want us. At most as cannon fodder for the Americans in a war against the Soviets. But I’ve had enough. I have to tell you truthfully that already a few months after joining the Waffen-SS I had reservations about the organisation, and later on I was even averse to it, although I have never met such brave and outstanding people in my life as I did then. So if I write for these people, I also benefit the organisation. And I don’t want that.“ Steiner did not interrupt me. At the end he said, slightly resigned: „It’s a pity, you would think differently about the Waffen-SS, even as an organisation, if you had joined the Wiking straight away. I maintain that we had more anti-Nazis in our ranks than in many divisions of the army. And be convinced that the Second Revolution would have come after the victory, and would have swept away all the brown bigwig scum.“
I think wishful thinking was involved in this statement. Steiner was right in many respects, although it must be added that he was too optimistic about the situation.
(Franz Schönhuber: Ich war dabei)