Curt von Gottberg
Encyclopedia
Curt von Gottberg was a Nazi
official and military commander. Beginning in October 1942, within a few years he had personally combined the highest civil and military powers in occupied
Belarus
: from March 1943 as representative of the HSSPF for central Russia
, and from October 1943 as the acting Commissioner-General of the occupied Belorussian SSR . Only a few days before the collapse of the German Army Group Centre, in early July 1944, he was promoted to HSSPF of Belarus and central Russia.
Gottberg is known to have personally ordered many actions resulting in war crimes, and commanded units that committed atrocities against the civilian population of occupied territories.
, to an old Farther Pomerania
n aristocratic family. After a training in agricultural management, from 1912, he fought in World War I
, serving from 2 August 1914. He served through nearly the entire war, receiving numerous bullet and shell wounds, and was decorated with the Iron Cross
1st and 2nd Class. Along with other demobilised officers, he then joined the Marinebrigade Ehrhardt
(a Freikorps
). Gottberg returned to East Prussia in 1924, finished his agricultural training and until the end of the 1920s managed personal estates near Königsberg.
in 1931, and the NDSAP in February 1932. In September 1932 he joined the SS. By the end of 1933, as an SS-Sturmbannführer, he was head of a Verfügungstruppe in Ellwangen
: the desire to construct a military force (the basis for the Waffen-SS
) compelled the SS leadership to rely on trained military personnel from World War I.
In 1936, Gottberg assumed leadership of the 49th SS-Standarte in Brunswick
. In January 1936 Gottberg was involved in a car accident, and his left leg was amputated below the knee. Heinrich Himmler
personally intervened on his behalf: the cost of medical care and of the damaged car (which was not Gottberg's) was covered. Himmler also intervened so that Gottberg was promoted to head of the Office of Race and Settlement (RuSHA) in July 1937. However, Gottberg became overwhelmed by his duties; by summer 1939 he was also the acting Commissar of Land Management for Prague
. Gottberg's financial mismanagement in these roles (dubious transactions, "donations", loans to private individuals, lack of supervision of subordinates, losses running into the millions) led to a scandal within the SS administration. In November 1939 his superior at RuSHA, Günther Pancke
, called for Gottberg's resignation, even threatening him with dispatch to a concentration camp.
His suspension and 'house arrest' lasted until November 1940, after interventions on his behalf. The long-delayed disciplinary proceedings at an internal SS court took place in April 1942, ending with Gottberg's rehabilitation. It was decided that "factual errors" had led him to make "inappropriate" decisions, but that he had also conducted himself with "remarkable" persistence, intelligence and "personal devotion".
was killed by a bomb in Minsk
on 23 October.
Gottberg developed a new 'strategy' in the fight against partisans
on the occupied territory of the Soviet Union
, mounting aggressive operations against suspected 'partisan bases' (generally ordinary villages; Gottberg's strategy seems to have largely involved terrorising the civilian population). Whole regions were classified as "gangster territory" : residents were expelled or murdered and dwellings destroyed. "In the evacuated areas," said Gottberg in an order, "all people are in future fair game". An order of Gottberg's of December 7, 1942 stated: "Each bandit, Jew, gypsy, is to be regarded as an enemy". After his first operation, Nürnberg, Gottberg reported on 5 December 1942: "Enemy dead: 799 bandits, over 300 suspected gangsters and over 1800 Jews [...] Our losses: 2 dead and 10 wounded. One must have luck".
As a result, Kampfgruppe
von Gottberg, along with the Dirlewanger
and Kaminski Brigades, under the coordination of Erich von dem Bach-Zelewski, were responsible for the organised mass murder of countless civilians in Belarus. Within a short time Gottberg had received the highest military awards, and a few days before the collapse of the front in June 1944 was promoted to HSSPF for Central Russia and Belarus, and on 30 June to the rank of Obergruppenführer.
The defeat of Army Group Centre saw Kampfgruppe von Gottberg thrown into front-line service against the Red Army
's Minsk
, Vilnius and Belostock Offensive Operation
s, all part of the strategic offensive Operation Bagration. His forces were tasked with helping to defend Minsk and subsequently Lida
, though in both cases they withdrew (contrary to Wehrmacht
orders) when faced with Soviet attack.
Gottberg was made the head of anti-partisan activity in occupied France
, but because of the rapid German retreat was not employed in this role. Shortly before the war's end he commanded the XII SS Corps.
In March 1945, Himmler put Gottberg in charge of screening the railroad system for soldiers who were traveling away from fighting fronts. Joseph Goebbels
also directed Gottberg that spring as desperate efforts were made to send men who had been released from the Wehrmacht back to combat.
on 31 May 1945 while in British
captivity in Flensburg
.
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
official and military commander. Beginning in October 1942, within a few years he had personally combined the highest civil and military powers in occupied
Occupation of Belarus by Nazi Germany
The occupation of Belarus by Nazi Germany occurred as part of the German invasion of the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941 and ended in August 1944 with the Soviet Operation Bagration.- Background :...
Belarus
Belarus
Belarus , officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe, bordered clockwise by Russia to the northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Its capital is Minsk; other major cities include Brest, Grodno , Gomel ,...
: from March 1943 as representative of the HSSPF for central Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
, and from October 1943 as the acting Commissioner-General of the occupied Belorussian SSR . Only a few days before the collapse of the German Army Group Centre, in early July 1944, he was promoted to HSSPF of Belarus and central Russia.
Gottberg is known to have personally ordered many actions resulting in war crimes, and commanded units that committed atrocities against the civilian population of occupied territories.
Early life
Gottberg was born in Preußisch Wilten, East PrussiaEast Prussia
East Prussia is the main part of the region of Prussia along the southeastern Baltic Coast from the 13th century to the end of World War II in May 1945. From 1772–1829 and 1878–1945, the Province of East Prussia was part of the German state of Prussia. The capital city was Königsberg.East Prussia...
, to an old Farther Pomerania
Farther Pomerania
Farther Pomerania, Further Pomerania, Transpomerania or Eastern Pomerania , which before the German-Polish border shift of 1945 comprised the eastern part of the Duchy, later Province of Pomerania, roughly stretching from the Oder River in the West to Pomerelia in the East...
n aristocratic family. After a training in agricultural management, from 1912, he fought in World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
, serving from 2 August 1914. He served through nearly the entire war, receiving numerous bullet and shell wounds, and was decorated with the Iron Cross
Iron Cross
The Iron Cross is a cross symbol typically in black with a white or silver outline that originated after 1219 when the Kingdom of Jerusalem granted the Teutonic Order the right to combine the Teutonic Black Cross placed above a silver Cross of Jerusalem....
1st and 2nd Class. Along with other demobilised officers, he then joined the Marinebrigade Ehrhardt
Marinebrigade Ehrhardt
The Marinebrigade Ehrhardt was a Free Corps group of around 6,000 men formed by Captain Hermann Ehrhardt in the aftermath of World War I, also known as II Marine Brigade or the Ehrhardt Brigade...
(a Freikorps
Freikorps
Freikorps are German volunteer military or paramilitary units. The term was originally applied to voluntary armies formed in German lands from the middle of the 18th century onwards. Between World War I and World War II the term was also used for the paramilitary organizations that arose during...
). Gottberg returned to East Prussia in 1924, finished his agricultural training and until the end of the 1920s managed personal estates near Königsberg.
Early SS career
Following a common route for former Freikorps members, Gottberg joined the SASturmabteilung
The Sturmabteilung functioned as a paramilitary organization of the National Socialist German Workers' Party . It played a key role in Adolf Hitler's rise to power in the 1920s and 1930s...
in 1931, and the NDSAP in February 1932. In September 1932 he joined the SS. By the end of 1933, as an SS-Sturmbannführer, he was head of a Verfügungstruppe in Ellwangen
Ellwangen
Ellwangen an der Jagst, officially Ellwangen , in common use simply Ellwangen is a town in the district of Ostalbkreis in the east of Baden-Württemberg in Germany...
: the desire to construct a military force (the basis for the Waffen-SS
Waffen-SS
The Waffen-SS was a multi-ethnic and multi-national military force of the Third Reich. It constituted the armed wing of the Schutzstaffel or SS, an organ of the Nazi Party. The Waffen-SS saw action throughout World War II and grew from three regiments to over 38 divisions, and served alongside...
) compelled the SS leadership to rely on trained military personnel from World War I.
In 1936, Gottberg assumed leadership of the 49th SS-Standarte in Brunswick
Braunschweig
Braunschweig , is a city of 247,400 people, located in the federal-state of Lower Saxony, Germany. It is located north of the Harz mountains at the farthest navigable point of the Oker river, which connects to the North Sea via the rivers Aller and Weser....
. In January 1936 Gottberg was involved in a car accident, and his left leg was amputated below the knee. Heinrich Himmler
Heinrich Himmler
Heinrich Luitpold Himmler was Reichsführer of the SS, a military commander, and a leading member of the Nazi Party. As Chief of the German Police and the Minister of the Interior from 1943, Himmler oversaw all internal and external police and security forces, including the Gestapo...
personally intervened on his behalf: the cost of medical care and of the damaged car (which was not Gottberg's) was covered. Himmler also intervened so that Gottberg was promoted to head of the Office of Race and Settlement (RuSHA) in July 1937. However, Gottberg became overwhelmed by his duties; by summer 1939 he was also the acting Commissar of Land Management for Prague
Prague
Prague is the capital and largest city of the Czech Republic. Situated in the north-west of the country on the Vltava river, the city is home to about 1.3 million people, while its metropolitan area is estimated to have a population of over 2.3 million...
. Gottberg's financial mismanagement in these roles (dubious transactions, "donations", loans to private individuals, lack of supervision of subordinates, losses running into the millions) led to a scandal within the SS administration. In November 1939 his superior at RuSHA, Günther Pancke
Günther Pancke
Günther Friedrich Wilhelm Ludwig Pancke was an SS-Obergruppenführer and the Higher SS and Police Leader of Denmark....
, called for Gottberg's resignation, even threatening him with dispatch to a concentration camp.
His suspension and 'house arrest' lasted until November 1940, after interventions on his behalf. The long-delayed disciplinary proceedings at an internal SS court took place in April 1942, ending with Gottberg's rehabilitation. It was decided that "factual errors" had led him to make "inappropriate" decisions, but that he had also conducted himself with "remarkable" persistence, intelligence and "personal devotion".
Later SS career and war crimes
Gottberg was successively promoted as the head of SS and police for Belarus between October 1942 and June 1944 due to Himmler's sponsorship. He was delegated with the duties of the Generalkommissar for Belarus on 27 October 1943 after Wilhelm KubeWilhelm Kube
Wilhelm Kube was a German politician and Nazi official. He was an important figure in the German Christian movement during the early years of Nazi rule. During the war he became a senior official in the occupying government of the Soviet Union, achieving the rank of Generalkommissar for...
was killed by a bomb in Minsk
Minsk
- Ecological situation :The ecological situation is monitored by Republican Center of Radioactive and Environmental Control .During 2003–2008 the overall weight of contaminants increased from 186,000 to 247,400 tons. The change of gas as industrial fuel to mazut for financial reasons has worsened...
on 23 October.
Gottberg developed a new 'strategy' in the fight against partisans
Soviet partisans
The Soviet partisans were members of a resistance movement which fought a guerrilla war against the Axis occupation of the Soviet Union during World War II....
on the occupied territory of the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
, mounting aggressive operations against suspected 'partisan bases' (generally ordinary villages; Gottberg's strategy seems to have largely involved terrorising the civilian population). Whole regions were classified as "gangster territory" : residents were expelled or murdered and dwellings destroyed. "In the evacuated areas," said Gottberg in an order, "all people are in future fair game". An order of Gottberg's of December 7, 1942 stated: "Each bandit, Jew, gypsy, is to be regarded as an enemy". After his first operation, Nürnberg, Gottberg reported on 5 December 1942: "Enemy dead: 799 bandits, over 300 suspected gangsters and over 1800 Jews [...] Our losses: 2 dead and 10 wounded. One must have luck".
As a result, Kampfgruppe
Kampfgruppe
In military history and military slang, the German term Kampfgruppe can refer to a combat formation of any kind, but most usually to that employed by the German Wehrmacht and its allies during World War II and, to a lesser extent, in World War I...
von Gottberg, along with the Dirlewanger
Oskar Dirlewanger
Oskar Paul Dirlewanger was a World War II officer of the SS who commanded the SS-Sturmbrigade Dirlewanger, a penal battalion composed of German criminals...
and Kaminski Brigades, under the coordination of Erich von dem Bach-Zelewski, were responsible for the organised mass murder of countless civilians in Belarus. Within a short time Gottberg had received the highest military awards, and a few days before the collapse of the front in June 1944 was promoted to HSSPF for Central Russia and Belarus, and on 30 June to the rank of Obergruppenführer.
The defeat of Army Group Centre saw Kampfgruppe von Gottberg thrown into front-line service against the Red Army
Red Army
The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army started out as the Soviet Union's revolutionary communist combat groups during the Russian Civil War of 1918-1922. It grew into the national army of the Soviet Union. By the 1930s the Red Army was among the largest armies in history.The "Red Army" name refers to...
's Minsk
Minsk Offensive Operation
The Minsk Offensive was part of the second phase of the Belorussian Strategic Offensive of the Red Army in summer 1944, commonly known as Operation Bagration.-Operational goals:...
, Vilnius and Belostock Offensive Operation
Belostock Offensive Operation
The Belostock Offensive was part of the third and final phase of the Belorussian Strategic Offensive of the Red Army in summer 1944, commonly known as Operation Bagration.-Role in the conflict:...
s, all part of the strategic offensive Operation Bagration. His forces were tasked with helping to defend Minsk and subsequently Lida
Lida
Lida is a city in western Belarus in Hrodna Voblast, situated 160 km west of Minsk. It is the fourteenth largest city in Belarus.- Etymology :...
, though in both cases they withdrew (contrary to Wehrmacht
Wehrmacht
The Wehrmacht – from , to defend and , the might/power) were the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the Heer , the Kriegsmarine and the Luftwaffe .-Origin and use of the term:...
orders) when faced with Soviet attack.
Gottberg was made the head of anti-partisan activity in occupied France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, but because of the rapid German retreat was not employed in this role. Shortly before the war's end he commanded the XII SS Corps.
In March 1945, Himmler put Gottberg in charge of screening the railroad system for soldiers who were traveling away from fighting fronts. Joseph Goebbels
Joseph Goebbels
Paul Joseph Goebbels was a German politician and Reich Minister of Propaganda in Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945. As one of Adolf Hitler's closest associates and most devout followers, he was known for his zealous oratory and anti-Semitism...
also directed Gottberg that spring as desperate efforts were made to send men who had been released from the Wehrmacht back to combat.
Arrest and death
Gottberg was arrested by the Allies after the war's end. He committed suicideSuicide
Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Suicide is often committed out of despair or attributed to some underlying mental disorder, such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, alcoholism, or drug abuse...
on 31 May 1945 while in British
Great Britain
Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...
captivity in Flensburg
Flensburg
Flensburg is an independent town in the north of the German state of Schleswig-Holstein. Flensburg is the centre of the region of Southern Schleswig...
.