Le Paradis massacre

Coordinates: 15°10′42″N, 108°52′10″E

Le Paradis Massacre
Location	Le Paradis village, commune of Lestrem, Northern France
Target(s)	2nd Battalion Royal Norfolk Regiment
Date	May 27, 1940
Attack type	Mass execution of POWs
Deaths	97
Injured	2
Perpetrator(s)	14th Company, 3rd SS Division Totenkopf SS Hauptsturmführer Fritz Knöchlein

The Le Paradis massacre was an atrocity committed by members of the 14th Company, SS Division Totenkopf under the command of Hauptsturmführer Fritz Knochlein against ninety-nine hors de combat members of the 2nd Battalion of the Royal Norfolk Regiment on May 26, 1940 during World War II. The incident took place as the British Expeditionary Force was attempting to retreat through the Pas-de-Calais region during the evacuation from Dunkirk. Soldiers of the Royal Norfolks were isolated from their regiment, and held out in a farmhouse against an attack by Waffen-SS forces in the village of Le Paradis. After running out of ammunition, the defendants surrendered to the German troops who led them across the road to a wall and machine-gunned them. Ninety-seven British troops died, but two survived although injured and hid until being captured days later. The commander of the German SS unit who ordered the massacre, Fritz Knochlein, was tracked down, convicted by a war-crimes court and executed in 1949.

Background

The German invasion of France through the Netherlands and Belgium commenced just after dawn on the 10 May, 1940. Army Group A under the command of Colonel General Gerd von Rundstedt fought its way through southern Belgium and north-eastern France. German forces pushed the French Army and the BEF to the Meuse on 12 May, crossing it that evening.^[1][2] From there, they rapidly advanced to the English Channel over the course of the next week. Units, including detached companies of the Royal Norfolks and Royal Scots were used by allied command in an attempt to slow the German advance down in northern France, which would allow more time to evacuate troops from Dunkirk.^[3][4][5]

SS Division Totenkopf

The men of SS Division Totenkopf had been indoctrinated with a strong sense of Nazi Party idealogy by its commander Theodor Eicke. They had a fanatical loyalty to him and Germany, along with an imbued hatred of Jews, Britain and the United States of America.^[6] The Battle of France was SS Division Totenkopf's first major engagement of World War II and they were part of the reserves of Army Group A, being called to the front line on 17 May. The unit was engaged in "mopping up" operations against Allied forces to the north and east of Cambrai.^[7][8] It should be noted that in total sixteen-thousand prisoners had been taken by the division, but that they had refused the surrender of two-hundred French-Moroccan troops. In total, only one hundred were taken in the area and two-hundred non-white, French soldiers were refused surrender and killed on the spot.^[9] The men of Totenkopf fought recklessly throughout the campaign, suffering comparatively higher death rates that other German forces.^[10] By this time, the first German units had reached the English Channel but the British counter-attacked under Major-General G. Le Q. Martel just west of Arras, on 21 May. The Totenkopf division suffered casualties of just under a hundred men in repelling the counter-attack.^[11] The Totenkopf was then ordered to the town of Béthune by General Erich Hoepner and crossed the La Bassée river under British attack on the 24 May. However, the men were ordered to retreat the next day on direct orders from Adolf Hitler. The order was issued to preserve tanks for the upcoming campaign and to allow the Luftwaffe the chance to attack Allied positions in the area.^[12] However the men had to make the hazardous crossing again on the night of the 26 May. The SS men then took Béthune after heavy house-to-house fighting with the British, who then withdrew to a line between Locon and Le Paradis.^[13]

Royal Norfolk Regiment

The 2nd Battalion of the Royal Norfolks, along with the 8th Lancashire Fusiliers, were holding the Allied line at the villages of Riez du Vinage, Le Cornet Malo and Le Paradis with the battalion headquarters based at Le Paradis. The battalions had been ordered to hold out for as long as possible against the Germans to give as much time as possible for the BEF to evacuate from Dunkirk.^[14] The SS Division Totenkopf emerged from the Bois de Paqueaut wood and attacked Le Cornet Malo at dawn, on the 27 May. The British troops defended stubbornly but were eventually overrun, the attack resulting in the deaths of four German officers and one hundred and fifty men. Another four hundred and eighty men and eighteen officers were wounded. Later the same day the German troops moved forward to attack Le Paradis.^[15][16][17]

Battle of Le Paradis

Fritz Knöchlein pictured on May 27 1941

After the engagement at Le Cornet Malo, C company and HQ Company of the 2nd Royal Norfolks had fallen back to their headquarters at Cornet Farm just outside Le Paradis. The company commanders had been informed by radio that their units were isolated and would receive no assistance.^[18] They therefore dug in around the farmhouse, which lay on the Rue du Paradis road, the boundary between the Royal Norfolk Regiment and the adjacent 1st Royal Scots. The Norfolk's last contact with Brigade Headquarters at L'Epinette was at 11:30 but despite no support and heavy opposition, the defenders held out against the 14th Company, 1st Battalion of the 2nd SS Infantry Regiment, until 17:15 when they ran out of ammunition.^[19][20] During the battle the Germans had attacked the farmhouse with mortars, tanks, and artillery shelling, which destroyed the building and forced the defenders to relocate to a cowshed.^[21][22] The ninety-nine surviving defenders of the 2nd Norfolks were eventually ordered to surrender by their commander Major Lisle Ryder, and they left the cowshed in which they had been defending under a white flag.^[23] The British handed themselves over to a company under the command of SS Hauptsturmführer Fritz Knöchlein - as to the boundary between the two British regiments was the road dividing the position, Ryder's men surrendered to Knöchlein, who had been fighting the Royal Scots.^[24] Recent evidence suggests that around twenty men of the Royal Scots who surrended to a SS unit may also have been murdered.^[25]

Massacre

The British captives, a majority of whom were wounded, were disarmed and marched down a road off the Rue du Paradis. While they were waiting two machine-guns from No.4 Machine-gun Company were prepared and set up by a barn in a paddock of the farm.^[26] The British prisoners were marched to the barn, lined up alongside it and were then fired upon by the two German machinegunners, who continued firing until all the British had fallen. Knöchlein then armed his men with bayonets and they finished off any remaining survivors. Satisfied that they had killed them all, the German soldiers left to rejoin the rest of their regiment.^[27][28][29]

The farmhouse where the survivors of the Royal Norfolks surrended

An account by Private Albert Pooley; one of only two survivors:

... we turned off the dusty French road, through a gateway and into a meadow beside the buildlings of a farm. I saw with one of the nastiest feelings I have ever had in my life two heavy machine guns inside the meadow ... pointing at the head of our column. The guns began to spit fire ... for a few seconds the cries and shrieks of our stricken men drowned the crackling of the guns. Men fell like grass before a scythe ... I felt a searing pain and pitched forward ... my scream of pain mingled with the cries of my mates, but even before I feel into the heap of dying men, the though stabbed my brain 'If I ever get out of here, the swine that did this will pay for it.'^[30]

In total, ninety-seven British prisoners were killed and the bodies then buried in a shallow mass grave the next day by forced French civilians. However, despite the German efforts, Private William O'Callaghan survived and pulled Private Albert Pooley alive from among the bodies in the field. The pair then hid in a pig-sty for three days and nights, surviving on raw potatoes and water from puddles before being discovered by the farm's owner, Madame Duquenne-Creton, and her son Victor. The French civilians risked their lives caring for the two men, who were later captured by the Wehrmacht's 251st Infantry Division.^[31][32]

Aftermath

On the day after the massacre, the 28 May, Gunter d'Alquen, a journalist in the Waffen-SS arrived at the scene with Dr Thum, the SS-Totenkopf deputy legal advisor. d'Alquen made a report of what he saw:

It was possible to look into the back yard from the road...the corpses in British uniform were lying in the yard near the buildings. They were lying in such a position that one can assume they were killed by machine-gun bursts. It struck me at once that the dead soldiers were not wearing helmets, nor did they have any equipment on them...I took pictures of the dead bodies, and the whole farm. At Thum's request these were to be placed at the disposal of the division...I believe I was already sitting there in the vehicle when Thum...told me that in the field which he had returned the equipment...the shot British soldiers were lying in a heap, from which he had come to the conclusion that a summary trial had taken place.^[33]

Another report was made by Major Friedkerr von Riedner, who was also at the scene of the massacre on that day.

These people had almost all suffered head wounds from shots that must have been fired at close range. Some had their whole skull smashed in, an injury that can almost only be caused by a blow from a gun butt or similar means. ^[34]

News of the massacre spread to neighbouring German divisions, eventually reaching General Hoepner, commander of the German forces in France. He disliked the SS, especially Eicke, and was determined to have him dismissed if charges of mistreatment or murdering of prisoners could be brought. However none of these investigations were ever successful, possibly because Knöchlein stated that the British had been using dumdum bullets, thus violating the Hague Convention of 1899.^[35] Even many SS officers were appalled by the massacre, some reportedly even challenged Knöchlein to a duel, although none was ever fought.^[36] The Allies received no information about the massacre until the summer of 1943, when Pooley, who had spent the last three years in a German hospital due to the injuries he had suffered in the massacre, was declared medically unfit and repatriated. However, Pooley's story was not believed on his arrival by the British authorities; it was not thought that the German army were capable of such atrocities against British troops.^[37] Private O'Callaghan did not return to the United Kingdom until 1945 after the liberation of his prisoner-of-war camp. He confirmed Pooley's story, which prompted an official investigation.^[38] The bodies of those killed in the massacre were exhumed in 1942 by the French, but only about fifty of the ninety-seven remains were successfully identified. The bodies were then reburied in Le Paradis churchyard, which now forms part of the Le Paradis War Cemetery administered by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission.^[39] In 1970, a memorial plaque was placed on the barn wall where the massacre took place and a large memorial was subequently erected beside the Church.^[40][41]

Trial of Knöchlein

Further information: Fritz Knochlein

After the war, the evidence of O'Callaghan and the discovery of the SS-run extermination camps prompted the British authorities to look into the reports. The massacre was investigated by the War Crimes Investigation Unit and after Knöchlein's company was identified as the perpertrators in 1947, he was traced and arrested in Germany.^[42] Knöchlein was arraigned on charges of war crimes in August 1948; to which he pleaded not guilty:

O'Callaghan and Pooley in Hamburg during the trial

The accused Fritz Knöchlein, a German national, in the charge of the Hamburg Garrison Unit, pursuant to Regulation 4 of the Regulations for the Trial of War Criminals, is charged with committing a war crime in that he in the vicinity of Paradis, Pas-de-Calais, France, on or about 27 May 1940, in violation of the laws and usages of war, was concerned in the killing of about ninety prisoners-of-war, members of The Royal Norfolk Regiment and other British Units.^[43]

He was tried before Curiohaus war crimes court in Altona, Hamburg, in Court Number 5 on Monday, 11 October, 1948. Knöchlein's defence hinged on the claim that he was not present at the massacre, although his lawyers did not deny that the event took place. They also claimed that the British had used dumdum bullets during the battle and misused a flag of truce; all of which was vigorously denied by the prosecution.^[44] Evidence was given by Pooley, O'Callaghan, Madame Duquenne-Creton, and a French civilian who testified to recognizing Knöchlein.^[45] On the twelfth day of the trial, during his summing up, the Judge-Advocate said that whether the British had or had not used illegal ammunition or abused a flag of truce was irrelevant; the German troops still had absolutely no right to execute prisoners of war without a fair and proper trial. On 25 October at 11:30, the verdict was read out by the President of the court. This asserted that the defendant, Fritz Knöchlein, had been found guilty of war crimes. His lawyer, Dr. Uhde, made the following plea to the court for clemency on account of Knöchlein's wife and family, who had attended every day of the trial.

All that is left for me to say is that some little doubt may have remained in the minds of the Court which will enable the members not to award the extreme penalty. Spare the life of the accused. He has a wife and four children who are dependent upon him for support. Consider also the fact that he is a soldier, and the Court is composed of members of the British Army. I believe I am entitled to appeal to the Court to pronounce a sentence which will enable my client to come out of prison at an early date. ^[46]

Despite this plea however, it was announced at 15:00 that he was to be sentenced to death by hanging; Knöchlein paled but showed no emotion.^[47] He was hanged on 28 January, 1949 in Hamburg. No other German soldiers or officers have ever been prosecuted for their roles in the massacre.^[48]

Notes and references