The Kragujevac massacre - 1941
The Kragujevac massacre was the murder of men and boys in Kragujevac, Serbia, by German soldiers on 20 and 21 October 1941. All males from the town between the ages of sixteen and sixty were assembled by German troops and members of the Serbian Volunteer Command and Serbian State Guard including high school students, and the victims were selected from amongst them. On 29 October 1941, Felix Benzler, the plenipotentiary of the German foreign ministry in Serbia, reported that 2,300 people were executed. Later investigations by the post-war Yugoslavian government came up with between 5,000 and 7,000 people executed, although these figures were never proven reliable. Subsequently, Serbian and German scholars have agreed on the figure of 2,778.
Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel had issued an order on 16 September 1941 (OKW-Befehl Nr. 888/41), applicable to all of occupied Europe, to kill 50 communists for every wounded German soldier and 100 for each German soldier killed. German soldiers were attacked in early October by the Communist Partisans and by Chetniks under Draza Mihajlovic near Gornji Milanovac, and the massacre was a direct reprisal for the German losses in that battle.
A German report stated that: "The executions in Kragujevac occurred although there had been no attacks on members of the Wehrmacht in this city, for the reason that not enough hostages could be found elsewhere."
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| Germans escorting people from Kragujevac and its surrounding area to be executed. |
Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel had issued an order on 16 September 1941 (OKW-Befehl Nr. 888/41), applicable to all of occupied Europe, to kill 50 communists for every wounded German soldier and 100 for each German soldier killed. German soldiers were attacked in early October by the Communist Partisans and by Chetniks under Draza Mihajlovic near Gornji Milanovac, and the massacre was a direct reprisal for the German losses in that battle.
A German report stated that: "The executions in Kragujevac occurred although there had been no attacks on members of the Wehrmacht in this city, for the reason that not enough hostages could be found elsewhere."
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| Germans rounding up Serb civilians in Kragujevac on 21 October 1941 |
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