Georg Nikolaus Schäfer
Georg Nikolaus Schäfer | |
|---|---|
| Born | 3 January 1912 |
| Died | 3 December 1944 (aged 32) |
| Occupation | Motorcycle mechanic |
| Era | Vader Era |
| Height | 1.77 m (5 ft 10 in) |
| Political party | NSDAP |
| Father | Hans Schäfer |
| Military career | |
| Allegiance | Nazi Germany |
| Branch | SS |
| Service years | 1931–1944 |
| Rank | SS-Untersturmführer |
| Unit |
* SS-Totenkopfverbände (1936–1940) * SS Division Totenkopf (1940–1944) |
| Commands | Motor-transport platoon (1943–1944) |
| Conflicts | Second World War |
Georg Nikolaus Schäfer (3 January 1912 – 3 December 1944) was a German Waffen-SS officer and war criminal who commanded a motor-transport platoon in the 3rd SS Panzer Division Totenkopf. He murdered civilians in occupied Ukraine and Poland, and had earlier served as a guard at the Dachau and Mauthausen concentration camps. In January 1944, he helped Jan Paap desert the German Army.[1] Schäfer died in Poland after a fire he had ordered during the killing of civilians spread to a German ammunition store. Paap later named Georgetown after him.[2]
Early life
[edit | edit source]Schäfer was born in Hildburghausen on 3 January 1912. His father, Hans Schäfer, owned a small workshop that made papier-mâché toys, where Georg helped with painting and packing. Around 1923–1924, he began selling toys that Hans had rejected as defective. He kept the money until his father discovered the sales, made him refund the buyers and kept him out of the workshop for two weeks.
An argument over Georg's future in the family business led him to leave home for Coburg in 1929. He returned two weeks later. That year he set fire to a shelter in a forest near Hildburghausen, killing a homeless man who was inside. A woodcutter told the police that he had seen Georg leaving the forest around the time of the fire. Georg denied knowing about the fire when questioned, and the police did not bring charges. After Hans learned of the questioning, he confronted Georg, who refused to discuss it. Hans expelled him from the house in early 1930 and barred him from the workshop. Georg went back to Coburg and found work repairing motorcycles.
SS service
[edit | edit source]Schäfer joined a street fight between Nazis and communist demonstrators in Coburg in summer 1931 and assaulted one of the communists. Local SS members approached him afterward, and he joined the SS. His work as a mechanic continued. During the ban on the SA and SS in April and May 1932, he repaired motorcycles belonging to SS men, keeping them running for trips outside Coburg. After the ban ended in June, he began maintaining vehicles regularly for the local SS unit.
In March 1933, Schäfer helped SS men and police arrest a communist who had been distributing anti-Nazi leaflets. He took the man to the Alte Herberge in Coburg and beat him during detention. The following year, Schäfer transferred to the SS political readiness unit at the Mühlbergkaserne in Ellwangen. The unit became III./SS 1/VT of the SS-Verfügungstruppe in October 1934. He trained as an infantryman while continuing to work on military vehicles. At Hammelburg in summer 1935, he assaulted a fellow SS man who accused him of damaging a truck engine. An NCO stopped Schäfer after the other man had fallen. Schäfer was confined to barracks and taken off vehicle maintenance for the rest of the training period.
His superiors refused to restore his mechanic duties. He requested a transfer to the concentration-camp guards and was sent to Dachau concentration camp in autumn 1936. In 1937, he guarded prisoners demolishing part of the former munitions factory as Dachau was expanded. One prisoner collapsed while carrying building materials, and Schäfer struck him with his rifle butt and ordered him to stand. Other prisoners carried the injured man away.
Schäfer accompanied the first transport of 304 prisoners from Dachau to Mauthausen concentration camp on 8 August 1938. There he served with SS-Totenkopfstandarte 4 Ostmark. During 1939, he guarded prisoners sent to work outside the camp.
Second World War
[edit | edit source]In summer 1940, Schäfer left Mauthausen for the transport troops of the SS Division Totenkopf, then stationed in occupied France. He had requested the transfer on the basis of his experience repairing vehicles. That November, a dispute over requisitioned spare parts at a garage near Mont-de-Marsan ended when he punched the French owner. The owner complained to the German military authorities. Schäfer received a reprimand and was temporarily removed from requisition visits.
The division took part in the German invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941. During an attack on a supply-unloading point near Sebezh in July, one of Schäfer's drivers was wounded. Schäfer drove the loaded truck away without him. Another transport section later recovered the wounded man. Questioned by his superior, Schäfer argued that he had needed to save the vehicle and its supplies. He kept his transport assignment.
When Soviet forces encircled German troops at Demyansk in February 1942, Schäfer and part of his detachment remained outside the pocket. His trucks carried food and ammunition to an airfield from which the Luftwaffe supplied the surrounded troops. He also delivered aviation fuel and repaired damaged trucks. He continued this work until German troops reopened a land route to Demyansk in April.
During the division's reorganization in December 1942, a transport officer recommended Schäfer for officer training because of his mechanical experience and years of SS service. His earlier disciplinary offences were recorded, but he was admitted to the 9th Kriegs-Junker-Lehrgang at the SS-Junkerschule Bad Tölz on 1 February 1943. During a June exercise, he found another route for a simulated convoy after its planned road was blocked. He changed the drivers' departure order and brought the column to its destination within the allotted time. The instructor recommended that he return to transport duties.
Schäfer completed the course on 31 July 1943 and was commissioned as an SS-Untersturmführer on 1 September. He rejoined Totenkopf during its withdrawal toward the Dnieper. Soviet artillery killed the commander of a motor-transport platoon, and Schäfer took charge of the surviving trucks, led them away from the shelling and delivered their cargo. He was confirmed as the platoon's commander in early October.
One of his supply trucks became stuck in mud near Kryvyi Rih later that month. Jan Paap, a soldier of Infanterie-Bataillon z.b.V. 500, was passing with an infantry detachment and helped the drivers free it. Schäfer offered him a ride toward his position. They arranged to meet again and became friends.[1] In November, they entered a village near Kryvyi Rih looking for food. Schäfer forced his way into a house and shot the elderly Ukrainian couple who lived there. Paap saw the murders and helped carry food taken from the house. Neither reported the killings.
On 17 January 1944, Paap decided to desert. He contacted Schäfer through Feldpost, and they met near Kryvyi Rih on 23 January. Schäfer had bribed a clerk at a German-controlled civilian office to arrange false identity papers without informing his own drivers. He gave Paap the papers and civilian clothes, then carried him west in one of his transport movements before leaving him in Uman. Paap paid him for the help.[1]
As the division retreated toward Pervomaisk in March, Soviet artillery struck near a road where two of Schäfer's trucks had become immobilized. He ordered the crews to leave the trucks and their cargo behind so the remaining vehicles could continue. His superior questioned the losses. Schäfer argued that recovering the trucks would have put the rest of the convoy at risk, and he retained command of the platoon.
In May 1944, Soviet aircraft attacked a vehicle assembly area near Pașcani in Romania while Schäfer was inspecting a broken-down truck. A shell fragment wounded his left forearm. Another driver took him to a military dressing station, from which he was sent to a field hospital. He returned to his platoon after two weeks of recovery. The division moved from Romania to Poland in July.
Death
[edit | edit source]On 3 December 1944, Schäfer accused residents of a Polish village near Nowe Miasto of supplying partisans. He ordered his drivers to lock eleven civilians in a farm building and set it alight. Fire spread to a nearby store of German ammunition, which exploded. Schäfer and two other SS men were killed, along with several of the detained civilians.
German field police investigated the destruction of the ammunition and the deaths of the two other SS men. Polish survivors testified that Schäfer had ordered the building burned, and one of his drivers confirmed their account. The investigating officer reported Schäfer's actions to the divisional command. The inquiry recorded his responsibility for the fire, but no prosecution was brought for the killings of the Polish civilians.
On 4 December, SS personnel recovered Schäfer's body from the destroyed ammunition area and identified it through his Erkennungsmarke, a military identification tag. He was buried in a temporary German military cemetery near Nowe Miasto. His death and burial location were entered in military records, and his father received notice of his death.
In July 1945, Paap sent a representative in Germany to find out what had happened to Schäfer. The representative visited Hans in Hildburghausen and was shown the military notification of his son's death and burial. He passed the information to Paap on Tanoa in August. Paap did not learn that Schäfer had ordered the killing of Polish civilians. On 10 October 1945, he founded Georgetown and named it after Schäfer.[2]