Samenvatting
After we published our book on Schnelle Gruppe Knittel two years ago, I thought I had completed my research on this topic. Research that had started in early 1996, when I walked into the old main public library at the Prinsengracht in Amsterdam looking for a topic for a short paper I had to write. The book that caught my attention was "Massamoord bij Malmédy, Kampfgruppe Peiper in de Ardennen" (Massacre at Malmédy – battle group Peiper in the Ardennes) by the late Gerd Cuppens. The simple fact that this book contained only a few photographs of SS-Sturmbannführer Gustav Knittel but virtually no background information marked the start of an investigation that eventually led to the publication of his biography in 2016 and to the publication in 2022 of a book that delved deeper into the crimes of his battalion. Because this second book devoted ample attention to the victims of the atrocities and brought these people out of anonymity, the French-language edition was very well received in Stavelot. This also confronted me with the limitations I had imposed on myself by focusing entirely on Knittel and his Schnelle Gruppe. Readers had noticed that a number of murders committed in and around Stavelot were not included in the book.
In December 2023 my co-researcher Vincianne Boulanger and I decided that an appendix to the book was needed. These atrocities had been committed by the three other battlegroups formed by the Leibstandarte in December 1944. The ‘Kampfgruppe Peiper’ is notorious for the Malmédy Massacre in which eighty-four captured Americans were killed, but its involvement in war crimes against civilians is less well known. Very little had been published about the Kampfgruppen Hansen and Sandig and there were no veterans alive to interview. To find the facts behind their involvement in the fighting and atrocities in the Amblève valley I had to go back to the Belgian, German and American archives and consult my fellow researchers. Vincianne spoke with the last living Belgian eyewitnesses and through relatives of the victims she gathered stories and photos which were indispensable in our efforts to also tell their stories.
In December 2024, the people of Stavelot will commemorate the horrific events in the Amblève valley for the eightieth time. After twenty-eight years a good moment for me to complete my search for the facts about Gustav Knittel, his men and his victims.
Timo R. Worst, the 19th of October 2024
Thuiswinkel Waarborg