page_title: 1st SS Panzer Division Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler
section_title: Killing of Wereth 11
hierarchical_section_title: 1st SS Panzer Division Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler / Western Front / Malmedy massacre / Killing of Wereth 11
caption_attribution_description: English: Flowers adorn one of three monuments at the Wereth 11 Memorial, dedicated to a group of black soldiers killed by the German SS during the early stages of the Battle of the Bulge.
context_page_description: The 1st SS Panzer Division "Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler", short LSSAH, began as Adolf Hitler's personal bodyguard, responsible for guarding the Führer's person, offices, and residences. Initially the size of a regiment, the LSSAH eventually grew into an elite division-sized unit during World War II.
  The LSSAH participated in combat during the invasion of Poland, and was amalgamated into the Waffen-SS together with the SS-Verfügungstruppe and the combat units of the SS-Totenkopfverbände prior to Operation Barbarossa in 1941. By mid-1942 it had been increased in size from a regiment to a Panzergrenadier division and was designated SS Panzergrenadier Division "Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler". It received its final form as a Panzer division in October 1943.
  Members of the LSSAH perpetrated numerous atrocities and war crimes, including the Malmedy massacre. They killed an estimated 5,000 prisoners of war in the period 1940–1945, mostly on the Eastern Front.
context_section_description: During Battle of the Bulge, troops from 3./SS-PzAA1 LSSAH captured eleven African-American soldiers from the 333rd Artillery Battalion in the hamlet of Wereth. Subsequently the prisoners were shot and their remains found by Allied troops two months later. The soldiers had their fingers cut off, legs broken, and at least one was shot while trying to bandage a comrade's wounds.
caption: Memorial to the Wereth 11
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