Battle of Heilbronn ( 1945 ) The Battle of Heilbronn was a nine - day struggle in April 1945 during World War II between the United States Army and the German Army for the control of Heilbronn , a mid - sized city on the Neckar River located between Stuttgart and Heidelberg . Despite the impending end of the war , the battle was characterized by very firm German resistance and the presence of various Nazi Party auxiliaries among the regular German troops . Following days of house - to - house combat , troops of the U . S . 100th Infantry Division captured Heilbronn and the U . S . VI Corps continued its march to the southeast . The German situation . Presence of the " First Army " ’ s only remaining battleworthy division , the " 17th SS Panzer Grenadier " , plus imposing river obstacles , gave real substance to the new German line along the Jagst - Neckar crescent . In addition , the " First Army " commander General Foertsch had managed through prodigious efforts to accumulate a sizable conglomeration of other troops — two battalions of an engineer school , several regular engineer battalions , replacement artillery and antiaircraft units , Volkssturm , a few tanks and assault gun s , and a miscellany , including several hundred Hitler Youth , belonging to the combat commander of Heilbronn . These troops and remnants of four divisions , plus the panzer grenadiers , were all subordinated to General Bork ’ s " XIII Corps " . Loose ends of two other divisions , including the " 2d Mountain Division " , were positioned on the north wing of Beyer ’ s " LXXX " Corps and thus might be used to help defend Heilbronn . U . S . attack . Before daylight on 4 April , the third battalion of the 100th Division ’ s 398th Infantry slipped silently across the Neckar in assault boats a mile or so north of Heilbronn , starting from the suburb of Neckargartach . As the men turned south toward the city after daybreak , a German battalion , using in some cases underground tunnels to emerge in the rear of the U . S . troops , counterattacked sharply . The ensuing fight forced the American infantry men back to within a few hundred feet of the river . There they held , but not until another battalion of the 398th crossed under fire in late afternoon were they able to resume their advance . Even then they could penetrate no deeper than a thousand yards , scarcely enough to rid the crossing site of small arms fire . Until the bridgehead could be expanded , engineers had no hope of building a bridge . Later on 4 April , General Burress of the 100th Division had the 397th Infantry cross the Neckar just south of the 398th ' s position . Bitter from the first , the fighting for Heilbronn had continued heavy . Although three of the 100th Division ’ s battalions eventually crossed into the little bridgehead north of the city to push south into a melange of factories on the northern outskirts , the going always was slow . Since the crossing site remained under German fire , engineers still had no hope of putting in a bridge . Without close fire support , the infantrymen depended upon artillery on the west bank of the Neckar , but fire was difficult to adjust in the confined factory district . Protected from shelling by sturdy buildings , the Germans seldom surrendered except at the point of a rifle , though many of the Hitler Youth had had enough after only a brief flurry of fanatic resistance . At one point , in response to intense mortar fire , a platoon of Hitler Youth soldiers ran screaming into American lines to surrender while their officers shot at them to make them stop . During the night of 5 April , a battalion of the 397th Infantry crossed the Neckar south of Heilbronn and found resistance at that point just as determined . There engineers had nearly completed a bridge during the afternoon of the 7th when German artillery , controlled by observers in the hills on the east edge of Heilbronn , found the range . Although the engineers at last succeeded early the next morning , less than a company of tank s and two platoons from the 824th Tank Destroyer Battalion had crossed before German shells again knocked out the bridge . Two days later much the same thing happened to a heavy pontoon ferry after it had transported only a few more tanks and tank destroyers across . On 8 April , the U . S . 399th Infantry crossed the Neckar to the south of Heilbronn , moving into southern industrial suburbs and the village of Sontheim . Most of Heilbronn was under U . S . control by 9 April , but not until 12 April was the rubble of Heilbronn cleared of Germans and a bridge built across the Neckar . On that day , the 397th Infantry took two hill summits to the east of the city , nicknamed " Tower Hill " and " Cloverleaf Hill " . These actions , coupled with the general advance of all three U . S . regiments , signaled the end of organized German resistance in Heilbronn . In nine days of fighting , the 100th Division lost 85 men killed and probably three times that number wounded . In the process , men of the 100th captured 1 , 500 Germans . The 63d Division , aided in later stages by tanks of the 10th Armored Division , had in the meantime kept up constant pressure against the enemy ’ s line along the Jagst River , driving southwestward from the vicinity of the Jagst - Tauber land bridge in hope of trapping the " 17th SS Panzer Grenadier Division " near the confluence of the Jagst and the Neckar . Although a contingent of armor at last established contact with the 100th Division near Heilbronn on 14 April , the panzer grenadiers had left . Assessment . General Foertsch ’ s hasty but surprisingly strong position along the Jagst - Neckar crescent had required eleven days of often heavy fighting to reduce . In view of the determined resistance , American casualties were relatively light , a daily average for the VI Corps of approximately 230 . Yet that number was almost double the number of casualties the corps suffered in the pursuit up to the two rivers . While the German defense had delayed the advance of part of the U . S . VI Corps for almost two weeks , it did not materially impede the advance of the U . S . Army into southern Germany . Heilbronn itself had been heavily damaged by air raids before the nine - day battle that resulted in the city ' s capture by U . S . forces , but the urban nature of the battle undoubtedly resulted in even more damage to the city .