SS-Standartenführer Joachim Peiper

Life and Destiny of a German WW II Soldier

 Joachim Peiper, honoured with the German Cross Swords and Oak-Leaves,, at the age of 28 became commander of the “SS-Panzerregiment 1” (tank regiment) of the “Leibstandarte” (Lifeguards) of Adolf Hitler.  In 1945 he was falsely accused and arrested as a war criminal by the Americans because of the “Malmedy Case”.  He was tortured, sentenced to death, but not executed as truth was somewhat different.  After eleven years of prison he was released. As trade unions black-mailed him, he lost his jobs, and therefore decided to go to France to be able to live in peace.  After the then “DDR” and the French communist daily “L´Humanité” had launched a press campaign against him, he was killed in his house on July 4th, 1976.


   The spectators were waiting in front of the trial barrack on July 16th, 1946, when the sentence concerning Peiper and his men was announced.  It took the American judges two hours to discuss the sentences.  Their decision:  forty-three death sentences and thirty years imprisonment.  It took only two minutes for each individual sentence.

    It was midnight when the villagers heard shots at the “Befestigung” (fort), the name given to Peiper´s house.  When the police and the fire-brigade arrived, everything was finished.  Apart from burnt corpse three bullet cases and rifle Peiper had borrowed from neighbours were found as well as five bullet cases of a 7.65mm revolver. “Peiper was like that”, one of his German friends said, “fighting up to the very last”.The district court of Vesoul, France, officially declared Peiper as dead but, under communist pressure had not got the guts to declare it a murder.  The murderers have never been found.  Some time ago, the Peiper family had his burnt corpse taken to Munich.  The prosecutors office at Munich had the coffin opened, they detected that only parts of the corpse were in it!  The head important to identify Peiper based on his teeth was missing!  This was the way the French justice authorities “handled” this murder case.  France, you know, is a constitutional state, and his judges all are honourable men.