Hitler's Baby Division

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division. The RJF offered to supply a sizeable proportion of the needed 4,000 NCOs by extracting eighteen-year-old HJ leaders who met SS requirements and had experience as “war training leaders.” Hitler meanwhile released them from labor duty if they agreed to become NCO candidates. They were to be prepared in a special camp at St. Veith (Oberkrain, Austria) as “training assistants” to aid WEL trainers running courses for regular HJ Division recruits. After that they were to undergo NCO training with the Waffen SS and join the division in the fall. The training at St. Veith was to be done by Waffen SS reservists. Experienced technical NCOs for the division still had to be found. Jüttner soon objected strenuously that the latter two groups were not available in the light of NCO shortages. Berger was willing to send the proffered HJ leaders directly tn NCO schools, but that would have meant skipping the WELs for enlisted men and the RJF insisted on premilitary training. Himmler would have preferred to extract the SS Body Guard from the front line and have it train the entire 20,000-men HJ Division, but since that could not be done, eighteen-year-old HJ leaders would have to become NCO candidates as Berger recommended. Subsequently many of them were supposed to be exchanged for experienced NCOs from the Body Guard. Himmler also promised to ask Hitler for an order to transfer HJ leaders with army and air force reserve status to the SS in order to supply the remaining divisional cadre of noncommissioned officers. Initially the RJF thought at least half of the needed 840 commissioned officers could be found among veteran HJ leaders who had front experience as company and battalion commanders in the army. Himmler believed he could get most of them transferred to the Waffen SS. The rest would have to come from existing SS field units. SS personnel chief Maximillian von Herff found some sixty lieutenants in various SS units who were former HJ leaders and could be 8
shifted to the HJ Division, but Hans Jüttner objected to that many transfers from field units already short on officers. Himmler then stepped in with a compromise solution. There were 600 former HJ leaders serving as NCOs in the Waffen SS. They would be required to take accelerated officer-training and eventually replace active officers to be transferred from the Body Guard and other SS divisions. 8 While planners threshed about in convoluted schemes and expedients, no one seems to have anticipated the problems of recruitment soon to be faced. What they did fear is negative publicity. Hence recruiting began secretly, because the RJF thought public notice would call attention to the distasteful memory of Langemarck where very enthusiastic but badly trained volunteers suffered disastrous losses. As late as November secrecy was still maintained under threats of prosecution, coupled with the suggestion that appearance of HJ Division units should be called simply Waffen SS volunteers. When recruitment was set in motion by Axmann in the middle of February, the HJ ran into surprising reluctance to volunteer, especially among students of secondary schools, a development the RJF might have expected had the hostile attitude of students in the WELs been taken into account. But the RJF plunged on nevertheless. Late in March an agreement was concluded with the National Business Chamber to allow vocational students, who would normally nave graduated in the fall, to take premature examinations in April, thus opening the way for induction into the WEL. For non-vocational students the problem was more complicated and eventually required SS influence to reach an agreement with the Ministry of Education. The RJF had accepted responsibility to negotiate a solution but seems to have encountered a series of roadblocks. Not until April was Axmann able to inform regional leaders that volunteers would be granted "preliminary leaving 9
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Page 3 and 4: others. It was in the forefront of
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Page 7: temporarily for HJ Division candida
Page 11 and 12: 400 before examinations, since thes
Page 13 and 14: commander of the division, ordered
Page 15 and 16: Ziegler. Although the course had to
Page 17 and 18: Hitler had originally ordered that
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Page 21 and 22: emphasis had been placed on trainin
Page 23 and 24: percent of the required vehicles -
Page 25 and 26: the conquest of Poland he volunteer
Page 27 and 28: done because the planners believed
Page 29 and 30: Ludwig (Stabsleiter of Gebiet Schwa

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