Talk:31st SS Volunteer Grenadier Division

Serbians in this unit

Due to constant anti serbian sentiment in english wikipedia, especially in ww2 subjects, i just wanted to check if this is true as i dont have the info and serbian historiography is pretty harsh towards all serbian collaborationists and I did not encounter any mentioning of serbs in this unit. 109.245.35.97 (talk) 19:48, 18 August 2023 (UTC)

Apologies for the long awaited reply. I have included the mentions of Serbs in this unit as the book, "For the Homeland" by Rudolf Pencz says that the Abteilung Medical Officers were ethnic Germans from the Serbian Banat or

the Batschka. In addition to this, the Batshcka region includes Vojvodina in Northern Serbia, so undoubtedly some Serbs would have fought in this unit. Someone I know from Vojvodina has a few gravestones in their town dedicated to some Waffen-SS members, I do not know much about it which is why I haven't included that information in the article.

I would also like to make it clear that my intention is not to be anti-serbian or to be harsh on serbian collaborationists, instead I wanted to outline the different types of 'Volksdeustche' in the Batschka region during the war. There is very scarce information regarding this unit, the cited books are the only books as such I could find. Rudolf Pencz's "For the Homeland" is definitely the best source of information, considering he was born in the Batschka region himself, and talked to many veterans of the unit. GereonGG (talk) 11:06, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

I am aware that there has been no further discussion from you or anyone else on this page for a few months now, with my response being made over a month ago now. Despite this, I wanted to add onto my original reply which wasn't exactly worded or formatted properly, in addition to this I didn't have as much knowledge as I do from reading into the division even more now that I possess an actual physical copy of the book made by Rudolf Pencz, so I hope this is able to clear up any questions or uncertainty you or others may have with Serbians being in this unit. Pencz outlines on Page 31 of his book (For the Homeland) that the ethnic Germans from Hungary were joined by smaller numbers of ethnic Germans from Croatia, and from the Serbian or Romanian Banat. In addition to this, it mentions how there were even a few Croatians from the Batschka. Using Page 21, we can determine that there was definitely a member recruited from the Serbian Banat region, Dr Franz Gettmann, a medical offier who was part of the artillery regiment in the 3rd abteilung. A quick google search of his name brings up the Familie Tenhumberg site, showing that he was born on 5 August 1906 in Vršac, a Serbian city in Vojvodina, many soldiers would have also been recruited from this area, some potentially being of Serbian origin as they were also amongst the population at this time. Whilst he was an ethnic German, the translation to Serbian is definitely justified with the fact there was a few Croatians from the Batschka mentioned before, along with a few Bosnian Muslims that were part of the 23rd Waffen Mountain Division SS 'Kama'. Majority of these soldiers would have spoken Serbo-Croatian, thus justifying the Serbian translation. I would like to further add that on Page 53, a memoir from Gustav Lombard (the divisional commander) states that in the early days of October, they were able to deploy Kampfgruppe Syr (led by SS-Sturmbannführer Syr) which consisted of former reservists from the Royal Hungarian Army and Royal Yugoslav Army, as well as Bosnians from the 23rd Waffen Mountain Division SS 'Kama'. Finally, due to the Batschka region being in both Hungary and Serbia, it can undoubtedly be acknowledged that a few Serbs or members from Serbia and or the Serbian Banat who could speak Serbian would be serving in the unit. I am aware that a more appropriate translation should be Serbo-Croatian to better represent the Bosnians and Croatians who also served in the unit, which I'm getting round to. Infact, I am slowly rewriting the entire page to revamp the info box (again), as well as include information on the history, deployment, etc on my Sandbox. I've currently reworked the entire composition of the division (the ethnic Germans) and where they came from, along with fixing the translations and the order of battle to be more consistent. I hope this helps clear up any questions or concerns you or anyone else may have, as my intent which I said in my other reply is not to be anti Serbian, discriminatory, harsh or racist to any group of people, my aim is just to put as much credible and historical information as possible, as for many years this article has had little to no information due to it being such an obscure and forgotten division. GereonGG (talk) 10:00, 19 January 2024 (UTC)