The 4th SS Polizei Panzergrenadier Division (German: 4. SS-Polizei-Panzergrenadier-Division) or SS Division Polizei was one of the thirty-eight divisions fielded as part of the Waffen-SS during World War II.
Formation
The division was formed in October 1939, when thousands of members of the Ordnungspolizei (Orpo) were drafted to fill the ranks of the new SS division. These men were not enrolled in the SS and remained policemen, retaining their Orpo rank structure and insignia. They did not have to meet the racial and physical requirements imposed for the SS. Himmler's purpose in forming the division was to get around the recruitment caps the Wehrmacht had succeeded in placing on the SS, it also provided a means for his policemen to satisfy their military obligation and avoid army conscription.
The first commander was Generalleutnant der Polizei (Major-General) Karl Pfeffer-Wildenbruch, a career police commander who had been a general staff officer during World War I; simultaneous with his appointment he was also commissioned as an SS-Gruppenführer. The division was equipped largely with captured Czech materiel and underwent military training in the Black Forest combined with periods on internal security duties in Poland.
France 1940
The division, at this time an infantry formation with horse-drawn transport, was held in reserve with Army Group C in the Rhineland during the Battle of France until 9 June when it first saw combat during the crossing of the Aisne river and the Ardennes Canal. The Kampfgruppe was disbanded in May 1943, when the division became operational. and the Distomo massacre; the latter being one of the worst atrocities committed by the Waffen-SS during World War II. On June 10, 1944, for over two hours, troops of the division under the command of Fritz Lautenbach went door to door and massacred Greek civilians in retaliation for a Greek Resistance attack upon the unit. A total of 214 men, women and children were killed in Distomo, a small village near Delphi. According to survivors, SS men "bayoneted babies in their cribs, stabbed pregnant women, and beheaded the village priest."
Elements of this division committed atrocities in the mountains of central Greece ("Ρούμελη") during May and June 1944 that resulted in the destruction of Sperchiada and the massacre of 28 civilians in Ipati. The division later participated in Operation Kreuzotter (5–31 August 1944), an attempt to eradicate Greek People's Liberation Army (ELAS) bases from the same mountains. The operation was a military failure, but resulted in the killing of 170 civilians and the partial or complete destruction of dozens of villages and cities.
The division was moved to Serbia in September 1944, and was stationed outside Belgrade to defend the Danube on the Belgrade-Timisoara-Arad line against Soviet advances in Transylvania. After the capture of Debrecen by the 2nd Ukrainian Front, the division was forced to withdraw to Senta and Sannicolau Mare on 6 October 1944, and eventually destroying the Tisza bridge crossings and withdrawing to Szeged, on 9 October.
After Soviet successes on the Tisza's east bank, 4th SS was ordered to cover Soviet movements against the west bank of the Tisza and hold Szolnok, which fell to the Soviets at the start of the Budapest Offensive on 4 November. Committing to a fighting retreat north, 4th SS pulled west of Jászberény on 12 November, only for the city to fall on 14 November, retreating further to Hatvan; falling to the Soviet forces on 25 November. 4th SS dug in further north of Hatvan. They had however, taken heavy casualties, with only 800 men and 13 functional armoured assault guns available for defensive operations, and starting 5 December, a very strong Soviet advance pierced 6 kilometres deep behind the German lines north of the village of Szucsi, allowing the 2nd Ukrainian Front to enter the Cserhát mountain range by 15 December. Facing extreme casualties on the Bátonyterenye line, much of the division withdrawn to the then Slovak-Hungarian border at Čebovce; arriving between 27–28 December, with the units suffering the worst casualty rates withdrawing to Banská Bystrica. Only 450 men and 3 heavy guns were available at Čebovce, which facing three Soviet rifle divisions became the scene of heavy fighting; where the village changed hands many times. After the loss of the village's highlands on 31 December, 4th SS was fully withdrawn to Slovakia, and eventually back to Germany, with any remaining forces fighting with 1st Panzer Army.
1945
The depleted division was moved to a front line north in Pomerania. Hitler assigned it to Army Detachment Steiner for the relief of Berlin. They were supposed to be part of the northern pincer that would meet the IV Panzer Army coming from the south and envelop the 1st Ukrainian Front before destroying it. Steiner explained to General Gotthard Heinrici that he did not have the divisions to perform this action and the troops lacked the heavy weapons needed, so the attack did not take place as Hitler had planned. Moved to Danzig, the SS-Polizei Division was encircled by the Red Army and was shipped across the Hela Peninsula to Swinemünde.