A Look at The Ardennes Battlefields Today

12/30/07

Much of the route that s. SS-Pz.Abt. 501 and the rest of the elements of Kampfgruppe Peiper took on their drive toward the Meuse can still be followed today.  The following pages show modern views of some of the areas that Kampfgruppe Peiper fought through.

Peiper ran into problems soon after he started on 16 December. Still in Germany just before the border with Belgium, his route crossed this bridge, which had been blown during the German retreat in September 1944 and hadn't yet been repaired by the engineers.  Peiper simply bypassed the blown bridge through the area in the foreground of this photo. It was the first of many delays. 

The bridge at the "Losheim Gap." (author's photo)

During the night of 16 December and early morning of 17 December the Kampfgruppe passed through several small Belgian villages, meeting slight resistance from scattered American forces.  Part of Peiper's assigned route consisted of trails that were little more than dirt tracks.

This trail is part of Peiper's assigned route, Rollbahn D, close to the village of Ondenval.  The road was not in much better condition in 1944, and some of the tanks attempted to go cross-country in the fields on either side, only to become bogged down. (author's photo)

Map of the initial area of Kampfgruppe Peiper's advance, from the German-Belgian border on the east to the Ligneuville area on the west.  (Microsoft MapPoint via Expedia.com)

Peiper was trying to reach the main N23 highway that crossed the Ambleve River in Ligneuville and carried on to the west.  As his lead element left the small village of Thirimont they took the direct route to the west.  Unfortunately, this route dwindled to a farm road which led to a creek with no bridge.  The armored vehicles could not cross the muddy bottomland, and the lead element turned around and headed north on another road toward Malmedy.  The change of route would have drastic consequences for Peiper and many of his men.

The direct route from Thirimont to Ligneuville led down into this muddy valley.  If the tanks and halftracks had been able to pass through here and reach Ligneuville, there might never have been a "Malmedy Massacre." (author's photo)

As the lead elements turned north, their intent was to reach the "Five Points" crossroads at Baugnez just south of Malmedy, and there to turn south and west on the N23 highway toward Ligneuville.  As the first tanks approached Baugnez, they could look across the fields to the highway they intended to take, and saw that a column of American trucks was moving along that highway.  This was a section of Battery B, 285th Field Artillery Observation Battalion.  SS-Obersturmführer Werner Sternebeck ordered his tanks to open fire on the Americans.  The lightly-armed GIs abandoned their vehicles and fled to ditches along the sides of the road.  Sternebeck's tanks pressed on through the crossroads.

The German tanks advancing toward Baugnez from Thirimont would have had this view, which is looking across the fields to the west at the Baugnez-Ligneuville road.  The vehicles of Battery B 285th FA Observation Battalion were driving from right to left toward Ligneuville.  (author's photo)

What happened next will probably never be fully known, but the event will forever be called the Malmedy Massacre.  The Americans in the ditches surrendered and were herded together in a field to the west of the road.  No German units could be spared to properly guard the prisoners, and as one of the parts of the Kampfgruppe passed the prisoners, the Germans opened fire.  Perhaps they thought the prisoners were trying to escape, perhaps they thought they were still armed, perhaps they were young and trigger-happy.  Some Germans even went into the field and shot anyone they thought was still alive.  Later some of the living Americans tried to make a run for it, and some of them were killed by Germans still in the area.  When the firing finally ceased, some 80 American prisoners of war were dead at the Baugnez Crossroads.

In this field at Baugnez south of Malmedy soldiers of Kampfgruppe Peiper killed American prisoners.  Photo taken in January 1945.  (Dr. Van Heeley Collection, 30th Division "Old Hickory" website, courtesy Warren Watson)

This view of Massacre Field was taken at 2:30 PM on December 17, 1994; 50 years after the event.  (author's photo)

The Belgians erected this monument to the Americans killed at Baugnez.  It is located across the road from the Massacre Field.  (author's photo)

Continue on Peiper's trail to Ligneuville and beyond. 

All text copyright 2005-2008 Gregory A. Walden. All rights reserved; material from this website may only be republished with the author’s permission.