The 31st SS Volunteer Grenadier Division was formed from Germans, Hungarians and Volksdeutsche, mostly from the Bačka in September 1944. The division is sometimes given the title Batschka. By November 1944 it was in action on the Hungarian Front In January 1945 it was sent to Austria and reformed as a type 45 Division; only two Battalions in each Regiment and only three platoons in each Company.
It then joined the 17th Army in Silesia where it was surrounded by the Red Army and surrendered near Hradec Králové in May 1945.
Read more about 31st SS Volunteer Grenadier Division: Commander, Order of Battle
Famous quotes containing the words volunteer and/or division:
“We should have an army so organized and so officered as to be capable in time of emergency, in cooperation with the National Militia, and under the provision of a proper national volunteer law, rapidly to expand into a force sufficient to resist all probable invasion from abroad and to furnish a respectable expeditionary force if necessary in the maintenance of our traditional American policy which bears the name of President Monroe.”
—William Howard Taft (1857–1930)
“Don’t order any black things. Rejoice in his memory; and be radiant: leave grief to the children. Wear violet and purple.... Be patient with the poor people who will snivel: they don’t know; and they think they will live for ever, which makes death a division instead of a bond.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)