First Battle of Kharkov - Occupation of Kharkov

Occupation of Kharkov

The city was subject to its first occupation during the war, which lasted until February 16, 1943. The city never became part of Reichskommissariat Ukraine because of its proximity to the front. The staff of the LV. Armeekorps acted as the occupational authority, using 57.ID as occupation force. Generalmajor Anton Dostler was Stadtkommandant until December 13, when he was succeeded by Generalleutnant Alfred von Puttkamer, and Kharkiv was transferred to the Heeresgebiet of the 6. Armee and put under the joint authority of the Stadtkommandant and Feldkommandantur 757.

German troops acting under the authority of the 'Reichenau-Befehl' of October 10 (effectively an order to kill anybody associated with communism) terrorized the population that was left after the battle. Many of the Soviet commanders´ corpses were hung off balconies to strike fear in the remaining population. Many people frantically began to flee, causing chaos.

In the early hours of November 14, multiple buildings in the city centre were blown up by time-fuses left by the retreating Red Army. Casualties included the commander (Generalleutnant Georg Braun) and staff of the 68. Infanterie-Division. The Germans arrested some 200 civilians (mostly Jews) and hanged them from the balconies of large buildings. Another 1,000 were taken as hostages and interned in the Hotel International on Dzerzhinsky Square. All of these war crimes were committed by frontline Heer commanders, and not by SS troops.

On December 14, the Stadtkommandant ordered the Jewish population to be concentrated in a hut settlement near the Kharkiv Tractor Factory. In two days, 20.000 Jews were gathered there. Sonderkommando 4a, commanded by SS-Standartenführer Paul Blobel, of Einsatzgruppe C started shooting the first of them in December, then continuing to kill them throughout January in a gas van. This was a modified truck that fitted 50 people in it; the van drove around the city and slowly killed the people that were trapped in it with carbon monoxide that was emitted from the car itself and channeled into an airtight compartment. The victims died by a combination of carbon monoxide poisoning and suffocation.

The German Army confiscated large quantities of food to be used by its troops, creating acute food shortages in the Ukraine. By January 1942 around one-third of the cities 300.000 remaining inhabitants suffered from starvation. Many would die in the cold winter months.

As a result of the battles in Kharkiv, the city was left in ruins. Dozens of architectural monuments were destroyed and numerous artistic treasures taken. One of Russia’s known authors – Aleksey Nikolayevich Tolstoy, wrote: “I saw Kharkiv. As if it were Rome in the 5th century. A huge cemetery…”