The formation of SS penal units

Added: 2026-05-23

[00:00:01]The idea of establishing SS penal units appeared in 1938 when two such units were established at Sax and concentration camp. In November 1941, the first formation composed of convicted SS men were created who were given the chance to serve part of their sentence in labor or reserve units.

[00:00:20]These recruits mostly came from the Matscow penal camp before official decisions were made to create and send to the front units composed of former SS members. The first improvised unit was formed near Demiansk in the early spring of 1942 formed from SSmen sentenced by a military court and unable to be sent to Matow due to logistical difficulties. In the following months, special probation units were formed.

[00:00:49]These were not penal units in the strict sense of the word, but units of mixed training and penal nature where soldiers could after meeting certain conditions be released from serving the rest of their sentence and undergo rehabilitation. Service in such formations, however, only concerned those convicted who, as part of their punishment, were additionally excluded from the ranks of the SS. They were sent to probation units after a previous six to eight week stay in a special reserve battalion near Prague in order to undergo additionally military training which could not be performed at Danzig Matskow. A former policeman on the other hand were sent to a special unit of the SS police division. XSS men who were unfit for further military service still had the option of shortening their sentences by serving in workers units such as the one that was set up at the Demita training ground in the Lublin region. A special category were those convicted who served their sentences without being kicked out of the SS. For them, the path to a possible shortening of their sentence led not through the park training battalion, but through the regular reserve units of the Vaffan SS, where they underwent further military training and were sent to special units of the Vaffan SS. They could also be sent directly from the penal camp to anti-partisan operations as well as to construction battalions or agricultural work. If an SS man was convicted by a field court marshal, he would usually be sent straight to a penal platoon. In the probation units, the probation period lasted from 3 to 6 months. The basis for rehabilitation were the reports of the company commander which were collected at the SS main judicial office. The chances of survival in these special units, however, was small. The units were sent to the most difficult sections of the eastern front or to engineering tasks which involved usually explosives. The best known units today are those which were made up of convicts from Danzig Matskow which went to SS units such as the dealer or the SS Fala Battalion 500. In 1942 alone a total of 1,100 prisoners from Matzka were placed in special units.

[00:03:16]Almost 2,000 prisons from Matzka were sent to the Dervanga brigade, famous for its cruelty. Now, I've done a series of videos on Deranga, whose troops were made up of criminals, initially recruited from Saxonhousen, but then to a large extent from Matau. These troops were used as guards for Jewish slave labor camps in Lublin district, then used to fight partisans in what is today Bellerus. However, they are most famous for their acts of wanting destruction of life and property during the Warsaw uprising and in particular for the VA massacre in the capital when in the week from the 5th of August 1944 they murdered around 60,000 Warsaw residents of both sexes and they murdered the wounded insurgents that they found in the hospitals as demand from the likes of Derivan for troops grew.