| 250th Infantry Division ("Blue Division") | |
|---|---|
| 250.ª División de Infantería ("División Azul") 250. Infanterie-Division ("Blue Division") | |
 Volunteers from the Blue Division. | |
| Active | 24 June 1941 (1941-06-24) – 10 October 1943 (1943-10-10) |
| Country |  Spain |
| Allegiance |  Germany |
| Branch |  German Army |
| Type | Infantry |
| Size | 18,000 troops (1941) 45,000 troops (total, 1941–44)[1] |
| Nickname | Blue Division |
| Engagements | |
| Commanders | |
| Notable commanders | Agustín Muñoz Grandes Emilio Esteban Infantes |
| Insignia | |
| Sleeve insignias | .svg)   |
The250th Infantry Division (German:250. Infanterie-Division), better known as theBlue Division (Spanish:División Azul,Blaue Division), was a unit of volunteers fromFrancoist Spain operating from 1941 to 1943 within theGerman Army (Heer) on theEastern Front duringWorld War II. It was officially designated theSpanish Volunteer Division (División Española de Voluntarios) by theSpanish Army.
Francisco Franco had secured power in Spain after theNationalist victory in theSpanish Civil War (1936–1939), during which the Nationalists received support fromNazi Germany. Franco's authoritarian regime remained officiallynon-belligerent in World War II but sympathised with theAxis powers. After lobbying by the Spanish Foreign MinisterRamón Serrano Suñer and by senior figures within the Spanish Army following the 22 June 1941 launch ofOperation Barbarossa, Franco agreed that Spanish people would be permitted to enlist privately in the German Army and undertook to provide tacit support. Aninfantry division was raised fromFalangist and Spanish Army cadres and was sent for training in Germany. The unit fought on the Eastern Front, in the 1941–1944siege of Leningrad, notably in theBattle of Krasny Bor. They eventually withdrew from the front afterAllied political pressure on Spain in October 1943 and returned to Spain shortly afterwards. Several thousand non-returners were incorporated into the 121st Infantry Division, the short-livedBlue Legion, and eventually into theWaffen-SS.
Francisco Franco took power at the head of a coalition offascist, monarchist, and conservative political factions in theSpanish Civil War (1936–1939) against theleft-leaning Spanish government supported bycommunist andanarchist factions. More than 300,000 people were killed, and lasting damage was done to the country's economy.[2]
While Spain formally remained neutral, it did not hide its ideological support for the Axis powers.[3] Franco had been supportedby Nazi Germany andFascist Italy during the Civil War and Franco sympathised with many aspects of fascist ideology, especially itsanti-communism.On the other side, the republican army had been supported bySoviet aid.Franco ensured that Spain wasneutral at the start ofWorld War II but seriously contemplated joining the conflict as a German ally in the aftermath of theFall of France in 1940.[2] Hemet Adolf Hitler on 23–24 October 1940 atHendaye but was unable to gain promises that Spain would gaincolonial territories from France in North Africa. Hitler feared delegitimizing the newVichy regime in France.[4]
TheGerman invasion of the Soviet Union led to renewed interest in participating in what Spanish officials saw as an "anti-communist crusade". Within hours of the invasion on 22 June 1941, Foreign MinisterRamón Serrano Suñer first proposed to Franco the idea of a Spanish contribution,[5] publicly declaringthe Soviet Union guilty of the Spanish Civil War. Senior officers of theSpanish Army supported the proposal. Franco soon agreed to the proposal, directing that the Spanish Army should unofficially co-ordinate the formation of the unit. Although disappointed that Spain had notdeclared war on the Soviet Union, the German regime accepted the Spanish offer on 24 June 1941.[6] Franco struggled to balance the demands of the Spanish Army andFalangist factions, both of which attempted to influence the new unit, himself siding with the former.
Recruitment began on 27 June 1941 and 18,373 men had volunteered by 2 July 1941 from within the Spanish Army and Falangist movement.[7] Fifty per cent of officers andNCOs were professional soldiers given leave from the Spanish Army, including many veterans of the Spanish Civil War.[citation needed] The division was made up mainly of Falangist volunteers and almost a fifth of early volunteers were students.[8] Additionally, the division was compromised of a small amount ofWhite émigrés from Spain.[3] GeneralAgustín Muñoz Grandes was assigned to lead the volunteers. Because the soldiers could not use official Spanish Army uniforms, they adopted a symbolic uniform comprising the redberets of theCarlists, thekhaki trousers of theSpanish Legion, and the blue shirts of the Falangists—hence the nickname "Blue Division." This uniform was used only while on leave in Spain; in the field, soldiers wore the German Armyfield grey uniform (Feldgrau) with a shield on the upper right sleeve bearing the word "España" and theNationalist Spanish national colours.
On 13 July 1941 the first train leftMadrid forGrafenwöhr,Bavaria for a further five weeks of training. There they became the German Army's 250th Infantry Division and were initially divided into fourinfantryregiments, as in a standard Spanishdivision. To aid their integration into the German supply system, they soon adopted the standard German model of three regiments. One of the original regiments was dispersed amongst the others, which were then named after three of the Spanish cities that volunteers largely originated from—Madrid,Valencia andSeville. Each regiment had threebattalions (of fourcompanies each) and twoweapons companies, supported by anartillery regiment of four battalions (of threebatteries each). There were enough men left over to create an assault battalion, mainly armed withsubmachine guns. Later, due to casualties, this unit was disbanded. Aviator volunteers formed aBlue Squadron (Escuadrillas Azules) which, usingMesserschmitt Bf 109s andFocke-Wulf Fw 190s, claimed to have shot down 156 Soviet aircraft.
On 31 July, after taking theHitler Oath,[9] the Blue Division was formally incorporated into the German Wehrmacht as the 250th Division.[10] It was initially assigned toArmy Group Center, the force advancing towardsMoscow. The division was transported by train toSuwałki,Poland (August 28), from where it had to continue by foot on a 900-kilometre (560 mi) march. It was scheduled to travel throughGrodno, andLida in Belarus,Vilnius (Lithuania), andMaladzyechna,Minsk, andOrsha in Belarus toSmolensk, and from there to the Moscow front. While marching towards the Smolensk front on September 26, the Spanish volunteers were rerouted fromVitebsk and reassigned toArmy Group North (the force closing onLeningrad), becoming part of the German16th Army. The Blue Division was first deployed on theVolkhov River front, with its headquarters inGrigorovo, on the outskirts ofNovgorod. It was in charge of a 50-kilometre (31 mi) section of the front north and south of Novgorod, along the banks of the Volkhov River andLake Ilmen.
The division's soldiers used theiconostasis of the Church of Saint Theodore Stratelates on the Brook for firewood. The iconostases of theCathedral of St. Sophia, Sts. Peter and Paul Church in Kozhevniki, and the Cathedral of the Nativity of the Mother of God in theAntoniev Monastery were taken to Germany at the end of 1943.[11] According to the museum curator in theChurch of the Transfiguration on Ilyina Street, the division used the high cupola as a machine-gun nest. As a result, much of the building was seriously damaged, including many of the medieval icons byTheophanes the Greek. Vladimir Kovalevskii, one of the division's White Russian emigre interpreters, left a particularly acerbic memoir account describing the low discipline and the crimes committed by the Spanish volunteers.[12]
In August 1942, the Blue Division was transferred north to the southeastern flank of thesiege of Leningrad, just south of theNeva River nearPushkin,Kolpino andKrasny Bor in theIzhora River area. After the collapse of the German southern front following theBattle of Stalingrad, more German troops were deployed southwards. By this time, GeneralEmilio Esteban Infantes had taken command. The Blue Division faced a major Soviet attempt to break the siege of Leningrad in February 1943, when the Soviet55th Army, reinvigorated after the victory at Stalingrad, attacked the Spanish positions at theBattle of Krasny Bor, near the main Moscow-Leningrad road. Despite very heavy casualties, the Spaniards were able to hold their ground against a Soviet force seven times larger and supported by tanks. The assault was contained and the siege of Leningrad was maintained for a further year. The division remained on the Leningrad front where it continued to suffer heavy casualties due to weather and to enemy action.[13]
The Blue Division was the only component of the German Army to be awardeda medal of its own, commissioned by Hitler in January 1944 after the Division had demonstrated its effectiveness in impeding the advance of theRed Army.[14] Hitler referred to the division as "equal to the best German ones". During histable talks, he said: "...the Spaniards have never yielded an inch of ground. One can't imagine more fearless fellows. They scarcely take cover. They flout death. I know, in any case, that our men are always glad to have Spaniards as neighbours in their sector".[15]
Eventually, theAllies and many Spaniards began to press Franco to withdraw troops from thequasi alliance with Germany. Franco initiated negotiations in the spring of 1943 and gave an order to withdraw on October 10 but some Spanish volunteers refused to return. On 3 November 1943 the Spanish government ordered all troops to return to Spain. In the end, the total of "non-returners" was close to 3,000 men, mostly Falangists. Spaniards also joined other German units, and fresh volunteers slipped across the Spanish border nearLourdes inoccupied France. The new pro-German Spanish units were collectively called theLegión Azul ("Blue Legion").
Spaniards initially remained part of the 121st Infantry Division, but even this meagre force was ordered to return home in March 1944, and was transported back to Spain on March 21. The rest of the volunteers were absorbed into German units.Platoons of Spaniards served in the3rd Mountain Division and the 357th Infantry Division. One unit was sent toLatvia. Two companies joined theBrandenburger Regiment and the121st Division inNazi security warfare inYugoslavia. The 101st Company (Spanische-Freiwilligen Kompanie der SS 101, "Spanish Volunteer Company of the SS Number 101") of 140 men, made up of four rifle platoons and one staff platoon, was attached to28th SS Volunteer Grenadier Division Wallonien.
Through rotation, as many as 45,000 Spanish soldiers served on the Eastern Front.[16] The casualties of the Blue Division and its successors included 4,954 men killed and 8,700 wounded. Another 372 members of the Blue Division, the Blue Legion, or volunteers of theSpanische-Freiwilligen Kompanie der SS 101 were taken prisoner by the Red Army; 286 of these men remained in captivity until 2 April 1954, when they returned to Spain aboard the shipSemiramis, supplied by theInternational Red Cross.[17] In action against the Red Army, the Blue Division suffered 22,700 casualties, while inflicting 49,300 casualties.[16]
Hundreds of Blue Division prisoners of war were held by the Soviet authorities.While most prisoners from other nations would be repatriated after the war, Francoist Spain and the Soviet Uniondid not have diplomatic relations. Soviet camps held together staunch anti-Communist prisoners, those who collaborated with the Soviets either by their previous hidden ideology or after captivity and even those Republican sailors whose Spanish ships had been requisitioned after thefall of the Republic. In 1954, after thedeath of Stalin, theFrench Red Cross arranged the shipSemiramis [es] to bring those prisoners who desired repatriation to Barcelona.
Like Spain,Portugal under theSalazar regime remained neutral during World War II in agreement with the United Kingdom in accordance to theAnglo-Portuguese Treaty of 1373 and more openly sympathized with theWestern Allies. There was some popular anti-communist sentiment, and 150 Portuguese volunteers served unofficially in the Blue Division. However, most had roots in Spain or had already fought on the Francoist side in theViriatos Division during the Spanish Civil War. The Portuguese served in Spanish units and had no separate national presence.[18]
1,900 soldiers of the Blue Division are buried in the war cemetery inVeliky Novgorod.[19]
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