We recently marked the 80th anniversary of the Battle of the Bulge. That battle was marked with fierce fighting and brutality, including the killings of POWs.

The Battle of the Bulge began on December 16, 1944, when the German forces began their last major push on the Western front, which resulted in breaks in the American line, cutting off troops and surrounding them with enemy forces, and creating a “bulge” in the Ardennes Forest. On December 17, the 1st SS Panzer Division took American soldiers captive, and then executed them in what became known as the Malmédy Massacre. But that wasn’t the only group of soldiers that were captured and executed by the 1st SS Panzer Division that day. In the small Belgian village of Wereth, eleven members of the 333rd Field Artillery Battalion were also captured and murdered by the SS – but this massacre was sealed and not reported in the official records, and was subsequently unknown for decades, even though the bodies of the men were recovered. There are probably two reasons why: there are 84 recorded deaths and 21 recorded survivors of the Malmédy Massacre, and the massacre was reported the same day that it happened, whereas there were no survivors in Wereth, and the massacre was not discovered until much later (when local civilians informed the Army of what had happened). Second, the 333rd Field Artillery Battalion was an all-black segregated unit – and when the official report was compiled, the Wereth 11 were left out.

A 1949 Senate Armed Services Committee documented and investigated 12 incidents of Nazi troops massacring captured American troops and Belgian civilians during the Battle of the Bulge, but the Committee’s report omitted the killings in Wereth, and history nearly overlooked the horrific deaths of the 11 members of the 333rd Field Artillery Battalion.

How was the massacre overlooked? That was the Army’s decision. They investigated, but then locked down the records. We don’t know who made that decision, or why. Was it just easier to sweep it under the rug because these were black soldiers without connections who could demand answers?

The U.S. Army invested two years investigating the Wereth 11 Massacre. In February 1947, almost two years to the day of the tragedy itself, the Army closed its investigation. Whoever committed the murders was never identified or located. The Langers were not sure of the specific SS unit. At that point the Army officially labeled the findings “Top Secret” and closed the files, hiding them away for decades. In 1949, the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee investigated a dozen recognized war crimes of this nature in Europe. They never knew about the Wereth 11.

The Langers were the family that had attempted to protect the Wereth 11, and had given them shelter as they tried to avoid capture. Unfortunately, they were discovered.

Eleven U.S. soldiers—members of the segregated 333rd Field Artillery Battalion—hiked ten miles through deep snow and record-setting cold to escape Nazi Schutzstaffel SS troops after fighting on December 17, 1944, the second day of the Battle of the Bulge. The desperate men finally sought shelter in Wereth. They knocked on the Langer family’s door and were welcomed with warmth and food. But soon, a Nazi patrol arrived—likely tipped off by a neighbor in the German-speaking community—and marched the unarmed men away. Hermann Langer, just 12 years-old at the time, never forgot the soldiers seated at his kitchen table, nor what he later saw in the nearby pasture: the soldiers’ bodies following brutal torture.

These were 11 black men, mostly from the deep South, and all enlisted men.

The 11 soldiers massacred, known as the “Wereth 11”, were: Curtis Adams of South Carolina; Mager Bradley of Mississippi, George Davis Jr. of Alabama; Thomas Forte of Mississippi; Robert Green of Georgia; James Leatherwood of Mississippi; Nathaniel Moss of Texas; George Motten of Texas; William Pritchett of Alabama; James Stewart of West Virginia; and Due Turner of Arkansas.

The Langer family were the last to see these eleven men alive.

The Langers expressed their concern about the welfare of the 11, but the German officer told them not to worry—pretty soon they would not be feeling the coldness. The Langers’ last view of the Americans, at about 7 pm on December 17, 1944, was of them running ahead of the Schwimmwagen into the evening darkness.

Evidence concludes the 11 were run about 900 yards into a cow pasture far from the eyes of those within the hamlet. Shortly thereafter, residents claimed to hear automatic gunfire. Then silence.

It would be well over a month before the bodies of the 11 were discovered. By the beginning of February 1945, the winter snow was melting. Knowing, generally, of the Americans’ fate, residents of Wereth led advancing GIs to where the 11 had lain undisturbed for nearly two months, buried under snow. Some had gone to view the bodies on December 18, but would say and do nothing about it.

The same SS division also carried out a civilian massacre at Stavelot just days later, killing 164 men, women, and children. While the German troops were in the area, the local population could do nothing without drawing attention to themselves. When the Americans took the area permanently, the locals informed the Army. The bodies bore the horrific evidence of Nazi brutality. Whether the mutilation happened before or after their executions, we will never know.

Corporal Ewall Seida was the first American to lay eyes on them on February 13. His findings went back to Major James L. Baldwin, regimental S-2 (Intelligence Officer). On February 15, the bodies were laid before medical examiner Captain William Everett. By that time, the evidence of the December 17, 1944, mass murder at Malmedy was well known, but there was a major difference between this murder and the 85 killed at Malmedy.

The bodies at Malmedy showed no evidence of mutilations, nor prolonged torture or suffering from abuse while alive. Most still had personal valuables such as rings with them. It was a murderous act followed by a quick exodus of the perpetrators. For the Wereth 11, there was an abundance of evidence of torture and mutilation—whether alive or following death. Some had one finger cut off, that being the most expedient manner of removing a valuable ring from a dead body when the object refuses to slide off easily.

This does not explain why Sergeant Thomas J. Forte had four fingers literally ripped off one hand. Other corpses had so many broken bones they would not even have been able to crawl. The backs of their skulls were crushed from massive strikes. Teeth were knocked out. Many bodies showed tire tracks—evidence of being run over by a vehicle. One died clutching a field dressing, as if attempting to bind another’s wound. The worst evidence was clear signs of bayonet wounds into their empty eye sockets. Whether alive or already dead at that moment, they were bayoneted in the eyes.

Seven of the Wereth 11 were buried at the Henri-Chapelle American Cemetery in Belgium, and the other four were repatriated back to the United States. It was only thanks to the dogged efforts of Hermann Langer, who erected the first memorial in 1994, that the horrific massacre of the Wereth 11 began to be remembered.

Langer’s frustration simmered for decades as the event remained a local story—insufficiently investigated by the U.S. government and omitted from its 1948 official war crimes report—while the massacre of white soldiers in nearby Malmedy on the same day became well-known WWII history. In 1994, he constructed a monument to the “Wereth 11” himself. Early ceremonies drew a couple dozen people, including U.S. military personnel based in Germany, yet the monument remained unknown to a wider audience in its remote location and unmentioned in Battle of the Bulge guidebooks.

A second memorial was constructed and dedicated in 2004. Hermann Langer died in 2013, but his efforts led to a yearly commemoration, and gained the support of the U.S. Embassy in Belgium, which participates annually. And after decades, Congress officially recognized the Wereth 11 massacre in 2017.

11 Afro-American soldiers of the 333rd Field Artillery Battalion tried to reach the US lines after being overrun earlier the same day.

All were captured, tortured and shot by soldiers of Kampfgruppe Knittel, 1st SS Panzer Division at Wereth. #WW2 pic.twitter.com/WBEKev16MF

— WWII Pictures (@WWIIpix) December 17, 2022

Today, the Wereth 11 memorial is recognized as not just a monument to the eleven men who died, but also honors the often-forgotten efforts of black servicemen during World War II. The Langer family still hosts tours, and invites veterans to sit at the same table in the house where the Wereth 11 sat. The YouTube channel History Underground documented a visit to the Langer home and the memorial by World War II veteran Louis Brown, age 99, during the 80th anniversary of the Battle of the Bulge. The video also visits the graves of those of the Wereth 11 that are buried at Henri-Chapelle.

Memorial Day is the time to remember and honor the stories of those who died in service to our nation, as we try to do on Victory Girls every year. Stories like the massacre of the Wereth 11 deserve to be remembered and told, especially because they were hidden for so long. What these men suffered should be recognized, and thanks to the persistence of one man – who was just a child at the time – they were not forgotten. And if you didn’t know their story before, now you do. On this Memorial Day, you too can honor the service and sacrifice of these eleven men of the 333rd Field Artillery Battalion, who deserve the recognition that they were long denied.

Featured image: the Wereth 11 memorial as it appeared in 2007 (the plaque bearing the names has since been redesigned), via Steven Hoover, Public Affairs Office of U.S. Army Garrison Benelux/American Forces Press Service on Wikimedia Commons, cropped, public domain