Allied Atrocities: Genitals cut off

Manuel Ruiz was a Spanish soldier, a member of the so-called Blue Division, which was composed of Spanish volunteers. He told his story before Judge Schoene on December 27, 1941.

“After Christmas 1941 the first company of the Spanish Division was attacked by the Russians at its middle section, just north of Novgorod. Many wounded Spanish soldiers were captured. Some hours later another Spanish company was able to reoccupy the area, and I personally saw the bodies of Spanish comrades who had been murdered by the Russians. Three of them had been pierced with a pickaxe through the chest, another had had the ears cut off, another was missing an arm, and still another had the genital organ amputated. Toward the end of December 1941 – after the events described above – I saw a Red Cross ambulance standing on a road… five wounded German soldiers who had been in the ambulance were lying on the ground… All five had been killed with bayonets or knives, and two of them had had their genitals cut off.”

Alfred M. de Zayas, The Wehrmacht War Crimes Bureau, 1939-1945, University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln and London. 1989. p. 192-93