German war graves commission

General der infanterie
Last death by firing squad
Only following orders meme

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World War II Database

Anton Dostler

Surname	Dostler
Given Name	Anton
Born	10 May 1891
Died	1 Dec 1945
Country	Germany
Category	Military-Ground
Gender	Male

Contributor: C. Peter Chen

ww2dbaseAnton Dostler was born in München, Germany. During WW2, he was an infantry general who served in the Italian theater. On 22 Mar 1944, Italian fascists captured 15 US Army personnel operating behind the German front lines, attempting to sabotage a railroad tunnel. The prisoners were eventually turned over to men under Dostler's command and were executed on 26 Mar. After the end of the war, Dostler was tried and found guilty of war crimes for these executions in the first war crime trial. Although he maintained his innocence, placing the blame of the illegal executions on his subordinate Colonel Almers, the courts upheld the charge, and Dostler was executed on 1 Dec 1945.

ww2dbaseSource: Wikipedia.

Last Major Revision: Dec 2006

Photographs

Anton Dostler Timeline

10 May 1891

Anton Dostler was born.

26 Mar 1944

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Anton Dostler (Munich, May 10, 1891 – Aversa, December 1, 1945) was a General of the Infantry in the regular German army during World War II. In the first Alliedwar trial after the war, Dostler was found guilty of war crimes and executed by a firing squad.

Military career[]

Anton Dostler joined the German Army in 1910 and served as a junior officer during World War I. From the start of World War II to 1940, he served as Chief of Staff of the 7th Army. Subsequently, he commanded the 57th Infantry Division (1941–1942), the 163rd Infantry Division (1942) and after some temporary stand-ins at Corps, was appointed commander of 75th Army Corps (Jan-July 1944) in Italy and then as Cdr. Venetian Coast (Sept to Nov 1944) when its name was changed to 73rd Army Corps, at which he finished the war.

Execution of U.S. soldiers[]

Main article: Operations Ginny I and II

On March 22, 1944, fifteen soldiers of the U.S. Army, including two officers, landed on the Italian coast about 15 kilometres north of La Spezia, 400 km (250 miles) behind the then established front, as part of O

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Anton Dostler (10 May 1891-1 December 1945) was a GermanWehrmachtGeneral der Infanterie who commanded army corps during World War II. He was executed by a US Army firing squad for presiding over the executions of American prisoners in Italy in March 1944.

Biography[]

Anton Dostler was born in Munich, Bavaria, Germany in 1891, and he joined the Imperial German Army in 1910 and served as a junior officer during World War I. He continued his military service as an officer in the Weimar Republic's Reichswehr, and, at the start of World War II, he became chief-of-staff of the German 7th Army.

From January to July 1944, he commanded the LXXV Armeekorps in Italy and then the LXXIII Armeekorps on the Venetian coast from September 1944 to May 1945. In March 1944, he exercised Adolf Hitler's "Commando Order" by executing 15 American commandos who had been sent to sabotage a railway tunnel from La Spezia to Genoa, in spite of his subordinate repeatedly attempting to convince Dostler that executing the prisoners was against the 1929 Geneva Convention.

At the end of the war, Dos