Werner Ostendorff (15 August 1903 – 1 May 1945) was a Major-General of Nazi Germany and one of the youngest Waffen-SS divisional commanders during World War II.
Biography[]
Werner Ostendorff was born on 15 August 1903 in Konigsberg, Prussia, German Empire. He joined the Reichswehr on 5 November 1925, and in 1934 he joined the Luftwaffe of Nazi Germany. On 10 October 1939, he was given command of the first SS division of the Wehrmacht, the 2nd SS Panzer Division Das Reich, and he fought against the Soviet Union during the Great Patriotic War. He was promoted to oberfuhrer for his actions at the Third Battle of Kharkov in 1943, and he was later transferred to the Western Front in Normandy. On 16 June 1944 he was shot in the shoulder by machine-gun fire during the Battle of Carentan against the United States, and Otto Binge took over his division. His last commanding was divisional commander of "Das Reich" on the Eastern Front, and on 9 March 1945 he was mortally wounded by an incendiary shell near Szekesfehervar in Hungary. He died of gangrene on 1 May 1945.