On May 5, 1945 — just three days before Nazi Germany’s unconditional surrender — one of the most extraordinary battles of World War II took place at Castle Itter in the Austrian Alps. It was a battle unlike any other in the war: American soldiers, German Wehrmacht troops, French VIP prisoners, and Austrian resistance fighters fought side by side against a common enemy — the fanatical Waffen-SS. The story reads more like fiction than history, but every detail is documented fact.
The Castle and Its Prisoners
Castle Itter, known as Schloss Itter, is a medieval fortress perched on a hilltop near the village of Itter in the Tyrolean Alps. During the war, the SS had converted it into a special prison for high-value French prisoners — political leaders, military officers, and celebrities whom the Nazis considered valuable hostages.
The castle’s prisoners were among the most prominent figures in France. They included Paul Reynaud, the former Prime Minister who had led France when Germany invaded in 1940; Édouard Daladier, another former Prime Minister who had signed the Munich Agreement with Hitler in 1938; General Maxime Weygand, former commander of the French army; Jean Borotra, the famous tennis champion and former Vichy government minister; and Michel Clemenceau, son of the legendary World War I leader Georges Clemenceau.
These were not ordinary prisoners of war. They were political pawns, kept alive as bargaining chips. The SS guarded them carefully, and as the war drew to its close, the prisoners lived in genuine fear that their captors would execute them rather than allow them to be liberated.
The Collapse of Order
By early May 1945, the Third Reich was disintegrating. Hitler had killed himself on April 30. Allied armies were advancing from all directions. German military units were fragmenting — some surrendering, some fighting on, and some descending into chaos.
In the Tyrolean Alps, however, fanatical SS units remained dangerous. Heinrich Himmler’s order to execute all prominent prisoners before they could be liberated was well known. The prisoners at Castle Itter had every reason to fear for their lives.
On May 4, the SS guards at Castle Itter suddenly abandoned their posts, fleeing into the mountains. The prisoners found themselves free but unprotected, with roving SS units in the surrounding area that might attack at any moment. Former Prime Minister Reynaud organized the prisoners’ defense as best he could with a handful of weapons left behind by the guards.
An Unlikely Alliance Forms
The prisoners managed to send word of their situation to nearby forces. Their message reached Major Josef “Sepp” Gangl, a German Wehrmacht officer who had become disillusioned with the Nazi regime and had been secretly working with the Austrian resistance. Gangl had already been in contact with advancing American forces and had effectively switched sides.
Gangl contacted Captain John Lee of the 12th Armored Division, U.S. Army. Lee, a former football player from Norwich, New York, immediately grasped the urgency. If the SS reached the castle before the Americans did, the French prisoners would almost certainly be murdered.
Lee assembled a small rescue force: a Sherman tank, a handful of American soldiers, and Gangl’s group of Wehrmacht defectors. It was a coalition that would have seemed impossible just weeks earlier — American and German soldiers riding together into battle.
The Defense of the Castle
Lee’s force reached Castle Itter late on the evening of May 4. They found the French prisoners armed and ready to fight but badly outnumbered if the SS attacked in force. Lee quickly organized the castle’s defense, positioning his men along the medieval walls and setting up the Sherman tank to cover the main approach road.
The defenders were a remarkable collection: American GIs, German soldiers who had turned against their own regime, French political leaders and generals, and Austrian resistance fighters from the village below. Tennis champion Jean Borotra volunteered to vault the castle wall and run through enemy lines to seek additional reinforcements — a mission he accomplished despite being shot at repeatedly.
At dawn on May 5, the attack came. An SS battle group, estimated at 100 to 150 men, advanced on the castle from multiple directions. They were well-armed and motivated by fanatical ideology — surrender was not in their vocabulary.
The battle was intense. SS troops attacked the castle walls with small arms, machine guns, and a captured anti-tank weapon. The defenders fought back from the medieval battlements, their fire discipline and elevated position compensating for their small numbers. The Sherman tank proved critical early in the fight, its 75mm gun devastating the SS positions until the tank was knocked out by a Panzerfaust.
During the fighting, Major Gangl was killed by a sniper’s bullet while pushing former Prime Minister Reynaud out of the line of fire. The German officer who had risked everything to oppose the Nazi regime died saving a French statesman — a poignant symbol of the battle’s strange alliances.
Relief and Victory
The fighting raged for several hours. Ammunition was running low and the defenders were taking casualties. The situation was becoming critical when, around mid-morning, a relief force arrived. The 142nd Infantry Regiment of the 36th Infantry Division, alerted by Borotra’s desperate run through the lines, fought through the remaining SS positions and reached the castle.
The arrival of American reinforcements broke the SS attack. The remaining SS fighters scattered into the mountains, where most were eventually captured. Castle Itter was secure, and every one of the French VIP prisoners survived.
The Aftermath
The Battle of Castle Itter was one of the last engagements of World War II in Europe. Germany surrendered unconditionally three days later, on May 8, 1945. The French prisoners returned to their homeland, where several resumed prominent political careers.
Major Gangl was posthumously honored by the Austrian government. The town of Wörgl, near Castle Itter, renamed a street in his honor — “Major-Gangl-Strasse” — recognizing his courage in opposing the Nazi regime from within.
Captain Lee received the Distinguished Service Cross for his leadership during the battle. His decision to race to the castle with a tiny force, against orders and common sense, saved the lives of some of France’s most important citizens.
Why It Matters
The Battle of Castle Itter matters because it defies the simple narratives we construct about war. It was not a battle between good and evil in the conventional sense — it was a battle in which former enemies recognized a common threat and chose to fight together.
The image of American GIs and German soldiers standing shoulder to shoulder on medieval castle walls, defending French politicians against SS fanatics, captures something essential about the chaotic, human reality of war. Alliances shift, individuals make moral choices that transcend national boundaries, and courage appears in the most unexpected places.
The battle also reminds us that the end of a war is often its most dangerous period. In the chaos of collapse, the most fanatical elements become the most dangerous. The prisoners at Castle Itter survived not because of grand strategy but because of individual decisions made by people of different nationalities who chose to do the right thing at the right time.
Castle Itter stands today as a hotel, its medieval walls bearing few traces of the remarkable battle fought there in the dying hours of World War II. But the story endures — a reminder that history’s most extraordinary moments often emerge from its most chaotic ones.
