Josef Schulz

Josef Schulz (born 1909 or 1910, Barmen, died 20 July 1941, Balkans, Serbia) also spelled Joseph Schultz (Serbian: Jozef Šulc), was a German soldier of the 714th Infantry Division stationed in the Balkans, Serbia during World War II. He died in 1941, allegedly executed after refusing to take part in a partisan execution. The German High Command recorded him as killed in action. The plot of the Yugoslav short movie Joseph Schultz (1973) is based on the incident. Based on a Bundesarchiv study, the incident was dismissed as a legend by many scholars in the 1990s.

Josef Schulz was a soldier. He was born in 1909 and lived in Barmen,Wuppertal,Germany. During World War II, he served as a corporal in the 714th Infantry Division of the Wehrmacht. He is officially recorded as having died during operations in Yugoslavia on 19 July 1941.

On 20 July 1941, a Wehrmacht firing squad executed sixteen Yugoslav partisans within the barracks of Smederevska Palanka, southeast of Belgrade. When the bodies of the victims were exhumed after the war, an eyewitness recalls that remains of military equipment ascribed to a German soldier were also recovered, while an identification tag got lost. In 1947, when a memorial was erected for the victims, the name of a Croat victim with a German-sounding first name, Marsel Mezic, was rendered to Marcel Masel to reflect the belief that a German soldier was executed along with the partisans for refusing to take part in the executions.

...
Wikipedia