The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos, 1933-1945

The Wehrmacht established Stalag 378 on May 26, 1942, in the Wahn district of Köln (Cologne) (map 4a), in Defense District (Wehrkreis) VI. In July 1942, the camp was deployed to Gorlovka (today Horlivka, Ukraine) (9f). While it was located in Gorlovka, Stalag 378 had several subcamps (Nebenlager), which were located in Novoekonomicheskii (today Novoekonomichne), Grishino (today Pokrovs’k), Grodovka (today Hrodivka), Dzerzhinsk (today Torets’k), and Nikitovka. After the German defeat at Stalingrad in February 1943, the camp staff withdrew through Krivoi Rog (today Kryvyi Rih) (9g), Zaporozh’e (today Zaporizhzhia) (9f), Dnepropetrovsk (today Dnipro) (9f), and Khorol (9f), where the Wehrmacht ordered it disbanded on August 26, 1943.¹ Stalag 378 received field post number (Feldpostnummer) 13 799 between January 27 and July 14, 1942. The number was struck on October 7, 1943.

In 1942, the camp was subordinate to the Commander of Prisoners of War with the Armed Forces Commander Ukraine (Kommandeur der Kriegsgefangenen beim Wehrmachtbefehlshaber Ukraine). In 1943, the camp was subordinate to the Rear Area Commander of Army Group South (Kommandeur der Kriegsgefangenen beim Befehlshaber des rückwärtigen Heeresgebiets Süd). The commandant of Stalag 378 was Oberstleutnant Johannes von Zerboni di Sposetti, and his deputy was Major Hans Edelmann. The counterintelligence (Abwehr) officer was Hauptmann Dr. Julius Trumpp.² The staff of the main camp totaled about 100 men.

Stalag 378 held Soviet prisoners of war (POWs). The main camp consisted of a number of two-story stone barracks surrounded by barbed wire. One witness estimated that there were between 2,000 and 3,000 prisoners in the camp at a time during its deployment in Gorlovka. The subcamp in Novoekonomicheskii held about 10,000 prisoners, the subcamp in Grishino about 1,800, the subcamp in Grodovka about 1,000, and the subcamp in Dzerzhinsk between 500 and 800.³ The conditions in the camp were similar to those in other camps for Soviet POWs. The prisoners faced severe overcrowding, minimal food supplies and medical care, and deliberate abuse by the guards. They were also forced to perform [End Page 378] hard labor in the numerous work detachments (Arbeitskommandos) that were dispatched from the camp. For example, prisoners at the main camp in Gorlovka worked in the ironworks in the city and at a nearby military airfield, and the prisoners in the subcamp in Novoekonomicheskii worked in coal mines as well as on repairing and building roads. The combination of malnutrition, disease, and exhaustion produced a high mortality rate. At least 2,500 bodies were found in 150 graves near the camp in Gorlovka. According to Soviet Extraordinary State Commission (ChGK) documents, about 2,000 prisoners perished in the camp at Novoekonomicheskii; however, casualty figures from the ChGK are often significantly inflated and should be viewed accordingly.⁴ As in other camps, prisoners arriving at Stalag 378 were screened to separate out Jews and political commissars, who were executed near the camp by Security Service (Sicherheitsdienst) personnel or camp guards.⁵

During the westward retreat, the 2,000–3,000 remaining prisoners were left at Stalag 348 in Dnepropetrovsk. The staff of Stalag 378 continued on to Khorol, where the unit was dissolved and its personnel distributed to other units.