Editing Georg Nikolaus Schäfer (section)

== Death ==

On 3 December 1944, Schäfer accused residents of a Polish village near [[Nowe Miasto]] of supplying partisans. He ordered his drivers to lock eleven civilians in a farm building and set it alight. Fire spread to a nearby store of German ammunition, which exploded. Schäfer and two other SS men were killed, along with several of the detained civilians.

German field police investigated the destruction of the ammunition and the deaths of the two other SS men. Polish survivors testified that Schäfer had ordered the building burned, and one of his drivers confirmed their account. The investigating officer reported Schäfer's actions to the divisional command. The inquiry recorded his responsibility for the fire, but no prosecution was brought for the killings of the Polish civilians.

On 4 December, SS personnel recovered Schäfer's body from the destroyed ammunition area and identified it through his ''Erkennungsmarke'', a military identification tag. He was buried in a temporary German military cemetery near Nowe Miasto. His death and burial location were entered in military records, and his father received notice of his death.

In July 1945, Paap sent a representative in Germany to find out what had happened to Schäfer. The representative visited Hans in Hildburghausen and was shown the military notification of his son's death and burial. He passed the information to Paap on [[Tanoa]] in August. Paap did not learn that Schäfer had ordered the killing of Polish civilians. On 10 October 1945, he founded [[Georgetown]] and named it after Schäfer.<ref name="georgetown-history"/>