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Friedrich Olbricht
Friedrich Olbricht (4 October 1888 – 21 July 1944) was a German general during World War II and one of the plotters involved in the 20 July Plot, an attempt to assassinate Adolf Hitler in 1944. He was a senior staff officer, with the rank of lieutenant general. He was secretly in contact with most of the leaders of the resistance. They briefed him on their various plots and he placed sympathetic officers in key positions. He quietly encouraged field commanders to support the resistance. By late 1943 his office was the centre of Resistance plotting, under Claus von Stauffenberg. Had the 20 July plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler been successful, he would have assumed the position of Minister of Finance in a post-Nazi regime. Early life Olbricht was born on 4 October 1888 in Leisnig, Saxony, to Richard Olbricht, a mathematics professor and director of the ''Realschule'' (secondary school) in Bautzen. Career Olbricht successfully passed the ''Abitur'' (university preparatory sc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Leisnig
Leisnig ( hsb, Lěsnik) is a small town in the district of Mittelsachsen, in the state of Saxony in Germany, 50 kilometers southeast of Leipzig. History A settlement in this location was first mentioned in 1046. The town features Mildenstein Castle which is over 1000 years old. The house Markt 13 shows the coat of arms of the Apian family. Leisnig was Friedrich Olbricht's birthplace. In 1944, he was involved in the 20 July Plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler, and was executed for his participation in it. The former municipality Bockelwitz became a part of the town of Leisnig in 2012. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Reichswehr
''Reichswehr'' () was the official name of the German armed forces during the Weimar Republic and the first years of the Third Reich. After Germany was defeated in World War I, the Imperial German Army () was dissolved in order to be reshaped into a peacetime army. From it a provisional Reichswehr was formed in March 1919. Under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles, the rebuilt German army was subject to severe limitations in size and armament. The official formation of the Reichswehr took place on 1 January 1921 after the limitations had been met. The German armed forces kept the name 'Reichswehr' until Adolf Hitler's 1935 proclamation of the "restoration of military sovereignty", at which point it became part of the new . Although ostensibly apolitical, the Reichswehr acted as a state within a state, and its leadership was an important political power factor in the Weimar Republic. The Reichswehr sometimes supported the democratic government, as it did in the Ebert-G ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Albrecht Mertz Von Quirnheim
Albrecht Mertz von Quirnheim (25 March 1905 – 21 July 1944) was a German Army colonel and a resistance fighter in Nazi Germany involved in the 20 July plot against Adolf Hitler. Early life Quirnheim was born in Munich, the son of Hermann Mertz von Quirnheim, a captain on the Bavarian General Staff, and the nephew of Walter Hohmann. He spent his youth in the Bavarian capital before his father became head of the Imperial Archive (the ''Reichsarchiv'') and the family moved to Potsdam in Prussia. As a child he befriended Hans-Jürgen von Blumenthal and as a young man came to know the brothers Werner von Haeften and Hans Bernd von Haeften, through family connections; these were all future fellow-conspirators. Military career Following his ''Abitur'', Quirnheim joined the ''Reichswehr'' in 1923. His friendshipHoffman, P. (1995) Stauffenberg (A Family History), 1905-1944, Mcgill-Queen's University Press, Canadap. 81 [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Henning Von Tresckow
Henning Hermann Karl Robert von Tresckow (; 10 January 1901 – 21 July 1944) was a German military officer with the rank of major general in the Nazi Germany, German Army who helped organize German resistance to Nazism, German resistance against Adolf Hitler. He attempted to assassinate Hitler on 13 March 1943 and drafted the Operation Valkyrie, Valkyrie plan for a coup against the German government. He was described by the Gestapo as the "prime mover" behind the 20 July plot, plot of 20 July 1944 to assassinate Hitler.Fest 1997, p. 236. He committed suicide at Królowy Most on the Eastern Front (World War II), Eastern Front upon the plot's failure. Early life Tresckow was born in Magdeburg into a noble family from the Brandenburg region of Prussia with 300 years of military tradition that provided the Prussian Army with 21 generals.Balfour 1988, pg. 124. His father, Leopold Hans Heinrich Eugen Hermann von Tresckow, later a cavalry general, had been present at Kaiser Wilhelm I' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Carl Friedrich Goerdeler
Carl Friedrich Goerdeler (; 31 July 1884 – 2 February 1945) was a monarchist conservative German politician, executive, economist, civil servant and opponent of the Nazi regime. He opposed some anti-Jewish policies while he held office and was opposed to the Holocaust. Had the 20 July plot to overthrow Hitler's dictatorship in 1944 succeeded, Goerdeler would have served as the Chancellor of the new government. After his arrest, he gave the names of numerous co-conspirators to the Gestapo, causing the arrests and executions of hundreds or even thousands of others. Goerdeler was executed by hanging on 2 February 1945. Early life and career Goerdeler was born into a family of Prussian civil servants in Schneidemühl in the Prussian Province of Posen of the German Empire (now Piła in present-day Poland). Goerdeler's parents supported the Free Conservative Party, and after 1899 Goerdeler's father served in the Prussian Landtag as a member of that party. Goerdeler's biographer and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ludwig Beck
Ludwig August Theodor Beck (; 29 June 1880 – 20 July 1944) was a German general and Chief of the German General Staff during the early years of the Nazi regime in Germany before World War II. Although Beck never became a member of the Nazi Party, in the early 1930s he supported Adolf Hitler's forceful denunciation of the Versailles Treaty and belief in the need for Germany to rearm. Beck had grave misgivings regarding the Nazi demand for all German officers to swear an oath of fealty to the person of Hitler in 1934, but Beck believed that Germany needed strong government, which Hitler could successfully provide if the Führer was influenced by traditional elements within the army, rather than by the SA and SS. In serving as Chief of Staff of the German Army between 1935 and 1938, Beck became increasingly disillusioned and stood in opposition to the increasing totalitarianism of the Nazi regime and to Hitler's aggressive foreign policy. Public foreign-policy disagreeme ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Coup D'état
A coup d'état (; French for 'stroke of state'), also known as a coup or overthrow, is a seizure and removal of a government and its powers. Typically, it is an illegal seizure of power by a political faction, politician, cult, rebel group, military, or a dictator. Many scholars consider a coup successful when the usurpers seize and hold power for at least seven days. Etymology The term comes from French ''coup d'État'', literally meaning a 'stroke of state' or 'blow of state'. In French, the word ''État'' () is capitalized when it denotes a sovereign political entity. Although the concept of a coup d'état has featured in politics since antiquity, the phrase is of relatively recent coinage.Julius Caesar's civil war, 5 January 49 BC. It did not appear within an English text before the 19th century except when used in the translation of a French source, there being no simple phrase in English to convey the contextualized idea of a 'knockout blow to the existing administratio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Operation Valkyrie
Operation Valkyrie (german: Unternehmen Walküre) was a German World War II emergency continuity of government operations plan issued to the Territorial Reserve Army of Germany to execute and implement in the event of a general breakdown in civil order of the nation. Failure of the government to maintain control of civil affairs might have been caused by the Allied bombing of German cities, or uprising of the millions of foreign forced labourers working in German factories. German Army ('' Heer'') officers, General Friedrich Olbricht, Major General Henning von Tresckow and Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg modified the plan with the intention of using it to take control of German cities, disarm the SS, and arrest the Nazi leadership once Hitler had been assassinated in the 20 July plot. Hitler's death (as opposed to his arrest) was required to free German soldiers from their oath of loyalty to him (''Reichswehreid''). After lengthy preparation, the plot was activated in 1944 but ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Oberkommando Des Heeres
The (; abbreviated OKH) was the Command (military formation), high command of the German Army (1935–1945), Army of Nazi Germany. It was founded in 1935 as part of Adolf Hitler's German rearmament, rearmament of Germany. OKH was ''de facto'' the most important unit within the German war planning until the Battle of Moscow, defeat at Moscow in December 1941. During World War II, OKH had the responsibility of strategic planning of Field army, Armies and Army Groups. The General Staff of the OKH managed operational matters. Each German Army also had an Army High Command ( or AOK). The Armed Forces High Command () then took over this function for theatres other than the Eastern Front (World War II), Eastern front. The OKH commander held the title of Commander-in-chief of the Army (). After the Battle of Moscow, the OKH commander Field marshal Walther von Brauchitsch was removed from office, and Hitler appointed himself as Commander-in-Chief of the Army. From 1938, OKH was, togeth ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Iron Cross
The Iron Cross (german: link=no, Eisernes Kreuz, , abbreviated EK) was a military decoration in the Kingdom of Prussia, and later in the German Empire (1871–1918) and Nazi Germany (1933–1945). King Frederick William III of Prussia established it on 17 March 1813 during the Napoleonic Wars (EK 1813). The award was backdated to the birthday (10 March) of his late wife, Queen Louise. Louise was the first person to receive this decoration (posthumously). Recommissioned Iron Cross was also awarded during the Franco-Prussian War (EK 1870), World War I (EK 1914), and World War II (EK 1939). During the 1930s and World War II, the Nazi regime superimposed a swastika on the traditional medal. The Iron Cross was usually a military decoration only, though there were instances awarded to civilians for performing military functions, including Hanna Reitsch, who received the Iron Cross, 2nd class, and Iron Cross, 1st Class, and Melitta Schenk Gräfin von Stauffenberg, who received ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
