Ernst Bregant
Ernst Bregant (born August 22, 1920 in Somogyszil , Hungary ; † March 27, 2016 ) was a first lieutenant in the sea , in command of a training submarine in the German Navy and one of the last surviving Austrian naval officers of the submarine war .
Life
Bregant was a son of Major General Camillo Bregant of the Austrian Army of the First Republic and his wife Katalin Bregant nee. Kathalin noble from Fautz. Grown up in an Austro-Hungarian military family in Graz , it was a matter of course for his brother Alfred (* 1918) and himself to embark on a military career. The brother was trained as a pilot in the army in 1937 . Ernst Bregant was after his war Matura as at December 1, 1939 cadets for the German Navy convened.
War effort
His basic training took place in Stralsund in the winter of 1939/40. In January 1940, he came as a midshipman at the Naval War College of Flensburg - Mürwik . This was followed by training on the sailing school ships Gorch Fock and Albert Leo Schlageter from March 1 to June 6, 1940. From June 7 to December 11, 1940, he served as an ensign for training on the light cruiser Emden . On August 29, 1940, his brother, Lieutenant Alfred Bregant and his flight crew lost their lives in the crash with his Ju 88 during a night fighter flight over the Netherlands ; he was buried in the military cemetery in Cologne-South .
After his training, Ernst Bregant was briefly on the battleship Gneisenau . From July 10, 1941 to September 2, 1942 he was back on the Emden , with whom he trained young sailors on the Baltic Sea . After his promotion to lieutenant at sea and successfully completed training in Mürwik , he served from September 3, 1942 to October 23, 1943 as the third radio technology officer (3rd FTO) on the heavy cruiser Lützow in northern Norway , where the Lützow was in the Altafjord . On December 31, 1942, during the Battle of the Barents Sea , heavy fighting broke out with British escorts from the northern sea convoy JW 51B .
In September 1943 he was promoted to lieutenant at sea . During a vacation in Graz he received a telegram that he would then be serving at the XXII. U-boat training division in Gotenhafen . From October 24, 1943 to May 23, 1944, he completed his U-boat watch officer training on U 58 (Type II C) and U 239 (Type VII C), then his commanding training on U 148 (Type II D).
From December 15, 1944 to March 12, 1945 he completed his anti-aircraft training at the Flak School VII in Swinoujscie . In mid-March he received the order to move to Wilhelmshaven as the commander of the Fährprahms F 208 (equipped with 2 submarine towers and several 3.7cm anti-aircraft guns ) in order to be in charge of the anti-aircraft defense of the submarines as head of the submarine training department to practice. Then the war ended and he was taken prisoner by the British, where he and his crew were able to stay on the F 208 Fährprahm and in the Husum officers' camp . The options were mine clearance in the Baltic Sea or trying to return to the hometown of Graz, since the British had taken over the occupation of Graz from the Russians. In September 1945, after his release from captivity, he managed to return home to Graz.
Career after the war
Ernst Friedrich Bregant became a student at the Karl-Franzens University Graz , specializing in law and political science. After receiving his doctorate in 1948/49, he did his legal internship at the Graz Higher Regional Court and married Ingigerd, née Dumler, on May 5, 1951. After a brief interlude as the private secretary of Karl Kahane , an Austrian entrepreneur and friend of Bruno Kreisky , he worked for the Steirische Magnesit-Industrie AG in Leoben from 1950 to 1958 . From 1958 to 1968 he was responsible for human resources and finance, claims management and legal transactions at Lavanttaler Kohlenbergbau GmbH in St. Stefan im Lavanttal. In the same position, he then worked at Bergdirektion Fohnsdorf and, until his retirement in 1980, at the headquarters of the Austrian Alpine Mining Company in Leoben and, after the merger, at VOEST-Alpine AG .
Sports
In the pre-war period he became a Styrian table tennis champion . He made a name for himself as a tennis player and number 1 of ASV Graz , winning successes at the first post-war tournaments in Velden am Wörthersee and Pörtschach (including against Jaroslav Drobný , the one-armed Alfred Huber and Hans Redl ). At the age of 48 he still played successfully in the Carinthian regional league against a young Hans Kary and only finally put down the tennis racket at the age of 80.
In 1962 he was a founding member of the Tegetthoff Marine Comradeship in Graz, of which he was most recently an honorary member, and after his retirement he turned his attention to extensive sailing trips, especially in the Mediterranean but also as far as Cape Verde . He was still very active in the Tegetthoff Marine Comradeship and in the Rotary Club of Oberes Murtal.
Award
Ernst Bregant received the Silver Decoration of Honor for Services to the Republic of Austria in 1978 and the Tegetthoff Medal in 2008 .
See also
Individual evidence
- ↑ Ernst F. Bregant v. Fautz
- ↑ Ernst Bregant passed away (bridgegraz.at of March 30, 2016, accessed on June 24, 2016)
- ↑ Nikolaus Sifferlinger u. Reinhard Stradner; Marineforum ISSN 0172-8539 ; 4-2011 p. 31.
- ^ First Lieutenant zur See Bregant Ernst ( Memento from October 29, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Small newspaper
- ↑ Officer's license from July 30, 1942 OB d. Marine GA Erich Raeder
- ↑ Fährprahm F 208 .
- ↑ Water and fire underground The end of the Lavanttaler coal mining 1967/68 by Nikolaus A. Sifferlinger & Johann Hodnik (HG)
- ^ The working committee for the establishment of a middle school (borg-wolfsberg.at, accessed on June 24, 2016)
- ^ Awarded the Silver Medal of Honor for Services to the Republic of Austria on April 28, 1978.
- ↑ board letter Graz, Issue III, September 2008 (marineverband.at, accessed on 24 June 2016)
- ↑ List of the bearers of the Decoration of Honor for Services to the Republic of Austria (parlament.gv.at, accessed on June 24, 2016)
- ↑ SC Graz (marineverband.at, accessed on 24 June 2016)
Web links
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Bregant, Ernst |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Bregant, Ernst Friedrich |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Austrian submarine commander, lawyer and tennis athlete |
| DATE OF BIRTH | 22nd August 1920 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Somogyszil |
| DATE OF DEATH | March 27, 2016 |