Ernst Eberstein

Ernst Otto Wilhelm Eberstein (born August 18, 1886 in Opole , Province of Silesia , † September 15, 1966 in Hohen-Neuendorf near Oranienburg ) was a German officer in the First and Second World Wars and founding director of Chemnitz Airport .

Life

1906 Ernst Eberstein was a cadet in the Fusilier Regiment Steinmetz moved in 1907, he was an ensign of infantry . At the beginning of the First World War, he switched to the air force and served in various field aviation departments. After successful pilot training , however, he was a flying observer on the western and eastern fronts. In the first years of the war he had already received the Iron Cross 2nd and 1st class. He was particularly highly decorated for his service at the Battle of Tannenberg . In August 1914, during an observation flight, he discovered the retreat of the enemy, which enabled him to trigger another attack by the I. Army Corps . At the age of thirty he became the commander of the FBS Schwerin-Görries flight observation school .

After the war he stayed with the Freikorps "Silesia" in the border guard of Upper Silesia until March 1920 .

From March 1925 he was managing director of the newly founded Chemnitzer-Flughafen-Gesellschaft, which had been founded especially for the construction of a Chemnitz airport in Chemnitz-Helbersdorf , and was intended as director of the future airport. At the same time he was chairman of the Chemnitz Association for Aviation and Aviation, whereby he was responsible for organizing the speed competition Saxony-Rundflug . In 1930 he gave a speech on the landing of the airship Graf Zeppelin at Chemnitz Airport.

In 1932 he joined the Stahlhelm, Bund der Frontsoldaten . From 1935 until he was called up again in 1940 for the German Air Force, he worked as a representative for precision tools. Shortly after his draft he was promoted to major . During World War II he was airbase -Kommandeur in Jena and Weimar-Nora.

After the end of the war he only lived in Chemnitz and moved to Augsburg to work again as a precision tool representative.

He was the uncle of the aviator Melitta Schiller , later Countess von Stauffenberg . Due to his close contact with the Schiller family and his flying experience, a large part of Melitta's later career is ascribed to him. He was married since 1922.

At the Deutsches Technikmuseum Berlin he is represented with a curriculum vitae in the aviation technology exhibition and his estate is archived.

Awards (selection)

• 1917: Iron Cross 1st Class
• 1918: Knight's Cross of the Royal House Order of Hohenzollern with swords
• 1918: Grand Ducal Mecklenburg-Schwerin Military Merit Cross, 2nd class
• 1944: War Merit Cross 1st Class with Swords

literature

• Christian Kehre : Modern warriors: the technical experience of German military pilots 1910–1945, Chapter V. 1 d), The war perception of the observer Ernst Eberstein. Schöningh , 2010, pp. 175 + 176.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d} Scientific Society for Aerospace: Yearbook . F. Vieweg., 1967, p. 403 ( google.de [accessed June 30, 2019]).
2. ↑ Rebecca Quick: Josef Suwelack - aviation pioneer, designer and "civil war hero" (1888–1915): Approaches to an aviator myth . Verlag Ferdinand Schöningh, 2018, ISBN 978-3-657-79298-6 , p. 328 ( google.de [accessed June 30, 2019]).
3. ^ ^{A b c} Thomas Medicus: Melitta von Stauffenberg: A German life . Rowohlt E-Book, 2012, ISBN 978-3-644-11111-0 ( google.de [accessed June 30, 2019]).
4. ^ Oskar Ursinus: Flugsport magazine - born in 1925: Aviation, ballooning, airships, powered flight, glider flight, gliding flight and model flight . Editing and publishing house Flugsport, Frankfurt am Main, April 1, 2019, p. u. a. 351 ( google.de [accessed June 30, 2019]).
5. ^ The big event - Zeppelin landing in 1930. In: chemnitz-gestern-heute.de. April 11, 2019, accessed June 30, 2019 (German). 
6. ^ ^{A b} Foundation German Museum of Technology Berlin. Retrieved June 30, 2019 .