Gerhard Gerigk

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Gerhard Gerigk (born July 27, 1925 in Queetz , Masuria ; † November 24, 2007 in Augsburg ) was a German officer candidate and building contractor . On May 2, 1945, he prevented destruction and fighting between the Wehrmacht , the Waffen SS and the United States Army in Lübz . He helped William A. Knowlton to find the Red Army and bring about the end of the war in southern Mecklenburg .

Life

In Guttstadt , Gerigk completed an apprenticeship as a carpenter in his father's company after completing secondary school.

Demolitionist

Immediately after the journeyman's examination in July 1943, he was called up to the Landwehr Pioneer Battalion 311 and came to Modlin in August . When the battalion moved to the Eastern Front , he and four comrades were assigned to a course for reserve officer applicants. After completing the course, on July 20, 1943, he was assigned to the engineer battalion of the 2nd East Prussian Infantry Division to serve at the front . He came to Tarnowitz to heal a shrapnel wound . Then he returned to Modlin. Since the assignment to the pioneer school in Berlin-Karlshorst was delayed by a few months, he was transferred to an artillery unit in Ortelsburg to train them on anti-tank mines. In the detonation of a recorded exercise mine seriously injured, deaf and almost blind, he came to Sopot and Bad Doberan . There he saw his parents for the last time. They were later deported and died in a gulag . His eldest brother died in Russia. Somewhat recovered, Gerigk came to a Szczecin engineer battalion. In the destroyed housing estate of the Peenemünde Army Research Institute , he trained recruits to blow houses.

Luebz

Gerigk came to Lübz via Rostock on April 22, 1945 as a Fahnenjunker NCO . There he was supposed to blow up bridges and close anti-tank traps. On the night of 2/3 May 1945 he guarded Knowlton from attacks by German soldiers. He got on well with the city commandant, a major from East Prussia . Contrary to the express order of General Walter Hörnlein , he did not blow up the three Lübz bridges on the evening of May 3, 1945. He threw the fuses into the Elde .

“In return for the fact that our fate was in Gerigk's hands for several hours, I promised him that I would work to ensure that he does not end up in Russian captivity; rather, I wanted to try to hand him over to a British prison camp. "

- William A. Knowlton, letter dated February 24, 2004

As a prisoner of war , from May 4, 1945, Gerigk was the interpreter for the Americans, who gave him a Volkswagen Type 166 floating car . In the area west of Ludwigslust and Hagenow he got to know the mayors of villages and small towns and the large assembly camp for German prisoners of war near Wittenburg . Because of the prohibition of fraternization , this activity ended after eight days. Knowlton personally brought Gerigk to Behlendorf on May 20, 1945, as a British prisoner of war . He gave him his home address in the USA and a portrait photograph with a personal dedication.

Emigration and return

Gerigk on the Lübzer lift bridge (2005)

Gerigk was released from captivity in Sievershagen in October 1945. After working as a carpenter at Salzgitter Klöckner-Werke in Castrop-Rauxel , he studied civil engineering at the Höxter building trade school . Knowlton regularly sent him care packages . In 1953 Gerigk emigrated to São Paulo , where relatives lived. He got married there and founded his own construction company. When he returned to Germany with his wife and three sons at the turn of the millennium , he lived in Augsburg . After 60 years he visited Lübz again. With two sons, the couple Peppel and Eberhart Schultze, he drove Knowlton's route on 21/23. May 2005 again. In October 2005 he left the original orders for the blasting of the three bridges in Lübz and the lock structure to the Lübz City Museum. He has been in close contact with Knowlton since his report.

literature

  • Eberhart Schultze: The liberation of Lübz and Parchim by allied troops , in: The Parchimer airfields from 1937-2006. Their past and present, with a territorial-historical consideration of the military processes in the last days of the Second World War and the first months of peace in the area between Ganzlin, Lübz, Parchim, Ludwigslust and Grabow , Volume 2, Part Three. cw Verlagsgruppe, Schwerin 2006, ISBN 3-933781-53-1 , pp. 140–220.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Ilja Baatz (SVZ, 2006)
  2. ↑ Count Donnersmarck had made Neudeck Castle available to the German Red Cross .
  3. ↑ Gerhard Gerigk: The last days of the war - meeting the Americans in Lübz . Diary March 16 to May 12, 1945
  4. ↑ E. Schultze: A German NCO saves the bridges in Lübz and helps the Americans , in ders. (2007), pp. 160–166.
  5. ↑ The soldier time by Gerhard Gerigk, in: Familienchronik Gerigk, chap. 4th
  6. ↑ E. Schultze: “I was just glad that the war was now over” , in ders. (2007), pp. 183–186.
  7. ↑ Adrian Bauer: Back in Lübz after 60 years. Gerhard Gerigk refused a demolition order for Eldebrücken and prevented a bloodbath . Parchimer Newspaper, October 25, 2005.
  8. ↑ E. Schultze, Schweriner Volkszeitung , regional edition Lübz, January 23, 2008.
personal data
SURNAME Gerigk, Gerhard
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German Fahnenjunker NCO and building contractor
DATE OF BIRTH July 27, 1925
PLACE OF BIRTH Queetz , Masuria
DATE OF DEATH November 24, 2007
Place of death augsburg