Kurt Dieckert

Kurt Dieckert

Kurt Dieckert (born December 17, 1893 in Allenburg , East Prussia , † October 28, 1959 in Hanover ) was a German building officer and officer . He became known as a military-historical chronicler of the East Prussian operation and the battle for Königsberg .

Life

Dieckert's parents were the go. Counselor Franz Dieckert and his wife Doris born. Sprengel . After graduating from the Collegium Fridericianum , Dieckert studied architecture at the Technical University of Danzig from 1912 , where he joined the Academic Architects' Association.

First World War

In 1914, at the beginning of the First World War, he was retired as "weak-hearted". In 1915 he came to the Prussian Army as a war volunteer to the 2nd Leib-Hussar Regiment "Queen Victoria of Prussia" No. 2 in Danzig. In 1916 he fought on the Eastern Front as a NCO and Vice Sergeant in Infantry Regiment No. 381 of the 3rd Division (German Empire) and was awarded the Iron Cross 2nd Class. As a lieutenant he took part in the German spring offensive in 1918 . After the November Revolution he was released to Koenigsberg on December 14, 1918 .

Building council

In the autumn of 1919 he passed the main diploma examination with "good" in Danzig . He joined the Prussian state building administration and in 1921 came to the building construction office in Johannisburg . After he had passed the state examination in Berlin in 1922, he was commissioned to restore the church in Allensburg, which had been destroyed in 1914. From 1925 he had to look after the renovation of the University Church in Marburg as well as the children's clinic and the ENT clinic of the Philipps University of Marburg . Since 1927 head of department in Bad Nenndorf , he was responsible for the new construction of the Winckler baths, the Kurhaus, the large bathhouse, the Deisterhaus and the hotels "Haus Cassel" and "Haus Hannover". Government building officer since 1931, in April 1932 he joined the State Building Department in Rinteln as a member of the board and in October 1932 the Building Department Hameln .

In April 1934 he was transferred to the forest and domain administration in the Gumbinnen administrative district , where he was responsible for agricultural buildings in the state domains , forests and stud farms, as well as for the construction of rural settlements . He led the construction of the primary school in Darkehmen and the district court in Treuburg as well as the renovation of the justice building in Insterburg . In the same year he was appointed government and building councilor.

Wehrmacht

From 1934 he made military exercises in Infantry Regiment 22 (Gumbinnen) of the 1st Infantry Division . In 1936 he reached the ranks of first lieutenant and captain of the reserve . On August 25, 1939, a week before the start of the attack on Poland , he was called up as a company commander of a blocking company from the Border Guard Regiment 1 in Goldap . Then in the 311st Infantry Division , he was transferred to the Ostmärkischen Infantry Regiment 664 in May 1940 . On September 12, 1941, he was appointed senior government and building councilor and on Christmas Eve of the same year was entrusted with leading a pioneer company (675) in Białystok . In 1942 he came to the Volkhov Front at his own request . In the 126th Infantry Division he fought near Novgorod and on Lake Ilmen . In the Battle of the Volkhov on January 19, 1942, he was seriously wounded in close combat . He was only released from the hospital a year later . After his convalescence leave, he served with a stiff leg in the replacement battalion of Fusilier Regiment 22 (formerly Gumbinnen Infantry Regiment) from the end of January 1943 . On July 1, 1943, he became the commander of the large forest camp at the Peenemünde Army Research Center . In November he returned to Gumbinnen . As the 2nd Belarusian Front approached, he made himself available as a liaison officer between the government in Gumbinnen and the 3rd Panzer Army . After a cholecystectomy in Bartenstein , he was with his family in Bad Nenndorf from November 13, 1943. He returned to East Prussia in early January 1945 and looked after dispersed troops. When the Gumbinnen Command ended on January 21, 1945, he came to Prussian Holland . From January 26th in the Führerreserve , he led a unit of the Air Force Combat Battalion from February 2nd, 1945. On February 25, 1945 he was dismissed as a major from the Wehrmacht in Pillau .

Escape and a new beginning

He fled East Prussia in the Hannibal company . Due to a storm, the training ship Oktant was only able to leave Pillau four days late on March 4th. The cruiser Admiral Scheer took over the refugees in Gotenhafen and brought them to Swinoujscie . On Good Friday (March 30th) he reached his family in Bad Nenndorf. In Rinteln he found a job as a senior government and building officer. In 1951 he came to the government in Hanover as senior building officer . The East Prussian collection he built up for the family comprised 1,000 non-fiction books, 600 titles of aesthetic literature, spa pennants , carpets from Masuria, as well as self-painted watercolors and paintings.

Because of his experience and knowledge from the battle for East Prussia, the publishing house Graefe and Unzer asked him for a report on the battle for Königsberg . He compiled the details in broad correspondence with the commanders of the East Prussian units . With new tactical maps they created an informative overall picture. When Otto Lasch returned from captivity in 1955 , Dieckert made all his material available to him. Lasch used it for his book about Königsberg's downfall. Horst Großmann put Dieckert's documents on paper. Under the title The Battle for East Prussia and Dieckert / Großmann Authorship , this documentary report was published unchanged in multiple editions, initially by Gräfe and Unzer in 1960, then by Motorbuch Verlag and most recently by Lindenbaum Verlag .

"Kurt Dieckert, senior building officer and major in the reserve, has spent years of work with great effort put together a unique collection of material about the struggles for East Prussia and has begun to conceptualize this book. He never got to write it down because death tore him from his work too early. The undersigned completed the work. "

- Horst Großmann in the foreword of the book

Dieckert worked on his own manuscript on the struggle for East Prussia to the last breath. At the age of 65 he succumbed to the second myocardial infarction . He left his wife Christel and the children Hans, Hella, Jürgen and Martin.

Awards

• Iron Cross 2nd Class (1918)
• War Merit Cross (1939) Second Class with Swords (1941)
• Iron Cross 1st Class (1942)
• Wound badge in silver (1942)

plant

• Dieckert / Großmann: The fight for East Prussia. The comprehensive documentary report . Gräfe and Unzer, Munich 1960.

- Swedish translation by Jörgen Elfving (2011): Ostpreussens undergång 1944–1945. En kamp utan nåd . Svenskt military historiskt Bibliotek Förlag.

- Polish transmission by Wawrzyniec Sawicki and Izabela Jankowska (2011): Bój o Prusy Wschodnie. Kronika dramatu 1944-1945

Web links

• Dieckert's contributions to military history (Bastiaan Willems)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d} family archive (Hans Dieckert)
2. ↑ Otto Lasch: This is how Königsberg fell. Battle and fall of East Prussia's capital . Gräfe and Unzer, Munich 1958. New editions 1959 and 1994. ISBN 3-87943-435-2
3. ↑ Preussische Allgemeine Zeitung , No. 50, December 14, 2013, p. 11
4. ↑ Hans Dieckert had a doctorate in forestry. Hella born Dieckert is director of studies