Peter Schilling (Wehrmacht deserter)

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Peter Nicolaus Schilling (born July 22, 1923 in Lage , Free State of Lippe , † January 20, 2009 in Almere , Netherlands ) was a German Wehrmacht deserter , later an interpreter and autobiographer .

Life

Peter Schilling was the son of a pastor who moved to a pastor's position in Sauen in Brandenburg in 1933 . Up to this point he grew up in Neunkirchen in Saarland.

He registered as a volunteer for the Wehrmacht . When he, deployed on the Eastern Front , witnessed the atrocities of German soldiers in 1942, he felt a remorse. He secretly made contact with French foreign workers and fled to Switzerland in 1943 . He escaped from the internment camp to France in the early summer of 1944 to join the French resistance movement, but was arrested in Besançon . After a conviction by a Wehrmacht court , he was transferred to Field Criminal Prisoner Division 19 in Upper Alsace , from where he deserted. He experienced the end of the war with the Czech partisans .

After the war he worked as a teacher and translator and went to the Netherlands . He tried in vain for rehabilitation or even recognition for his behavior.

Peter Schilling reported, among other things, on his experiences in Raimund Koplin's TV film Fahnenflucht ( WDR , May 18, 1989) and wrote these together in 1998 in his book Carved from Other Wood , which was published in 2000 by BoD-Verlag . Alongside Ludwig Baumann and Helmut Kober , Schilling is one of the three contemporary witnesses whose life stories Lars G. Petersson takes up as an example in the center of his treatise Hitler's deserters . His descriptions of experiences were taken up several times in relevant literature.

Schilling was a member of the Federal Association of Victims of Nazi Military Justice . He died at the age of 85 in Almere, his adopted home.

Publications

  • I had to do something myself ... ; in: Michael Eberlein, Roland Müller: I'm fed up with butchery ... , Marburg History Workshop, 1992, pp. 132 ff., 184. ISBN 978-3-926-29503-3
  • Carved from a different cloth. Half a sentence for life. BoD-Verlag, 2000. ISBN 978-3-831-10029-3

Literature (selection)

  • Peter Schilling - command, obedience, refusal and moral courage. Regional history working group, Neustadt am Rübenberge, January 28, 2009.
  • Lars G. Petersson: Hitler's deserters. Chipmunkapub Verlag, 2012. ISBN 978-1-84991-795-7
  • Martin Schnackenberg: Case 12. Mr. Schilling, b. 1923. With preliminary work by the Federal Association of Victims of Nazi Military Justice, 1999, p. 125 ff.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Peter Schilling - Order, obedience, refusal and moral courage. Regional history working group, Neustadt am Rübenberge, January 28, 2009.
  2. ↑ "A paradise with imperfections" , Märkische Oderzeitung , January 22, 2008.
  3. ↑ a b c Manuel Becker: The military resistance against Hitler in the light of new controversies. XXI. Königswinter Conference from 22.-24. February 2008. LIT Verlag Münster, 2010, p. 208. ISBN 978-3-825-81768-8 ( limited preview in Google book search)
  4. ↑ Magnus Koch: desertions. Wehrmacht deserters in World War II. Life paths and decisions. Volume 42 of the series War in History , Verlag Ferdinand Schöningh , p. 54. ISBN 978-3-506-76457-7 .
  5. ↑ Martin Schnackenberg: Case 12. Mr. Schilling, b. 1923. With preliminary work by the Federal Association of Victims of Nazi Military Justice, 1999, p. 125 ff. ( Pdf )
  6. ^ Günther Knebel ( EAK ) on Lars G. Petersson: Hitler's deserters. Chipmunkapub Publishing House, 2012.
  7. ↑ Peter Schilling: I had to do something myself ... ; in: Michael Eberlein, Roland Müller: I'm fed up with butchery ... , Geschichtswerkstatt Marburg, 1992, pp. 132 ff., 184.
personal data
SURNAME Schilling, Peter
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Schilling, Peter Nicolaus (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German armed forces deserter, later interpreter and autobiographer
DATE OF BIRTH July 22, 1923
PLACE OF BIRTH Location , Free State of Lippe
DATE OF DEATH January 20, 2009
Place of death Almere , Netherlands