Rudolf Petershagen

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Gravestone in the New Cemetery in Greifswald

Rudolf Peter Hagen , (* 4. June 1901 in Hamburg , † 13. April 1969 in Greifswald ) was in World War II as an officer in the German Wehrmacht commandant of Greifswald, he carried bloodless handover from destruction by Soviet troops kept.

Early life

Rudolf Petershagen came from a Hamburg merchant family. His father was an authorized signatory . Even as a high school senior, he was a soldier in the Free Corps "Assault Battalion Schmidt", which later in the Reichswehr was acquired. After graduating from high school in 1921, he began studying at the Munich War School. In 1924 he was made a lieutenant and in 1934 a first lieutenant .

In the spring of 1935, Rudolf Petershagen married Angelika von Lindequist, who came from aristocratic circles, in Potsdam; the church wedding took place in the garrison church . In 1937, when he was promoted to captain, he was transferred to the 92nd Infantry Regiment as a company commander in Greifswald. There the couple moved into an officer's house in 1938.

Life as a soldier

As a company commander , Petershagen was involved in the occupation of Czechoslovakia in 1938 . In the summer of 1939 he was promoted to major unscheduled . In the first time after the beginning of the Second World War, Petershagen belonged to the staff of the replacement division in Stettin. Then he was transferred to France and fought in the Balkans . During the Russian campaign , he and his battalion were included in the first battle for Kharkov . He and his battalion did not allow himself to be rolled over as ordered, but successfully dared to break out. For this he received the Knight's Cross . He was also promoted to colonel and commander of Greifswald's 92nd Panzer Grenadier Regiment. He took part in the Battle of Stalingrad with his unit . He was badly wounded and flown out of Stalingrad. He was taken to a hospital in Greifswald. After a long recovery, he was no longer fit for front duty and from 1943 was what is known as the “location elder” in Greifswald.

City commandant of Greifswald

On January 1, 1945 he was appointed city ​​commander of Greifswald. At that time, a group had formed around the rector of the University of Greifswald , who considered plans to hand over the city to the Red Army without a fight . The group managed to win Petershagen over to their project.

Process of handover from Greifswald

On the night of April 29-30, 1945, a parliamentary delegation drove towards the enemy lines. The group consisted of the rector of the Carl Engel University , the director of the medical university clinic Gerhardt Katsch and the deputy city commandant Colonel Max Otto Wurmbach . During the nightly negotiations in the burning Anklam , the parliamentarians managed to convince the Soviet general that Greifswald would surrender without a fight. The Soviet attack was imminent and important buildings in Greifswald were charged with explosives.

In contrast to the neighboring cities of Anklam and Demmin , Greifswald was saved from destruction in this way. Petershagen was sentenced to death by the National Socialists for surrendering the city to the Red Army without a fight.

While Engel, Katsch and the military Petershagen and Wurmbach belonged to the National Socialist ruling class, in Greifswald members of a resistance group around the communist Hugo Pfeiffer, the Wiecker pastor Gottfried Holtz and the deputy mayor Siegfried Remertz had been doing preparatory work for such a surrender for a long time. A plaque unveiled in 2011 in the Greifswald town hall recalls the role played by 18 citizens in the surrender and rescue of the city, including Petershagen.

After 1945

From 1945 to 1948 Petershagen was taken prisoner by the Soviets. After his release in 1948, he returned to Greifswald.

First, Rudolph Petershagen worked in Greifswald in building the National Democratic Party ( NDPD ), which was considered the political home of former Wehrmacht officers and converted fellow travelers of the Nazis. He later became the district chairman of this party. In 1950 Petershagen was appointed to the Greifswald city council and shortly thereafter to the district council on the Baltic Sea island of Usedom .

On the occasion of a trip to Munich in 1951 , Petershagen was arrested by the American secret service for aiding in espionage . While in custody, he became seriously ill with lungs and heart.

Petershagen was later sentenced to six years in prison twice by an American military tribunal, of which he served four years in Munich , Landsberg and Straubing . During his detention, Petershagen was pressured by representatives of the American secret service to leave the GDR. In return he was offered freedom and a pension as a colonel. Petershagen declined the offer. He was pardoned in 1955 and exchanged for a prisoner in the GDR.

After his return in 1955, the city of Greifswald made him an honorary citizen. In the GDR he became a "mythical figure", a symbol for the rescue of Greifswald and a militant fighter against rearmament in the Federal Republic under Konrad Adenauer. Other actors were pushed into the background, including Katsch, who was rector of the university at the 500th anniversary in 1956, and the communist and after the war, temporary mayor of Greifswald Hugo Pfeiffer, who had come into conflict with his party. Engel, Mayor Richard Schmidt and Remertz died earlier in the Soviet internment camp in Fünfeichen. In 1956 Petershagen was appointed honorary senator of the Ernst Moritz Arndt University , but he never received the honorary doctorate he had hoped for. After that he held less important political honorary posts and worked mainly as a freelance writer. He was an unofficial employee of the MfS , which he tried to use for his own purposes.

Rudolf Petershagen's grave is in the New Cemetery in Greifswald. Hundreds of people attended his funeral in 1969, including representatives of all GDR parties.

Honors

The Rudolf-Petershagen-Allee in Greifswald was named after Rudolf Petershagen. In 1956 he was honored with the Ernst Moritz Arndt Medal for his deed . His autobiographical report, Conscience in Riot , published in 1957, was a bestseller with 23 editions and was filmed in 1961 as a five-part miniseries by DEFA for German television with Erwin Geschonneck in the lead role. For their participation in this film, he and his wife were awarded the Patriotic Order of Merit in silver in 1961.

See also

Publications

  • Conscience in turmoil . Verlag der Nation , Berlin 1957, 23rd edition 1988, ISBN 3-373-00221-4 .
  • Life is not a dice game . Verlag der Nation, Berlin 1961.
  • Matthias Schubert: The surrender of Greifswald without a fight on April 30, 1945: memories of and from Paul Grams. In: Contemporary History Regional, Volume 19, Issue 2, December 2015, editor Geschichtswerkstatt Rostock eV, pp. 69–80.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Hans-Otto Lecht: Angelika Petershagen wife of a Greifswald city commandant Rudolf Petershagen and Greifswald . In: greifswald.netz.de. Retrieved April 12, 2015.
  2. ↑ Jantje Hannover: Destruction and Rescue at the Last Minute , Deutschlandfunk Kultur, April 29, 2005
  3. ^ A b c d e f Greifswalder Mythen: Rudolf Peterhagen , Ostsee-Zeitung, April 12, 2009. On the occasion of a lecture by the city archivist Uwe Kiel on the 50th anniversary of his death in the town hall.
  4. ↑ Neues Deutschland from July 13, 1957, p. 8
  5. ^ New Germany , October 6, 1961.
personal data
SURNAME Petershagen, Rudolf
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German city commander (Wehrmacht) of Greifswald, politician (NDPD) of the GDR
DATE OF BIRTH June 4, 1901
PLACE OF BIRTH Hamburg
DATE OF DEATH April 13, 1969
Place of death Greifswald