Dietl, Eduard Wolfrath Christiaan, “Büffel”.

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Dietl, Eduard, born on 21-07-1890 in Bad Aibling, Upper Bavaria, as the eldest of three sons of a Royal Bavarian finance official. The father Eduard Dietl Sr, came from a peasant family whose ancestors had farmed for over five centuries in an interrupted sequence at Weiden in the Upper Pfalz a farm. His mother was Lina, born Holzhause and together with his brothers, the young Eduard attended from 1900 to 1909 the Gymnasium in Rosenheim  . The later Mountaineering Officer preferred to spend his free time in the mountains and was already an avid ‘Kraxler’ or mountaineer. Civil servants like his father-perhaps as a financial councilor or senior civil servant-didn’t like the native-school graduate. He was attracted by the colorful skirt of the soldier. But it was not easy for him, despite good school reports, to be accepted as a Fahnenjunker in the Bavarian army. The Bamberger regimental commander, in which the bow-legged young man with big ears had to introduce himself as an officer candidate, he appeared from the outside to unmilitary and was therefore initially rejected. Only the successor of this colonel was ready some weeks later to accept, the nineteen-year-old Eduard Dietl as Fahnenjunker in the 5st Bavarian Infantry squad “Grand Duke Ernst-Ludwig von Hessen” on 01-10-1909 During World War I he served as a company commander with his regiment. In March 1918, he was promoted to Hauptmann. He was wounded  four times during his actions in the first World War. He joined the D.A.P, Deutsche Arbeiter Partei , number 524, and the Freikorps  of Franz Ritter von Epp
in 1919. Dietl, a pleasant and cheerful man, a fanatic skier and humorous man
continued to serve in the German Army. Dietl married Gerda-Luise in 1926, the daughter of the later General of the Infantry Siegfried Haenicke. The marriage gave birth to four children. Haenicke was arrested by the Soviets in 1945, and died in 1946 in NKVD Special Camp No. 1.
As a Generalmajor Dietl helped organize the 1936 Winter Olympics held at Garmisch-Partenkirchen. He was the captain of the German ski team.
. He then commanded the German 3rd Mountain Division that participated in the German invasion of Poland in 1939 and later in Norway, on April 9 and 10, 1940 with Generaloberst der Infanterie, Nikolaus von Falkenhorst
       The Mountain Divisions had famous commanders like General der Gebirgstruppe, Ludwig Kübler General der Gebirgstruppe, Hans Schlemmer General der Gebirgstruppe, Carl von Le Suire 
  and Field Marshal, Ferdinand Schörner.
  Most of this division was landed at Narvik by a German naval force of ten destroyers. A convinced Nazi and one of Adolf Hitler’s  (did you know) favorite Generals, he was the first German soldier to receive, on 19-06-1940, the Oak Leaves cluster to the Knight’s Cross of the Iron Cross.
 Bundesarchiv_Bild_183-B16420,_Russland,_General_Eduard_Dietl Dietl rose to the rank of Generaloberst, commanding the 20th Mountain Army on the northern Eastern Front, where the results of the German Arctic campaign were disappointing.

Death and burial ground of Dietl, Eduard Wolfrath Christiaan, “Büffel”.

   
Dietl here standing at the Finnish theater of war between the Generals Ferdinand Schörner  (left) and Ritter von Hengl  was ordered to the Berghof on the Obersalzberg, and on 23-6-1944, the Ju 52 aircraft carrying Dietl, General der Infanterie Thomas-Emil von Wickede, age 51, General der Gebirgstruppe Karl Eglseer, age 53, Generalleutnant der Gebirgstruppe, Franz Rossi and three other passengers crashed
      in the vicinity of the small village of Rettenegg, Styria, there were no survivors.
    
        Thomas von Wickede.             Karl Eglseer.                         Franz Rossi.        
Dietl was succeeded by Generaloberst Lothar Rendulic   The Chief of Staff of the 20th Mountain Army was Generalleutnant der Gebirgstruppe, Hermann Hölter
who surrendered to the Allied forces. Dietl who in 1926 had married Gerda-Luise Hannicke and had three daughters and one son, the age of 53, 23-06-1944,
       was buried on the Nordfriedhof of Munich, Section 114. Adolf Hitler himself hold a graveside speech and was to hear on radio in Germany.
Dietl was a founding member of the NSDAP. What has led the Bundeswehr and the German federal government to reverse honours towards Dietl, though, is his recently discovered view on marriages between Scandinavian women and his soldiers, which was “extreme even by the standards of the Third Reich”: after Dietl circulated an order that called Norwegian and Finnish women “racial flotsam”, Himmler himself had to intervene to rescind it
Close to his grave with the “Narvikschild”  is the grave of the 1923 Putz victim Andreas Bauriedl,
Bauriedl, Andreas Section 121 and Heinrich Hoffmann
   , Hitler’s personal photographer and his daughter Henriette von Schirach-Hoffmann and Baldur von Schirach, Dr. Gustav von Kahr, President of the Bavarian court in 1923 during the Putz and some further the secretary of Hitler, Hitler’s former adjutant, SS Standartenführer, Section 193 Max Wünsche Section 69 Bernd Freytag von Loringhoven Freytag, Section 28 Traudl Junge+(Hans), the General der Flieger, Kommandeur Luftwaffe Hongaria, Kuno Futterer and Generalleutnant der Artillerie, Commander of the POW in Wehrkreis IV, Section 169 Erich von Botzheim,  Hitler’s Dr. Ludwig Stumpfegger, Hitler’s driver and founder of the SS, SS Oberführer,  Section 97 Emil Maurice, the Troost couple, Section 46 Paul Troost and Gerda, Hitler’s favorites.
  images  Dietler_Kreuz
           

Message(s), tips or interesting graves for the webmaster:    robhopmans@outlook.com

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  1. From South of Spain in front of Gibraltar. A magnificent piece of research. Very useful.
    Congratulations.

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