Jörling, Karl, born 24-03-1879 in Gnesen, West Prussia, , not member of the NSDAP, was an old school soldier and in „preußischer Tradition“ unpolitical. In WWI, he was the personal Adjutant of the last German Empress Augusta Victoria ..Karl joined the Army Service, age 19, on 20-05-1899, as a Fähnrich in the Grenadier-Regiment König Karl (5. Württembergisches) Nr. 123
, under command of Oberst Heinrich von Flotow. He was in the fields of the first war and was wounded in hospital from 22-10-1918 until 16-02-1920 and after in French captivity, released on 16-02-1920. Here is Karl Jörling with Reichskanzler Paul Ludwig Hindenburg in 1927 (Jörling is turning his back to Paul Hindenburg)
He was allowed in the new 10 divisons Reichswehr, but retired on 31-01-1929 again. He employed by the Army on 01-02-1929 and was a Landswehr Officer to 01-10-1933. He, who never was a member of the NSDAP, joined the Army Service again on 01-10-1933 as an Oberstleutnant and Territorial and Supplement Officer, until 02-06-1941. Karl Jörling here with his daughter Irmgard in 1940 appointed to Commander of Military District Command Schwäbisch Gmünd. Field Command 812, Field Command 725 to 01-05-1942 and landed in the infamous Führer Reserve (see Adolf Hitler) (did you know), until 30-09-1942.
He was a personal friend of Fieldmarshall Erwin Rommel.
Here is a letter of Feldmarschall Rommel to Karl Jörling and his grandson writes. Rommel (or Speidel?) writes in may 1944 (2 months before the Claus Schenk von Stauffenberg– Hitler Attentat) to my grandfather: „Cordially thank dear Karl for your dear congratulations according my Ritterkreuz, which I was very happy about. In old connectedness, most cordially greeetings and wishes, always your loyal more devoted (I thought it was Rommels letter, but the signature looks a bit like „Hans“, so it could be Hans Speidel, but maybe you can read „Erwin“? But I think, it is Hans, so the letter is from Rommel’s adjutant Hans Speidel).Karl Jörling was asked to take part at the Stauffenberg resistance group, but he felt himself bound to his oath for the Deutsche Kaiserreich. But he was critical, so he didn’t allowhis daughter Irmgard to go in the Hitlerjugend. That caused a lot of trouble in the small city of Schwäbisch Gmünd and the NS-Gauleiter Hermann Oppenländer, first row left, for the area put him and his family therefore to the black list of persons, who will go to the KZ (concentration camp) after the „Endsieg“. This list luckily was found after the war by the american soldiers and after that point, they were utmost friendly to my grandmother.
Death and burial ground of Jörling, Karl.
Jörling was retired at the age of 63 already. He was put out of service in 1944 or beginning 1945 at that time, he already was very ill. Living in Schwäbisch Gmünd, Jörling died at the age of 65, on 11-01-1945 of cancer. General Jörling is buried on the war section of the Leonardus Cemetery of Schwäbisch Gmünd. On the civil cemetery is buried Generalleutnant der Infanterie, Kommandeur der LVIII Panzer Korps, Walter Botsch
.
The photo’s and much of the information was, with great thanks, sent to me by his grandson Lawyer Klaus Goetz Thiel,,Specialist lawyer for criminal law in Frankfurt am Main. He tells that after the war, the house of his parents was occupied by the Americans, but they were fair and didn’t take too many „souvenirs“. Funny story: One allied officer presented my mother (aged 15) chocolate (which nobody had in 1946/47) and my grandmother immediately gave her a „backpfeife“, because she did not want, that my mother takes anything from them. So my mother didn’t get the chocolate and was sad about it. Maybe my grandmother was afraid, that my mother was raped, but this did not happen, the Americans in Schwäbisch Gmünd were gentlemen. General Karl Jörling’s wife, my grandmother Hedwig Jörling, born. Moldenhauer continued living in Schwäbisch Gmünd until she wanted to visit my parents. My parents lived in the late 50‘s for 4 years in São Paulo, Brazil (where my father worked for the Hoechst AG) and my grandmother wanted to visit them in January 1959, but the Lufthansa plane, coming from Frankfurt crashed during the landing in São Paulo and there she died. Here is a photo from my grandmother with her horse Salome:
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