Spreti-Weilbach, Hans Erwin Graf von.

Spreti-Weilbach, Hans Erwin Graf von, born 24.01.1908, in Karlsruhe, came from the younger house (Weilbach) of the noble family of the Spreti . His father was the merchant and Oberleutnant Martin Johann Nepomuk Joseph Franz de Paula Graf von Spreti-Weilbach ( 02-04-1867 at Unterweilbach Castle; †  18-04-1950), his mother Anita Freiin von und zu Aufseß (26-11-1873 in Nuremberg, † 17-04-1962 in Unterweilbach). He was the youngest of the couple’s four children: his brothers Friedrich von Spreti-Weilbach (born 04-03-1897 in Karlsruhe, † 01-12-1917 at Cambrai) and Kurt von Spreti-Weilbach (born 04-07-1899 in Bruchsal; † 17-8-1917 at Camurriere) died in the First World War. His sister was Martina von Spreti-Weilbach (1902-1998), married Braun von Kress, widowed Baroness Kress von Kressenstein . After the family moved to Unterweilbach in 1910, Spreti was first taught there by a tutor, then from 1920 to 1922 attended the Theresien-Gymnasium and then until 1927 the Neue Realgymnasium in Munich. He finally passed his Abitur in March 1928 at Dr. Harang’s private school in Magdeburg. He then completed an agricultural internship at the Herrlehof to begin studying agriculture at the then “Royal Academy for Agriculture and Brewery” in Weihenstephan in the winter semester of 1929, which was incorporated into the Technical University of Munich a year later. After completing his pre-diploma, he spent two semesters of his studies at Christian-Albrechts-University in Kiel before returning to Weihenstephan. There he finally finished his studies in August 1932 with the examination to become a graduate farmer.On 01-02-1935, Spreti was supposed to take over the fatherly estate Weilbach, which had been leased until then, after an agricultural traineeship as administrator.

In 1930 Spreti-Weilbach joined the NSDAP (membership number 341.877) and its combat formation, the SA. In 1931 he came into the immediate vicinity of Ernst Röhm,

    who had just returned from Bolivia and had been appointed Chief of Staff of the SA by Adolf Hitler.

  On 05-01-1932, he was appointed SA assault leader and assigned as SA leader for the special use of SA Standard 2 (SA group Hochland), of which he was a member until 13-04-1932. From 01-07-1932 to 01-05-1933, he worked as a SA leader for special use in the Supreme SA leadership.

Spreti-Weilbach was already one of Röhm’s four closest employees in 1932 alongside Stabschefs der SA,.Georg Bell, SA Fuhrer Julius Uhl and SA Fuhrer Karl Leon Du Moulin-Eckart. In March 1932, along with Röhm, Spreti-Weilbach was the target of a – ultimately unrealized – murder project from among his own party: Walter Buch , the chief party judge of the NSDAP, and his son-in-law Martin Bormann were planning the NSDAP on the political mortgage at that time to free the public scandals related to Röhm’s homosexuality by eliminating it. In addition to Röhm, some men from his immediate environment, including Spreti-Weilbach, were to be murdered. The count came under the conspirators’ eye not only because of his close cooperation with Röhm, but above all because of his homosexual relationship with his chief of staff, whose lover he was. After the murder plot became known, Spreti-Weilbach temporarily fled to Berlin together with Röhm. According to the Social Democratic Munich Post, “the purpose of this transfer action was to eliminate the most prominent 175s in the Brown House”.

The order to murder Georg Bell on 03-04-1933 in Durchholzen, age 34, by the party judge of the NSDAP, Walter Buch, who was also Martin Bormann‘s father-in-law. Afterwards, Buch feared that Bell was too dangerous as a confidant about the sexual internals of the SA and as a potential blackmailer. SA Fuhrer Julius Uhl was murdered on 02-07-1934, age 31, in Konzentration Camp Dachau. In the spring of 1934 SA Fuhrer Karl Leon Du Moulin-Eckart as a former adjutant Röhm one of four defendants in a lawsuit before the Munich district court in connection with Ernst Röhm’s homosexuality. He was imprisoned in the Lichtenburg concentration camp until 1936. He was later transferred to the Dachau concentration camp, where he was held until 1936. During his detention, he was under the personal protection of his old friend Heinrich Himmler. Du Moulin-Eckart was then legally certified not to be a homosexual and withdrew from public life. Lucky Du Moulin-Eckart died 31-03-1991, age 91 in Oberviechtach

After the National Socialist “seizure of power”, Spreti was raised to the rank of SA storm leader on 01-04-1933, and was SA leader from May 01- to 31-10-1933; b. V. at the SA group Silesia. On 01-11-1933, Spreti returned as the first adjutant to the Chief of Staff of the SA, under Ernst Röhms, back to the staff of the Supreme SA leader. In this position, which he held until his death on 30-06-1934, he was promoted to SA Standard leader on 01-03-1934. In terms of party organization, he was assigned to the NSDAP local group “Brown House” at that time.

Death and burial ground of Spreti-Weilbach, Hans Erwin Graf von.

On 30-06-1934, Spreti-Weilbach was arrested and shot as a result of the National Socialists’ disempowerment of the SA. There are two different versions of the process:

The popular version says that Spreti-Weilbach had been with Röhm in the Bavarian spa town of Bad Wiessee

since June 1934. There, in the early morning of June 30, he was arrested together with other members of the SA leadership team around Röhm by a contingent of the Bavarian political police under Hitler’s personal guidance, transported to Munich and taken there to Stadelheim prison. An unusual detail in some reports of this version is the claim that Spreti-Weilbach was “arrested” by Hitler himself and attacked and badly battered with a hippo whip. According to Wolfram Selig, who relied on information from Spreti-Weilbach’s sister, he was not arrested in Wiessee, but was taken into custody when he arrived at the Munich train station on June 30 after returning from his vacation on the way to Wiessee . His arrest is said to have been ordered by Hitler’s driver Emil Maurice. Irrespective of the circumstances of the arrest, Spreti-Weilbach finally came to Stadelheim, where he came up with five other SA leaders, Hans Hayn, age 37 SA Obergruppenführer  Edmund Heines, Hans Peter von Heydebreck age 44, Wilhelm Schmid, age 45 and SA Obergruppenführer August Schneidhuber in the early evening of June 30 Hitler’s personal order was shot by an SS commando.

The justice sergeant Zink, who witnessed the executions, described them to the journalist Erwein von Aretin, who was based in Stadelheim, who later published them as a report: “Next came the young Count Spreti, who was excitedly trying to protest the process and was harshly ordered to rest by the SS leader. He also received his sentence read aloud, but died, like all of the following, with the cry: I am dying for Germany, Heil Hitler! ”

Shortly before he was shot, he managed to write a farewell greeting to his family on a business card: “Do not forget me! I also fell for the fatherland. Hans Erwin ”

Spreti’s body was initially buried in the Perlach cemetery, but was then exhumed and cremated on 21-07-1934 and handed over to his parents in an urn. This urn was then sunk in private in the family grave at Cemetery Unterweilbach 85241 Graf-Spreti-Straße 6 Hebertshausen, Attempts by the father to clarify the reasons for the shooting of his son – for what purpose he turned to   Rudolf Hess  and Heinrich Himmler   were unsuccessful.

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