Mertz von Quirnheim, Albert.

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Mertz von Quirnheim, Albert, born on 25-03-09 in Munich, as the son of the Hauptmann in the Bavarian General Staff, Hermann Ritter Mertz von Quirnheim, who died age 80, on 05-01-1947, in Blankenburg and the nephew of Walter Hohmann  a German engineer who made an important contribution to the understanding of orbital dynamics..They moved to Potsdam and got acquainted with the family of the brothers

Werner von Haeften Haeften, Werner Karl Otto Theodore von and Hans-Bernd,   who turned against the Hitler’s regime, both were killed. Albert met Oberst der Kavallerie, Claus Schenk von Stauffenberg during his training with the 17th Cavalry Regiment in Bamberg

. At first Mertz von Quirnheim is enthusiastic with the assumption of the NSDAP  and has high expectations after the Versailles Pact. Together with von Stauffenberg he ended the General Staff Officer  training, on the War Academy in Berlin. At the beginning of World War II he is in the organisation of the General Staff. Mertz not at all did believe in the German treatment of the civilian people of the occupied countries and got conflicts with Alfred Rosenberg Rosenberg was hanged on 16-10-1946 in Nuremberg and Erich Koch the Reichscommisssar, Gauleiter in the Ukraine, Koch died old age of 90, on 12-11-1986, in Barczewo, Poland.

      Hans Bernd von Haeften.                   Erich Koch.      Alfred Rosenberg.       Erich Hoepner.

Quirnheim was a big Hitler supporter, but when he saw the brutality that Hitler’s regime had, he began to distance himself from it. But the more distance he took from it, the higher his position became. In 1942 he became a Oberstleutnant in the 24th Army of the Eastern Front, and he became an Oberst in 1943. In this year he also married Hilde Baier. Home during his leave he talked with his brother in law Wilhelm Dieckmann,

 who married his sister Erika, already longer a resistance man and executed by the Gestapo in the Zellengefängnis, prison, Lehrterstrasse age 51, on 13-09-1944, about the situation behind the front. Promoted to Oberstleutnant he becomes the Chief of Staff of the 24th Army Corps on the Eastern Front. 1943 Albert married Hilde Baier    and decided to join the group of officers against Adolf Hitler and their attempt plans. Together with Friedrich Olbricht he is working for the Operation Walküre plan, Valkyrie and the takeover of power in Germany.

Death and burial ground of Mertz von Quirnheim, Albert.

    After the bomb attack on July 20th Quirnheim takes over the command of General Olbricht in the Wehrmacht headquarters, Bendlerblock, but the attack failed and Hitler’s loyal arrested Stauffenberg, in the meanwhile back from the Wolfsschanze, von Quirnheim, Olbricht, Ludwig Beck and Erich Hoepner, Hoepner trailed by jurist, Roland Freisler  , was hanged in the Plötzensee prison, on 08-08-1944, age 57.  In the night of 20/21 July, von Stauffenberg, Mertz, von Haeften and Olbricht were executed on the inner court of the Bendlerblock. The four had a temporary common grave on the Alter Sankt Matheaus Friedhof, in Berlin, but after a few weeks the bodies were burned by the SS and the ashes scattered on a secret place. In his hometown Berlin, suburb Bogenhausen, Bogenhauser Platz, there is a remembrace stone on the local church. On this cemetery is also buried Ernst “Putzi” Hanfstaengel

  , he was an intimate of Adolf Hitler before falling out of favor and defecting.

A few days after the death of Quirnheim, the parents and sister of Quirnheim were arrested and murdered by the Gestapo, as was his brother-in-law Wilhelm Dieckmann, age . 

   

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

 

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