70 years
ago on this date, April 15, 1945, German Resistance Member, Friedrich Von
Rabenau was shot dead at Flossenbürg concentration camp. As the German Resistance had
inspired the comrades of Unit 1012, let us not forget them and remember them as
heroes who stood against evil.
We will post information about Friedrich
Von Rabenau from Wikipedia.
 |
| Friedrich von Rabenau |
Born
|
10
October 1884
Berlin, German Empire |
Died
|
15
April 1945 (aged 60)
Flossenbürg concentration camp |
Allegiance
|
|
Service/branch
|
Wehrmacht
|
Years of
service
|
1903 -
1942
|
Rank
|
General
of Artillery
|
Battles/wars
|
|
Friedrich von Rabenau (10 October 1884 – 15 April
1945) was a German career-soldier, general, theologian, and opponent of National
Socialism.
Biography
Rabenau was born in Berlin to the
physician Friedrich von Rabenau (1847–1885) and Wally, née Noebel. He joined
the Prussian Army in 1903 as a member of the
72nd Field Artillery Regiment (stationed at Danzig), served in World War I, and remained in the Weimar
German Reichswehr. In 1936, Von Rabenau was
assigned by the then head of the general staff, Generaloberst Ludwig August
Theodor Beck, to establish (from the Reichsarchiv)
the first central archive of the German army, in Potsdam. Well suited to the task, Rabenau
strove to prevent ideological falsifications with a scientific diligence in
gathering sources that was second to none.
His Christian beliefs led him to join
the opposition to Nazism early. Rabenau was a Rechtsritter
("Knight of Justice") in the supradenominational Order of Saint John.
As a Protestant Christian and a general, he successfully applied to then Reichsführer
SS Heinrich Himmler for permission to take over Maria Laach Abbey, which had been
seized from Roman Catholic Cardinal Graf von Galen in Münster.
Rabenau joined no resistance group, though he did act as a conduit between
Generaloberst Ludwig Beck and Carl Friedrich Goerdeler, whom he knew
from his time as an Abteilungskommandeur ("Section Commander")
in Königsberg
(now Kaliningrad).
In mid-1942 Von Rabenau was relieved
of his office, transferred to the Führerreserve (a classification for
high-ranking officers who were without billet which was often used by Hitler to
push aside officers with whom he was not pleased) at his current rank of General
der Artillerie ("General of Artillery"), and thus sent
into premature retirement. He studied Protestant theology at the University
of Berlin and in 1943 was made Licentiatus theologiae,
writing his dissertation on military chaplaincy.
Von Rabenau was arrested in the
aftermath of the plot which culminated in the attempt on Hitler's life on July 20, 1944. On April 15, 1945, without
having been charged or tried, General von Rabenau, one of the last inmates
remaining in the Flossenbürg concentration camp, was shot on the specific
orders of Himmler. The execution order was issued by Gestapo Chief Heinrich Müller
with additional orders to report his death as resulting from a low-flying
allied air attack. The Flossenburg Memorial erroneously gives Rabenau's date of
judicial murder as April 9, 1945. Surviving him were his widow Eva Kautz and
their two daughters.
 |
| Friedrich von Rabenau |
Awards and
decorations
- Knight of Justice of the Order of St John
- Iron Cross of 1914, 1st and 2nd class
- Knight's Cross of the Royal House Order of Hohenzollern with Swords
- Friedrich Cross
- Military Merit Cross, 3rd class with War Decoration (Austria-Hungary)
Works
This list is incomplete; you can help by expanding
it.
- Die alte Armee und die junge Generation; Berlin: Mittler, 1925.
- Operative Entschlüsse gegen einen an Zahl überlegenen Gegner; Berlin: Mittler, 1935.
- Seeckt; Leipzig: V. Hase & Koehler, 1938.
- Scharnhorst nach 1808 - Seeckt nach 1918; Berlin: Landesgeschichtl. Vereinigg. f. d. Mark Brandenburg, 1939.
- Buch und Schwert; Leipzig: Oberbürgermeister, 1940.
- Von Geist und Seele des Soldaten; Berlin: Eher, 1940.
- Geistige und seelische Probleme im jetzigen Krieg; Berlin: Eher, 1940.
- Vom Sinn des Soldatentums; Köln: Du Mont Schauberg, 1941.
- Hans von Seeckt. Aus seinem Leben 1866-1917.
- Hans von Seeckt. Aus seinem Leben 1918-1936.
From Liste der auszusondernden
Literatur (Berlin: Zentralverlag, 1946), Deutsche Verwaltung für
Volksbildung in der sowjetischen Besatzungszone
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