Carl-Heinrich von Stülpnagel

Infobox Military Person
name=Carl-Heinrich von Stülpnagel
born=birth date|1886|1|2|df=y
died=death date and age|1944|8|30|1886|1|2|df=y
placeofbirth=Berlin
placeofdeath=Plötzensee Prison in Berlin


caption=Carl-Heinrich von Stülpnagel
nickname=
allegiance=flagicon|German Empire German Empire (to 1918)
flagicon|Germany Weimar Republic (to 1933)
flagicon|Nazi Germany Nazi Germany
branch=Heer
serviceyears=1904–1944
rank=General der Infanterie
commands=II. Armeekorps
unit=
battles=World War I
World War II
awards=Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross
laterwork=

Carl-Heinrich von Stülpnagel, (2 January, 1886 – 30 August, 1944) was a German general and a member of the July 20 Plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler.

Early life

Born in Berlin, Stülpnagel joined the German military right after he finished school in 1904, and in the First World War, he was in the "Reichswehr" as a general staff officer.

In 1938, the Blomberg-Fritsch Affair and the Sudeten Crisis led to a weakening of Stülpnagel's enthusiasm for the National Socialist régime in Germany.

World War II

From 20 December 1940 to 4 October 1941, Stülpnagel commanded the 17th Army. On 22 June 1941, after the launch of Operation Barbarossa, he successfully led this army across southern Russia on the Eastern Front. Under Stülpnagel's command, the 17th Army achieved victory during the Battle of Uman and the Battle of Kiev.

Stülpnagel also took part in the military opposition's first revolutionary plans, aimed at ousting Hitler and the Nazis, but these plans were largely abandoned after the Munich Agreement. Despite his involvement in the military opposition's plot to assassinate Hitler, substantial archival evidence indicates that during his tenure as commander of the 17th Army and military governor of France, Stuelpnagel was involved in war crimes. In Russia, Stuelpnagel signed many orders authorizing reprisals against civilians for partisan attacks and closely collaborated with the Einsatzgruppen in their mass executions of Jews.

In March 1942, Stülpnagel was made German-occupied France's military commander, and in this position, he, along with his personal advisor Lieutenant-Colonel Caesar von Hofacker, went forth with their plans to further the cause of ridding Germany of Hitler. Hofacker served as Stülpnagel's liaison with Claus von Stauffenberg, who eventually carried out the assassination attempt at the Wolfsschanze in East Prussia.

On the day in question, 20 July, 1944, Stülpnagel put his part of the plot into operation. This mainly involved rounding up all SS and Gestapo officers in Paris and imprisoning them. However, when it became apparent that the assassination attempt in East Prussia had failed, Stülpnagel was unable to convince Field Marshal Günther von Kluge to support the uprising and was forced to release his prisoners. When Stülpnagel was recalled from Paris, he stopped at Verdun and tried to kill himself by shooting himself in the head with a pistol on the banks of the Meuse River. He only succeeded in blinding himself. ["Die Wehrmacht: Eine Bilanz", Guido Knopp, p. 258] While he was in captivity, he reportedly screamed the name "Rommel" in a delirium. As a result, Rommel was soon put under surveillance by the SS.

Colonel General Stülpnagel and his adviser were both arrested by the Gestapo, and Stülpnagel was brought before the "People's Court" ("Volksgerichtshof") on 30 August, 1944. He was found guilty of high treason and guided to the gallows the very same day at Plötzensee Prison in Berlin.

References

* Fellgiebel, Walther-Peer. "Die Träger des Ritterkreuzes des Eisernen Kreuzes 1939-1945". Friedburg, Germany: Podzun-Pallas, 2000. ISBN 3-7909-0284-5.
* Knopp, Guido "Die Wehrmacht: Eine Bilanz", C. Bertelsmann Verlag, München, 2007. ISBN 978-3-570-00975-8

External links

*
* [http://www.gdw-berlin.de/bio/ausgabe_mit.php?id=197 Biography of Carl Heinrich von Stülpnagel] de icon, Gedenkstätte Deutscher Widerstand ("Memorial to German Resistance") website