Is This the Tannenberg Memorial?

[Maurice Laarman]

and in English:

Hindenburg's last trip
Evacuation from the Tannenberg monument
by Kristian Knaack

On January 25, 1945, the 229th Infantry Division reported to the 7th Panzer Corps that all measures to destroy the Imperial Memorial had been initiated in the midday hours of January 21. However, the explosion did not actually occur until the evening of January 21. The existing explosives were only sufficient to destroy the Hindenburg tomb and the main and entrance towers. This emerges from a very carefully researched documentary by Gert Sailer, which appeared in the German Soldier Yearbook in 1988.
According to Gert Sailer, the initiative to salvage the Hindenburg coffins also came from the Königsberg fortress commander and military commander general of the infantry Otto Lasch, but especially from Lasch's chief of staff, colonel in the general staff Frhr. v. Süsskind-Schwendi. Hitler is said to have initially rejected the request. A little later, however, the coffins were ordered to be rescued, as was the destruction of the Tannenberg monument. On January 20, the bones of the couple v. Hindenburg was brought to Königsberg together with the replicas of the flags and standards involved in the battle in Königsberg. Unfortunately, Sailer does not say who took away coffins on January 20 and how.

But in his documentation, which was created with scientific meticulousness, further, essential information is contained, such as that the 229th Infantry Division only started its new command post - coming from the east - in Hohenstein in the Hotel "Kaiserhof" in Hohenstein on the night of January 20 set up where, on the morning of the 21st, the VII Panzer Corps received the leader’s command to destroy the Tannenberg monument by radio. It follows that the 229th Infantry Division was commissioned to blow up the memorial, but not to retrieve the coffins, and furthermore that the order to destroy was given only after the successful rescue from the Tannenberg memorial had been carried out. Another note from Gert Sailer is even more important. Shortly before the explosion, as there was complete silence, a Wehrmacht soldier was able to inspect the Tannenberg monument again in detail. All towers had been cleared out and empty. "He also looked around the Hindenburg crypt, the two sarcophagi were no longer there."
On the cruiser "Emden" in Königsberg, however, the two bronze sarcophagi from the Hindenburg crypt no longer arrived, but only the two oak coffins of the married couple. Hindenburg and the 69 Tannenberg field signs. There was no trace of the bronze sarcophagi. The other pieces of equipment of the eight towers, which - according to Gert Sailer - had previously been removed by the monument head Fritz Stubenrauch, have also been lost.

Why the so careful researcher Gert Sailer did not publish an initially plausible version can no longer be checked today. Except for a small black notebook, his estate has not survived. According to this, Captain D. R. Estner, a civilian teacher in Hohenstein, wants to have the coffins - not sarcophagi - removed. However, Estner was stationed in Königsberg. It cannot be explained how he could have reached Hohenstein so quickly when the orders were tight. The captain has been missing since the fighting in the Heiligenbeiler Kessel. He mentioned the coffin transport in a letter to his wife.
A serious trace of the fact that the Hindenburg coffins were transported by rail, even if only partially, can not be seen from the letters available so far, but nevertheless a number of extremely interesting "contradictions", in research as "competing information" designated. It can be shown that the railway line between Bartenstein and Königsberg - and thus via Glommen - was still intact until January 26th. The "competing notes" make it seem conceivable that coffins and sarcophagi were brought separately to Königsberg and one of these transports by rail around the 21st and 22nd centuries. January 1945 passed the Glommen stop.

From the numerous letters to the publication "The traces of the coffins" in episode 8 of February 22nd, a surprising finding can already be gained: the removal of the Hindenburg coffins from the Tannenberg monument did not take place on the 20th, but only on the Tomorrow of January 21st. A Hohensteiner from Mohrungen attended the transport, consisting of four to five trucks. She no longer remembers whether it was the coffins or the bronze sarcophagi. "In any case, flags were not loaded in the Tannenberg monument."
Another contemporary witness remembers seeing the truck column on the barracks in Allenstein, near the main gate / guard, in the evening on January 21. It said: "Here are the coffins from Hindenburg and his wife on it, brought from Tannenberg." Olsztyn lies southeast of Mohrungen. But also in Heilsberg an unknown "covered transporter" was seen by a Königsberger woman living there, on which - according to one officer - the Hindenburgs would leave East Prussia. The truck came from Allenstein and continued towards Bartenstein. But also in Landsberg, north of Olsztyn, two military vehicles with the Hindenburg coffins and rolled-up flags were seen on January 21 or 22, 1945. They parked in front of the "Landsberger Hof" hotel. A pioneer captain of unknown name talked to an East Prussian during a bus trip that he had the special order to blow up the Tannenberg monument and to bring the coffins to Königsberg on the "Emden". It may not have been that way. What is interesting, however, is his claim that the transport was initially carried out by train, but then had to be continued later by truck.

Why was the so valuable "freight" not immediately placed in the protective belly of the "Pretoria" in Pillau, just 34 kilometers away, by the "several trucks", where only one - as the Potsdam-Bernterode transport section shows - was needed? Why were the coffins with honor guard on display so clearly on the "Emden", when the "Emden" was a junk heap at the time and nobody knew when - and if at all - the "Emden" could be made ready for driving again? Why not protective tarpaulins over coffins and flags, but instead over the coffin of the Generalfeldmarschall the old German Reich war flag black, white and red with an iron cross that looked like a signal (which Walter Görlitz in his 1953 biography of Hindenburg still retouched)? Why has no historian asked the question so far what the coffin Paul v. Hindenburgs may have happened on the way that he had to be roughly nailed together again in the Bernterode mine? Not only the first transport section "Tannenberg Monument - Königsberg" is full of unanswered questions that are entitled to serious, correct answers that corresponded to the reality at that time - over five decades later.

[GregSingh]

That's the photo I mentioned in my last post. Looks very similar to Hindenburgstandbild, less the head.
Note left hand resting on backsword and a coat's sleeve.

Hindenburgstandbild.jpg (94.65 KiB) Viewed 6254 times

[Maurice Laarman]

You might be right GregSingh! I was checking if the photos you show could be one of the the soldier statues at the entrance of the tower, but they are different.

Some more photos on the Hindenburg statue. One is a postcard I bought, plus 3 photos from a book which was shown on MFF forum. (thanks!)

The statues, both for the Tannenberg and the Kyffhauser monument were made in Weißenstadt by the company Grasyma. On the photo we see however TWO statues for Tannenberg being made. I thought there was only one, but when checking my photos I see indeed two different locations with a slighty different pedestal.

The one for the Kyffhauser monument is still there:

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyffhäuse ... häuser.jpg

[GregSingh]

Nice photo of the "old" Tannenbergkrug with a memorial to horses who perished in the battle.

[iggy1871]

and in English:

Hindenburg's last trip
Evacuation from the Tannenberg monument
by Kristian Knaack

On January 25, 1945, the 229th Infantry Division reported to the 7th Panzer Corps that all measures to destroy the Imperial Memorial had been initiated in the midday hours of January 21. However, the explosion did not actually occur until the evening of January 21. The existing explosives were only sufficient to destroy the Hindenburg tomb and the main and entrance towers. This emerges from a very carefully researched documentary by Gert Sailer, which appeared in the German Soldier Yearbook in 1988.
According to Gert Sailer, the initiative to salvage the Hindenburg coffins also came from the Königsberg fortress commander and military commander general of the infantry Otto Lasch, but especially from Lasch's chief of staff, colonel in the general staff Frhr. v. Süsskind-Schwendi. Hitler is said to have initially rejected the request. A little later, however, the coffins were ordered to be rescued, as was the destruction of the Tannenberg monument. On January 20, the bones of the couple v. Hindenburg was brought to Königsberg together with the replicas of the flags and standards involved in the battle in Königsberg. Unfortunately, Sailer does not say who took away coffins on January 20 and how.

But in his documentation, which was created with scientific meticulousness, further, essential information is contained, such as that the 229th Infantry Division only started its new command post - coming from the east - in Hohenstein in the Hotel "Kaiserhof" in Hohenstein on the night of January 20 set up where, on the morning of the 21st, the VII Panzer Corps received the leader’s command to destroy the Tannenberg monument by radio. It follows that the 229th Infantry Division was commissioned to blow up the memorial, but not to retrieve the coffins, and furthermore that the order to destroy was given only after the successful rescue from the Tannenberg memorial had been carried out. Another note from Gert Sailer is even more important. Shortly before the explosion, as there was complete silence, a Wehrmacht soldier was able to inspect the Tannenberg monument again in detail. All towers had been cleared out and empty. "He also looked around the Hindenburg crypt, the two sarcophagi were no longer there."
On the cruiser "Emden" in Königsberg, however, the two bronze sarcophagi from the Hindenburg crypt no longer arrived, but only the two oak coffins of the married couple. Hindenburg and the 69 Tannenberg field signs. There was no trace of the bronze sarcophagi. The other pieces of equipment of the eight towers, which - according to Gert Sailer - had previously been removed by the monument head Fritz Stubenrauch, have also been lost.

Why the so careful researcher Gert Sailer did not publish an initially plausible version can no longer be checked today. Except for a small black notebook, his estate has not survived. According to this, Captain D. R. Estner, a civilian teacher in Hohenstein, wants to have the coffins - not sarcophagi - removed. However, Estner was stationed in Königsberg. It cannot be explained how he could have reached Hohenstein so quickly when the orders were tight. The captain has been missing since the fighting in the Heiligenbeiler Kessel. He mentioned the coffin transport in a letter to his wife.
A serious trace of the fact that the Hindenburg coffins were transported by rail, even if only partially, can not be seen from the letters available so far, but nevertheless a number of extremely interesting "contradictions", in research as "competing information" designated. It can be shown that the railway line between Bartenstein and Königsberg - and thus via Glommen - was still intact until January 26th. The "competing notes" make it seem conceivable that coffins and sarcophagi were brought separately to Königsberg and one of these transports by rail around the 21st and 22nd centuries. January 1945 passed the Glommen stop.

From the numerous letters to the publication "The traces of the coffins" in episode 8 of February 22nd, a surprising finding can already be gained: the removal of the Hindenburg coffins from the Tannenberg monument did not take place on the 20th, but only on the Tomorrow of January 21st. A Hohensteiner from Mohrungen attended the transport, consisting of four to five trucks. She no longer remembers whether it was the coffins or the bronze sarcophagi. "In any case, flags were not loaded in the Tannenberg monument."
Another contemporary witness remembers seeing the truck column on the barracks in Allenstein, near the main gate / guard, in the evening on January 21. It said: "Here are the coffins from Hindenburg and his wife on it, brought from Tannenberg." Olsztyn lies southeast of Mohrungen. But also in Heilsberg an unknown "covered transporter" was seen by a Königsberger woman living there, on which - according to one officer - the Hindenburgs would leave East Prussia. The truck came from Allenstein and continued towards Bartenstein. But also in Landsberg, north of Olsztyn, two military vehicles with the Hindenburg coffins and rolled-up flags were seen on January 21 or 22, 1945. They parked in front of the "Landsberger Hof" hotel. A pioneer captain of unknown name talked to an East Prussian during a bus trip that he had the special order to blow up the Tannenberg monument and to bring the coffins to Königsberg on the "Emden". It may not have been that way. What is interesting, however, is his claim that the transport was initially carried out by train, but then had to be continued later by truck.

Why was the so valuable "freight" not immediately placed in the protective belly of the "Pretoria" in Pillau, just 34 kilometers away, by the "several trucks", where only one - as the Potsdam-Bernterode transport section shows - was needed? Why were the coffins with honor guard on display so clearly on the "Emden", when the "Emden" was a junk heap at the time and nobody knew when - and if at all - the "Emden" could be made ready for driving again? Why not protective tarpaulins over coffins and flags, but instead over the coffin of the Generalfeldmarschall the old German Reich war flag black, white and red with an iron cross that looked like a signal (which Walter Görlitz in his 1953 biography of Hindenburg still retouched)? Why has no historian asked the question so far what the coffin Paul v. Hindenburgs may have happened on the way that he had to be roughly nailed together again in the Bernterode mine? Not only the first transport section "Tannenberg Monument - Königsberg" is full of unanswered questions that are entitled to serious, correct answers that corresponded to the reality at that time - over five decades later.

Would the original coffins have been valuable as war materiel, to be melted down?

[carius]

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George

[LAstry2]

Nice pictures...Sic Transit glori

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George

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George

[ostland]

Generalfeldmarschall von Mackensen on the right.

[Mannheim]

Here's my two bob's worth: I bought this postcard at the Berlin flea markets near Charlottenburger Tor in 2019. You can see it cost me ten Euro and has quite a nice postmark if you're into that sort of thing.

[carius]

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George

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Alamy
George

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George

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George