Lt. (Olt.) Wilhelm Bartelborth

[ubibene]

He was the commander of Panther Ausf. A, which was destroyed by M-26 Pershing at the cathedral in Cologne in April 1945.
But he had succeded in escaping with 3 of his crew from his panzer in last moment.
Is there anyone, who knows his life/fate after this battle?
Of course, I watched the video '1945 Kriegsende in Köln' of H. Reindorf. I found no answer.

[RichP08]

This is from Adam Makos facebook pg.: "Bartelborth's decision to stand and fight resulted in the deaths of three Americans, one of his own crew, and one of his crew being severely burned. Bartelborth would surrender shortly after escaping the tank and would live to 93-years-old." No information on what he did after the war but apparently he lived to be 93 years old! I am just finishing reading "Spearhead" by Adam Makos. A great book on the Cologne battle, Paderborn and the reunion in 2013 of Clarence Smoyer, gunner of the Pershing and Gustav Schaefer, crewman of the German Mk IV Smoyer buried under a shot-down building. It seems Bartolborth should have been alive at this time but where? No mention. That would have been a great reunion. Hope this helped.

[ubibene]

Thanks for the information.

[RichP08]

I've just answer my own question of why there was no reunion between Clarence Smoyer and Wilhelm Bartelborth. Bartelborth lived to be 93 and died in 1998(?). The reunion didn't happen until 2013.

[askropp]

For the sake of completeness, the excellent website of Dierk Lürbke describes the tank duel at Köln on 6 March (not April!) 1945:
https://anicursor.com/colpicward2.html

Four crew members managed to escape from the burning Panther, one died at the scene. In my opinion, it is not entirely clear if additional crew members later died of wounds or burns. A rival author whose conspiracy theory of a "faked duel" is ripped apart by Lürbke gives "Bartelborth" and "König" as the names of two surviving Panzer soldiers, but I cannot tell if this is true or just another invention by that guy. In the award holders thread, our former member Bernd R. says that a Leutnant d.R. Wilhelm Bartelborth from Panzerabteilung 2106 of Panzerbrigade 106 "Feldherrnhalle" received the Ehrenblattspange in 1945.