Berthold Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg
Encyclopedia
- see Berthold Maria Schenk Graf von StauffenbergBerthold Maria Schenk Graf von StauffenbergBerthold Maria Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg is a retired German Bundeswehr general.He is the oldest of five children of Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg and nephew of Berthold Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg, two German aristocrats who were active in the 20 July plot to assassinate Adolf...
(born 1934) for Claus's son and Berthold's nephew
Berthold Alfred Maria Graf Schenk von Stauffenberg (born 15 March 1905 in Stuttgart
Stuttgart
Stuttgart is the capital of the state of Baden-Württemberg in southern Germany. The sixth-largest city in Germany, Stuttgart has a population of 600,038 while the metropolitan area has a population of 5.3 million ....
— executed 10 August 1944 in Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
-Plötzensee
Plötzensee
Plötzensee is a small glacial lake in Berlin. It is situated near the Rehberge public park in the former borough of Wedding, now a part of Mitte. The name stems from Plötze, one name for the roach in German, as the lake formerly teemed with it....
) was a German aristocrat, lawyer and conspirator in the 20 July plot of 1944, along with his brother, Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg
Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg
Claus Philipp Maria Justinian Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg commonly referred to as Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg was a German army officer and Catholic aristocrat who was one of the leading members of the failed 20 July plot of 1944 to assassinate Adolf Hitler and remove the Nazi Party from...
, an army colonel. Claus had named his eldest son Berthold Maria Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg
Berthold Maria Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg
Berthold Maria Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg is a retired German Bundeswehr general.He is the oldest of five children of Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg and nephew of Berthold Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg, two German aristocrats who were active in the 20 July plot to assassinate Adolf...
after his brother.
Early life
Berthold was the oldest of four brothers (the second being Berthold's twin Alexander Schenk Graf von StauffenbergAlexander Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg
Alexander Franz Clemens Maria Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg was a German aristocrat and historian.Alexander was the younger twin of Berthold Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg...
) born into an old and distinguished aristocratic South German Catholic family. His parents were the last Oberhofmarschall of the Kingdom of Württemberg
Württemberg
Württemberg , formerly known as Wirtemberg or Wurtemberg, is an area and a former state in southwestern Germany, including parts of the regions Swabia and Franconia....
, Alfred Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg, and Caroline née von Üxküll-Gyllenband. Among his ancestors were several famous Prussia
Prussia
Prussia was a German kingdom and historic state originating out of the Duchy of Prussia and the Margraviate of Brandenburg. For centuries, the House of Hohenzollern ruled Prussia, successfully expanding its size by way of an unusually well-organized and effective army. Prussia shaped the history...
ns, including most notably August von Gneisenau
August von Gneisenau
August Wilhelm Antonius Graf Neidhardt von Gneisenau was a Prussian field marshal. He was a prominent figure in the reform of the Prussian military and the War of Liberation.-Early life:...
.
In his youth, he and his brothers were members of the Neupfadfinder, a German Scout association
Scouting in Germany
The Scout movement in Germany consists of about 150 different associations and federations with about 260,000 Scouts and Guides.Scouting in Germany started in 1909. German Scouting later became involved with the German Youth Movement, of which the Wandervogel was a part...
and part of the German Youth movement
German Youth Movement
The German Youth Movement is a collective term for a cultural and educational movement that started in 1896. It consists of numerous associations of young people that focus on outdoor activities. The movement included German Scouting and the Wandervogel...
.
After having studied law at Tübingen
Tübingen
Tübingen is a traditional university town in central Baden-Württemberg, Germany. It is situated south of the state capital, Stuttgart, on a ridge between the Neckar and Ammer rivers.-Geography:...
, he became assistant professor of international law at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Foreign and International Law in 1927. He and his brother Claus were introduced by Albrecht von Blumenthal
Von Blumenthal
The von Blumenthal family are German nobility from Brandenburg-Prussia. Other, unrelated, families of this name exist in Switzerland and formerly in Russia, and many unrelated families called "Blumenthal" without "von" are to be found worldwide.The family was already noble from earliest times ,...
to the circle of the mystic symbolist poet Stefan George
Stefan George
Stefan Anton George was a German poet, editor, and translator.-Biography:George was born in Bingen in Germany in 1868. He spent time in Paris, where he was among the writers and artists who attended the Tuesday soireés held by the poet Stéphane Mallarmé. He began to publish poetry in the 1890s,...
, many of whose followers became members of the German Resistance
German Resistance
The German resistance was the opposition by individuals and groups in Germany to Adolf Hitler or the National Socialist regime between 1933 and 1945. Some of these engaged in active plans to remove Adolf Hitler from power and overthrow his regime...
to National Socialism. He worked at the Hague from 1930–1932 and married at Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
-Zehlendorf on 20 June 1936 Maria (Mika) Classen (Marenskaja, Südrussland, 5 February 1900 — Sigmaringen
Sigmaringen
Sigmaringen is a town in southern Germany, in the state of Baden-Württemberg. Situated on the upper Danube, it is the capital of the Sigmaringen district....
, 13 September 1977). They had two children:
- Alfred Claus Maria Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg (TübingenTübingenTübingen is a traditional university town in central Baden-Württemberg, Germany. It is situated south of the state capital, Stuttgart, on a ridge between the Neckar and Ammer rivers.-Geography:...
, 8 November 1937 — BerlinBerlinBerlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
, 28 October 1987), married at Wilflingen on 24 April 1962 to his distant cousin Marie Sophie Schenk Freiin von Stauffenberg (b. BerlinBerlinBerlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
, 23 September 1937), and had three sons:- Berthold Franz Maria Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg (b. RiedlingenRiedlingenRiedlingen is a town in the district of Biberach, Baden-Württemberg, in the south-west of Germany. It is one of the destinations of the Upper Swabian Baroque Route. There are ca. 10,000 inhabitants.- Geography :...
, 26 May 1963), married to María Jesus Alejandra Carabias (b. 17 July 1961), and had one son:- Alfred Friedrich Maria Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg
- Philipp Friedrich Maria Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg (b. NeuillyNeuillyNeuilly is a common place name in France, deriving from the male given name Nobilis or Novellius:...
, 17 May 1964), married at Lautlingen to Bettina Baatz (b. Frankfurt am Main), without issue - Alexander Clemens Juan Maria Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg (b. MadridMadridMadrid is the capital and largest city of Spain. The population of the city is roughly 3.3 million and the entire population of the Madrid metropolitan area is calculated to be 6.271 million. It is the third largest city in the European Union, after London and Berlin, and its metropolitan...
, 8 February 1967), unmarried and without issue
- Berthold Franz Maria Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg (b. Riedlingen
- Elisabeth Caroline Margarete Maria Schenk Gräfin von Stauffenberg (b. 13 June 1939), married to Piero Roberti (b. 26 December 1935)
Career and coup attempt
In 1939, he joined the German Navy, working in the High Command as a staff judge and advisor for international law.Berthold's apartment at Tristanstraße in Berlin, where his brother Claus also lived for some time, was a meeting place for the July 20 conspirators, including their cousin Peter Yorck von Wartenburg
Peter Yorck von Wartenburg
Peter Graf Yorck von Wartenburg was a German jurist and a member of the German Resistance against Nazism.-Biography:...
. As Claus had access to the inner circle around Hitler, he was assigned to plant a bomb at the Führers briefing hut at the military high command in Rastenburg, East Prussia
East Prussia
East Prussia is the main part of the region of Prussia along the southeastern Baltic Coast from the 13th century to the end of World War II in May 1945. From 1772–1829 and 1878–1945, the Province of East Prussia was part of the German state of Prussia. The capital city was Königsberg.East Prussia...
on July 20, 1944. Claus then flew to Rangsdorf
Rangsdorf
Rangsdorf is a municipality in the district of Teltow-Fläming in Brandenburg in Germany. It has an airfield, from where on 20 July 1944 Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg flew in his unsuccessful attempt to assassinate Adolf Hitler at Wolfsschanze....
airfield south of Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
where he met with Berthold. They went together to Bendlerstraße, which the coup leaders intended to utilize as the centre of their operations in Berlin.
Hitler survived the bomb blast and the coup failed. Berthold and his brother were arrested at Bendlerstraße the same night. Claus was executed by firing squad shortly afterwards.
After his arrest, Stauffenberg was questioned by the Gestapo about his views about the "Final Solution to the Jewish Question". Stauffenberg told the Gestapo that “He and his brother had basically approved of the racial principle of National Socialism, but considered it to be exaggerated and excessive” Stauffenberg went on to state,
The racial idea has been grossly betrayed in this war in that the best German blood is being irrevocably sacrificed, while simultaneously Germany is populated by millions of foreign workers, who certainly cannot be described as of high racial quality
Berthold was tried in the Volksgerichtshof ("People's Court") by Roland Freisler
Roland Freisler
Roland Freisler was a prominent and notorious Nazi lawyer and judge. He was State Secretary of the Reich Ministry of Justice and President of the People's Court , which was set up outside constitutional authority...
on 10 August and was one of eight conspirators executed by strangulation, hanged in Plötzensee
Plötzensee
Plötzensee is a small glacial lake in Berlin. It is situated near the Rehberge public park in the former borough of Wedding, now a part of Mitte. The name stems from Plötze, one name for the roach in German, as the lake formerly teemed with it....
Prison
Prison
A prison is a place in which people are physically confined and, usually, deprived of a range of personal freedoms. Imprisonment or incarceration is a legal penalty that may be imposed by the state for the commission of a crime...
, Berlin, later that day. Before he was killed Berthold was strangled and then revived multiple times. The entire execution and multiple resuscitations was filmed for Hitler to view at his leisure.
Portrayal in the media
Berthold has been portrayed by the following actors in film:- Christopher Buchholz in the 2004 German film StauffenbergStauffenberg (Film)Stauffenberg is a German-Austrian TV movie released in 2004 by Das Erste , about Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg and the 20 July 1944 plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler....
. - Karl Alexander Seidel in the 2008 film ValkyrieValkyrie (film)Valkyrie is a 2008 American historical thriller film set in Nazi Germany during World War II. The film depicts the 20 July plot in 1944 by German army officers to assassinate Adolf Hitler and to use the Operation Valkyrie national emergency plan to take control of the country...
.