Ferdinand Schörner

Ferdinand Schörner was a German army general during World War II. He was born in Munich in 1892 and attended college to become a teacher but eventually joined a Bavarian infantry regiment and fought in World War I, seeing action at Verdun, Hermannstadt and the Isonzo River as part of an Alpine mountain unit, and was awarded the Blue Max medal for bravery. After the war he became involved in right-wing politics and joined a "freikorps", a term given to the private militias that formed in Germany after the war, but eventually left them and joined the German army. In 1929 he was a member of the unit that helped to crush the Munich Putsch, an uprising begun by the fledgling Nazi party headed by his future commander, Adolf Hitler. He later joined a Bavarian infantry regiment and was eventually promoted to major. He was posted to the German General Staff and was appointed commander of the 98th Gebirgsjager Regiment in 1937, earning a promotion to lieutenant-colonel. He took part in the invasion of Poland in 1939 and was given command of the 6th Gebirgs Division, fighting in the Balkans and in Finland. His record earned him promotion to commander of XIX Corps and then XL Panzer Corps in 1943. In 1944 he was promoted to colonel-general and given command of Army Group Ukraine. His record there earned him command of Army Group North, but when he arrived to take command he found that a Soviet offensive had trapped it on the Courland Peninsula. In 1945 he was given command of the newly formed Army Group Center, which was formed from the remains of the battered Army Group A. Under heavy attack from Sovet forces, his unit retreated to the west but managed to keep the Soviets from sweeping into Upper Silesia and Czechoslovakia, allowing more than a million refugees to escape the Red Army. Unlike some of his fellow generals, Schorner was a devoted follower of Adolf Hitler, who liked to issue "fight to the last man" orders. Schorner enthusiastically carried out those orders, and was eventually referred to derisively by his troops as "King of the Last Stand". When German units were trapped in the Sworba pocket in Estonia by vastly superior Soviet forces and running out of food, water and ammunition, Schorner gave orders that any soldier suspected of running away from the fighting be shot for desertion. After the war, his driver recalled an incident when he was driving Schorner down a dirt road on Sworba towards the front when he saw a soldier walking on the road coming toward him. Schorner told the driver to stop the car, then got out and walked over to the soldier. He spoke to the man for a few seconds, then ordered an accompanying officer to take the soldier to a drainage ditch and shoot him, which the officer then did. In 1945, as American forces were preparing to attack his unit near the town of Tyrol, he changed from his uniform into civilian clothes, got into a small reconnaissance plane and had the pilot fly it to where the American forces were quartered. Upon landing he identified himself and surrendered. Unfortunately for him, the Americans handed him over to the Russians, who threw him into a prison camp, where he spent ten years, being released in 1955. After his return he was arrested by German authorities for crimes against German soldiers during the war--mainly his orders to summarily execute soldiers suspected of desertion--found guilty and spent 4-1/2 years in prison. He died in Germany in 1973.