When it became clear that Germany would lose the World War II, Bormann attempted to break through the lines of the Red Army with Hitlers driver SS Obersturmbanführer, Erich Kempka, SS Brigadeführer, Wilhelm Mohnke, SS Gruppenführer, States Secretary of the Reichsministry and right hand of Josef Goebbels, Werner Naumann, Dr. Ludwig Stumpfegger and other. On 02-05-1945 at 23:00 hours the mass escape began. Moving in small groups, they proceeded underground, as planned, to the Friedrichstrasse station. Here they emerged to find the ruins of Berlin in flames, and Russian shells bursting everywhere around them. The first group managed to cross the river Spree by an iron footbridge that ran parallel to the Weidendammer Bridge. The remaining groups likewise emerged at the Friedrichstrasse Station, but there became confused and disoriented. They made their way north along the Friedrichstrasse to the Weidendammer Bridge, where they found their way blocked, at the bridges north end, by an anti-tank barrier and heavy Russian fire. They next withdrew to the south end of the bridge, where they were soon joined by a few German tanks. Gathering about the tanks, they again pressed forward. Bormann, Artur Axmann, head of the Hitler Youth after Baldur von Schirach and SS Obersturmbannführer, Ludwig Stumpfegger, Hitlers surgeon, and others followed the lead tanks as far as the Ziegelstrasse. There a panzerfaust struck the lead tank. The violent explosion stunned Bormann and Stumpfegger, and wounded Axmann. All retreated to the Weidendammer Bridge. Now it was every man for himself. Bormann, Stumpfegger, Axmann, and others followed the tracks of surface railway to the Lehrter station. There Bormann and Stumpfegger decided to follow the Invalidestrasse east. Axmann elected to go west, but encountered a Russian patrol and returned on the path Bormann and Stumpfegger had taken. He soon found them. Behind the bridge, where the Invalidienstrasse crosses the railroad tracks, they lay on their backs, both were dead. Axmann could see no signs of an explosion, and assumed that they had been shot in the back. He continued on his way, escaping from Berlin and spending the next six months hiding out with the Hitler Youth in the Bavarian Alps, where he was eventually captured. On 07-12-1972 when construction workers uncovered human remains, the identity papers discovered on one of the bodies identified it as Stumpfegger. The dental work and a healed broken collar bone was strong evidence that the second body was Bormann. Fragments of glass found in the two mens jawbones led to the conclusion that they committed suicide via cyanide capsules. The sightings and reports post war proved to be flights of fantasy that Bormann had flew to Argentina. A test on a skull thought to be Bormanns in 1998 found the remains compatible with his sons and the mystery was over. He had died just hours after Hitler.
Posted on: Sat, 25 Oct 2014 16:58:16 +0000
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