Hanna Reitsch | |
|---|---|
 Hanna Reitsch in 1941 | |
| Born | 29 March 1912 (1912-03-29) |
| Died | 24 August 1979 (1979-08-25) (aged 67) |
| Nationality | German, Austrian[1] |
| Known for | Nazi,Aviator,test pilot
|
| Partner | Robert Ritter von Greim (1945) |
Hanna Reitsch (29 March 1912 – 24 August 1979) was a Germanaviator andtest pilot. Along withMelitta von Stauffenberg, she flight-tested many of Germany's new aircraft duringWorld War II and received many honors. Reitsch was among the very last people to meetAdolf Hitler alive in theFührerbunker in late April 1945.
Reitsch set more than 40flight altitude records and women's endurance records ingliding and unpowered flight,[2][better source needed] before and after World War II. In the 1960s, she was sponsored by the West German foreign office as a technical adviser inGhana and elsewhere,[3] and founded a gliding school in Ghana, where she worked forKwame Nkrumah.
Reitsch was born inHirschberg,Silesia, on 29 March 1912 to an upper-middle-class family. She was daughter of Dr. Wilhelm (Willy) Reitsch, who was an ophthalmology clinic manager, and his wife Emy Helff-Hibler von Alpenheim, who was a member of theAustrian nobility. Despite her mother being a devoutCatholic, Hanna was raised aProtestant. She had two siblings, brother Kurt, a navalFregattenkapitän (frigate captain), and younger sister Heidi. Reitsch began flight training in 1932 at the School of Gliding inGrunau.[4] While a medical student inBerlin, she enrolled in a German Air Mail amateur flying school for powered aircraft atStaaken, training in aKlemm Kl 25.[5]
In 1933, Reitsch left medical school at theUniversity of Kiel to become, at the invitation ofWolf Hirth, a full-time glider pilot/instructor atHornberg in Baden-Württemberg.[6] Reitsch contracted with theUfa Film Company as a stunt pilot and set an unofficial endurance record for women of 11 hours and 20 minutes.[7]In January 1934, she joined a South America expedition to study thermal conditions, along with Wolf Hirth,Peter Riedel andHeini Dittmar.[8] While in Argentina, she became the first woman to earn theSilver C Badge, the 25th to do so among world glider pilots.[9]
In June 1934, Reitsch became a member of theDeutsche Forschungsanstalt für Segelflug (DFS) and became atest pilot in 1935.[10] Reitsch enrolled in the Civil Airways Training School inStettin, where she flew a twin-engine on a cross country flight andaerobatics in aFocke-Wulf Fw 44.[11]In 1937,Ernst Udet gave Reitsch the honorary title ofFlugkapitän after she had successfully testedHans Jacobs'sdivebrakes for gliders.[12]At the DFS she test-flew transport and troop-carrying gliders, including theDFS 230 that was used at theBattle ofFort Eben-Emael.[13]
In September 1937, Reitsch was posted to theLuftwaffe testing centre atRechlin-Lärz Airfield by Ernst Udet.[14]
Her flying skill, desire for publicity, and photogenic qualities made her a star ofNazi propaganda. Physically she was petite and very slender, with blonde hair, blue eyes and a "ready smile".[15] She appeared in Nazi propaganda throughout the late 1930s and early 1940s.[16]
Reitsch was the first femalehelicopter pilot and one of the few pilots to fly theFocke-Achgelis Fa 61, the first fully controllable helicopter, for which she received the Military Flying Medal.[17] In 1938, during the three weeks of the International Automobile Exhibition in Berlin, she made daily flights of the Fa 61 helicopter inside theDeutschlandhalle.[16]
In September 1938, Reitsch flew theDFS Habicht in the ClevelandNational Air Races.[18]
Reitsch was a test pilot on theJunkers Ju 87Stukadive bomber andDornier Do 17light/fast bomber projects, for which she received the Iron Cross, Second Class, from Hitler on 28 March 1941.[19]Reitsch was asked to fly many of Germany's latest designs, among them the rocket-propelledMesserschmitt Me 163Komet in 1942.[20] And as such, she became the first and only woman in the world to fly a rocket plane.[citation needed] A crash landing on her fifth Me 163 flight badly injured Reitsch; she spent five months in a hospital recovering.[21] Reitsch received theIron Cross First Class following the accident, one of only three women to do so.[22]
She was also the only woman to have flown the world's biggest glider, theMesserschmitt Me 321 Gigant (Giant).[citation needed] She was instrumental in having a second pilot added to the Me 321. She was also the first woman in the world to fly a jet fighter (Me 262), and the only woman in the world to have flown a cruise missile (Fieseler Fi 103R Reichenberg).[citation needed] She was also likely to have been the first woman to fly a dive bomber (Ju 87).[citation needed]
In February 1943 after news of the defeat in theBattle of Stalingrad, she accepted an invitation fromGeneraloberstRobert Ritter von Greim to visit theEastern Front. She spent three weeks visiting Luftwaffe units, flying aFieseler Fi 156 Storch.[23]
 | This sectionappears to contradict the articleFieseler Fi 103R Reichenberg. Please discuss at thetalk page and do not remove this message until the contradictions are resolved.(September 2024) |
On 28 February 1944, she presented the idea of Operation Suicide to Hitler atBerchtesgaden, which "would require men who were ready to sacrifice themselves in the conviction that only by this means could their country be saved." Although Hitler "did not consider the war situation sufficiently serious to warrant them ... and ... this was not the right psychological moment", he gave his approval. The project was assigned to Gen.Günther Korten.[24] About seventy volunteers enrolled in the Suicide Group as pilots for the human glider-bomb.[25] By April 1944, Reitsch and Heinz Kensche finished tests of theMe 328, carried aloft by aDornier Do 217.[26] By then, she was approached bySS-ObersturmbannführerOtto Skorzeny, a founding member of theSS- Selbstopferkommando Leonidas (Leonidas Squadron). They adapted theV-1 flying bomb into theFieseler Fi 103R Reichenberg, including a two-seater and a single-seater with and without the mechanisms to land.[27] The plan was never implemented operationally, "the decisive moment had been missed."[28]
In her autobiographyFliegen, mein Leben Reitsch recalled that after two initial crashes with the Fi 103R she and Heinz Kensche took over tests of the prototype Fi 103R. She made several successful test flights before training the instructors. "Though an average pilot could fly the V1 without difficulty once it was in the air, to land it called for exceptional skill, in that it had a very high landing speed and, moreover, in training it was the glider model, without engine, that was usually employed."[29]
In October 1944, Reitsch claimed she was shown a booklet by Peter Riedel which he had obtained while in the German Embassy in Stockholm, concerning thegas chambers. She further claimed that while believing it to be enemy propaganda, she agreed to informHeinrich Himmler about it. When she did, Himmler is said to have asked whether she believed it, and she replied, "No, of course not. But you must do something to counter it. You can't let them shoulder this onto Germany." "You are right," Himmler replied.[30]
During thelast days of the war, Hitler dismissedHermann Göring as head of the Luftwaffe and appointedRobert Ritter von Greim to replace him. Von Greim and Reitsch flew fromGatow Airport into embattled Berlin to meet Hitler in theFührerbunker, arriving on 26 April whenRed Army troops were already in the central area of Berlin.[31] Reitsch and von Greim had been flown fromRechlin–Lärz Airfield to Gatow Airfield in aFocke-Wulf Fw 190 (with Reitsch riding in the small plane's fuselage), escorted by twelve other Fw 190s fromJagdgeschwader 26 under the command ofHauptmannHans Dortenmann.[32][33] In Berlin, Reitsch and von Greim took a Fi 156Storch—initially piloted by von Greim until his foot was struck by a bullet, then by Reitsch reaching over him to land onan improvised airstrip in the Tiergarten near theBrandenburg Gate andBerlin Victory Column.[34] On 27 April, Hitler gave Reitsch two capsules of poison for herself and von Greim, which she accepted.[35][36]
Shortly after midnight on 29 April, Hitler ordered Reitsch and von Greim to fly out of Berlin in anArado Ar 96 (which had been flown to the Tiergarten by the pilot who stowed Reitsch in his fuselage), asserting that they could get GeneralWalther Wenck to save Berlin.[37] Von Greim was ordered to get the Luftwaffe to attack the Soviet forces that had just reachedPotsdamer Platz and to make sure Himmler was punished for his treachery in making unauthorised contact with theWestern Allies regarding surrender terms.[Note 1] Troops of the Soviet3rd Shock Army, which was fighting its way through theTiergarten from the north, tried to shoot the plane down fearing that Hitler was escaping in it, but it took off successfully.[38][39][Note 2]
Reitsch was soon captured along with von Greim and the two were interviewed together by U.S. military intelligence officers.[Note 3] When asked about being ordered to leave theFührerbunker on 29 April 1945,[43] Reitsch and von Greim reportedly repeated the same answer: "It was the blackest day when we could not die at our Führer's side." Reitsch stated, "We should all kneel down in reverence and prayer before the altar of the Fatherland," referring to theFührerbunker.[44] Reitsch dismissedassertions of Hitler's survival, saying, "He had no reason to live and the tragedy was that he knew it ... perhaps better than anyone else did." Reitsch claimed Hitler was initially motivated by a will to "make Germany healthy again" in terms of its economy, but gambled his populace. She criticised his incompetence as a leader (e.g. his selection of the wrong persons for office) and argued repeatedly that never again must an individual have so much control over any country.[45] Reitsch was held for eighteen months;[46] von Greim killed himself on 24 May 1945.
Evacuated from Silesia ahead of the Soviet troops, Reitsch's family took refuge inSalzburg.[47] During the night of 3 May 1945, after hearing a rumour that all refugees were to be taken back to their original homes in the Soviet occupation zone, Reitsch's father shot and killed her mother and sister[48] and her sister's three children before killing himself.[49]
After her release Reitsch settled inFrankfurt am Main. After the war, German citizens were barred from flying powered aircraft, but within a few yearsgliding was allowed, which she took up again. In 1952, Reitsch won a bronze medal in theWorld Gliding Championships inSpain; she was the first woman to compete[50] and in 1955 she became German champion.[50] She continued to break records, including the women's altitude record (6,848 m (22,467 ft)) in 1957 and her first diamond of the Gold-C badge.[50]
During the mid-1950s, Reitsch was interviewed on film and talked about her wartime flight tests of the Fa 61,Me 262 and Me 163.
In 1959, Indian Prime MinisterJawaharlal Nehru invited Reitsch, who spoke fluent English, to start a gliding centre, and she flew with him overNew Delhi.[50] In 1961,United States PresidentJohn F. Kennedy invited her to theWhite House.[51]
From 1962 to 1966, she lived inGhana. The then Ghanaian President,Kwame Nkrumah invited Reitsch to Ghana after reading of her work in India. AtAfienya she founded the first black African national gliding school, working closely with the government and the armed forces. The West German government supported her as technical adviser.[52] The school was commanded byJ.E.S. de Graft-Hayford, with gliders such as the double-seatedSchleicher K7,Slingsby T.21 and aBergfalke, along with a single-seatedSchleicher K 8.[53] She gained theFAI Diamond Badge in 1970.[54] The project was evidently of great importance to Nkrumah and has been interpreted as part of a "modernist" development ideology.[55]
Reitsch's attitudes to race underwent a change. "Earlier in my life, it would never have occurred to me to treat a black person as a friend or partner ..." She now experienced guilt at her earlier "presumptuousness and arrogance".[56] She became close to Nkrumah. The details of their relationship are now unclear due to the destruction of documents, but some surviving letters are intimate in tone.[57]
In Ghana, some Africans were disturbed by the prominence of a person with Reitsch's past, butShirley Graham Du Bois, a noted African-American writer who had emigrated to Ghana and was friendly towards Reitsch, agreed with Nkrumah that Reitsch was extremely naive politically.[58] Contemporary Ghanaian press reports seem to show a lack of interest in her past.[59]
Throughout the 1970s, Reitsch broke gliding records in many categories, including the "Women's Out and Return World Record" twice, once in 1976 (715 km (444 mi)) and again, in 1979 (802 km (498 mi)), flying along theAppalachian Ridges in the United States. During this time, she also finished first in the women's section of the first world helicopter championships.[15]
Reitsch was interviewed and photographed several times in the 1970s, towards the end of her life, by Jewish-American photojournalist Ron Laytner. In her closing remarks she is quoted as saying:
And what have we now in Germany? A country of bankers and car-makers. Even our great army has gone soft. Soldiers wear beards and question orders. I am not ashamed to say I believed in National Socialism. I still wear the Iron Cross with diamonds Hitler gave me. But today in all of Germany you can't find a single person who voted Adolf Hitler into power ... Many Germans feel guilty about the war. But they don't explain the real guilt we share – that we lost.[60]
In the same interview, she is quoted as saying,[42]
I asked Hermann Göring one day, "What is this I am hearing that Germany is killing Jews?"Göring responded angrily, "A totally outrageous lie made up by the British and American press. It will be used as a rope to hang us someday if we lose the war."
_03.jpg)
Reitsch died of a heart attack in Frankfurt at the age of 67, on 24 August 1979. She had never married.[61] She is buried in the Reitsch family grave in the Salzburger Kommunalfriedhof.
Former British test pilot andRoyal Navy officerEric Brown said he received a letter from Reitsch in early August 1979 in which she said, "It began in the bunker, there it shall end." Within weeks she was dead. Brown speculated that Reitsch had taken the cyanide capsule Hitler had given her in the bunker, and that she had taken it as part of a suicide pact with Greim.[62] There is no record of an autopsy.[63]
 | This sectionneeds additional citations forverification. Please helpimprove this article byadding citations to reliable sources in this section. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Hanna Reitsch" – news ·newspapers ·books ·scholar ·JSTOR(August 2018) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
Reitsch has been portrayed by the following actresses in film and television productions:
