Hans-Georg von Friedeburg

Hans-Georg von Friedeburg (15 July 1895 in Strasbourg – 23 May 1945 in Flensburg) was the deputy commander of the U-Boat Forces of Nazi Germany and the last Commanding Admiral of the Kriegsmarine.

Friedeburg was an ardent supporter of Nazi regime. A prominent German naval officer of the post-World War I period, he was appointed Deputy Commander of the German U-boat fleet in September 1941. Overseeing German U-Boat training and deployment of the U-boat bases in France, he later organised U-boat picket lines in the mid-Atlantic to find and attack Allied convoys. Promoted to Rear Admiral in 1942, Friedeburg assumed command of the German U-boat fleet in February of the following year. He was awarded the Ritterkreuz des Kriegsverdienstkreuzes mit Schwertern on 17 January 1945. He succeeded Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz as Commander-in-Chief of the Kriegsmarine when Dönitz became Reich President upon Hitler's suicide (and per Hitler's last will), and was promoted to Generaladmiral on 1 May 1945.

In early May 1945, Friedeburg was ordered by Dönitz to negotiate a truce with the Western Allied forces. Arriving at Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery's headquarters in Lüneburg, Germany he was informed that an unconditional surrender to all Allied forces was necessary and not negotiable. Nevertheless, he signed an instrument of surrender of all German armed forces in the Netherlands, northwest Germany and Denmark on 4 May 1945.

Friedeburg was later present, on behalf of the German Navy, when the document declaring the official surrender of the German armed forces in Northern Europe, including Germany, taking effect at midnight of 8/9 May 1945, was signed on behalf of the German High Command by Colonel General Alfred Jodl at Reims, France. He later signed on behalf of the Kriegsmarine, in Berlin on 8 May 1945, along with Colonel General Hans-Jürgen Stumpff for the Luftwaffe and Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm Keitel for the Wehrmacht, an instrument of surrender in the presence of Marshal Georgy Zhukov for the Red Army and other Allied representatives. Doing so, he became the only German representative who signed both official surrender declarations. Two weeks later, on 23 May 1945, the day when the members of the Flensburg government were arrested, Friedeburg became a prisoner of war of the British in Plön. Unable to endure the defeat of his country, and having made up his mind back in 1944 about this perspective, he took poison the same day. He was interred in Adelby Cemetery near Flensburg.

His son Ludwig von Friedeburg (1924–2010) was a well-known sociologist and politician (SPD) and served between 1969 and 1974 as minister for culture in the state of Hesse.

Awards

• Iron Cross (1914)
  • 2nd Class
  • 1st Class
• Knight's Cross Second Class of the Order of the Zähringer Lion with Swords
• Knight of the Order of St. John
• Cross of Honour
• Wehrmacht Long Service Award 4th to 1st Class
• Spanish Cross in Silver with Swords
• Iron Cross (1939)
  • 2nd Class
  • 1st Class
• War Merit Cross with Swords
  • 2nd Class
  • 1st Class
• German Cross in Silver on 6 June 1942 as Kapitän zur See and 2nd admiral of the U-boats
• Knight's Cross of the War Merit Cross (17 January 1945)