General Claus Graf Schenk von Stauffenberg

Claus von Stauffenberg was born November 15th, 1907 at Jettingen, Germany. After an uneventful childhood he entered the Army in 1926. Stauffenberg gained distinction in the campaigns against Poland and France. After his transfer to the eastern front however he became disillusioned with the brutal policies toward Slavs and Jews. He was transferred at his own request to North Africa where he was severly wounded losing his right hand, two fingers of the left hand and right eye in April 1943.
     During his convalescence Stauffenberg had a lot of time to think about Germany's future and he came to the conclusion that Hitler must be eliminated. He assumed the leadership of a ever-widening circle of army officers opposed to Hitler and reserved for himself the task of carrying out the proposed assassination. In July of 1944 the time came to carry through his plan. After two attempts he was able to place a bomb in Hitler's Rastenburg headquarters but it failed to kill the dictator. A coup to take place simultaneously in Berlin failed and Stauffenberg and a few co-conspirators were summarily executed on the night 20 July 1944. They were the lucky ones. Those who were suspected and later arrested suffered many tortures before being put out of their misery. They were the first of some five thousand, many completely innocent, who would die in the bloody aftermath of the conspiracy