The Fall of Breslau
During the waning months of World War II, as the Soviet army advanced into Silesia and encircled Fortress (Festung) Breslau, Hanke was named by Hitler to be the city's "Battle Commander" (Kampfkommandant). Hanke oversaw, with brutal fanaticism, the futile and militarily useless defense of the city during the Battle of Breslau. Goebbels, dictating for his diary, repeatedly expressed his admiration of Hanke during the spring of 1945. However, when Breslau was finally taken, Hanke was not to be found.
On 6 May, German General Hermann Niehoff surrendered Breslau. Hanke had flown out on 5 May in a small plane kept in reserve for him, a Fieseler Storch. In his memoirs, German Minister of Armaments, Albert Speer, claimed that he heard from Anton Flettner, the designer, that Hanke actually escaped in one of the few existing prototype helicopters.
Read more about this topic: Karl Hanke
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“Our medieval historians who prefer to rely as much as possible on official documents because the chronicles are unreliable, fall thereby into an occasionally dangerous error. The documents tell us little about the difference in tone which separates us from those times; they let us forget the fervent pathos of medieval life.”
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