Rochus Misch

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Rochus Misch in 1999 (left) and 1944 (right).

Rochus Jordan Misch (born July 29, 1917) was an Oberscharführer in the 1st SS Division Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler who worked as a courier, bodyguard and telephone operator for Adolf Hitler from 1940 to 1945.

Misch was born in Oppeln in the Province of Silesia. As a junior member of Hitler's permanent staff, Misch traveled with the Führer from bunker to bunker throughout the Second World War. On January 16, 1945, following German defeat in the Battle of the Bulge, Misch, together with the rest of Hitler's personal staff, moved into the Führerbunker in Berlin, not to leave it for any significant periods of time until the end of the war. Misch handled all of the direct communication from the super-bunker.

Following the suicides of Hitler and Joseph Goebbels on, respectively, April 30 and May 1, 1945, Misch and mechanic Johannes Hentschel, two of the last people remaining in the bunker, exchanged letters to their wives if anything were to happen to them. Misch was captured after fleeing the bunker on May 2, only hours before the Red Army seized it.

After his release from captivity in 1954, Misch returned to Berlin where he lives two km from the Führerbunker. Following the rediscovery of the bunker in the 1990s, Misch has stated publicly that the bunker should not be completely destroyed, being an important part of world history.

In May 2005, Misch appeared in the news when he was accused of tainting the memories of Holocaust victims after calling for a plaque in memory of the Goebbels children, who were killed by Magda Goebbels, shortly before her own suicide, on May 1, 1945.

With the death of Bernd von Freytag-Loringhoven on February 27, 2007, Misch is the last remaining survivor of the Führerbunker.

[edit] References

Burns, Chris. (October 15, 1999). "Berliners debate what to do with Hitler's bunker". CNN
Hall, Allan. (May 3, 2005). "Hitler, the Tragic Goebbels Children and Me: 60 Years on, Fuhrer's Nurse Tells Her Story". The Daily Mail, p. 13