Hajo Herrmann

Hans-Joachim "Hajo" Herrmann (1 August 1913 – 5 November 2010) was a World War II Luftwaffe pilot and officer and was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords.

Hans-Joachim Herrmann
Hajo Herrmann in January 1944
Nickname(s)	Hajo
Born	(1913-08-01)1 August 1913 Kiel, Kingdom of Prussia, German Empire
Died	5 November 2010(2010-11-05) (aged 97) Düsseldorf, Germany
Allegiance	Nazi Germany
Service / branch	Luftwaffe
Years of service	1935–1945
Rank	Oberst (colonel)
Unit	KG 4, KG 30, JG 300
Battles / wars	Spanish Civil War World War II Battle of Britain Balkans Campaign
Awards	Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords
Spouse(s)	Ingeborg Reichelt
Relations	Thilo Martinho (son)
Other work	Lawyer

After the war, Hermann spent 10 years in Soviet custody as a prisoner of war. Following his release, he became a Nazi activist and lawyer whose high-profile cases included the defence of neo-Nazis and genocide deniers while simultaneously promoting denial and the movement's organisations.

Early life and career

On 1 May 1933, Herrmann joined the Hamburg Landespolizei (state police) and attended the Prussian higher police school in Potsdam-Eiche. Following graduation, he was promoted to Polizei-Leutnant (police second lieutenant) on 1 June 1935. He then joined the military service of the Wehrmacht, initially serving with Infanterie-Regiment 47 (47th Infantry Regiment), a regiment of the 20th Infantry Division. On 1 August 1935, Herrmann transferred to the newly formed Luftwaffe (air force). He then attended the bomber pilot school at Kitzingen Airfield. Following flight training, he was posted to 9. Staffel (9th squadron) of Kampfgeschwader 253 (KG 253—253rd Bomber Wing), a unit which later became Kampfgeschwader 4 "General Wever" (KG 4—4th Bomber Wing), based at Nordhausen.

From 1936 until 1937, Herrmann served in Condor Legion during the Spanish Civil War, travelling on the Usaramo to Cadiz in early August 1936. One of his initial tasks in Spain included developing instructions and training for the usage of the 2 cm Flak 30 anti-aircraft artillery. In this capacity, Herrmann held training sessions in the evening for Nationalist forces after he had flown daytime shuttle missions for the Spanish Army of Africa from Spanish Morocco to Spain, these missions became known as Operation Magic Fire (Feuerzauber). He then flew a Heinkel He 111 B bombers with 1. Staffel of Kampfgruppe 88 (K/88—88th Bomber Group). Herrmann flew 50 combat missions over Spain and following his return to Germany, he was posted to 7. Staffel of KG 4 and appointed Technischer Offizier (TO—Technical Officer). On 1 June 1938, he was promoted to Oberleutnant (first lieutenant). For his service during the Spanish Civil War, he was awarded the Spanish Cross in Gold with Swords (Spanienkreuz in Gold mit Schwertern) on 14 April 1939.

World War II

World War II in Europe began on Friday 1 September 1939 when German forces invaded Poland. Herrmann flew 18 combat missions on the He 111 over Poland, including missions against Polish forces fighting in the Battle of Kutno, and received the Iron Cross 2nd Class (Eisernes Kreuz zweiter Klasse) in October. On 31 May 1940 during the Battle of Dunkirk, he was shot down by Royal Air Force (RAF) fighters, resulting in a crash landing of his Junkers Ju 88 A-1 on the German held beaches near Dunkirk. On 20 June 1940, he was appointed Staffelkapitän (squadron leader) of 7. Staffel of KG 4 and took part in the Battle of Britain. He sank 70,000 tons of Allied shipping as a bomber pilot, and was instrumental in the attack upon Convoy PQ 17.

In February 1941 his group was transferred to Sicily, from where it attacked Malta then fought in the Battle of Greece. In one attack Herrmann sank the ammunition ship Clan Fraser in the Port of Piraeus. The explosion sank 11 ships and made the Greek port unusable for many months.

In July 1942 he was assigned to the general staff in Germany, where he became a confidant of Luftwaffe commander Hermann Göring. In 1942 Herrmann was appointed to the Luftwaffe Operational Staff. He played a role in the creation of night fighter wing Jagdgeschwader 300 Wilde Sau (Wild Boar) using day fighters at night in response to the night raids of RAF Bomber Command on Germany in mid-1943. As a single seat night fighter he scored 9 victories.

In December 1943 Herrmann was appointed Luftwaffe Inspector of Aerial Defence. By 1944 he was Inspector General of night fighters and received the Knight's Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords. At the end of 1944 he led the 9th Air Division.

Herrmann was a leading exponent of the tactical deployment of Rammjäger Sonderkommando Elbe (ram fighters), sent into action in April 1945. Suicide pilot volunteers, often aged 18 to 20, were to be trained only to be competent enough to control specially lightened and unarmoured Bf 109 fighters and bring down Allied bombers by ramming the tail or control surfaces with the propellers of their aircraft and bailing out if possible. Herrmann's intention was to gather a large number of these fighters for a one-off attack on the USAAF bomber formations in the hope of causing enough losses to curtail the bombing offensive for a few months. Fuel shortages prevented employment of the large numbers necessary, although from one mission of this type, on 7 April 1945, of the 120 fighters thus committed only 15 returned. On 11 May 1945, Herrmann was captured by Soviet forces and held prisoner of war for 10 years and returned to Germany in October 1955.

Law career and Nazi activism

Then he studied law and settled in Düsseldorf. He defended Otto Ernst Remer, the head of the neo-Nazi Socialist Reich Party and the Holocaust deniers David Irving and Fred A. Leuchter. Hermann's affinity for Remer, a committed Nazi and former Wehrmacht officer, was rooted in their mutual Holocaust denial activities. In October 1999 he had another interview with historians Colin Heaton and Jon Guttman. Heaton had been interviewing Herrmann for over ten years.

In 1959 Herrmann married the German soprano Ingeborg Reichelt. The couple had two children.

Summary of career

Herrmann flew 320 combat missions as a bomber pilot, including 50 of which during the Spanish Civil War, sinking twelve ships of approximately 65,000 gross register tons (GRT) of Allied shipping.

Aerial victory claims

According to Aders, Herrmann was credited with nine nocturnal aerial victories. Foreman, Parry and Mathews, authors of Luftwaffe Night Fighter Claims 1939 – 1945, researched the German Federal Archives and found records for three nocturnal victory claims. Mathews and Foreman also published Luftwaffe Aces — Biographies and Victory Claims, stating Herrmann claimed nine aerial victories.

Chronicle of aerial victories
Claim	Date	Time	Type	Location	Serial No./Squadron No.
– Kommando Herrmann –
?	3 August 1943	01:50	Lancaster	vicinity of Hanstedt	Lancaster ED645/No. 103 Squadron RAF
1	4 July 1943	01:30	Lancaster	vicinity of Mehlen
– Stab of Jagdgeschwader 300 –
2	3 January 1944	—	Lancaster
3	3 January 1944	—	Lancaster

Awards

• Spanish Cross in Bronze with Swords
• Iron Cross (1939)
  • 2nd Class (October 1939)
  • 1st Class (27 May 1940)
• Honour Goblet of the Luftwaffe (28 September 1940)
• German Cross in Gold on 5 June 1942 as Hauptmann in the III./Kampfgeschwader 30
• Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords
  • Knight's Cross on 13 October 1940 as Oberleutnant and Staffelkapitän of the 7./Kampfgeschwader 4 "General Wever"
  • 269th Oak Leaves on 2 August 1943 as Major and Geschwaderkommodore of Jagdgeschwader 300
  • 43rd Swords on 23 January 1944 as Oberst and Inspekteur der deutschen Luftverteidigung

Dates of rank

Hamburg Landespolizei
1 June 1935:	Polizei-Leutnant (second lieutenant)
Wehrmacht
1 June 1938:	Oberleutnant (first lieutenant)
19 December 1940:	Hauptmann (captain), backdated to 1 December 1940
1 March 1943:	Major (major)
1 August 1943:	Oberstleutnant (lieutenant colonel)
1 December 1943:	Oberst (colonel)

Publications

• Herrmann, Hajo (1984). Bewegtes Leben – Kampf- und Jagdflieger 1935–1945 [Eventful Life – Bomber and Fighter Pilot 1935–1945] (in German). Stuttgart, Germany: Motorbuch-Verlag. ISBN 978-3-613-01008-6.
• Herrmann, Hajo (1988). Als die Jagd zu Ende war – Mein Flug in die sowjetische Gefangenschaft [When the Hunt was over – My flight into Soviet Captivity] (in German). Munich, Germany: Universitas. ISBN 978-3-8004-1167-2.
• Herrmann, Hajo, ed. (2006). "Supersoldiers" – Die Wehrmacht im Urteil ausländischer Experten ["Supersoldiers" – The Wehrmacht in the Judgement of Foreign Experts] (in German). Munich, Germany: FZ-Verlag. ISBN 978-3-924309-77-0.

References

Bibliography

• Aders, Gebhard (1978). History of the German Night Fighter Force, 1917–1945. London: Janes. ISBN 978-0-354-01247-8.
• Berger, Florian (1999). Mit Eichenlaub und Schwertern [With Oak Leaves and Swords.] (in German). Vienna, Austria: Selbstverlag Florian Berger. ISBN 978-3-9501307-0-6.
• Fellgiebel, Walther-Peer [in German] (2000) [1986]. Die Träger des Ritterkreuzes des Eisernen Kreuzes 1939–1945 — Die Inhaber der höchsten Auszeichnung des Zweiten Weltkrieges aller Wehrmachtteile [The Bearers of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross 1939–1945 — The Owners of the Highest Award of the Second World War of all Wehrmacht Branches] (in German). Friedberg, Germany: Podzun-Pallas. ISBN 978-3-7909-0284-6.
• Foreman, John; Parry, Simon; Mathews, Johannes (2004). Luftwaffe Night Fighter Claims 1939–1945. Walton on Thames: Red Kite. ISBN 978-0-9538061-4-0.
• Forsyth, Robert (2019). Ju 88 Aces of World War 2. Oxford, UK: Osprey Publishing. ISBN 978-1-4728-2921-4.
• Goss, Chris (2018). Knights of the Battle of Britain — Luftwaffe Aircrew Awarded the Knight's Cross in 1940. Yorkshire, UK: Pen and Sword Books. ISBN 978-1-52672-651-3.
• Kaiser, Jochen (2010). Die Ritterkreuzträger der Kampfflieger—Band 1 [The Knight's Cross Bearers of the Bomber Fliers—Volume 1] (in German and English). Bad Zwischenahn, Germany: Luftfahrtverlag-Start. ISBN 978-3-941437-07-4.
• Laureau, Patrick (2010) [2000]. Condor: The Luftwaffe in Spain, 1936–39. Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole Books. ISBN 978-0-8117-0688-9.
• Lorant, Jean-Yves (October 2001). "Courrier des Lecteurs" [Readers' Letters]. Avions: Toute l'Aéronautique et son histoire (in French) (103): 2–5. ISSN 1243-8650.
• Mathews, Andrew Johannes; Foreman, John (2015). Luftwaffe Aces — Biographies and Victory Claims — Volume 2 G–L. Walton on Thames: Red Kite. ISBN 978-1-906592-19-6.
• Obermaier, Ernst (1989). Die Ritterkreuzträger der Luftwaffe Jagdflieger 1939 – 1945 [The Knight's Cross Bearers of the Luftwaffe Fighter Force 1939 – 1945] (in German). Mainz, Germany: Verlag Dieter Hoffmann. ISBN 978-3-87341-065-7.
• Patzwall, Klaus D.; Scherzer, Veit (2001). Das Deutsche Kreuz 1941 – 1945 Geschichte und Inhaber Band II [The German Cross 1941 – 1945 History and Recipients Volume 2] (in German). Norderstedt, Germany: Verlag Klaus D. Patzwall. ISBN 978-3-931533-45-8.
• Rembiszewski, Sarah (1996). The final Lie: Holocaust Denial in Germany: a Second Generation Denier as a Test Case. Tel Aviv, Israel: Tel Aviv University. ISBN 978-965-7033-04-3.
• Saintes, Philippe (May 2001). "Les grands as allemands 39/45: Hajo Herrman" [The Major German Aces: Hajo Herrman]. Avions: Toute l'Aéronautique et son histoire (in French) (98): 48–53. ISSN 1243-8650.
• Saintes, Philippe (June 2001). "Les grands as allemands 39/45: Hajo Herrman". Avions: Toute l'Aéronautique et son histoire (in French) (99): 41–46. ISSN 1243-8650.
• Scherzer, Veit (2007). Die Ritterkreuzträger 1939–1945 Die Inhaber des Ritterkreuzes des Eisernen Kreuzes 1939 von Heer, Luftwaffe, Kriegsmarine, Waffen-SS, Volkssturm sowie mit Deutschland verbündeter Streitkräfte nach den Unterlagen des Bundesarchives [The Knight's Cross Bearers 1939–1945 The Holders of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross 1939 by Army, Air Force, Navy, Waffen-SS, Volkssturm and Allied Forces with Germany According to the Documents of the Federal Archives] (in German). Jena, Germany: Scherzers Miltaer-Verlag. ISBN 978-3-938845-17-2.
• Smith, J.R.; Kay, A. (1972). German Aircraft of the Second World War. London: Putnam. ISBN 978-0-370-00024-4.
• Stockert, Peter (2012) [1997]. Die Eichenlaubträger 1939–1945 Band 3 [The Oak Leaves Bearers 1939–1945 Volume 3] (in German) (3rd ed.). Bad Friedrichshall, Germany: Friedrichshaller Rundblick. ISBN 978-3-932915-01-7.
• Thomas, Franz (1997). Die Eichenlaubträger 1939–1945 Band 1: A–K [The Oak Leaves Bearers 1939–1945 Volume 1: A–K] (in German). Osnabrück, Germany: Biblio-Verlag. ISBN 978-3-7648-2299-6.
• Weal, John (2012). Junkers Ju 88 Kampfgeschwader in North Africa and the Mediterranean. London: Osprey Publishing. ISBN 978-1-78200-445-5.
• Westermann, Edward B. (2001). Flak: German Anti-aircraft Defenses, 1914-1945. University Press of Kansas. ISBN 978-0-7006-1136-2.
• Accident description for Lancaster ED645 at the Aviation Safety Network. Retrieved on 22 November 2023.

External links

• Hajo Herrmann in the German National Library catalogue
• "Hans-Joachim Herrmann". The Daily Telegraph. 24 November 2010.