Otto Günsche – Adolf Hitler’s Personal Adjutant (WIA 20 July Plot, Führerbunker)

Original Postwar Signature on a Letter of Otto Günsche. Otto Günsche (24.09.1917 † 02.10.2003) earned the Verwundetenabzeichen “20. Juli 1944” in Schwarz and was a member of the Leibstandarte-SS Adolf Hitler before he became Adolf Hitler’s personal adjutant.

With the end of Nazi Germany imminent, Günsche was tasked by Hitler on 30 April 1945 with ensuring the cremation of his body after his death. That afternoon, he stood guard outside the room in the Führerbunker where Hitler and Eva Braun committed suicide. After waiting a short time, Hitler’s valet, Heinz Linge, opened the study door with Martin Bormann at his side. The two men entered the study with Günsche right behind them. Günsche then left the study and announced that Hitler was dead to a group in the briefing room, which included Joseph Goebbels, General Hans Krebs, and General Wilhelm Burgdorf. Günsche had the table and chairs in the study moved out of the way and blankets were laid out on the floor. Hitler and Braun’s lifeless bodies were then wrapped in blankets. In accordance with Hitler’s prior written and verbal instructions, his and Braun’s bodies were carried up the stairs and through the bunker’s emergency exit to the garden behind the Reich Chancellery to be burned. Having ensured that the corpses were burnt using petrol supplied by Hitler’s chauffeur Erich Kempka, Günsche later left the Führerbunker after midnight on 1 May. On 2 May 1945, Günsche was taken prisoner by Soviet Red Army troops that were encircling the city and flown to Moscow for sharp interrogation by the NKVD.