Georg Hansen

This article is about the German army officer. For the Danish photographer, see Georg Emil Hansen.

Colonel Georg Alexander Hansen (5 July 1904- 8 September 1944) was a German army officer and a member of the German resistance against Adolf Hitler's Nazi regime.

Early life

He was born in Sonnefeld and, after attending Casimirianum from 1914 to 1923, briefly studied law at the University of Erlangen before joining the Reichswehr in 1924. In 1927 he was promoted to leutnant and in 1931 he married Irene Stölzel from Michelau and they went on to have five children. In 1935 Hansen was posted to the General Staff training office where he met General Ludwig Beck and Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg. He was then appointed to the department of espionage and foreign intelligence of the Reich War Ministry, headed by Rear Admiral Wilhelm Canaris. He was promoted to Oberstleutnant in the Foreign Armies East Department in 1942. Following the dismissal of Canaris in January 1944 he was appointed as his successor as the chief of the counterintelligence office and in March 1944 he attended a meeting with the SD to set up a unified intelligence service.

Hitler assassination attempt

Hansen was a key member of the resistance group led by Generalmajor Henning von Tresckow and Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg. He attended the meetings where the conspirators discussed the assassination of Adolf Hitler". and his house in Rangsdorf often served as the venue for the meetings. After the July 20 plot coup attempt he returned from Bamberg to Berlin, despite the fact that he knew the coup attempt had failed and that Hitler had survived. He was invited to the office of Ernst Kaltenbrunner where he was arrested by the Gestapo in the waiting room. He was interrogated at length and dishonorably discharged from the army by a court of honor.

Death

He was tried by the People’s Court on 10 August 1944 with Erich Fellgiebel, Alfred Kranzfelder, Fritz-Dietlof von der Schulenburg and Berthold Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg. He was sentenced to death by Roland Freisler and executed by hanging on 8 September 1944 at Plötzensee prison, Berlin. His family were imprisoned, their property was confiscated and his five children were placed an orphanage near Bad Sachsa under new names.

See also

• List of members of the July 20 plot

External links

• dmh de Biography of Georg Hansen