Name Walter Scherff | ||
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Died May 24, 1945, Saalfelden, Austria | ||
Major General Walter Scherff (1 November 1898, in Cannstatt – 24 May 1945, in Saalfelden) was a German army officer and military historian appointed by Adolf Hitler to the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht in May 1942 to compile the history of the war.
He served in a Panzer Battalion and was promoted Oberstleutnant in 1939, Oberst in September 1941 and Generalmajor in September 1943. He was injured in 1944 by the 20 July plot bomb at the Wolf's Lair headquarters in Rastenburg, East Prussia.
A great admirer of Hitler, he committed suicide by means of a cyanide capsule while in American captivity.
Scherff was responsible for the destruction of parts of the complete stenographic record of Hitler's military conferences despite not having the authority to do so. Those copies under the administration of the Stenographic Service were ordered burned early in May 1945, at his direction. His personal copies were also "probably" burned, according to historians, as "Scherff made it plain that his opinion of Hitler as a general had changed, and he strongly criticized the military strategy of the last few years."