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On this day, Leutnant von Einsiedel claimed two Il-2 Stormoviks within five minutes. Over the next six weeks he would claim another 28 Soviet aircraft before being shot down and captured. Heinrich Graf von Einsiedel, the great-grandson of Otto von Bismark, was born as the youngest child to Count Herbert von Einsiedel. Einsiedel served as a German fighter pilot, initially with JG 2 in the west flying the Bf 109. Here he took part in escort operations over the cruisersas they made their "Channel dash" from Brest to Germany in February 1942. Einsiedel claimed two of the six Swordfish of No. 825 Squadron Fleet Air Arm, who made an unsuccessful low-level torpedo attack. In June 1942, Einsiedel was transferred to the Stab of III./JG 3 on the Eastern Front for the forthcoming offensive against Stalingrad. Finally on 30 August 1942, during combat with Russian Ratas, he was forced to land, was captured by Russian ground forces and became a POW. After taken prisoner Heinrich Graf von Einsiedel became a founding member, vice-president and commissary of propaganda of the National Committee for a Free Germany, the Communist organization for Germans captured by the Russians. After the war he work as a journalist in the Soviet occupied zoon of Germany. After given permission he was sent by the NKVD for intelligence-gathering purposes to West Berlin. Here he was was arrested by US Forces and later sentenced for spying. He was however able to stay in the west and continue working as a Journalist, scriptwriter and a film soundtrack dubber. He also played the role of a pilot in the drama The Last Bridge. Einsiedel later joined the Social Democratic Party of Germany and was later elected as a member of the German Bundestag as a candidate of the PDS, the German communist party. In total von Einsiedel
was credited for a total of 35 confirmed victories plus one further
unconfirmed claim. He was awarded the German Cross in Gold, the
Nazi award introduced by Hitler himself. |
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