Rommel museum
 

I found out from his biography that Erwin Rommel is the only senior member of the Nazi regime who's life and career are shown in a museum dedicated to him.
I know that his house is in Herrlingen near Ulm, and his grave is there as well, but where is this museum?
I found a website in German only and I couldn't find much information (I don't know German either), however, there are no details like you find on any web page of a museum, be it big or small.

http://www.deutsche-museen.de/show.p...ndesland_id=12

Is it his former house, Friedenthal Haus?
Anybody knows anything about this museum? Any details please?

Thank you,
Gabriel

Hello, gab.

According to the website, the museum is in Blaustein-Herrlingen at Linderhof 2--just outside Ulm in the Villa Linderhof. Telefon 0 73 04/ 70 44

And the description of the museum mentions diaries, maps, plans, and pictures.

Rommel . . . interesting case. Supremely gifted field commander on the wrong side. Hard to deny the romance of the Afrika Corps.

Thank you, Rufus.

I found another web page, also in German, but they have a contact e-mail there, so I sent them a message (hopefully they can speak English) asking about opening hours and other details.

Would anyone here know about opening hours, days when it is closed, etc?

From the silence on this subject on this forum, I gather that nobody has passed by (not to mention visited) Rommel's house-museum.

In case I get a reply from the website, I'll post the details here, just in case someone may become interested.

I received a reply from the town archives (or something like that) and they say that Rommel-Museum can be visited on request on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday (Fr. only in the morning) and admission is free.

Rommel's grave is about 250 m away from the Museum. The commemorative plate (where he committed suicide) is at a distance of about 1.5 km from the Museum, on a hill.
At least if anybody else becomes interested, or wants to visit the place, now the details are here.

Thanks gabriel--this info is going into my Germany folder.

My wife and I returned recently from our holiday in Germany and now I can put down some details about our visit to Rommel's museum and grave and other information.

Trains from Ulm to Blaustein are quite frequent and the trip takes about 10-15 minutes. From Blaustein we took a bus and got off at the third stop, Herrlingen. We went to the town hall and were given the key to the villa that houses Rommel's Archives. Nobody else was there.

They say that they have a few visitors a week. Entrance was free. Nearby is the local cemetery where we visited his grave. It is marked with a wooden cross in the shape of the Iron Cross, well taken care of and covered with flowers.

We then walked on an uphill path for about 1.5 km from the station and found the commemmorative stone, where he committed the forced suicide.

After a few days we went to Stuttgart and at the House of History we saw his marshall baton.

As for the rest of the holiday, I will start writing the trip report in a few days.

I understand that his son was mayor of Stuttgart for a time a few years ago. Manfred, I think his first name is.

I didn't know there was a Rommel museum, but many years ago, we used to go to a restaurant near Heidelberg whose chef had been Rommel's chef.

I've always felt that if Montgomery's troops hadn't outnumbered Rommel's so greatly and if Rommel had had enough fuel for his tanks, El Alamein might have turned out differently.

He seems to be one of the few German generals whose reputation hasn't suffered.

Indeed, Manfred was mayor of Stuttgart. He brought his father's distinctions, medals and marshall baton to the House of History (of the Baden-Wurttemberg) in Stuttgart, where now are displayed in the WWII section.

At Rommel Archives (that's the actual name of the museum) most of the material is in German, unfortunately. Very little is in English.

The Allies sunk the ship carrying supplies for Rommel and this is how his situation got bad there.

He was nicknamed "Germany's last knight". He carried his battles very fairly and respecting the conventions, he was guided by chivalry on the battle field and was loved by the German people.

Leaving aside the fact that he happened tobe on the wrong side of the fence, he was a great man.

Pegontheroad

Regarding Rommel's reputation, a couple months ago I read a review of a recent book out on Rommel that is less flattering of the man. Alas, I forgot to write down the title - and now I can't even find reference to it on a 'google' search. Possibly it might still be available only in German. (If anyone here has heard of this book, I'd love to hear more about it.)

Interesting thread,thank you for resurecting it, I missed it first time round.

I am certainly no expert on Rommel, but I have recently read something that struck me as being quite strange, or maybe a coincidence.

In October 1942, while Rommel was on holiday with his family, the British 8th Army attacked at El Alamein, and shattered the myth of the invincible Afrika Korps. Although Rommel rushed back, it was too late to avoid defeat.

On 4 June 1944, Rommel left for Germany to celebrate Lucie's 50th birthday. On the same day, the Allied invasion of France began. Once again, Rommel had to rush back to the battlefield and once again he was overcome by superior Allied forces. Wounded in an air attack, he returned home to convalesce.

Now either the allies, were so afraid of this great man that they monitored his movements waited for him to be out of the way and acted accordingly or he wanted to be out of the way at those specific times.

Very interesting coincidence is it not?

Muck

I wonder if you were searching for info about Rommel when you dug out this thread, DrSK!
Anyway, I enjoyed reading about your experience.

Mucky, your coincidences are interesting, indeed.
However, didn't the Allies decide the D-Day long before Rommel happened to go to Germany? Or did they just guess that he will leave, being his wife's birthday?

Then why are we made to believe that they decided on the date of 6th June based on different grounds?

A documentary that I saw on his life, says that he dreaded the fact that he was given the responsibility of the Atlantic Wall. He was an advocate of the war in open spaces (e.g. desert), where soldiers have where to move.

He didn't like the idea of having his soldiers confined to tight spaces. However, he did what he could to protect his soldiers as much as possible with that concrete wall that he built.

Who knows what may have happened if he was there when the Allies struck that morning? His Panzer Division was held back because he was not there, and was destroyed.

D-Day was June 6th, and I believe delayed because of bad weather.

Can't think that Rommel's holiday's would have been a factor in the timing.

Post hoc, ergo propter hoc.

Your right it was delayed by one day due to bad weather, but a real coincidence anyway. I suspect this is something that we will never know.

But it is entirely feasible that the allied intelligence knew he was planning to leave the area and I wouldn't be surprised if this was a small contributory factor in the decision making process.

The fact that he had decided to leave the area suggested to the allies that the Nazi's expected everything to be quiet and subsequently were not expecting the attacks.
History shows that to be the case.

All speculation but Interesting, none the less !!

Muck