Hübner Werner

Werner Hübner, born on 6 March 1912 in Teutschenthal, Saxony, died on 8 June 1988 in Rehburg. Hübner’s father was a forester. He trained as a surgeon in Berlin and married in 1939, with two children. He then did war service in Denmark and France and on the eastern front. In November 1944 he was moved to the Feldherrnhalle brigade, where he served in its chief dressing station.

The brigade’s chief dressing station was sited before Christmas in Tárogató utca, then in Pest at the Hotel Continental, then briefly from 18 January 1945 in Fő utca, next to the Trade Ministry. The last dressings were handed out on 20 January 1945, after which the treatment consisted simply of a weak pea soup. During those days, Hübner was slightly injured in the stomach by a splinter, but it brought on peritonitis and there was no chance of surgery as the standard of hygiene would have meant immediate death. So Hübner was gravely ill, with fever and ague, but carried on working as long as possible. By the end of the siege his weight had fallen to 45 kg.

On 9 February 1945, his wound led him to join the central dressing station. There he carried on with his surgical work for as long as he could.

Physically there wouldn’t in any case have been much chance of him breaking out. He relied on a promise from SS Battalion Leader Wilhelm Fehrensen that 50 orderlies and 12 medics would remain at the chief dressing station, which would come under the protection of the International Red Cross. In the event, nobody stayed behind: Hübner alone had to supply the medical care at the Castle’s chief dressing station. Meanwhile he also did much to end a spate of suicides that followed the outset of the Breakout.

Hübner operated continually, without even the looting Soviet troops interfering. When the dressing station caught fire, he showed defiant courage in setting about to rescue the immobilized wounded. He went in after fire had broken out and found other survivors that he could close into their ward with an iron door, which had to be cooled with vessels of urine he found in the ward.

After being taken prisoner, his health broke down and he was allowed home at the end of 1945. He worked initially in forestry, then found a job in 1947 as a general practitioner in Loccum. After that he moved to Rehburg, where he combined general practice with working as a medic at the local military parade ground. He served in 1961─1972 as mayor of the town. His merits earned him the Federal Cross of Merit Third Class. He retired on 31 March 1981 and died suddenly on 6 June 1988.