The Brettheim Drama

The idea and initial research for the book was developed by Gunda Borgeest. The book written by Jürgen Bertram was published in May 2005 at Fischer Paperback, Germany.

Volker Ullrich wrote in his review on April 6, 2005 in the German weekly newspaper DIE ZEIT:
"The last days of the war in a village in Wuerttemberg. On April 7, 1945 a unit of fanatical Hitler Youth marched into Brettheim to stop the approaching American army. Considerate villagers stop them and take their weapons away, but with tragic consequences: An SS squad sentence three villagers to death by hanging, for insurgence. The village is not handed over without fighting and therefore the bombs are falling on Brettheim. It is almost completely destroyed, and 17 inhabitants die in the battle. Jürgen Bertram gives an absorbing account of the dramatic events, that happened in similar ways in many places of the doomed 'Third Reich'".