Meanwhile, the fighting inside the Reichstag intensified as Neustroev’s troops fought for control of the second floor. Sergeants Yegorov and Kantariya of the reconnaissance troop blasted their way to the half ruined staircase leading to the third floor, but were halted in their tracks by German machine gun fire. The Red Banner was waved from a second story window at 14.25hrs. Colonel Zinchenko, commanding 756th Rifle Regiment was not satisfied, demanding to know, ‘Where is the banner?’. The attempt to secure the whole building had failed at the first attempt. German troops still controlled the basement and parts of the upper floors. A second assault would be needed. All knew that the clock was ticking as Stalin wanted the Red Banner flying over the Reichstag in time for the important May Day holiday and parade.
Whilst the first attempt to storm the Reichstag was taking place, Hitler sat down to lunch with his remaining secretaries Gerda Christian and Traudl Junge, also present was his cook Constanze Manziarly. Eva Braun did not attend, as presumably she had no appetite. Hitler’s last meal of spaghetti in a light sauce was taken in near silence. Then after finishing this last meal he thanked his cook, after which he stood from the table and in a barely audible voice said, ‘The time has come; it’s all over’. His decision to commit suicide on this day came following his conversation with Mohnke earlier in the morning. Mohnke confirmed that the end was approaching as his troops could only hold on for a few hours more. To this end, Hitler instructed his adjutant Otto Gunsche to take steps in order to ensure that his remains were ‘forever undiscovered’.
Now it was time for the final farewells. On his way to the conference room, Hitler was stopped by his faithful valet Heinz Linge who wanted to say goodbye. Hitler told him that he should attempt to break out of the Soviet encirclement. Linge asked for whom should he make such an effort? Hitler replied, ‘For the coming man’. He then bade a formal farewell of sorts to Goebbels, his wife Magda, Bormann, Generals Krebs and Burgdorf, diplomat Walther Hewel, Vice-Admiral Hans-Erich Voss, the head of the Reich Security Service bodyguard Brigadier-General Johann Rattenhuber, Gunsche, Linge, head of Department 1 and criminal director of the Reich Security Service Lieutenant-Colonel Peter Hogl and the remaining secretaries Christian and Junge. After a few words in response to those making up the mournful gathering , Hitler returned to his private rooms with his wife.
His last moments of reflection (no doubt concerning those he believed had betrayed him) were interrupted by an almost hysterical Magda Goebbels who insisted on speaking to her beloved leader. Gunsche later recalled the scene:
The Fuhrer was standing in his study. Eva was not in the room, but there was a tap running in the bathroom so I assume she was there. He was very annoyed at me for interrupting. I asked him if he wanted to see Frau Goebbels. ‘I don’t want to speak to her any more’, he said.
The excellent film Downfall which showed Hitler speaking briefly with Magda. However, the reality was that he had heard enough and wanted to be left alone. She returned to her room sobbing. The lower bunker area was cleared in an attempt to provide a semblance of dignity for the final act. Seeking a release from the unbearable tension, many went to the canteen where a macabre imitation of a party was taking place. The noise penetrated to the lower depths but attempts to stop the carousing of those involved met with little response.
Unable to stand the tension, Hitler’s youngest secretary ran upstairs where she bumped into the Goebbels’ children. It transpired that none had eaten since breakfast, so she went to fetch them something to eat. On her return, she prepared the food and attempted to distract the children. Then, at some time between 15.15hrs and 15.30hrs Hitler and his wife committed suicide. There is some dispute as to whether the actual shot from Hitler’s pistol was heard (the constant noise from the generators and ventilation system would have made distinguishing individual sounds difficult). The tension was finally broken by Linge who entered Hitler’s room. On surveying the scene he reported to Bormann very matter-of-factly, stating ‘It’s done’. Gunsche then went into the room to see for himself before confirming to those waiting in the conference room that Hitler was dead.
Time was running out fast, therefore the removal of the bodies to their cremation site above ground took place very quickly. Hitler and his wife’s lifeless forms were wrapped in blankets and carried to a small trench close to the bunker exit. The bodies were doused in petrol provided by Kempka and set alight. The heavy shellfire meant that there was little opportunity for those present to stage a Wagnerian funeral, instead the disposal of the bodies was hurried and somewhat undignified. At approximately 23.00hrs, the charred (and much reduced) remains of Hitler and his wife were gathered up, and as Gunsche later recalled, ‘were let down into a shell hole outside the exit from the bunker, covered with earth, and the earth pounded firm with a wooden rammer’. Nurse Flegel later recounted how by failing to answer her simple question of, ‘Is Hitler still alive’, Professor Hasse confirmed his death to her on the late afternoon of 30 Apriclass="underline"
As he gave me no answer, I knew the truth. It was natural that such an event was not discussed, and yet it affected us all very deeply, also that at such a time unimportant matters were of no interest at all. For, of course, we all believed that we, too, should not come out of this hell alive; we knew precisely what might be in store for us, everyone had made up his mind to that, there was no more question about it, we were paying attention to only what was essential.
Like those others trapped in the bunker, Nurse Flegel knew that the death of Hitler would not bring an automatic end to the horror. The advancing Red Army would want its revenge. In the ever shrinking last bastion based around the government district, desperate defenders fought on to delay the moment of reckoning. Meanwhile, final preparations for the storming of the Reichstag were complete.
The second attempt to fully secure the Reichstag and raise Red Banner No 5 was made at 18.00hrs. Yegorov and Kantariya were summoned by Zinchenko, who pointing to the roof of the building said, ‘Well then, off you go lads, and stick the banner up there’. Fighting in near darkness, the Soviet assault groups drew German fire, whilst the banner party made their way to the roof. Progress was slow, as determined German resistance showed no signs of slackening. Writing in the Soviet Voenno–istoricheskii Zhurnal in 1960, Neustroyev recalled the severity of the fighting:
Everywhere in the pitch-dark, smoke-filled Reichstag was soon confused and deadly. Knives and bayonets and rifle-butts were the weapons of those pitched medieval-style battles in the two side-chambers on the ground floor and on the main staircase. Then a grenade exploded, which blew to pieces Russians and Germans quite indiscriminately. There was a moments stunned silence… More explosions. Fire. Flames spread quickly over the plush furniture and wood panels and in some of the rooms actually stopped the fighting while men gasped for breath or desperately tried to stop their scorched uniforms burning…
It should therefore come as no surprise that it took the best part of five hours for Yegorov and Kantariya to claw their way to their final objective. At 20.50hrs, Red Banner No 5 was finally raised above the smouldering Reichstag, seventy minutes before Stalin’s deadline. Order No 6 of the 1st Belorussian Front’s Military Council marked the significance of this great moment:
1. The Reichstag district in the city of Berlin was defended by crack SS units. In the early hours on April 28, 1945, the enemy parachuted in a battalion of marines to reinforce the defences of the district. In the Reichstag district the enemy resisted desperately, their troops having turned every building, stairway, room, cellar into strongpoints and defensive positions. The fighting within the main building of the Reichstag repeatedly took the form of hand-to-hand combat.