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Hans Heinrich Herwarth von Bittenfeld (1904–1999), also known as Johnnie or Johann von Herwarth, was a German diplomat, stationed in Moscow 1933–1941, later serving at the Eastern Front, after the war West Germany's first ambassador to London, 1955–1961, then 1965–1971 ambassador to Rome, and 1971–1977 president for the Goethe-Institut. Von Herwarth, who by marriage was a cousin of Claus von Stauffenberg, belonged to the aristocratic opposition against the Nazi regime.
In the later U.S. ambassador's memoirs, Witness to History, 1973, Charles E. Bohlen reveals how he on the morning of August 24, 1939, visited von Herwarth on the German embassy and received the full content of the secret protocol to the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, signed the day before. The secret protocol contained an understanding between Hitler and Stalin in how to split Central Europe, the Baltic region and Finland between their powers. President Roosevelt was urgently informed. The United States did not conduct this information to any concerned governments in Europe. A week later the plan was realized with the German invasion of Poland, and World War II was commenced.
According to the German London-embassy's website[1] (http://www.german-embassy.org.uk/diplomats_and_martyrs.html), von Herwarth and his superior, ambassador von der Schulenburg, had tried already before the Munich Agreement to persuade Britain, France and the United States not to give in to Hitler's territorial demands.
Hans von Herwarth was the chief contact from the German embassy in Moscow to those of the western powers. Through him, the British were continuously informed on the progress of Soviet-German contacts during 1939.
von Herwarth is also held to be one of the German officials who informed the Allies on the decision to launch Operation Barbarossa in 1941, and to have given some of the earliest accounts of atrocities against Jews[2] (http://www.arts.mcgill.ca/programs/history/faculty/hoffmann/rolle.htm) and other civilians behind the Eastern Front and in the Holocaust. It's not known how much his Soviet counterparts were informed.
Bibliography
- Johnnie Herwarth von Bittenfeld and S. Frederick Starr. Against two evils. London: Collins, 1981 and New York: Rawson, Wade, 1981
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