Karl-Heinz Becker

Karl-Heinz Becker was born in January 1914 in Schwedt, Brandenburg. His father was an architect in nearby Angermünde. Between 1929 and 1931, he lived with his father in Los Angeles, California, where he attended Manual Arts High School. In the Easter period of 1934, at the age of twenty, he passed his Abitur exams in Germany. 

In October 1934, Becker entered as a cadet the ‘General Göring’ Landespolizei Group: one of the units that would evolve into the ‘Hermann Göring’ Division during the war. He served in that unit until the end of 1938.  

Becker was a member of the 3^rd Company of the ‘General Göring’ Airborne Battalion, which was transferred from Berlin to the parachutist training centre in Gardelegen. There the company was reinforced by volunteers of the ‘Feldherrnhalle’ SA-Regiment and transformed into the 3^rd Battalion of the 1^st Parachute Regiment. 

In 1939, Becker took command of the 11^th Company, with which he participated in all the battalion’s operations: in September 1939 in Poland; in May 1940 in Holland (Rotterdam); and in May 1941 in Crete, where he landed with his company on 20 May near Candia (Heraklion). On 9 July 1941, he was awarded the Knight’s Cross for this operation.

The battalion was subsequently deployed on the Eastern Front near Leningrad and then transferred to France for a brief recovery period, followed by redeployment to the Eastern Front in October, near Vitebsk and Smolensk. Promoted to captain in April 1942, Becker became regiment aide in July. On 21 November 1942, he was named commander of the 3^rd Battalion; in that role, he took part in the battles of Velikiye Luki and Orel in Russia. He was wounded in January 1943.

Within the division, the 3^rd Battalion was referred to informally as ‘Becker’s horde’—a name emphasizing the soldiers' recklessness and their strong ties to their commander. In June 1943, the battalion was transferred from France to Naples and initially stationed in Pomigliano d'Arco. On 8 September, it disarmed the Italian garrison in Castellammare di Stabia. After a period of convalescence in southern Italy, Becker, by then promoted to major, took command of the battalion; the exact date this took place is unclear. Military files show that in September 1943, a ‘Becker Combat Group’ was formed from his battalion and additional Luftwaffe forces. The group fought in the Lattari Mountains against Allied troops until 24 September, then withdrew past Vesuvius through the countryside north of Naples towards the Volturno River. On 2 October, the group suffered losses in Acerra. In a revenge action the next day, a rear-guard force of the ‘Hermann Göring’ Division killed 84 of the town’s residents.

In November, Becker and his men were in Abruzzo, near Sulmona; in mid-November, they took up positions in the area of Pietransieri. From there, they engaged in operations on the opposite side of the Sangro Valley, aimed at opposing the advance of Canadian troops. On 21 November, the men perpetrated a massacre of citizens of Pietransieri who had refused to evacuate the area and sought shelter in some of the outlying farmhouses. The massacre occurred in the context of these rear-guard actions. The battalion remained at the front near Pietransieri until 19 December, after which it was transferred to Francavilla al Mare. During the Christmas period, it fought near Arielli, and in February 1944, it was deployed at the Nettuno Front near Cisterna.

On 7 March 1944, Becker’s battalion was detached from the 1^st Parachute Division and transferred from Italy to Brittany, France. There it was deployed in the newly organized 3^rd Parachute Division, as the 3^rd Battalion of Parachute Regiment 5. 

On 15 June 1944, Becker took command of Parachute Regiment 5 in Normandy and was promoted to lieutenant colonel on 1 October 1944. He was awarded the Oak Leaf Cluster of the Knight’s Cross—a significant military honour—for his regiment’s achievements during the withdrawal through France and the Battle of the Bulge in the winter of 1944/45. In April 1945, he assumed deputy command of the 3^rd Parachute Division and was promoted to colonel shortly before the German collapse.

Very little is known about his life in the postwar period. Between 1970 and 1982, Karl-Heinz Becker served as the mayor of the village of Bargum in Schleswig-Holstein, a small cluster of farmhouses near the Danish border. He also served as an official for the district of North Frisia and was chairman of the German Association for the Protection of Forests and Woodlands.