News has just been published that one of the last two surviving holders of the Ritterkreuz – Heinz Rafoth – died on 20th February in Margetshöchheim, Bavaria, at the age of 103.
Heinz Rafoth was wounded three times while serving with the 12th Infantry Division of the Wehrmacht, where he fought mainly on the Eastern Front, including the Battle of the Demyansk Pocket and the Battle of Nevel (1943).
In the later stages of the war, Leutnant Heinz Rafoth fought on the Western front, and it was here that he earned his Ritterkreuz.
His citation read:
“On the 03.03.1945 Leutnant Rafoth fought to cover the ordered breakout of the remnants of the I./Grenadier-Regiment 48 in an action that primarily featured bitter urban combat. He did this from a position at the southeastern entrance of Blessem with a 20-man strong Kampfgruppe (consisting of stragglers and supply troops) which he had just been placed in command of. During this defensive battle he observed how 2 reinforced enemy bicycle companies (supported by 2 tanks) sought to reach the Erft river along the road Lechenich—Liblar. Leutnant Rafoth thus decided to disengage from his battle at Blessem, and he fought through enemy occupied territory up to the village of Liblar. From here, fighting at the head of his men, he threw back those American attacking spearheads that had already reached the undamaged railway bridges via the Kölner und Brühler roads (located northeast of Liblar). Here he held both bridges for two hours against a much larger attacking force until the remnants of the I./Grenadier-Regiment 48 arrived as reinforcements. This bold and decisive action by Leutnant Rafoth and his small Kampfgruppe prevented the enemy from capturing these two undamaged bridges. This in turn prevented the further advance of the Americans beyond the Division’s incomplete frontline and in the direction of Cologne.”
From 1956 until his retirement aged 59 in 1982 Heinz Rafoth served in the Bundeswehr, latterly as a senior officer in the West German intelligence service BND, where he was involved in the investigation of the notorious Soviet spy Gunther Guillaume.
Heinz Rafoth’s death means that only one holder of the Ritterkreuz is still alive: the Luftwaffe flying ace Hugo Broch, now aged 104.
