Whilst trolling around the net I found this. I got it off wiki but it's on a few others. I'm not saying it didn't happen but does anyone else have details of Manteuffel (pushing 50 at the time) bringing down Soviet troops hand to hand. "But von Manteuffel was faced with an overwhelming attack launched by General Konstantin Rokossovsky's 2nd Belorussian Front during the Battle of Berlin. At one point in the battle, Soviet troops entered his headquarters, and killed four of his staff, wounding an equal number. Before they could kill the others, Manteuffel himself shot one, and brought down the other with his trench knife."
i don't remember that instance in "the last battle" by cornelius ryan. he interviewed HVM personally.
I just checked "The Last Battle". In the dozen or so pages that have references to Von Manteuffel, there is no mention of this hand to hand battle. Personally, I find it hard to believe that a general officer who hadn't seen combat personally in 25 years could take down battle hardened Soviet troops.
i do remember ryan describing him as a diminutive officer who looks more like a thoughtful priest than a veteran tank commander.
The addition of the Knife reference on Wiki appears to have been first done in April 2009. Sadly, it's one of those IP editors with no talk page to view. (cur | prev) 17:58, 7 April 2009 65.24.27.202 (talk) . . (14,207 bytes) (+239) . . (→World War II) (undo) So I'm afraid somewhat unhelpful. A quick Google by date-range does show that there seems to be almost no other web-reference to this knife fight before that edit (other than on live content sites which are based on Wiki, and so don't confirm to Google date-searches in a useful way anyway). Mentions on other sites post-edit would almost all appear to have come from Wiki. I vote cavalier Wiki editing, but that doesn't mean there might not be a grain somewhere. Hmmm. One trace has the following (my bold) added to the Trench Knife reference: Battle of the Seelow Heights I'm not sure if that's a live or static page - it's web-published date is 2006, based on a 1999 magazine article. Might be possible to contact the author, as he's named. ~A
Every thing is possible in wartime,but, I suspect that the author of this story has read to much P.Carrel,S.Hassell,K.May,StLaurent,a.o.
You have to read Ryan's other two books (The Longest Day and A Bridge Too Far). I have come across few WW2 books that match their quality. The entire Ryan "trilogy" is excellent -- its too bad he passed away before he could write more.
