German
What citizenship did Konrad Schumann hold from 1961 to 1990?
Konrad Schumann Hans Konrad Schumann ( often anglicized to Hans Conrad Schumann in English-language sources ; March 28 , 1942 – June 20 , 1998 ) was an East German border guard who escaped to West Germany during the construction of the Berlin Wall in 1961 . Early life . Born in Zschochau ( now part of Ostrau , Saxony ) during World War II , Schumann enlisted in the East German Bereitschaftspolizei ( state police ) following his 18th birthday . After three months training in Dresden , he was posted to a non-commissioned officers college in Potsdam , after which he volunteered for service in Berlin . Escape to West Germany . On 15 August 1961 , the 19-year-old Schumann was sent to the corner of Ruppiner Strasse and Bernauer Strasse to guard the Berlin Wall on its third day of construction . He and his unit arrived at 4:30 AM , where an officer ordered them to take control and protect the border against the enemies of socialism . Schumann later recalled : We stood around looking pretty stupid at first . Nobody had told us how thats done : taking control of a border . At that time and place , the wall was only a single coil of concertina wire . Throughout the day , as Schumann paced ten steps up and down , West Berlin residents shouted catcalls . You pigs ! You traitors ! You concentration camp guards ! One scene particularly upset Schumann . A young lady in east Berlin passed a bouquet of flowers over the top of the wire to an older lady in west Berlin , obviously the younger ladys mother , and wished her a happy birthday . The young lady apologized for not being able to visit , then motioned to Schumann and added , Those [ people ] over there , they wont let me cross anymore . Schumann started to reconsider whether he really wanted to spend the rest of his working life keeping his fellow citizens imprisoned . Around noon , a west Berlin crowd of about 1,000 demonstrators approached the wire at Schumanns post . They shouted various slogans , including Freiheit ( Liberty ) . Schumann recalled : Suddenly the mass of people moved toward us like a living wall . I thought : theyre going to run over us right away . I was nervous and didnt know what to do . I didnt want to shoot and I wasnt supposed to . Before Schumann was forced to act , more soldiers arrived in armored cars and pushed the crowd back with rifles fixed with bayonets . Schumann started to think that he should leave , especially after trucks arrived with concrete posts and steel plates . Over the course of two hours , when no other soldier was watching , he pushed down the same section of wire . West Berlin bystanders started to take notice . One young man came close and Schumann yelled at him Get back at once , then whispered Im going to jump ! The young man alerted the West Berlin police , who showed up with a van . At roughly 4:00 PM , Schumann jumped over the barbed wire while dropping his PPSh-41 submachine gun , and was promptly driven away in the van by West Berlin police . West German photographer Peter Leibing photographed Schumanns escape . The photograph , entitled Leap into Freedom , has since become an iconic image of the Cold War era and featured at the beginning of the 1982 Disney film Night Crossing . The scene , including Schumanns preparations , was also filmed on 16-mm film from the same perspective by camera operator Dieter Hoffmann . Schumann went from West Berlin to West Germany , settling in Bavaria . In 1962 , he met and married Kunigunde Gunda in Günzburg . They had a son the following year . Schumann took up a new job at a winery and eventually at the Audi car assembly factory in Ingolstadt , where he worked for nearly 30 years . Later life and death . After the fall of the Berlin Wall Schumann said , Only since 9 November 1989 [ the date of the fall ] have I felt truly free . Even so , he continued to feel more at home in Bavaria than in his birthplace , citing old frictions with his former colleagues , and was even hesitant to visit his parents and siblings in Saxony . On 20 June 1998 , suffering from depression , he committed suicide , hanging himself in his orchard near the town of Kipfenberg in Upper Bavaria . His body was found by his wife a few hours later . In May 2011 , the photograph of Schumanns leap into freedom was inducted into the UNESCO Memory of the World programme as part of a collection of documents on the fall of the Berlin Wall . Monument . A sculpture called Mauerspringer ( Walljumper ) by Florian and Michael Brauer and Edward Anders can be seen close to the site of the defection , but has since been moved to the side of a building on Brunnenstraße , several meters south of Bernauer Straße . Literature . - Christoph Links : Schumann , Konrad . In : Wer war wer in der DDR ? 5 . Ausgabe . Band 2 , Ch . Links , Berlin 2010 , .