with the clergy. Local German communists called for an end to the resistance of the city in flyers. In a pamphlet titled the "Freiheits-Kämpfer" (English: Freedom fighters) it called for an end to the fighting and told the local population "not to be afraid of the Red Army who came as liberators". Seventeen of the members of the resistance group were executed on Gauleiter Hanke's orders. Surrender Hanke flew out to Prague on 5 May in a small Fieseler Storch plane kept in reserve for General Niehoff. On 6 May, after 82 days of siege and shortly before the unconditional surrender of Germany in World War II, General Niehoff surrendered Festung Breslau to the Soviets. During the siege, German forces lost 6,000 dead and 23,000 wounded defending Breslau, while Soviet losses were possibly as high as 60,000. Civilian deaths amounted to as many as 80,000. Breslau was the last major city in Germany to surrender, capitulating only two days before the end of the war in Europe. Gauleiter Hanke had fled to Prague by the time of the city's surrender. Hanke attached himself to the 18th SS-Freiwilligen-Panzer-Grenadier-Division "Horst Wessel" in the uniform of an SS private, to conceal his identity in the event of capture. The group surrendered to Czech partisans on 6 May and were marching when a train passed their route. Hanke and several other POWs ran to the train and clung on to it. The Czechs opened fire, with Hanke falling first while two other POWs slumped on the track. They were then beaten to death with rifle butts. Aftermath Breslau was transferred to Poland in the aftermath of the war and renamed Wrocław. Most of the German inhabitants in Wrocław fled or were forcibly expelled between 1945 and 1949 and moved to Allied Occupation Zones in Germany. A small German minority still remains in the city. The post-war Polish mayor of Wrocław, Bolesław Drobner, arrived in the city four days after the surrender, on 10 May, finding the city in ruins. See also Courland Pocket German World War II strongholds Prague Offensive Second Army (Poland) SS Fortress Regiment 1 Citations References 1945 in Germany Battles and operations of the Soviet–German War Siege of Breslau Sieges involving Germany Sieges involving the Soviet Union Conflicts in 1945 Battles and operations of World War II involving Germany Sieges of World War II Urban warfare February 1945 events in Europe