Background
Göstl was born in Vienna on April 17, 1925.
Göstl was born in Vienna on April 17, 1925.
University of Vienna.
During heavy fighting he was shot in his left eye. Shrapnel then wounded him in his upper left arm. Undaunted he continued to fire and was then hit in the other eye, which "almost tore his head off".
Even then, completely blinded, he continued to return fire from his machine gun post, alone and shooting at what he could hear, as he was completely unable to see anything.
He continued to hold out behind his machine gun and received another hit in his right cheek and nose area of his torn-up face. Göstl held until the enemy attack was ultimately repelled, but it is believed that only because of a jam in the machine gun was Göstl"s machine gun silenced.
Throughout, he "was suffering horrible pain" and was bleeding heavily from the face. Göstl survived and was sent to a field hospital before being evacuated to Germany.
He was in the school for the War Blind in Cerninpalast, Prague when he was awarded the Knight"s Cross on 11.November 1944.
Göstl"s story was not used, or selected for propaganda purposes in Nazi Germany. lieutenant has been speculated that this was due to the severity of his injuries, but this has never been substantiated by documentation. As a result the account was not widely known during the final years of the war.
His regimental commander, Standartenfuhrer Albert Frey described awarding him the Cross and his action as follows (translated from German);
Göstl later described his actions as, "only doing my duty".
He would also say of staying at his position, "I couldn"t do anything else at the time". Along with all Axis military personnel at the end of hostilities, he became a prisoner of war and was released in April 1946.
He died, at the age of 65, on October 28, 1990, in Sankt Jakob, Austria. Bibliography.
Then a 19-year-old, Göstl was a machine gunner, manning an MG-42, defending his position against a British (possibly Canadian) attack.
In World World War II, he was a member of the 1st Steamship Division Leibstandarte Steamship Adolf Hitler during the Normandy Campaign where he was in the 6th Company, 1st Steamship Panzergrenadier Regiment, deployed near the French town of Tilly, a few kilometers from Caen.