Susan Hibbert, witness to German surrender, dies

[David]

AP


LONDON – Susan Hibbert, who typed the English version of the German surrender document and then messaged London when World War II ended in Europe in 1945, has died at age 84.

Hibbert died Feb. 2, her family said.

As a staff sergeant in the Auxiliary Territorial Service, Hibbert — then Susan Heald — was assigned to type the English version of the surrender document, and retyped it several times as it was amended.

She was present on May 7, 1945, when Gen. Alfred Jodl formally surrendered, and she was given the task of sending a cable to London confirming that the mission had been accomplished, The Daily Telegraph said in an obituary published Wednesday.

Preparing the documents at Gen. Dwight Eisenhower's headquarters in the French city of Reims was an ordeal, she recalled.

"For five days we were typing documents," she said in an interview with the British Broadcasting Corp. in May 2005.

"We started early in the morning and finished late at night. I typed the English documents, three other secretaries typed the French, Russian and German versions."

"There were constant changes and amendments. I often had to start again from the beginning," she said.

She and other secretaries were invited to watch the ceremony.

"We were very, very tired. We had been waiting for ages. The actual signing was carried out quietly and solemnly. There was no celebrating," she recalled.

Afterward, "we had some champagne but we didn't have any glasses so we had to drink it out of army mess tins. We passed the tins around and had a few sips."

She was then given the assignment of typing a message informing the War Office in London that the war was over: "The mission of this Allied Force was fulfilled at 0241, local time, May 7th, 1945."

"When the surrender was over, we just disappeared," she said. "I went to bed and didn't get up for two days. I was so exhausted."

A funeral service is planned in Abbotts Ann, Hampshire, on Feb. 28. Hibbert's husband Basil died in 2001. They had no children.