Tirpitz

“There can be no justification or military grounds for refusing any further to employ what promises to be our most effective weapon,” Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz declared.

Lipke then gave it to his daughter and son-in-law, von Tirpitz — von Hassell’s great-grandfather and one of the best-known figures in German military history.

The emperor credited von Tirpitz with persuading the Reichstag to expand the country’s fleet to rival Britain’s.

Von Tirpitz was appointed state secretary of the Imperial Naval Office in 1897 under Emperor Wilhelm II, the last kaiser of Germany and the final member of the House of Hohenzollern to be king of Prussia.

The desk remained in Bavaria with Ulrich von Hassell’s wife, Ilse, who was von Tirpitz’s daughter, and remained in her possession when she testified during the Nuremberg Trials about the execution of her husband.