Helmut Heinrich Waldemar Schmidt (* December 23rd, 1918 in Hamburg) is a sergeant of the Reserve in the Wehrmacht. Before the war, he originally had planned to study Architecture and urban development.
As a 17-year-old, he was evicted from the (Marine-)Hitler Youth - which he had had to join two years before, with his whole students rowing club - because of his "loose mouth" in 1936. On November 4th in 1937, he was drafted. Since 1939, he is serving with the anti-air defense of Bremen.
His father Gustav is the out-of-wedlock Son of the Jewish private banker Ludwig Gumpel, which they can keep a secret fortunately. Officially, they are both nothing but evangelic-Lutheran.
Hannelore "Loki" Glaser (* 3 March 1919) is his childhood sweetheart.