Mayor of captured Leipzig commits suicide.

Mayor of captured Leipzig commits suicide. The Nazi burgomeister of Leipzig, Germany, Alfred Freyburg, sprawls dead across his desk. He commited suicide as troops of the First U.S. Army entered the city April 1945, after wiping out the last resistance of the Volkssturm (people's army). many residents of Leipzig asked Nazi authorities to declare it an open city and evacuate it without fighting. These plans were rejected and, as a result, approximately 300,000 of the population of 750,000 are homeless and 5,000 are reported dead. Freyburg, his wife and their daughter all took poison after the 52-year-old Mayor proclaimed: 'Germany is beaten - it is all over.'