On 16 April, Hammerstein fell into a coma from which he never recovered. He died in his home on Saturday, 24 April 1943. His family refused an official funeral at Berlin's Invalidenfriedhof Cemetery, because this would have meant that his coffin would have been draped in the "Reichskriegsflagge" with the swastika. He was instead interred at the family grave in Steinhorst, Lower Saxony. Hitler ordered the sending of a wreath with a message of condolence, but the wreath was not on display at the funeral because it had been "forgotten" in a Berlin subway by Hammerstein's family.