Heinrich Stammler was born on December 15, 1912 in Jurgan, Germany to Wolfgang and Hildegarde Stammler. He received a classical education at gymnasia in Griefswald and Hanover. Continuing his education in Slavic literatures and languages, he attended the Universities of Griefswold, Munich, and Prague. In 1937, he received a PhD in Slavic on Russian fold poetry at the University of Munich. That same year, he moved to Bulgaria to teach modern forgien languages until 1940, when he worked at the German Embassy in Sofia, Bulgaria. In 1942, he was drafted into the German army.

After the war, Stammler taught at a university in Munich. In 1952 he recieved a grant to travel to different American universities until 1953 when he accepted a position at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, teaching German and Russian. Seven years later, he moved to Lawrence to teach at the University of Kansas.

On January 23, 1960, Heinrich married Ursula Hoffman in Chicago. Two years later, in 1962, he became the first chair of the new department of Slavic Languages at the University of Kansas. He crafted a department famous for offerings in Russian and Slavic intellectual thought for which the department is still well known.

Stammler published works in all three branches of the Slavic language family and translated Slavic poems into German. He published articles from 1939 to 2006. His work is thought to have kept the Russian Renaissance alive as he studied the time period 1890 to 1930 and knew many influential Slavic intellectuals.

Heinrich Stammler passed away on November 29, 2006 in Lawrence, Kansas.