Elard von Oldenburg-Januschau

Elard von Oldenburg-Januschau

Elard Kurt Maria Fürchtegott von Oldenburg-Januschau (born March 20, 1855 in Beisleiden , Preußisch Eylau district , † August 16, 1937 in Marienwerder ) was a German agricultural major, lobbyist and member of the Reichstag. In historical research he is considered to be one of the most influential members of the so-called camarilla around the Reich President Paul von Hindenburg , i.e. the group that decisively determined the politics of the German Reich in the late phase of the Weimar Republic, and in this context as a key figure in the context with the developments that ultimately led to Hitler's appointment as Reich Chancellor .

youth

Elard von Oldenburg, initially called Elard von Oldenburg-Beisleiden, then Elard von Oldenburg-Januschau, with the addition of the ownership name, was born as the son of an East Elbian manor owner family that had lived in East Prussia since the 18th century . The von Oldenburg family came from the ancient aristocracy of Bremen and was first mentioned in a document in 1247. The great-grandfather entered the service of Frederick the Great as a young man and finally rose to become his wing adjutant. After the Seven Years' War he said goodbye and married the noblewoman Dorothea von der Trenck.

After the marriage, the ancestor emigrated to East Prussia and acquired the Beisleiden estate there in 1801. Oldenburg-Januschau's father Botho von Oldenburg (1814–1888) took over the management of the estate in 1843. In his first marriage, the father was married to Freiin Brunsig von Brun (1818–1845), with whom he had three daughters and a son who died early. From his second marriage to Maria von Arnim (1829–1868) came his son Elard. He was the fourth son from this connection. The two oldest sons died as children, while Elard and his older brother grew up in their parents' house. In 1862, Elard's father bought the run-down Januschau estate east of Rosenberg , including the late classicist manor house from the 18th century, so that he could leave his youngest son an agricultural property. The village Januszewo or Januschau was mentioned for the first time in 1312 and received the hand-fest in 1362 . After the death of his second wife, his father married Countess Malwine Klara Marie von Eulenburg (1847–1917) in 1869.

The young Oldenburg-Januschau attended school in Königsberg , Wernigerode , Brandenburg and Halle . Then he became a soldier and attended the knight academy in Dom Brandenburg . After passing the ensign examination , he joined the traditional 2nd Guard Uhlan Regiment in Berlin, where he was promoted to lieutenant in 1875 . During the eight years of his active military service in Potsdam, Januschau got to know Kaiser Wilhelm I , Otto von Bismarck , Helmuth von Moltke and the Minister of War Albrecht von Roon personally. Although he was very fond of the soldier's life, he took his leave in 1883, at that time with the rank of second lieutenant, after the early death of his older brother Boto (1852-1882) in order to be able to devote himself to the administration and management of the family estate. After the death of his father in 1885 he also took over the Beisleiden estate.

In 1884 Elard von Oldenburg-Januschau married Agnes Countess von Kanitz. The marriage, which lasted until his death, gave birth to three daughters, who in turn gave birth to eighteen grandchildren. Through his marriage he established family ties with one of the most politically influential families in the empire. His brother-in-law, District Administrator Hans Graf von Kanitz - one of the most important parliamentarians of his time - introduced Januschau into politics and promoted his acceptance into the circle of conservative members of the Reichstag . Elard's brother-in-law was General Heinrich Graf von Lehndorff-Steinort , Adjutant General Wilhelm I.

Political activity in the empire

Oldenburg-Januschau was one of the leaders of the German Conservatives . The politician (called "Januschauer" by his peers) was considered the prototype of the originally conservative, militaristic, anti-democratic and anti-parliamentary East Elbe Junker both in the German Empire and in the Weimar Republic .

As one of the leading farmers in West Prussia, v. Oldenburg-Januschau has been the provincial association of the “ Federation of Farmers ” and the West Prussian Chamber of Agriculture for over two decades . His career took him through the district council, the provincial parliament and the provincial committee to the Prussian House of Representatives (1901 to 1910) and finally to the Reichstag , which he attended from 1902 to 1912 (for the Conservative Party and the Reichstag constituency of Danzig 1 administrative district ) and 1930 to 1932 ( elected for the DNVP in what is now constituency 1 East Prussia ) as a member. He was notorious among his fellow parliamentarians and the general public for his radical anti-parliamentary and anti-democratic views. In the committees he stood up with his unconventional, coarse and humorous manner in particular for the interests of agriculture, the military and the House of Hohenzollern. In particular, he stood out because of the pithy choice of words with which he expressed these views. His favorite enemy in parliament was August Bebel , the party leader of the Social Democrats, with whom he and others. a. a violent verbal argument about sense or nonsense and the necessity or dehumanization of the goose step of the Prussian soldiers delivered. During the Daily Telegraph affair , he was the only MP to protect himself from the emperor and dubbed the Social Democrats who disrupted his speech a "gang of pigs". In further sensational speeches inside and outside parliament, Januschau said, among other things, that he would like to "burn in a constitution" for the Germans, that they would "lose sight of their hearing".

On January 29, 1910, during the Reichstag debate on the military budget, he caused a great stir throughout the Reich when he declared in his speech in the plenary session of the Reichstag: “The King of Prussia and the German Kaiser must be able to say to a lieutenant at any moment: Take ten men and close the Reichstag! ” With this provocative call for direct breach of the constitution, he aroused lively encouragement from his conservative parliamentary group colleagues, while the other parliamentarians - especially the Social Democrats - aroused vigorous protest. The speech caused tumultuous scenes in parliament, so that Oldenburg-Januschau felt compelled not to appear in the Reichstag for days and to hide from the indignant public for a while in the officers' mess of a barracks (the "people's anger" against Januschau went so far that a man who was mistaken for him was attacked by an angry crowd in front of the portal of the Reichstag). In some cities there were even public protest gatherings against Januschau. On November 27, 1910, he resigned his mandate in the Prussian Chamber of Deputies in Berlin.

In addition to his work as a member of the Reichstag, Januschau also served as President of the West Prussian Chamber of Agriculture. The acquaintance with the then retired General von Hindenburg arose due to the mutual membership of the "gentlemen's club" of East Elbe landowners. The two had been on friendly terms with each other even before the First World War .

Member of the "Kamarilla"

After the First World War , in which Januschau, despite his advanced age, became the commander of an infantry regiment - a position he held until 1917 - his influence in politics and agriculture remained unbroken.

In the 1920s Januschau again played a prominent role on the public stage. In his memoirs Januschau frankly admits that he was involved in coup plans in 1919/1920. At the beginning of 1920 he tried to prevent his friend Wolfgang Kapp , who in March 1920 was attempting a coup in Berlin together with General von Lüttwitz in Berlin , from choosing the capital as the starting point for an attempted coup, when he inaugurated him in conversation about his plans. Instead, he urged him to choose East Prussia as a much more promising base and to carry out the planned blow from there.

After his personal friend and comrade Paul von Hindenburg had been elected to the highest office of state in the presidential election in 1925 , Januschau began to exert influence on German politics again from the background as part of his close relationship with the head of state. Today in research he is included in the influential circle of "shadow men" around Hindenburg - usually referred to in the literature as " camarilla " - who significantly influenced and sometimes even steered the political decisions of the Reich President.

In his "Memories", which were widely publicized, Januschau admits that his "attempts to exert influence" on the Reich President were aimed at "eliminating parliamentarism and establishing a dictatorship". As a result, he advocated vigorously the system of presidential and Papen " blow to Prussia " (constitutionally questionable dismissal of the caretaker government of Prussia) of 20 July 1,932th

Entanglement in the Eastern aid scandal

Twenty kilometers from Januschau was the old Hindenburg family estate, Neudeck , which had belonged to the Field Marshal's brother and Reich President. It had become unsustainable during the economic crisis of the 1920s, had to be given up by the family and as a result was owned by a bank. In the late 1920s - after Paul von Hindenburg had been elected President of the Reich in 1925 - Oldenburg-Januschau tried to buy back the Hindenburg property in order to be able to give it back to friends and confidants. To this end, he first turned to representatives of large-scale agriculture, then also to those from heavy industry, who ultimately donated the funds for a buyback of the property and even for a new construction of the manor house and the renovation of the associated buildings. The estate was given to Hindenburg in 1927 on the occasion of his 80th birthday. The deed of donation was presented to him at Gut Januschau. However, the deed was issued to his son Oskar von Hindenburg in order to avoid inheritance tax . This tax trick was perfectly legal, but since it was carried out with the knowledge and approval and for the profit of the Reich President - that is, the head and highest representative of the state, who was naturally supposed to fulfill a role model function - and his family, it was morally disreputable. When, as part of the global economic crisis, many of the large estates in the East Elbe were threatened, Hindenburg came to the aid of his peers by providing them with generous government grants for the rehabilitation of their estates. In this context, however, irregularities occurred (excessive payments to individual Junker families, subsidies for relatives of the Reich President, inappropriate use of state funds for purely private purposes, etc.), which began to come into the focus of the press and the public in 1932. The result was the so-called Osthilf scandal, to which the matter began to expand in the autumn of 1932 due to ever more extensive revelations by the press. Today it is assumed that the National Socialist German Workers' Party or the party-internal secret service deliberately reported various incriminating facts that it had become aware of to the press, all the more so through ever new threatening revelations in the public, the pressure on the - an appointment of Hitler as Reich Chancellor at that time categorically rejecting Hindenburg by first placing his personal friends and peers in the crosshairs of public criticism and anger, but at the same time giving the people around the Reich President to understand that a government would prevent Hitler from raising new allegations and preventing the existing attacks would prevent. The situation became particularly unpleasant for the family when the first clues came to light in the press regarding the dubious practices that had been used when the Neudeck estate was donated to the Reich President (in particular the dubious avoidance of inheritance tax). Joseph Ersing ( center ) and Kurt Heinig ( SPD ), the rapporteurs of the parliamentary committee of inquiry, brought forth that the Hindenburg friend had received an inadmissible debt relief loan of 621,000 Reichsmarks . The Ministerialdirektor Ernst Reichard from the Reichskommissariat für die Osthilfe had to confirm the Oldenburg-Januschau case to the committee on January 20. The National Rural League was consequently representations to the Reich President demanding that Chancellor von Schleicher dismissed.

Hindenburg visited Oldenburg-Januschau in the last week of January 1933 at Gut Neudeck. According to the then State Secretary of the Reich President Otto Meissner at the Nuremberg war crimes trials , the discussion that followed contributed a great deal to Hindenburg's decision to appoint Hitler as Reich Chancellor.

Later advocates of the thesis that Oldenburg-Januschau was largely responsible for the destruction of the Weimar Republic and its inheritance by the National Socialists were, among others, the former deputy mayor of Berlin Ferdinand Friedensburg , who worked as an administrative officer with Oldenburg-Januschau in the early 1920s had to do, the publicist Bernt Engelmann ("United against law and freedom") and historians such as Ian Kershaw or Hans Mommsen .

Last years and aftermath

After the so-called “ Night of the Long Knives ” on June 30, 1934, Januschau intervened near Hindenburg in favor of the former Stahlhelmführer Theodor Duesterberg , who had been imprisoned by the Nazis, and was thus able to obtain his release. (Hindenburg, who had not heard of this measure, was very angry about it.) Oldenburg-Januschau's last public appearance was his participation in the funeral of his friend Paul von Beneckendorff and von Hindenburg in 1934 in the Tannenberg memorial , to which he was wearing the uniform of Guard Uhlans appeared. It was at this time that he wrote down his memoirs. Oldenburg-Januschau died in the summer of 1937 at the age of 82. Three years later, in August 1940, his wife followed him.

After his grandfather's death, his grandson Heinfried Graf von Lehndorff (1910–1987) took over the Januschau estate and managed it until 1945 . The estate was last 2,826 hectares. In 1945 the Januschau manor house became the seat of the Soviet command for the region. After the withdrawal of the Red Army and massive looting, the manor house fell into disrepair over the years, until only a ruin was left. Since 2001 the estate has been owned by the Polish Zdun family, who are pursuing the plan to convert the remains of the manor house into a hotel.

Evaluation by contemporaries and posterity

Elard von Oldenburg-Januschau was an extremely controversial figure throughout his public service. For decades he was seen by the political left as the prototype of the East Elbe Junker and a model example of a narrow-minded reactionary. On the right-wing side, Oldenburg-Januschau was extremely popular.

The shoddy sayings with which "the old Januschauer" commented on the political events were notorious. Social democrats and liberals, but also some moderate conservatives, saw humorous remarks such as that he, Januschau, was more interested in "how many piglets a sow in [Gut] Januschau gets than the most witty speech of the MP Richter", as an expression of a rough and uncouth mindset. Others, like the conservative Chancellor Franz von Papen, dismiss such accusations as inaccurate. Papen later defended Oldenburg-Januschau in his memoirs by declaring: “Oldenburg-Januschau was essentially a good-hearted person despite its often outwardly hurtful nature. His workers adored him because he looked after them like a father and took part in all their needs. ” The National Socialist Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels confided in his diary in the late phase of the Weimar Republic that he was a“ guy with real shot and grain in Oldenburg-Januschau ”That“ we [National Socialists] could always use ”. While the rest of the DNVP is “lime”, according to Goebbels, Oldenburg-Januschau is “also reactionary, but tolerable” and is the only one in the DNVP “a guy and a man”. In particular, Goebbels saw the influence of Oldenburg-Januschau on Hindenburg as a political factor that should not be left unused. On January 28, 1933, during the decisive phase of the power struggle that ended with Hitler's appointment as Reich Chancellor, Goebbels wrote: “Hitler has to act , but how? The old man [Hindenburg] doesn't want to. So drill. I have to work on the Januschauer. "

Von Papen later insisted in his memoirs that Hindenburg's resentment towards Brüning in the summer of 1932, which led to the dismissal of the Chancellor, was not due to the whispering of Oldenburg-Januschau, but that it originated in a personal resentment of the Reich President. "He is to be acquitted of the suspicion of having shot Brüning's position ready to collapse in 1932."

Fonts

• Memories , Koehler & Amelang, Leipzig 1936.

literature

• Helmut Neubach:  Oldenburg-Januschau, Elard von. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 19, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1999, ISBN 3-428-00200-8 , p. 513 f. ( Digitized version ).
• Detlef Gotter: Oldenburg-Januschau, a representative of the Prussian Junkers . s. l. 1978, (Halle-Wittenberg, Univ., Diss., 1978).
• Fabian von Schlabrendorff : Encounters in five decades . Wunderlich, Tübingen 1979, ISBN 3-8052-0323-3 , p. 51 f .

Web links

• Elard von Oldenburg-Januschau in the database of members of the Reichstag
• Newspaper article about Elard von Oldenburg-Januschau in the press kit of the 20th century of the ZBW - Leibniz Information Center for Economics .

Remarks

1. ↑ It is about the Prussian major a. D. Georg Christoph von Oldenburg (October 27, 1724 - September 5, 1783) who married Wilhelmine Sophie Dorothea von der Trenck (December 29, 1739 - December 5, 1798). The major was the master of Beydirds, Strawischken, Smitten, Sudau and Mischen. See: Gothaisches genealogical pocket book of noble houses, 1905, sixth year, p.586
2. ↑ Quoted from: Stenographic Reports of the Reichstag, XII. Legislative period , 2nd session, vol. 259, p. 898.
3. ^ Elard von Oldenburg-Januschau: Memories . Koehler & Amelang, Leipzig 1936, p. 218.
4. ^ Ferdinand Friedensburg: Entry into service in East Prussia: A contribution to the history of the Weimar Republic , in: Month 1968 20 (242): 31-36.
5. ↑ Franz von Papen: Vom Scheitern einer Demokratie , 1968, p. 162. In addition, Oldenburg-Januschau is an "original", an amusing narrator but also a fearless advocate of his opinion and this at all times: against the Kaiser, against the Landtag and Reichstag and towards the National Socialists! He never took a leaf to his mouth but said once upon an attack: "Well, I know, I am always the oak tree that every sow pushes on!"
6. ↑ Elke Fröhlich (Ed.): The Diaries of Joseph Goebbels , Part 1, Vol. 2 / I, Munich 2005, p. 127. At the same point, Goebbels notes that he has vigorously opposed Oldenburg-Januschau's intention to resign from his seat in the Reichstag.
7. ↑ Fröhlich: Diaries , p. 162.
8. ↑ The fact that Oldenburg-Januschau visited Hindenburg more often in favor of the National Socialists emerges from a number of other diary entries, for example on January 13, 1931 (p. 123): “I kneel old OJ. He's still going to Hindenburg. Should plead for us. He likes me very much. Hugged me when he saw me. ”On October 15, 1931 (p. 125):“ I'm working on the old Januschauer. He's going to Hindenburg tomorrow. ”Then (p. 157)“ Old Januschau writes me worried letters. Answered in detail and very loyally. The old man deserves it. "On December 3, 1931 (p. 162):" The old Januschau writes me a very nice letter. "
9. ↑ Franz von Papen: From the failure of a democracy , 1968, p. 162.