Ulrich Biel (politician, 1907)

Ulrich Eduard Biel (actually Bielschowsky ; born May 17, 1907 in Charlottenburg ; † January 9, 1996 in Berlin ) was a German lawyer and politician ( CDU ). Biel is considered to be the discoverer of Konrad Adenauer for German post-war politics.

Life

Grave site , Königin-Luise-Straße 55, in Berlin-Dahlem

Coming from a Silesian merchant family and the son of a Charlottenburg lawyer, Bielschowsky studied law and political science in Geneva and Berlin and received his doctorate in inheritance law at the University of Bonn in 1934 . After the "takeover" of the NSDAP , Bielschowsky saw himself prevented from pursuing a planned legal career because of his Jewish origins and race laws , so that he emigrated to New York in 1934 .

While emigrating, he married on May 12, 1941 in New York Kadidja Wedekind (1911-1994), daughter of the writer Frank Wedekind , who emigrated in 1937 and worked in theaters in New York, Connecticut and Massachusetts. Here he took American citizenship and the surname "Biel". Biel was used as an advisor to General Patton .

After the end of the Second World War , Biel returned to Berlin as a captain in the US Army and entered the service of the US State Department and was assigned to the Allied city commander for Berlin.

In 1952 he took on his German citizenship again, passed the assessor examination and became a lawyer and notary in Berlin. Since the divorce from Kadidja Wedekind in the same year, he was the long-time partner of Marion Countess Yorck von Wartenburg (1904–2007), widow of the resistance fighter Count Peter Yorck von Wartenburg ; the marriage with Kadidja Wedekind remained childless.

Biel was considered a gray eminence and an avowed anti-communist . Biel persuaded the Social Democrat Gustav Dahrendorf and the Christian Democrat Ernst Lemmer to flee the Soviet zone . The career of Ernst Reuters was also promoted by Biel, against his inner-party opponent, the brief mayor Otto Ostrowski .

His friends included Henry Kissinger and Zbigniew Brzeziński , who came to Dahlem / Zehlendorf for the inauguration of his house in the late 1950s .

In the 1960s, Biel became a member of the CDU in West Berlin . From March 14, 1971 to April 23, 1979 he was a member of the Berlin House of Representatives for the Wedding district ; Among other things, he was age president in the 6th electoral term .

Honors

Ulrich Biel was awarded the Ernst Reuter plaque for his services and in 1987 the Great Cross of Merit with Star of the Federal Republic of Germany. The CDU parliamentary group in the district assembly applied unsuccessfully to name a square or a street after him.

literature

Werner Breunig, Andreas Herbst (ed.): Biographical handbook of the Berlin parliamentarians 1963–1995 and city councilors 1990/1991 (= series of publications of the Berlin State Archives. Volume 19). Landesarchiv Berlin, Berlin 2016, ISBN 978-3-9803303-5-0 , p. 89 f.
Mark Altten : Mister Biel and the West Berlin swamp. Spotless Volume 210, edition ost , Berlin 2008, ISBN 978-3-360-02004-8 .
Gerhard Keiderling: About Germany's unity. Ferdinand Friedensburg and the Cold War in Berlin 1945–1952. Böhlau Verlag, Cologne 2009, ISBN 978-3-412-20323-8 .
Martin Otto: Ulrich Biel (1907-1996) - gray eminence of (West) Berlin politics. A first biographical approach. In: Berlin in the past and present. Yearbook of the Berlin State Archives 2011. Gebr. Mann Verlag, Berlin 2011; ISBN 978-3-7861-2652-2 ; Pp. 285-304.
Martin Otto: “A quiet diplomat.” Ulrich E. Biel in conversation about the Berlin post-war period. Ernst Reuter Hefte Volume 8, be.bra Wissenschaft , Berlin 2017, ISBN 978-3-95410-083-5 .

Web links

Commons : Ulrich Biel (CDU) - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

↑ Martin Otto: Document found: Adenauers Entdecker . Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 113/2007 of May 16, 2007, page 13.
^ Family tree on the website The Bielschowsky Family 1740 - Now , bielschowsky.nl; Retrieved July 24, 2014.
^ Dataset at the German National Library
^ Wedekind from Horst Kr. Neustadt am Rübenberge in Lower Saxony. In: Lower Saxony gender book. Volume 187 (1982), pp. 481-634, here p. 533

personal data
SURNAME	Biel, Ulrich
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Biel, Ulrich Eduard (full name); Bielschowsky (real name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	German lawyer and politician (CDU), MdA
DATE OF BIRTH	May 17, 1907
PLACE OF BIRTH	Charlottenburg
DATE OF DEATH	January 9, 1996
Place of death	Berlin

[1] Martin Otto: Document found: Adenauers Entdecker . Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 113/2007 of May 16, 2007, page 13.

[2] Family tree on the website The Bielschowsky Family 1740 - Now , bielschowsky.nl; Retrieved July 24, 2014.

[3] Dataset at the German National Library

[4] Wedekind from Horst Kr. Neustadt am Rübenberge in Lower Saxony. In: Lower Saxony gender book. Volume 187 (1982), pp. 481-634, here p. 533