Änne Saefkow

Memorial plaque for Anton and Änne Safkow

Änne Saefkow , nee Anna Thiebes (* 12. October 1902 in Dusseldorf , † 4. August 1962 in Berlin ) was a German communist resistance fighter against the Nazis , prisoner in the concentration camp , mayor of Berlin-Prenzlauer Berg , People's Chamber deputies and VVN - activist .

Life

Änne Thiebes, daughter of a carpenter, attended elementary and commercial school in Düsseldorf and learned the trade of stenographer. She then worked as an office messenger, typist, secretary and technical correspondent. In 1919 she became a member of the Free Socialist Youth and in 1920 of the Communist Youth Association of Germany (KJVD), where she held management positions in the local, subdistrict and district associations in Düsseldorf and in the Niederrhein district . In 1921 she became a member of the Free Trade Unions and in 1922 of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) and was active against the emergence of National Socialism . From 1926 she worked as an employee in the Central Committee of the KPD and in the RGO Reich Committee. From 1928 to 1929 she was the mandate of the KPD district councilor in the district council assembly of Berlin-Prenzlauer Berg.

After the transfer of power to the NSDAP , she was still active in the resistance against National Socialism . She worked for Theodor Neubauer in the illegal apparatus of the Central Committee . After his arrest in August 1933, she worked as a typist and correspondent for various companies. In 1941 Anton Saefkow included her in the resistance work of his resistance organization . On July 5, 1944 a day after her husband, she was ver liable and taken to the concentration camp. During the evacuation march from the Ravensbrück concentration camp, she was liberated by the Red Army on May 1, 1945 .

When the Nazi rule was eliminated, she worked in various municipal and regional functions. She joined the FDGB and KB in 1945 and initially worked as a district councilor for social affairs in Berlin-Pankow until 1946. From 1946 to October 1949 she was a city district councilor in Pankow. She became a member of the SED in 1946.

When the district mayor of Pankow was elected on December 6, 1946, the SPD and LDP objected to Änne Saefkow's candidacy. After Erich Ryneck (SPD) had been unanimously elected district mayor, Änne Saefkow was unanimously elected as deputy mayor after an intergroup debate. Before that she was a candidate of the SED for the office of councilor for social affairs in the magistrate of Berlin , which the SPD faction awarded to the CDU politician Margarete Ehlert . In 1947 she joined the DFD and in 1948 the DSF . After a short course in 1949/50 at the "Walter Ulbricht" administrative academy, she was deputy chairwoman of the Commission for State Control of East Berlin from 1950 to 1952. As the successor to Walter Bartel , she was chairwoman of the regional association of Greater Berlin from March 1950 until the VVN was dissolved in February 1953. From February 1953, she expressed her experiences of resistance and persecution in the politics of memory work of the Committee of the anti-fascist resistance fighters of the GDR one. From February 23, 1953 to March 5, 1956, she acted as mayor of Berlin-Prenzlauer Berg and was also a city district councilor.

In October 1950, she was on the list of 66 in the People's Chamber sent Berlin representative with the mandate of VVN in the People's Chamber . From 1954 until her death in 1962, she continued to sit in the People's Chamber as a Berlin representative with the SED mandate . From 1954 to 1958 she was a member of the People's Chamber's Grace Committee.

Änne Saefkow had a daughter in his first marriage in 1928. Since 1941 she was married to Anton Saefkow for the second time. Their daughter Bärbel Schindler-Saefkow (* 1943) is a historian and chairwoman of the German Peace Council. V.

Awards and honors

• 1954 medal for excellent performance
• 1954 Clara Zetkin Medal
• May 6, 1955 Patriotic Order of Merit in silver
• 1958 medal for fighters against fascism 1933 to 1945
• A memorial plaque was placed on her home at Trelleborger Strasse 26 in Berlin-Pankow.

literature

• Handbook of the People's Chamber of the German Democratic Republic, 3rd electoral period, Kongress-Verlag, Berlin 1959, p. 459.
• Elke Reuter, Detlef Hansel: The short life of the VVN from 1947 to 1953: The history of those persecuted by the Nazi regime in the Soviet Zone and GDR. Berlin 1997, ISBN 3-929161-97-4 , p. 579

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Election of the district offices in Pankow and Charlottenburg . In: Neues Deutschland , December 7, 1946, p. 1.
2. ↑ Aenne Saefkow adopted . In: Neue Zeit , March 7, 1956, p. 8.
3. ↑ Berlin representatives for the popular election . In: Neues Deutschland, October 4, 1950, p. 6.
4. ↑ ... certainly not alone . In: Berliner Zeitung , August 26, 1956, p. 6.
5. ↑ http://www.luise-berlin.de/ehrung/s/saefkow_anne.htm Retrieved July 21, 2011