Alexander von Kameke (lawyer)

Alexander von Kameke

Leopold Georg Ludwig Wilhelm Alexander von Kameke (born October 3, 1887 in Berlin , † August 11, 1944 in Meseritz-Obrawalde ) was a German lawyer and landowner . As a member of the Confessing Church, he stood up against National Socialism and was killed for it.

Life

family

Alexander came from an old Pomeranian noble family, the von Kameke family . He was the son of the Prussian major Leopold von Kameke (1854–1901) and his first wife Margarete Lucke (1863–1895). Kameke married on March 3, 1935 in Berlin the widowed Margot von Oven (born October 6, 1902 in Liegnitz , Lower Silesia ; † September 8, 1989 in Kleve ), the daughter of Major General Georg von Oven and Helene von Dresler and Scharfenstein. The couple had two sons.

Studies and World War I

Kameke studied law at the Royal University of Greifswald , the University of Lausanne , the Georg-August University of Göttingen and the Silesian Friedrich-Wilhelms-University of Breslau . From the winter semester 1906/07 to the end of the winter semester 1908/09 he was active in the Corps Pomerania Greifswald . He completed his studies with the trainee examination. In 1911 he was at the Georg-August University of Göttingen Dr. iur. PhD. He was a landowner on Varchminshagen in the district of Köslin , Western Pomerania . During the First World War he was seriously wounded several times as a reserve lieutenant and was taken prisoner by the Russians . Under the impact of the war and imprisonment, he is said to have vowed to devote his entire life to God.

Christian at the time of National Socialism

After 1933 he belonged to the Confessing Church . In the church struggle of the Nazi regime, he anticipated great disaster if it were not possible to ban politics from the church. In order to make Hitler aware of this danger, he wrote a memorandum that he wanted to hand over to him at the end of July 1938 when he was inspecting the Groß Born military training area . He was arrested by the Gestapo and, after two months in prison, released with a warning not to do anything like that again.

At a solstice celebration of the Hitler Youth on June 22, 1939, he protested loudly against a speech by the district leader of the NSDAP , who had spoken of the “centuries of misleading the German people by Christianity”. As a result, Kameke was arrested again and sent to the insane asylums in Lauenburg in Pomerania and later in Treptow at Rega to examine his mental state . After he was declared completely normal and healthy by the doctors, he was transferred to the Szczecin prison. In a list of the Confessing Church, which was read out at intercession services and a copy of which was put on file in the Reich Chancellery on October 1, 1939 , Kameke is mentioned in a prominent place and as the only layperson as "in custody". The prison doctor thought he was "not suitable for a concentration camp " because of his severe wound .

After he refused never to speak out against the Nazi state again, his wife was advised to apply for placement in a sanatorium. Although she refused to accept this, Alexander von Kameke was then transferred from one sanatorium to the other; because the doctors found again and again that Kameke was completely healthy. While the Confessing Church held intercession services for other arrested people , this was no longer possible for Kameke after 1939 because he was not officially imprisoned, but sick .

Most recently, he came to the psychiatric department of the state hospital in Meseritz-Obrawalde. His wife was last able to visit him there in June 1944. On this occasion Kameke expressed the fear that he would have to "believe in it" at the next opportunity; because he protested to the doctor that 40–50 prisoners were killed every day. The senior doctor wrote to a friend who had inquired about von Kameke that he was “to be regarded as a sensitive psychopath, but not as a mentally ill person, because he had been accused of having made untrue or grossly distorted allegations, which in the Public could not be tolerated ”.

Alexander von Kameke died on August 11, 1944. His widow was telegraphed that he had died of a heart attack. A cousin was later able to determine that he had been killed "in settlement of pending proceedings".

The Nazi regime also planned the expropriation of the Varchminshagen estate. After an intervention by Mrs. von Kameke's son-in-law, however, this was postponed “until the end of the war”. The deputy district leader of Köslin stated in this connection that "Kameke had indeed rendered harmless, but the overall action against him and his family still had to come to an end".

Alexander von Kameke was an honorary knight of the Pomeranian Cooperative of the Order of St. John .

literature

Wilhelm Michaelis, Karl Friedrich von Kameke: The von Kameke family 1298–1971 , in: Deutsches Familienarchiv 49 (1972), esp. Pp. 52–58
Kyra T. Inachin (Ed.): From self-assertion to resistance: Mecklenburg and Pomeranians against National Socialism 1933 to 1945. State Center for Political Education Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. Kückenshagen: Scheunen-Verlag 2005 ISBN 3-934301-97-5 , p. 204
Genealogical manual of the nobility , noble houses A volume XXVII, page 388, volume 132 of the complete series, C. a. Starke Verlag, Limburg (Lahn) 2003, ISBN 3-7980-0832-9

Individual evidence

↑ Genealogisches Handbuch des Adels, Vol. 34, 1965, p. 153.
↑ Kösener Corp lists 1960, 53/599.
↑ Dissertation: To what extent does omission in the BGB establish an obligation to pay compensation?
↑ Eberhard Röhm, Jörg Thierfelder: Evangelical Church between cross and swastika . Stuttgart: Calwer 1983 ³ ISBN 3-7668-0688-2 , p. 98
^ Gerhard Saß: The church fight in Pomerania 1933-1945. An interim balance. In: Baltic Studies . Volume 69 NF, 1983, ISSN 0067-3099 , p. 69. ( excerpt )
^ Letter from the medical director of the psychiatric department of the state hospitals in Meseritz-Obrawalde dated July 15, 1944
↑ Baltic Studies , Society for Pomeranian History, Archeology and Art (ed.), Verlag T. von der Nahmer, 1960, page 73.
↑ Affidavit of the son-in-law of Mrs. von Kameke Dr. Hermann Ringsdorff of January 29, 1949 in: Wilhelm Michaelis, Karl Friedrich von Kameke: The von Kameke family 1298–1971 , Deutsches Familienarchiv 49 (1972).

personal data
SURNAME	Kameke, Alexander von
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Kameke, Leopold Georg Ludwig Wilhelm Alexander von (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	German lawyer, member of the Confessing Church, victim of National Socialism
DATE OF BIRTH	October 3, 1887
PLACE OF BIRTH	Berlin
DATE OF DEATH	August 11, 1944
Place of death	Meseritz-Obrawalde

[1] Genealogisches Handbuch des Adels, Vol. 34, 1965, p. 153.

[2] Kösener Corp lists 1960, 53/599.

[3] Dissertation: To what extent does omission in the BGB establish an obligation to pay compensation?

[4] Eberhard Röhm, Jörg Thierfelder: Evangelical Church between cross and swastika . Stuttgart: Calwer 1983 ³ ISBN 3-7668-0688-2 , p. 98

[5] Gerhard Saß: The church fight in Pomerania 1933-1945. An interim balance. In: Baltic Studies . Volume 69 NF, 1983, ISSN 0067-3099 , p. 69. ( excerpt )

[6] Letter from the medical director of the psychiatric department of the state hospitals in Meseritz-Obrawalde dated July 15, 1944

[7] Baltic Studies , Society for Pomeranian History, Archeology and Art (ed.), Verlag T. von der Nahmer, 1960, page 73.

[8] Affidavit of the son-in-law of Mrs. von Kameke Dr. Hermann Ringsdorff of January 29, 1949 in: Wilhelm Michaelis, Karl Friedrich von Kameke: The von Kameke family 1298–1971 , Deutsches Familienarchiv 49 (1972).