Anton Dey

Peter Anton Dey (born October 21, 1892 in Mühlheim am Main ; † September 17, 1973 there ) was a German politician ( SPD ).

1892 to 1945

Anton Dey's father Jakob Joseph was the managing director of the consumer association , his mother Anna Maria Josephina, née Blümmel, was a housewife. She died at the age of 25, Anton was three years old, his sister Anna two. The children were raised by a stepmother and grandmother Blümmel. Dey's entry into the SPD took place officially in 1911 when he came of age. But even as a 14-year-old apprentice, he was active for social democracy and the trade union. From 1914 to 1918 Dey took part in World War I and returned wounded. After the end of the war, he began to work full-time as secretary of the SPD for the Hesse district in 1920. At the same time he was a managing member of the Hesse workers' welfare organization. In the state elections in the state of Hesse in 1932, Dey called on the people of the city of Mühlheim to vote for the SPD. He attacked the National Socialist faction, which was also up for election, in a leaflet:

“As big as the Nazi faction moved into the state parliament, its political and legislative 'work' has been so pathetic. Nowhere the serious will to help the people. Krakeel, slander and suspicion were the expression of the 'activity' of this faction, which alone belonged to 3 men who had a criminal record for fraud, theft and other offenses. "

This was followed by a search of his private house in May 1933 and his discharge from his public office. In the same year Dey was brought into “police protective custody ” - as the National Socialists called her - “because your [Deys] longstanding Marxist activity in nationally thinking circles created a hostile mood against you to a considerable extent, so that attacks on yours Person to be worried [!]. There is also the risk that you will continue to work for this party despite the SPD's ban on activities. "

Apparently, Dey was not impressed by the Nazis' “protective custody” and took part in the establishment of an illegal party organization that worked with the SPD executive committee in exile in Prague . The aim of the organization was to break the synchronization of the media in the Nazi regime and to inform the population about the plans and strategies of the National Socialists with newspapers made of thin paper. Dey kept the leaves hidden in the stove in his home kitchen and distributed them among his party comrades and confidants on his bike rides. In order to be able to continue to support the family, he opened a rental laundry in Offenbach with the help of his wife and a party friend. In May 1936 Dey was arrested for the second time by the Nazis and in November of the same year he was sentenced to 2½ years in prison for preparation for high treason. These political “cleansing actions” by the National Socialists were so thorough that they hit the grotesque: Anton Deys' confiscated bicycle was “confiscated” by the Gestapo in favor of the State of Hesse because it was “used for purposes hostile to the state”. After his release from prison in May 1938 Anton Dey was still under political and espionage police surveillance. Thus, further work in the political underground was almost impossible.

In 1944, in a bomb attack on Mühlheim, of all things, the Deys' house was destroyed down to the cellar, whereupon the family, with the help of friends and neighbors, immediately set about clearing the rubble and rebuilding it. A year earlier, the Offenbach laundry had been affected in an air raid. As a consequence of Stauffenberg's assassination attempt on Hitler in 1944, the Reichsführer SS Heinrich Himmler ordered a wave of arrests on general suspicion . With this “ grating action ” he ordered “that all former members of the Reich and Landtag, as well as city councilors of the KPD and the SPD in the Reich are to be arrested. It does not matter whether or not something has been proven at the moment. ”So Anton Dey was arrested again in August 1944 and held for two months in the Dachau concentration camp . On the afternoon of March 26, 1945, Mühlheim was liberated by the Americans after an SS raid had shot dead in the police station a group of anti-fascists under the leadership of Willi Busch who were preparing the surrender of the city without a fight.

1945 to 1973

Almost a month later, Anton Dey was appointed acting mayor of the city of Mühlheim by the American site commander. In the first free election after the war, Dey was confirmed as mayor in 1946 and elected for two years. The second legislative term was set for six years and again Dey won the election. Finally, in 1953, he was confirmed for another term, this time for twelve years. He held the office of mayor from 1945 until he retired in 1963, at the age of 70, for a total of almost 18 years. In addition to his work as Mühlheim mayor, in the course of which he had to master the almost superhuman task of supplying the population and rebuilding the political structures of the city, which had been smashed by the National Socialists, Dey also became a member of the district and state parliament as well Founding member and long-time president of the Hessian Community Assembly and the German Community Assembly . As such, Dey was particularly committed to strengthening communities as the basis of a democratic society. To this end, he also tried to establish communication between the communities on a European level, in order to prevent renewed armed conflicts through a European citizenship that is on friendly terms.

Dey was honored several times for his commitment in the following years, for example he received the Great Cross of Merit of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany , the Freiherr vom Stein plaque and the silver plaque of honor of the city of Mühlheim.

literature

• Jochen Lengemann : The Hessen Parliament 1946–1986 . Biographical handbook of the advisory state committee, the state assembly advising the constitution and the Hessian state parliament (1st – 11th electoral period). Ed .: President of the Hessian State Parliament. Insel-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1986, ISBN 3-458-14330-0 , p. 234 ( hessen.de [PDF; 12.4 MB ]).
• Jochen Lengemann: MdL Hessen. 1808-1996. Biographical index (= political and parliamentary history of the state of Hesse. Vol. 14 = publications of the Historical Commission for Hesse. Vol. 48, 7). Elwert, Marburg 1996, ISBN 3-7708-1071-6 , p. 106.
• City of Mühlheim am Main (ed.): A life for the communities. Commemorative lettering for the 100th birthday of former mayor Anton Dey (1892–1973) on October 21, 1992 . Muhlheim 1992.
• Anton Dey , in: Internationales Biographisches Archiv 38/1948 from September 6, 1948, in the Munzinger Archive ( beginning of article freely available)

Web links

• Dey, Peter Anton. Hessian biography. (As of October 21, 2019). In: Landesgeschichtliches Informationssystem Hessen (LAGIS).

Individual evidence

1. ^ City of Mühlheim am Main (ed.): A life for the communities. Commemorative publication for the 100th birthday of former mayor Anton Dey (1892–1973) on October 21, 1992. Mühlheim 1992, p. 17.
2. ↑ ^{a b c} City of Mühlheim am Main (ed.): A life for the communities. Commemorative publication for the 100th birthday of former mayor Anton Dey (1892–1973) on October 21, 1992. Mühlheim 1992, p. 26.