August Ortloph

August Ortloph (born April 15, 1882 in Cadolzburg , † May 17, 1964 in Korntal ) was commander of the fire protection police in Dresden during World War II and, from 1950, chairman of the Association for the Promotion of German Fire Protection .

Life

Ortloph learned the trade of mechanical engineer . In April 1908 he joined the fire department. In January 1909 he was employed as a fire chief at the Lübeck fire department . In 1910 he moved to the Saxon state capital Dresden , where he initially continued to work as a fire supervisor, later as a fire inspector and city building officer. In 1923 Ortloph became fire director at the Dresden professional fire brigade and head of the local fire department. In the same year he became 2nd chairwoman of the state fire brigade association of Saxony .

During the air raids on Dresden, destroyed and burned-out turntable ladder on the way to use

After the seizure of power of the Nazis Ortloph occurred on March 1, 1933, the NSDAP in. Under Gauleiter Martin Mutschmann , Ortloph acted from 1935 as the state fire brigade leader and chairman of the Saxon Fire Brigade Association. From 1938 to April 1945 he was in command of the Dresden Fire Police . In this position Ortloph was appointed Colonel of the Fire Police on July 1, 1940 . During the air raids on Dresden on February 13 and 14, 1945, Ortloph was responsible for directing the fire-fighting and rescue forces alongside SS Brigadier General and Major General of the Police Johannes Thiele , who was the local air raid chief. Ortloph was arrested by the Gestapo on April 27, 1945, but after the intervention of the then Mayor of Dresden, Hans Nieland, he was released the following day, but was put into immediate retirement. On April 30, 1945 he was called back to the fire service at the request of the Dresden fire brigade management. After the end of the war, the Soviet city commandant appointed him acting head of the Dresden professional fire department. At the end of June 1945, however, Ortloph was released and briefly imprisoned. Freed again, he and his daughter fled to the western sector in 1945.

From 1950 to 1954, Ortloph was chairman, from 1954 honorary chairman, of the Association for the Promotion of German Fire Protection. In 1953 he was the organizer of the first post-war fire protection exhibition Der Rote Hahn in Essen . On June 9, 1954, he was awarded the Federal Cross of Merit, 1st class. On August 1, 1962, he was the first to receive the Heinrich Henne Medal .

literature

• Andreas Schulz, Dieter Zinke: The generals of the Waffen SS and the police. Volume 5. Biblio-Verlag 2013, ISBN 978-3-7648-3209-4 , pp. 602-603, footnote 30.

Web links

• History of the Dresden fire brigade