Carl Heimbs

Carl Ernst Adolf Heimbs (born June 4, 1878 in Leese ; † March 9, 1972 in Braunschweig ) was a German businessman and politician of the German People's Party (DVP). In the course of the proceedings for the naturalization of Adolf Hitler , Heimbs and his party colleague Heinrich Wessel campaigned for Adolf Hitler to be granted German citizenship through naturalization in the Free State of Braunschweig . So Hitler became a German on February 25, 1932.

Merchant

The Heimbs company on the Rebenring in Braunschweig

After training as a food wholesaler, Heimbs went to Braunschweig, where on December 8, 1920 he became a partner in the coffee roasting company founded by Ferdinand Eichhorn on January 10, 1880 , which he gradually expanded into a well-known company that operates throughout Germany. In 1933 the product name " Heimbs coffee " was introduced, which still exists today. After Eichhorn's death in 1934, the company became the property of the Heimbs family and was managed by Carl Heimbs. Today it is the largest and oldest coffee roastery in Lower Saxony and is owned by the Dallmayr company ( Nestlé Group).

During the heavy bombing raid on October 15, 1944 , the business premises on Steinweg were completely destroyed. In 1950 the company was rebuilt on the Rebenring, where it is still based today.

Politician

During the Weimar Republic , Heimbs was a member of the German People's Party (DVP), which, as part of the bourgeois coalition parties in the Free State of Braunschweig, played a key role in efforts to naturalize Adolf Hitler in 1932. Together with Dietrich Klagges ( NSDAP ), Minister of the Interior of the Free State, as well as Werner Küchenthal ( German National People's Party [DNVP]) and others, everything was tried to get Hitler, after several unsuccessful attempts, the German citizenship necessary for the presidential election in 1932 .

For this purpose, intensive exploratory talks were held between the NSDAP, DVP, DNVP and the Braunschweigische Einheitsliste (BEL) over a longer period of time . Those involved were: Dietrich Klagges, Ernst Zörner (NSDAP member and President of the Braunschweigische Landtag ), Gerhard Marquordt (former Braunschweig Prime Minister), Albert Brandes, Carl Heimbs (as a member of the DVP Board of Directors) and Heinrich Wessel (DVP, Vice President of the Brunswick State Parliament).

Steinweg 22 : The " Café Lück ", where Heimbs, Zörner, Frank and probably Friedrich Alpers met on February 17, 1932.

Although the DVP board was generally positive about naturalization, it still wanted a minimum level of legality to be maintained, which made the undertaking cumbersome and lengthy for the National Socialists. On February 17, 1932 at 10:00 pm in the " Café Lück " in Braunschweig, Heimbs, Zörner, Frank and probably Friedrich Alpers met to discuss Hitler's naturalization. The apparently hesitant behavior of the DVP so annoyed Joseph Goebbels that he noted in his diary on February 23, 1932: "Even here the German National People's Party is causing difficulties in Braunschweig." Then NSDAP lawyer Hans Frank traveled from Berlin to find a solution to achieve in the interests of the party. This consisted of the fact that Hitler should be given a position in the Braunschweig embassy to the Reichsrat in Berlin. What happened with the approval of the DVP.

post war period

Heimbs was active in the Brunswick economic life and in the local business community from an early age. For example, he was a member of the "Union", an association of Braunschweig merchants, which was founded in 1818 and belonged to or chaired Heimbs for almost 30 years and of which he was last honorary president.

Honors

The city of Braunschweig awarded Heimbs the city's golden plaque on June 4, 1958 on his 80th birthday. This honor was followed just a few days later, on June 23, 1958, by the award of the Great Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany by the then Minister-President of Lower Saxony, Heinrich Hellwege . On November 30, 1964, Carl Heimbs finally became an honorary citizen of the city of Braunschweig .

Critical re-evaluation of lifetime achievement

In the context of the debate about an appreciation of the political life work of the Brunswick politician Minna Faßhauer , the SPD parliamentary group in the Brunswick city council made a motion in August 2013, in this context also the lives of other Brunswick politicians from the time of the November Revolution in Brunswick , the Weimar Republic to to subject the city to a critical reassessment towards the time of National Socialism . This proposal was supported by the CDU parliamentary group. The people whose life achievements are to be reevaluated include: Otto Grotewohl (first Prime Minister of the GDR ), Carl Heimbs ( DVP , responsible for the naturalization of Adolf Hitler ), Werner Küchenthal , August Merges ( USPD , first President of the Socialists Republic of Braunschweig ), Josef Oerter ( anarchist , USPD , Prime Minister of Braunschweig, later NSDAP ) and Ernst August Roloff ( DNVP , founder of BEL ).

literature

E. Günter Stammnitz: About good coffee . Heimbs and Son, Braunschweig 1954, OCLC 74884952 .
Luitgard Camerer , Manfred Garzmann , Wolf-Dieter Schuegraf (eds.): Braunschweiger Stadtlexikon . Joh. Heinr. Meyer Verlag, Braunschweig 1992, ISBN 3-926701-14-5 .
Horst-Rüdiger Jarck , Günter Scheel (Ed.): Braunschweigisches Biographisches Lexikon - 19th and 20th centuries . Hahnsche Buchhandlung, Hannover 1996, ISBN 3-7752-5838-8 .
Ursula Schelm-Spangenberg: The German People's Party in Braunschweig. Foundation, development, sociological structure, political work. In: Braunschweiger workpieces. Volume 30, Braunschweig 1964.

Individual evidence

^ Ernst-August Roloff : Bourgeoisie and National Socialism 1930–1933. Braunschweig's way into the Third Reich. Hanover 1961, p. 93.
^ Ernst-August Roloff: Bourgeoisie and National Socialism 1930–1933. Braunschweig's way into the Third Reich. Hanover 1961, p. 96.
↑ About us ( Memento from January 29, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) on heimbs.de
↑ Ulrich Menzel : The stirrup holder. Annotated chronicle about the naturalization of Hitler in Braunschweig. In: No. 114, research reports from the Institute for Social Sciences (ISW), the Technical University of Braunschweig, Braunschweig 2014, ISSN 1614-7898 , pp. 109–110.
↑ ^a ^b Ernst-August Roloff: Bourgeoisie and National Socialism 1930-1933. Braunschweig's way into the Third Reich. Hanover 1961, p. 94.
↑ Ernst-August Roloff: How brown was Braunschweig? Hitler and the Free State of Braunschweig. Braunschweiger Zeitung (Ed.), Braunschweig 2003, p. 25.
↑ Honorary Citizen of the City of Braunschweig on braunschweig.de, accessed on September 14, 2013.
↑ SPD application of August 26, 2013: From Ernst August to August Merges to Heinrich Jasper - The time of the Weimar Republic in Braunschweig from the beginnings to the beginning of fascism (PDF file)

personal data
SURNAME	Heimbs, Carl
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Heimbs, Carl Ernst Adolf
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	German businessman and politician
DATE OF BIRTH	June 4, 1878
PLACE OF BIRTH	Leese
DATE OF DEATH	March 9, 1972
Place of death	Braunschweig

[1] Ernst-August Roloff : Bourgeoisie and National Socialism 1930–1933. Braunschweig's way into the Third Reich. Hanover 1961, p. 93.

[Roloff-96-2] Ernst-August Roloff: Bourgeoisie and National Socialism 1930–1933. Braunschweig's way into the Third Reich. Hanover 1961, p. 96.

[3] About us ( Memento from January 29, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) on heimbs.de

[4] Ulrich Menzel : The stirrup holder. Annotated chronicle about the naturalization of Hitler in Braunschweig. In: No. 114, research reports from the Institute for Social Sciences (ISW), the Technical University of Braunschweig, Braunschweig 2014, ISSN 1614-7898 , pp. 109–110.

[Roloff-94-5] Ernst-August Roloff: Bourgeoisie and National Socialism 1930-1933. Braunschweig's way into the Third Reich. Hanover 1961, p. 94.

[Braun-25-6] Ernst-August Roloff: How brown was Braunschweig? Hitler and the Free State of Braunschweig. Braunschweiger Zeitung (Ed.), Braunschweig 2003, p. 25.

[7] Honorary Citizen of the City of Braunschweig on braunschweig.de, accessed on September 14, 2013.

[8] SPD application of August 26, 2013: From Ernst August to August Merges to Heinrich Jasper - The time of the Weimar Republic in Braunschweig from the beginnings to the beginning of fascism (PDF file)