Dachau uprising
The Dachau uprising took place on the morning of April 28, 1945 in Dachau . It was led by the former prisoners of the Dachau concentration camp Georg Scherer and Walter Neff .
prehistory
At the end of the Second World War , an armed resistance group had formed in Dachau in the last days of April . The aim was to end the Nazi regime in the city, to prevent a senseless defensive battle with the Allies and, if possible, to prevent the final liquidation or evacuation of the Dachau concentration camp. The group led by Neff and Scherer consisted of concentration camp prisoners who had escaped shortly before, Dachau citizens and members of the Volkssturm .
course
The Freedom Action Bavaria had gained control of two radio stations in Munich on 28 April 1945th She sent appeals to the people to resist the National Socialists and to behave without a fight against the Allies . Influenced by this appeal, about 25 people stormed the Dachau town hall and disarmed the members of the Gestapo who were present , killing an NSDAP functionary. Ultimately, units of the Waffen SS moved into Dachau and opened fire with heavy weapons. At eleven o'clock the uprising was suppressed.
The insurgents withdrew, whereby six resistance fighters were no longer able to escape. Two insurgents were shot in the action and four, including a Dachau citizen and two members of the Volkssturm, were executed. As a deterrent, the bodies of the killed resistance fighters lay in front of the town hall until 5 p.m. The SS now partially withdrew from the city of Dachau and the concentration camp . The camp was liberated the next day .
aftermath
On November 5, 1946, the Dachau city council renamed six small streets in Dachau-Süd after the deceased resistance members:
- Anton-Hackl -Strasse (formerly Immelmann-Strasse),
- Anton-Hechtl-Strasse (formerly Scharnhorststrasse),
- Erich-Hubmann -Strasse (formerly Bölcke-Strasse),
- Friedrich-Dürr- Strasse (formerly Richthofenstrasse),
- Johann-Pflügler -Strasse (formerly Admiral-Scheer-Strasse),
- Lorenz-Scherer- Strasse (formerly Karlsfelder Strasse).
Also in November 1946, the square on Stadtlinde (in today's Konrad-Adenauer-Straße) became a place of resistance , but the new name was forgotten in the following years, until an editor of the Süddeutsche became aware of its disappearance in 1980.
Since September 14, 1947, a memorial plaque on today's Sparkasse in the old town has been commemorating the murdered.
In the Dachau forest cemetery, a tombstone bears the names of the six resistance fighters and that of another, uninvolved citizen who happened to pass the place of the uprising at the time and who was then also shot by the SS.
In the summer of 2015, an exhibition on the uprising took place on the Dachau town hall square.
literature
- Stanislav Zámečník : That was Dachau (= Fischer 17228 The time of National Socialism ). Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2007, ISBN 978-3-596-17228-3 .
- Comité International de Dachau , Barbara Distel , Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial (ed.): Dachau Concentration Camp. 1933 to 1945. Text and picture documents for the exhibition. Lipp, Munich 2005, ISBN 3-87490-750-3 .