Greater German Youth Association

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Großdeutsche Jugendbund was a youth organization in the environment of the Bündische Jugend during the Weimar Republic . The association was founded in 1919 as the German National Youth Association (DNJ), organized in an authoritarian manner and politically right-conservative and monarchist . Only slowly did the federal government develop into a self-education association in the federal style. After a “young German” wing had split off as the Young National Association (JuNaBu) in 1921 , the DNJ was renamed the Greater German Youth Association (GJB) in 1924 . In 1930 the GJB briefly merged with the German Freischar to form the new German Freischar . After the old German Freischar broke away from the association after a few months due to political differences, the GJB and the Jungnationale Bund - Bund deutscher Jugend (FjN) were re- constituted as a Freischar Junge Nation (FjN). In March 1933, this association finally merged with the German Scout Association and the German Freischar to form the Greater German Confederation . On June 17, 1933, this new large association was dissolved and incorporated into the Hitler Youth .

Foundation of the German National Youth Association

The origins of the Greater German Youth Association (GJB) lie in the last months of the First World War . On October 14, 1918, students from the Königin-Auguste-Gymnasium in Berlin founded a German National Freikorps under the leadership of Lieutenant Kurt Viebig , who went blind during the war , in order to place young people who were not yet conscripted into military positions. The November Revolution, however , anticipated the implementation of these plans. From the existing approaches, with the support of numerous dignitaries, the German National Youth Association (DNJ) emerged as a “collecting basin for national youth”.

The DNJ was founded on January 4, 1919 at a meeting in the Bechsteinsaal in Berlin, chaired by General a. D. Max von Seydewitz (1857–1921) founded. The organization of the DNJ quickly spread across the entire Reich and by the end of 1919 already had 50,000 members. From the beginning, the federal government was firmly rooted in the political spectrum of the monarchist opponents of the republic. At the consecration of the flag on January 18, 1920 at the Berlin University of Music , cathedral preacher Bruno Doehring gave the dedication speech, while Erich Ludendorff hammered the first nail into the flag. The members were obliged to take part in marches to greet the returning troops and to take part in protest meetings against the Treaty of Versailles . Up to 3,000 boys and girls were mobilized in Berlin. However, binding to the DNVP was strictly rejected.

The federation was deliberately not organized on the model of the federations of the youth movement . It should not serve education, but exclusively physical training, mental motivation and mobilization. Spontaneity was considered a lack of discipline. There were also no connections to the pre-war youth movement or to the war migrant bird . At the beginning of the 1920s, the federal government had 35,000 members who, according to the statutes, could not be older than 20 years. In contrast to other leagues, the leadership of the Confederation was not appointed in self-determination, but was provided by civil dignitaries and former officers.

The Young National Federation split off in 1921

At the Bundestag in Nuremberg on August 8, 1921, a national revolutionary wing of the DNJ split off, which saw itself as "Young German" rather than "Old Prussian". Initially under the leadership of Admiral Reinhard Scheer , and soon afterwards Heinz Dähnhardt and Hans Ebeling , the Jungnationale Bund (JuNaBu) with 7,000 members aged 12 to 25 was created. The young nationals understood each other very politically without wanting to join a particular party. For them it was about a “state of youth” from a covenant spirit. They rejected the democracy of the Weimar Republic as destructive and "anti-popular". Instead, they adhered to the idea of ​​a “ national community ” in which the workers should be integrated into the state and society. In terms of foreign policy, they advocated "overcoming the Versailles Treaty".

The DNJ, on the other hand, was conservative-monarchist in orientation, admittedly rejecting the Versailles Treaty as well as parliamentary democracy. At the head of the association was the Vice Admiral a. D. Adolf von Trotha , who had just been forced into retirement because he had promised to support the putschists during the Kapp Putsch . Trotha, who attached great importance to military training and the implementation of the Führer concept, had a decisive influence on the development of the federal government.

Conversion into the Greater German Youth Association

But also the DNJ increasingly developed from a youth care association to a self-education association in the Bundisch style. The "old Prussian" orientation increasingly faded into the background. On August 10, 1924, the DNJ was renamed as an outward sign of the transformation into the Greater German Youth Association (GDJ) and provided with a statute. The Großdeutsche Ring was founded as a union of the elders . At a leaders' meeting at Easter 1926, the GJB acknowledged the idea of ​​the Education Association.

Shortly after the founding of the federal government, the German National People's Party made attempts to incorporate the DNJ as the party's own youth association. The DNJ, meanwhile, insisted on its independence, but lost members to the DNVP and its youth association, which has been operating as the Bismarck Youth since 1922 (since 1929 Bismarck League ). Some members also joined the Stahlhelm, Bund der Frontsoldaten , the SA or the SS , while the GDJ in 1929 demarcated itself from National Socialism . From a mass organization to the end of the Weimar Republic, the GDJ developed into a closed following with around 6,000 members.

The GJB was organized in a strictly hierarchical manner into “Fähnlein”, “Follower”, “Group” and “Tribe”. It was part of the members' duties to recruit additional members. Interested parties were initially accepted as "guests", "newly wedged" or "wildlings" for four weeks on a trial basis. The final recording took place on the regularly held "Thing". The new member, called “Wölfling”, usually rose to “young man” and finally “man” after working for up to two years. The federal government created a uniform rift via a central shopping center: black, knee-length leather velvet trousers, wide black leather belt, an olive-green everyday shirt, a white holiday shirt and hiking boots with gray knee-high socks. A "country cord" to which "rune marks" and "federal marks" were attached were used as identification. The group life consisted mainly of walks, trips and war games. The Bielefeld DNJ and GNJ, for example, recreated historical battles such as the battle in the Teutoburg Forest or Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck's campaign in German East Africa and took part in patriotic rallies.

Merger with the German Freischar

In the winter of 1927/28 negotiations began on a merger with the JuNaBu - Bund deutscher Jugend , which had been under new leadership since Pentecost 1927. After these negotiations failed, the GJB merged on May 4, 1930 with the politically differently oriented German Freischar . The new association, now comprising around 16,000 members, was also called the German Freischar , but was under the leadership of Admiral von Trotha. On June 18, the JuNaBu - Bund deutscher Jugend joined the new German Freischar . However , this change was not simply accepted by the circles of the formerly liberal German Freischar . On the one hand, it was criticized that the new German Freischar was not formed according to the model of the national community, but rather corresponded to the model of a civic bloc coalition. On the other hand, the republican and socialist forces within the Freischar rejected Trotha's anti-democratic attitude and his patriarchal style of leadership. The Greater Germans, on the other hand, insisted on the idea of ​​a life union for all age groups under one leadership. In contrast to the JuNaBu, the GDJ did not take part in the national revolutionary “Aktion der Jugend” of March 16, 1930 against the Young Plan .

From the free crowd of young nation to the Greater German Confederation

As a result, on October 2, 1930, the new alliance broke up again. Trotha had been criticized by the German Freischar because, as a representative of a formerly bourgeois youth association, he had not taken part in the change to unified views. Trotha explained the failure of the merger in reverse with the existence of “social democratic” and “Jewish” ideas within the German Freischar . The occasion was the signing of an appeal for the founding of the German State Party by two leading members of the new Großbund, Werner Pohl and Werner Kindt , who were excluded from Trotha. Other leading representatives of the Freischar were also excluded, such as Karl Otto Paetel for “undignified press attacks on Hindenburg ”. The old German Freischar was reconstituted, while von Trotha, as the new association, set up the again clearly right-wing national Freischar of Young Nation (also "Green Freischar") with himself as federal leader for life. About 1,500 girls and 4,000 boys took part in the FjN Whitsun Day in 1931.

After the National Socialist seizure of power , von Trotha succeeded on March 30, 1933 in merging his new group of young nationals with the German Scout Association , the German Freischar and other associations to form the Greater German Confederation (GB). Even under von Trotha, the GB demonstrated their refusal to allow themselves to be unconditionally integrated into the Hitler Youth. Nonetheless, Trotha said in retrospect in 1936 that the Führer principle had already been implemented in his association in 1925, according to which he had been released from re-election and had appointed all subordinate leaders up to the groups. On April 15, 1933, the federal chapter was held, at which it was decided to fight for "integration into the National Socialist movement and for the covenant living space in it". The last Bundestag was held on June 4, 1933.

When Baldur von Schirach was appointed Reich Youth Leader on June 17, 1933, all youth associations in the German Reich were subordinated to him. Schirach's first official act, only a few hours after his appointment, was the dissolution of the Greater German Confederation under von Trotha. However, this synchronization did not go off completely smoothly. A complaint from Trothas to President von Hindenburg was unsuccessful.

On February 4, 1936, the Reich Ministry of the Interior published a decree, according to which the GDJ, the German Scout Association and the Nerother Wandering Bird Association were to be neutralized at last, provided they had not yet dissolved themselves. This ban was repeated on June 20, 1939.

literature

  • Michael H. Kater: Bourgeois Youth Movement and Hitler Youth in Germany from 1926 to 1939. In: Archive for Social History 17 (1977), 127–174 online
  • Werner Kindt (Hrsg.): The German youth movement 1920 to 1933. The Bundische Zeit. Source writings. Düsseldorf 1974.
  • Wolfgang R. Krabbe: Critical followers - uncomfortable disturbers. Studies on the politicization of German youth in the 20th century. Berlin 2010.
  • Frigga Tiletschke u. Christel Liebold (Ed.): From gray cities walls . Civic youth movement in Bielefeld 1900–1933. Bielefeld 1995.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d Werner Kindt: The German Youth Movement 1920 to 1933. The Bundische Zeit. Düsseldorf 1974, p. 471.
  2. ↑ a b c Wolfgang R. Krabbe: Critical followers - uncomfortable troublemakers. Studies on the politicization of German youth in the 20th century . Berlin 2010, pp. 20f.
  3. ↑ a b Matthias von Hellfeld , Bündische Jugend and Hitlerjugend. The History of Adaptation and Resistance 1930-1939. Cologne 1987, p. 39.
  4. ^ Kindt, youth movement , p. 475.
  5. ↑ a b c Tiletschke u. Liebold, From gray cities walls , p. 172f.
  6. ↑ Krabbe, trailer , p. 28.
  7. ↑ Die Tat 22 (1930), p. 13.
  8. ↑ Tiletschke u. Liebold, From gray cities walls, pp. 175–188.
  9. ↑ Kindt, youth movement , p. 474.
  10. ^ Michael Jovy: Youth Movement and National Socialism. Münster 1984, p. 143f.
  11. ^ Kindt, youth movement , p. 1122.
  12. ↑ Rudolf Kneip: Youth of the Weimar period. Handbook of Youth Associations 1919–1938 . Frankfurt a. M. 1974, p. 120.
  13. ↑ Kater, Bürgerliche Jugendbewegung and Hitlerjugend , pp. 161 f., 140.
  14. ↑ Tiletschke u. Liebold, From gray cities walls , p. 173 f.
  15. ^ Kater, Bürgerliche Jugendbewegung and Hitlerjugend , p. 156 f.
  16. ^ John Alexander Williams: Turning to Nature in Germany. Hiking, Nudism, and Conservation, 1900-1940. Stanford 2007, p. 199.
  17. ^ Kater, Bürgerliche Jugendbewegung and Hitlerjugend , p. 160.