Edwin Bergner

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Edwin Bergner (born October 27, 1903 in Crivitz ; † 1980 ) was a German local and state politician ( KPO / SED ) and the first director of the Buchenwald National Memorial .

Life

Bergner comes from a Saxon working-class family. His father was a weaver , his mother a stenographer . In Gera he attended elementary school , after which he took up an apprenticeship as a machine fitter and worked in this profession. Through membership in a workers' sports club, he grew into his political commitment. In 1922 he joined the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) and later became a member of the Gera sub-district leadership. In 1928 he joined the KPD opposition and became its Gera organization director. Because he continued the illegal anti-fascist work in 1933 , he was arrested in 1934 and in various penitentiaries - u. a. imprisoned in the Gera "Torhaus" - as well as in the Buchenwald concentration camp with prisoner number 2837. Here he was housed in a block with Richard Eyermann . From August 23, 1943 to March 28, 1945 he was assigned to the Kassel concentration camp external command . Kurt Leonhardt , camp elder Joseph Schuhbauer , Richard Krauthause and Edwin Bergner formed the so-called illegal KPD party active in Kassel. The main goals of the party activity were to gain a positive influence on the guards and to promote political work among the foreign inmates. See the report by the former German prisoner Josef Peschke (Buchenwald Archive 6225-2).

After the liberation of the prisoners in Buchenwald concentration camp by the 3rd US Army in April 1945, he took on several functions in the newly formed administration: as a member of the Gera Antifa Committee, deputy head of the Housing Office , and from 1949 head of the Personnel Department in the Thuringian Ministry of the Interior responsible for denazification of administrations. After an internal party criticism of his behavior, he attended the SED state party school. He was then appointed as the state parliament director . From 1952 to 1961 he held the position of chairman of the council of the Erfurt-Land district . From 1969 he was director of the Buchenwald National Memorial and Memorial.

honors and awards

literature

  • Steffen Kachel : A red-red special path? Social Democrats and Communists in Thuringia 1919 to 1949 , = publications of the Historical Commission for Thuringia, Kleine Reihe Volume 29, p. 540

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Memorial and meeting place in the gatehouse ( memento of the original from January 19, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.torhaus-gera.de
  2. ^ Alfred F. Groeneveld: In the Kassel external command of the Buchenwald concentration camp (PDF; 6.6 MB), Kassel 1991
  3. ^ State regular school "Am Lindenkreis" Buttelstedt  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / www.rsbuttelstedt.ap.th.schule.de  
  4. ^ New Germany , December 10, 1968, p. 2
  5. ↑ Berliner Zeitung , September 21, 1973, p. 2
personal data
SURNAME Bergner, Edwin
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German local and state politician (SED), director of a memorial
DATE OF BIRTH October 27, 1903
PLACE OF BIRTH Crivitz
DATE OF DEATH 1980