Elisabeth Gross

Elisabeth Groß , née Geiberger (born July 24, 1899 in Worms ; † August 25, 1944 in Plötzensee prison , Berlin ) was a German housewife and a victim of the Nazi justice system. She should not be confused with the wife of the same name of the resistance fighter Nikolaus Groß .

Life and activity

Early life

Elisabeth Geiberger was born the fourth of thirteen children of the worker Karl Geiberger and his wife Elise, née Knierim. Around 1918 she married the carter Heinrich Groß. The marriage resulted in two sons - Heinrich (* 1919) and Erwin (* 1924).

During the Weimar Republic, Groß was close to the Communist Party of Germany (KPD), and probably even belonged to it. She also worked for the International Workers Aid (IAH), a charitable sub-organization of the KPD. Among other things, she worked in an IAH soup kitchen in Worms, which fed needy workers. By 1932 at the latest, Groß acted as head of the Worms section of the IAH. In this function, she took part in April of the same year as a delegate at an IAH congress in Moscow . During this trip she took part in factory tours in Moscow and Leningrad . After her return to Worms, Groß reported to a public gathering of 400 KPD members and sympathizers about the Congress and her other impressions of the Soviet Union. A transcript of their explanations, secretly stenographed by an NSDAP informant, was sent to the local NSDAP district leadership and more than ten years later used as evidence in the trial against Groß.

Time of National Socialism and denunciation

After the National Socialists came to power in the spring of 1933, Groß largely withdrew into private life. From 1933 to 1939 she ran a fruit trade in Frankfurt am Main . At the beginning of the Second World War, she and her husband and sons opened a car transport business that worked with two trucks for the Todt Organization .

On July 29, 1943, Groß received a visit from Kurt G., a non-commissioned officer who was friends with her son and who was currently on home leave. During their conversation, the war situation was also discussed, whereby Groß is said to have said: “The Hitler, the dog, the rascal, the Stromer. There must be some way to kill him. Isn't there anyone who can get at him? ”She also told him that she was listening to a Moscow radio station on the radio and asked G. to desert the Wehrmacht.

After G. had told his fiancé Herta L. about Groß's statements to him and about her request to desert him, Groß denounced - with G.'s consent - to the NSDAP district leadership in Worms. She also pointed out to the district leadership two other women who could say incriminating things about Groß. She and her fiancé had found them beforehand by systematically asking people from Groß's circle of friends whether they had made statements to them against the war and the regime. A certain Ms. B had reported to them that in an interview with her at the end of June, Gross had stated that it was impossible to know whether the war would be won. Groß also explained to her, Ms. B., that she would have it no worse with the communists than she is now. Groß was then reported by the district leadership to the Secret State Police in Darmstadt, which took Groß into custody on August 8, 1943, because of the various incriminating statements obtained against them in this way .

Imprisonment, trial before the People's Court and execution

With a stopover in the Darmstadt court prison and in Mainz, Groß was transferred to Berlin in November 1943 by order of the Reich Security Main Office. There she was held in Moabit Prison , where she spent eight months. According to the results of the research by Arenz-Morsch, the harsh prison conditions - she was chained and kept in solitary confinement for more than a month - took Groß physically and especially mentally into considerable harm, so that she finally fell into an apathetic and stuporous state . This went so far that she no longer recognized her husband and was classified as no longer able to be questioned. In January 1944, she attempted suicide . A medical report came to the conclusion that she was no longer responsible due to a complete psychological breakdown. However, the court rejected this opinion and stuck to the implementation of the planned procedure.

On July 21, 1944, Groß was charged with preparing for high treason and degrading military strength before the 2nd Senate of the People's Court, which met in Potsdam, under the chairmanship of Wilhelm Crohne . During the trial, Ms. B., who was summoned as witnesses, and another witness, put the statements they had gathered by the district leadership about the statements made by Groß to them, so that Kurt G. was the only witness on whom the entire accused ultimately relied. In the judgment passed on the same day, Groß was nevertheless found guilty and sentenced to death. Appeals for clemency from her lawyer, mother and husband were denied.

The death sentence was carried out with the guillotine on August 25 in the Berlin-Plötzensee prison . The authorities forbade Groß 'family members to publish an obituary notice.

Trials against large informers

The death sentence against Groß had legal consequences: in 1949 the informers G. and L. were charged with crimes against humanity before the Mainz regional court . They were charged with initiating the proceedings against Groß with their reports to the district management, and in the case of Gs, having given his testimony to the People's Court, also provided the direct basis for the death sentence imposed on them and thus responsible for Groß's death . Both were thus helpers in a persecution for political reasons. The court found both guilty on November 30, 1949 and sentenced G. to fourteen months in prison with loss of civil rights for three years, while L. received ten months in prison.

Both the Chief Public Prosecutor in Mainz, who considered it too mild, and G. appealed against this judgment to the Higher Regional Court of Koblenz . In its session on April 27, 1950, the criminal division of the Higher Regional Court declared the appeal to be admissible, insofar as it concerned G. Herta L.'s petition for revision was rejected because her prison sentence had been suspended due to a federal amnesty on December 31, 1949. With the declaration of admissibility of G's appeal for appeal, the Higher Regional Court followed the then common practice of case law in denunciation acts during the Nazi era, according to which criminal charges and truthful statements because of statements and acts directed against the regime are not as such as crimes against humanity were grasp. The case was therefore referred back to the Mainz regional court, where it has now been brought before the jury.

The jury of the regional court ruled in a new judgment of December 10, 1950 that G. could not prove that he intended to make his reports to the district management about Groß's statements in 1943 and his incriminating testimony during the trial of 1944 made to harm her. Since there was no evidence that his statements were false or exaggerated, it must be assumed, in line with the principle in dubio pro reo , that he was telling the truth at the time and that a truthful statement could not be the basis for a judicial conviction. Therefore, an acquittal for lack of evidence is appropriate. In contemporary newspaper reports on the trial, this judgment was met with indignation by the commentators responsible. Articles with headings such as “The jury took a different view - acquittal from the charge of a crime against humanity” or “babbler or hangman? - Brought a friend's mother to the scaffold ”.

Afterlife

Today a stumbling stone in front of the house at Gaustraße 65 in Worms reminds of Groß.

literature

• Sebastian Bonk: On the trail of National Socialism in Worms , 2005.

Web links

• Angelika Arenz-Morch: executed for “statements that degrade the military strength”. The fate of Elisabeth Groß from Worms and the follow-up lawsuit against her informers
• Resistance from individuals - an example from Worms Elisabeth Groß (1899 - 1944)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ http://www.warmaisa.de/stolpersteine/gross-elisabeth-geb-geiberger-1899-1944/