Ernst Goldschmidt (resistance fighter)

Ernst Goldschmidt ( January 20, 1904 in Kleve - 1963 ) was a German resistance fighter and writer.

Life

The Jewish ancestors of Ernst Goldschmidt had lived since the 1850s in Kleve. His father Heinrich Goldschmidt was the owner of a leather factory in Kleve. His mother Lucy (or Luzie) Offenbacher came from Paris . Ernst Goldschmidt studied economics in Frankfurt am Main and joined the Communist Party there .

After the fire in the Reichstag in February 1933, Ernst Goldschmidt was placed in what is known as protective custody in Klever Prison , where he also had to serve an eight-month prison sentence for allegedly possessing a firearm. He was then transferred again as a "protective prisoner" first to the Börgermoor concentration camp , then to the Esterwegen concentration camp , where he met the writer Carl von Ossietzky .

After his release he first emigrated to Amsterdam , and in 1935 to Belgium . From abroad he supported the Red Aid . In 1939 he was arrested again as a stateless person in France. He managed to escape and enter Switzerland. He became editor of the exile magazine “Über die Grenzen” and taught young refugees in a training center.

Goldschmidt trained as an interpreter in Geneva . After the Second World War , Ernst Goldschmidt took Belgian citizenship and started a family in Brussels .

In 1959 he testified as a witness in the trial of Franz Schneider's murder .

Ernst Goldschmidt died in 1963 as a result of an operation.

Honors

In Kleve, Ernst-Goldschmidt-Strasse, which borders the Jewish cemetery , has been named after him since 1992 .

Web links

• Helga Ullrich-Scheyda: Ernst Goldschmidt fought against forgetting In: Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung of March 7, 2015 (with photo)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Luca Anne Mayer, Jannis Gilde, Johannes Hunger: Ernst Goldschmidt - "You lack the imagination ..." (PDF; 3.45 MB) In: www.servicedepaix.be. ARSP , March 4, 2015, accessed December 7, 2017 .