Ernst Hadermann

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Ernst Hadermann (born May 22, 1896 in Schlüchtern , Hessen-Nassau ; † January 2, 1968 in Halle (Saale) ) was a German soldier, high school teacher, humanist, resister and Germanist.

Life

Hadermann, the son of a mill owner, graduated from high school in Fulda in 1914 and volunteered for the artillery at the beginning of the First World War . He was wounded several times and was awarded the Iron Cross 1st and 2nd class. After the armistice and his discharge as a lieutenant, he was elected to the workers 'and soldiers' council of the Fulda garrison .

While studying German and history at several universities, he was politically active and supported social revolutionary currents, joined the USPD in 1920 and left the same year. In 1923 he received his doctorate. phil. After Hadermann passed the state examination for German and ancient languages ​​in 1924, he worked as a student trainee and assessor at the Staatliche Oberlyceum, then at the Staatliche Gymnasium Philippinum (both in Marburg ) and at the Oberrealgymnasium in Melsungen . In the autumn of 1930 he was appointed a teacher and appointed to the Wilhelmsgymnasium in Kassel . There he taught Greek, German, Latin, French and (until 1934) history. The nine years that followed were the period of his educational success, although he was denounced in 1933 and temporarily imprisoned in 1934 after the so-called Röhm Putsch . Amazingly - even for himself - he remained in office, only he was no longer allowed to teach history. In 1933 he became a member of the Stahlhelm, Bund der Frontsoldaten , in 1935 of the National Socialist German Teachers' Association and after the NSDAP's ban on membership in 1937 he became a party member.

From 1939 Hadermann did military service and was awarded the EK I clasp. On July 18, 1941, as a captain near Rogachev on the Dnieper , he was taken prisoner by the Soviets . In Jelabuga an der Kama, in the prisoner-of-war camp for German officers, Hadermann was able to use a small library and work out a speech that was to cause a stir. He presented them to his approximately 1,000 fellow prisoners on May 21, 1942; with a few exceptions, they reacted with icy rejection. But it apparently fit into the concept of the Soviet government because it was printed and half a million copies were dropped over German positions. Together with Walter Ulbricht , Hadermann was used for loudspeaker propaganda at the front. The content of his speech “How is the war to be ended? - A man's word from a captain "wanted to reach the soldiers of the Wehrmacht on the basis of their intellectual and moral constitution and character: The question of the military oath occupied a special place: to renounce it," has become difficult, very difficult; but we only took the oath we took Hitler as the leader of the German people. But Hitler has forfeited the right to call himself the leader of the German people. ”In the final part of his speech, Ernst Hadermann ties in with antiquity. Since the "fateful hour" is near, the Wehrmacht member is also faced with a question of fate. "See, gentlemen, that you make the right decision."

At least three points of view are remarkable in Hadermann's argument:

  1. it dates well before the time when the German military conquest plan for the Soviet Union came to a standstill (the Battle of Stalingrad did not begin until November 1942);
  2. it dates clearly before the founding of the National Committee “Free Germany” (NKFD) on 12./13. July 1943, which was then built up with Hadermann's support, but later;
  3. it is not at all congruent with Marxist theory; consequently it was strictly rejected by the Moscow KPD leadership.

Hadermann's conservative, Christian-humanistic, classical educational ideals allowed him to join the NSDAP in 1937 , but he was certainly not a supporter in the narrower sense. He counted himself among the quiet people in the country, among those who thought they were obliged to a minimal loyalty, among those who hoped to be able to hold down the demon simply by their presence. A mistake in reasoning, which Hadermann apparently recognized in part after the Reichspogromnacht 1938, but in its totality only when he was a prisoner of war in 1942. Hadermann was formally “released from military service” by the National Socialists in December 1944 in order to initiate proceedings before the “ People's Court ”. These proceedings were still pending at the end of the war.

Hadermann was a member of the executive committee of the NKFD, employee of the newspaper Free Germany and member of the extended editorial team of the station “Free Germany” . He was also a founding member of the Association of German Officers (BDO) as well as the Berlin high school teacher and officer Fritz Rücker , with whom he was specifically brought together to collaborate after his capture in December 1942. In 1943 Hadermann worked on loudspeakers in the Stalingrad basin. He was the author and spokesman for numerous weekly political reviews and cultural programs for the radio station Free Germany .

Hadermann's involvement in the National Committee “Free Germany” continued seamlessly after the war in his work for a better Germany. At the beginning of February 1945 he was co-author of the “Selection and Interpretation of German Literature in Higher Schools (Upper Classes)”, and at the end of July 1945 (still formally a prisoner of war) he was co-author of the “Guidelines for Teaching German History”. From August 1945 he headed the school department of the " German Central Administration for National Education " in Berlin for three years (the first one and a half years as deputy head). a with Erwin Marquardt , Paul Oestreich and Heinrich Deiters . From 1948 to 1949 he was a member of the 1st German People's Council for the Kulturbund. From 1948 to 1950 he was a member of the SED . In 1950 he explored the possibility of returning to his Hessian homeland, to which he was attached throughout his life. The price, however, seemed unacceptably high to him; his involvement in Moscow made him a “persona non grata” in the West, and he expressly received no help from his West German family members either. All relations with relatives in West Germany were broken off. He never got over this loss of his home for the rest of his life. Hadermann wanted to pay off guilt, felt that he had to make up for his mistakes, and he was committed to the educational policy of the young GDR with the honesty and honesty given to him . But the Marxist view of history did not share his understanding of education.

“I only get a condescending smile from younger party comrades when I tell them that my best and most successful class at the grammar schools in Marburg and Kassel was my Plato class. […] Today I have to fall silent and leave the field to ruthless philistines. "

Hadermann was Vice Dean of the General Science Faculty of the Brandenburg State University Potsdam from 1950 to 1955 and Director of the Institute for German Studies at the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg in Halle (Saale) from 1955 until his retirement in 1962 . In 1961, shortly before reaching the age limit, a protracted conflict with party offices flared up again because of his “individualistic attitude”. In German studies, he continued to be interested not only in Expressionism, but also in Hölderlin and Stefan George . He resigned on September 16, 1961 and retired the following year. Regardless of these conflicts, the University of Halle remained his center of science and life until his death. In the last years of his life he felt increasingly lonely, underestimated and cheated of his loyalty.

On the occasion of his 65th birthday, Hadermann was awarded the Patriotic Order of Merit in silver in June 1961 . In 1965 he received the Patriotic Order of Merit in gold.

literature

  • Prof. Dr. Ernst Hadermann - a German humanist. For his 100th birthday . Potsdam 1996.
  • Bernd-Rainer Barth :  Ernst Hadermann . In: Who was who in the GDR? 5th edition. Volume 1. Ch. Links, Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-86153-561-4 .
  • Dieter Kirchhöfer, Christa Uhlig (ed.): Ernst Hadermann. Educational thinking between tradition and a new beginning . Peter Lang, Frankfurt am Main 2008.
  • Wolfgang Plat: The National Committee Free Germany . In: Soviet Union Today . 35. Vol. 11 (November) 1990, pp. 60-63.
  • Harry Waibel : Servant of many masters. Former Nazi functionaries in the Soviet Zone / GDR. Peter Lang, Frankfurt am Main et al. 2011, ISBN 978-3-631-63542-1 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Harry Waibel : Servants of many masters. Former Nazi functionaries in the Soviet Zone / GDR. Peter Lang, Frankfurt am Main et al. 2011, ISBN 978-3-631-63542-1 , p. 118.
  2. ↑ Ernst Hadermann in the DRAFD Wiki
  3. ^ Hohendorf, Gerd / König, Helmut / Meumann, Eberhard (eds.): Wegbereiter der neue Schule , Berlin 1989, p. 212; ISBN 3-06-212774-0
  4. ↑ Berliner Zeitung , June 16, 1961, p. 2
  5. ↑ Berliner Zeitung, May 7, 1965, p. 4
personal data
SURNAME Hadermann, Ernst
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German soldier, high school teacher, resistance activist and Germanist, MdV (Kulturbund)
DATE OF BIRTH May 22, 1896
PLACE OF BIRTH Schluechtern
DATE OF DEATH 2nd January 1968
Place of death Halle (Saale)