Ernst Sigle

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Ernst Sigle (born March 7, 1872 in Kornwestheim ; † March 7, 1960 ) was a German entrepreneur in the shoemaking trade .

Career

Sigle came as the son of Johann Christoph Sigle and Elisabeth Sigle, geb. Hammer, to the world. He started as an apprentice in his older brother Jakob's company . He later became a board member of J. Sigle & Cie. Schuhfabriken AG and, after the transformation into Salamander AG in 1930 and the death of his brother in 1935, took over the chairmanship of the company's supervisory board. He was also the deputy chairman of the supervisory board of J. Mayer & Sohn Lederfabriken AG in Offenbach am Main.

"Forced labor at Salamander", in Berlin-Kreuzberg

Ernst Sigle and his older brother Jakob , as owners, as deputy and chairman of the supervisory board , were primarily responsible for the aryanization of Salamander AG in 1933 and its direct beneficiaries, together with general director Alexander Haffner . Ernst Sigle was jointly responsible for the Aryanization of the leather company J. Mayer & Sohn in Offenbach and the Bernhard Ross shoe factory in Speyer in 1936 as well as the acquisition of shares in the Aryanization of the Sihler & Cie leather factory. AG in Zuffenhausen in 1937. Due to its position Sigle was also partly responsible for both the exploitation and often inhumane treatment of thousands of forced laborers / inside during the Second World War by the Salamander AG and for the " re-use " hundreds of thousands of pairs of shoes of the victims of the extermination camps in Salamander repair shop in Berlin-Kreuzberg .

As a representative of the largest German shoe manufacturer at the time, Sigle had a say in the Wehrmachts Schuhwerk special committee on the tests on the " shoe test track " in Sachsenhausen concentration camp and was therefore jointly responsible for the mistreatment and murder of thousands of prisoners by the SS on the "shoe test track". “Documents from the state authorities in the Berlin Federal Archives show that leading Salamander managers were not only involved in the decision to even build a test track in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp and operate it with prisoners. Salamander was also one of the first companies to voluntarily send materials and shoe models to the concentration camp for testing in June 1940 . There was evidence of visits from managers from the Salamander company to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp. There they examined the experiments and had direct contact with the concentration camp inmates, who had to line up in front of them to inspect their shoes. In other points, too, direct concentration camp connections of the company management can be proven. For example, members of the top management in the war economy held leading positions in various technical committees that spent almost five years evaluating the concentration camp experiments. Men like Ernst Sigle, Angelo Hammelbacher, Robert Eichenlaub and Hans Dietmann therefore knew exactly that concentration camp prisoners were being abused here for their purposes. ”Salamander paid 6 RM per day per prisoner for the tests on the“ shoe test track ” the Reich Office for Economic Development .

Honors

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ on Jakob see Jutta Hanitsch:  Sigle, Jakob. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 24, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-428-11205-0 , p. 402 f. ( Digitized version ).
  2. ↑ Petra Bräutigam: Medium-sized entrepreneurs under National Socialism - Economic developments and social behavior in the shoe and leather industry in Baden and Württemberg, R. Oldenbourg Verlag, Munich 1997, pages 257 and 331f
  3. ^ Petra Bräutigam: Medium-sized Entrepreneurs in National Socialism - Economic Developments and Social Behavior in the Shoe and Leather Industry in Baden and Württemberg, R. Oldenbourg Verlag, Munich 1997, page 235ff
  4. ^ Anne Sudrow: The Shoe in National Socialism - A Product History in a German-British-American Comparison, Wallstein Verlag, Göttingen 2010, page 607ff
  5. ↑ Vera Friedländer: I was a slave laborer at Salamander, Das Neue Berlin, Berlin 2016, page 76
  6. ↑ Forced labor with Salamander
  7. ↑ Ulrich Ziegler: "If you fell down, you got a shot in the neck", Interview with Joop Sneep on May 2nd, 2015 on Deutschlandfunk and Susanne Mathes: The high price of being upright, Stuttgarter Zeitung, May 19, 2010
  8. ↑ Susanne Mathes: To this day there has been no reparation, interview with Dr. Anne Sudrow, Stuttgarter Nachrichten No. 47 of February 26, 2011, page III
  9. ^ Anne Sudrow: The Shoe in National Socialism - A Product History in a German-British-American Comparison, Wallstein Verlag, Göttingen 2010, page 523
personal data
SURNAME Sigle, Ernst
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German entrepreneur
DATE OF BIRTH March 7, 1872
PLACE OF BIRTH Kornwestheim
DATE OF DEATH March 7, 1960