Ernst Wetzel

Ernst Alfred Walter Wetzel (born February 15, 1891 in Schöneberg near Berlin ; † September 10, 1966 in Klein Süstedt near Uelzen ) was a German paramilitary activist and SA leader. He was best known as the commander of the Berlin SA from 1929 to 1931.

Life and activity

Wetzel was a son of the worker Karl Friedrich Wilhelm Wetzel and his wife Augusta Wilhelmina, nee. Bohlke. Wetzel took part in the First World War from 1914 to 1918. From March 1917 to January 1918 he was a lieutenant in the reserve division leader and later an officer for special use (adjutant) in the A 213 aviation division.

In 1924 Wetzel began to work in the Wehrverband Frontbann, a replacement organization for the Sturmabteilung (SA) , which was banned after the Hitler coup of November 1923 . In March 1925 he was appointed by Paul Röhrbein, the leader of the Frontbanns North, the section of the Frontbanns responsible for Berlin and Brandenburg, to head the Frontbanns in Greater Berlin and Brandenburg. In this position, Wetzel was under about 5,000 Frontbann members in these areas, which were divided into three districts, which were led by Kurt Daluege , Waldemar Geyer and Ludwig Dargel .

In 1926, the north front ban was incorporated into the newly established SA. However, Wetzel only became a member of the SA and the NSDAP, which was newly founded in 1925, on July 1, 1928 (membership number 92.716).

On September 20, 1928, Wetzel became the leader of a Berlin SA formation. In August / September 1929 Wetzel became the successor of Walter Jahn Gausturmführer von Berlin, d. H. Commander of the Berlin SA, with the rank of SA Oberführer. In this position he was subordinate to the OSAF Deputy East, Walther Stennes , who had been in charge of the entire SA east of the Elbe since 1928.

Involvement in the Stennes Revolt (1931)

Wetzel retained the leadership of the Berlin SA until the so-called Stennes revolt of April 1931. This was an uprising by parts of the Berlin SA against the leadership of the NSDAP around Adolf Hitler in Munich, which resulted from the rejection of the political strategy of the party leadership: While Hitler and his entourage were legally conquering political power - The Berlin SA around Stennes and Wetzel demanded that the party and the SA should give up the legality course and instead use the power in the state on a revolutionary basis by gaining electoral victories and the constitutional transfer of governance by the Reich President due to the parliamentary weight of the party Should take ways through a violent coup.

The Stennes revolt was triggered by Stenne's refusal to obey an order from SA Chief of Staff Röhm to vacate his post in Berlin and instead switch to the Supreme SA leadership in Munich: instead of obeying, Stennes dared to obey, supported by Wetzel and For some loyal followers, the open uprising against the party leadership by trying to seize control of the Nazi movement in Berlin with the help of a few hundred SA members standing behind them: Wetzel had the Berlin Gauleitung occupied by SA members and took over at the same time the control over the editorial office of the Berlin party newspaper of the NSDAP the attack . Stennes declared Goebbels to be deposed as Gauleiter and proclaimed Wetzel as his successor as the new Gauleiter of Berlin. For a few days it appeared that the party was about to split. In the course of April, however, the senior lieutenant, appointed by Hitler as a special commissioner to put down the Stennes revolt, succeeded. D. Paul Schulz to suppress the survey with the help of SA and especially SS members loyal to Hitler. The majority of the Berlin SA ultimately remained loyal to the party leadership.

Like Stennes and about 500 other SA members, Wetzel was expelled from the NSDAP on April 2, 1931 under Article 4b of the NSDAP statutes of 1925 by order of Hitler. Wetzel's provisional successor as the Berlin Gausturmführer was Edmund Heines .

Further life

From 1931 to 1933 Wetzel belonged to the secessionist group of Revolutionary National Socialists.

After the National Socialists came to power in 1933, Wetzel tried to re-join the NSDAP and the SA in autumn 1933: At the decision of the Berlin SA chief Karl Ernst , Wetzel was re-admitted to the SA on February 1, 1934 and as Obersturmführer on April 1, 1934 promoted.

By order of June 14, 1934, Wetzel was appointed advisor for technical training at SA-Obergruppe III.

After the events of the Röhm affair in the summer of 1934, SA court proceedings were initiated against Wetzel. The SA special court decided on August 2, 1934 to apply to the Supreme SA leadership to annul Wetzel's re-entry into the SA and his promotion to SA Obersturmführer: The SA chief of staff Viktor Lutze finally made a decision on August 29 1934 that Wetzel had been re-admitted to the SA due to a misconduct on his part, which should not have happened, and that he should therefore be removed from it again, not by expulsion or dismissal, but by declaring that his reinstatement in the SA and the rank awarded to him.

family

Wetzel married Minna Anna Lücke (born December 3, 1899) on October 9, 1920, with whom they had two children.

estate

In the Federal Archives to personnel records have received to Wetzel: In particular, the stocks of the former Berlin Document Center , a file with party correspondence to Wetzel (PK microfilm T 56, images 771 to 782), a record of the Supreme Party Court (OPG microfilm images 307 to 326), an SA personnel file (SA microfilm 319-B, images 1107–1108) and an SA court file (SA-P microfilm D 288, images 479–536).

literature

• Bernhard Sauer: "Goebbels Rabauken". On the history of the SA in Berlin Brandenburg

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Death register of the Hansen registry office No. 4/1966.