Erwin Zindler

Erwin Zindler (born October 6, 1895 in Hamburg ; † November 5, 1964 ) was a German teacher , headmaster , political director in the NSDAP , acting head of the NSLB Gauamt as well as an officer and writer .

Life

Erwin Zindler was the son of an elementary school teacher. He spent his childhood in Hamburg-Hamm . Zindler attended elementary school at Lohkoppelstrasse 36 for three years and in 1905 switched to the Johanneum's school for scholars . After graduating from high school in 1914, he began studying at the University of Hamburg and the University of Göttingen , which he interrupted due to the First World War. He did military service as an officer and received the Iron Cross first and second class, the Front Fighter Cross of Honor and the Hamburg Hanseatic Cross . Schindler continued his studies and completed it with a state examination for a higher teaching post. He was thus qualified to teach German, history and gymnastics as well as Spanish and pedagogy. From 1922 to 1930 Zindler taught at what is now the Bismarckgymnasium at Bogenstrasse 59, which at the time was an upper secondary school for boys. From 1930 to 1933 he taught at the learned school of the Johanneum.

In mid-1933 Heinrich Landahl was deposed as headmaster of the Lichtwark School . Zindler took over his position. In 1934, Schindler said that the reform pedagogy pursued at the Lichtwark School was arrogant, artificial and characterized by “grandiose left intellectuality”. The headmaster radically changed the school profile. In addition, he replaced teachers who, in his opinion, were “contaminated with Marxism”, in order to orient the teaching staff in a Nazi way . Zindler considered a "new building" and not a "reconstruction" of the school necessary. After the end of National Socialism , however, Zindler spoke of having retained the old spirit of the Lichtwark School, which, however, must be viewed as a legend.

In 1937 the state education authority dissolved the Lichtwarkschule. The school merged with the Heinrich Hertz secondary school and was a high school for boys in the Hamburg city park laid. Zindler was the younger of the two school principals. He was therefore appointed deputy head of the new high school. Zindler said after 1945 that the rulers did not want to give him the post of headmaster because they considered him a dangerous person. However, his career after 1937 contradicts this. Zindler, who had already applied for admission to the NSDAP in 1933 , became a party member in 1937 and was active as political leader in Eppendorf . From 1939 to 1942 he did military service in the artillery in Poland , France and Russia . He acted as battery chief and department commander, received an award and a promotion to major .

From 1940 the school management had considered transferring Zindler back to the post of headmaster, presumably because of his political commitment as well as his military activities. Albert Henze , who ruthlessly headed the school administration, dismissed Werner Puttfarken as headmaster of the school of scholars in mid-1942 . The Reich Ministry of Education saw the Johanneum as a "particularly valuable school", so the headmaster received higher salaries. Oskar Zindler took over Puttfarken's position as the new head of the facility. At around the same time, Wilhelm Schulz resigned from the service as Gauleiter of the Hamburg National Socialist Teachers' Association (NSLB) for health reasons. Zindler took over his position as the second acting Gauleiter of the NSLB. In the period that followed, Zindler and, in some cases, Schulz also gave pronounced propaganda speeches. After 1945 Zindler declared that he only acted on orders. For the NSLB he concentrated on achievements in science, education and art. Since Zindler, as the leader of the NSLB, had the right to sit in on other high schools and also made use of it, he was considered unpopular with their headmasters.

On February 18, 1943, the NSLB was dissolved. Zindler then headed the children's area as the NSDAP's regional school commissioner . A week after the assassination attempt on July 20, 1944 , Zindler spoke to his students about this. "The state stands higher than the individual," said Zindler, who viewed the attack as a crime. Since Zindler was considered an experienced military leader, he was called up for military service again in August 1944. As a commander, he was to lead a Landsturm battalion. The battalion consisted of political leaders and was supposed to defend Hamburg. In December 1944 he was given command of three battalions of the Volkssturm . The 50 to 60-year-old men were supposed to secure the office of Karl Kaufmann , whose seat was at the Budge-Palais in Harvestehude . Zindlers set up his weapons depot and command post in the northern basement of the Johanneum . Its area of ​​application included the area from Eidelstedt to Alte Wöhr station east of the city park. From March 13th to 20th, Zindler gave a Volkssturm course in the Walddörferschule .

After the end of World War II , the British Military Government issued orders on June 27, 1945 to suspend Zindler. At the same time, he was asked to take part in order and clean-up work on an hourly basis. The service and civil servant relationship as a teacher ended in August 1945. In the following three years, Zindler was temporarily employed as a warehouse worker or for transport activities. In 1948 he wrote a ten-page book with which he wanted to stage himself. According to Zindler, he was an idealist and had high hopes for the promises made by the NSDAP. However, like other teachers and school principals, he never completely surrendered to the party. Zindler appealed his suspension; however, all instances rejected his request.

When in 1953 the form of the elementary high school was restored in Hamburg, there was a shortage of teachers. The school authorities therefore offered Zindler a new position. Zindler taught at the grammar school in St. Georg from 1954 to 1961 . He was considered robust, brisk and extremely hard-working. In German lessons he emphasized the Germanic, the heroic. He kept his distance from authors whom he described as “Marxist, defeatist and decant”, including Thomas Mann . Zindler declared that a National Socialist state could have been salvation for Germany. Adolf Hitler , whom he called a "proletarian", prevented this from happening.

Erwin Zindler died on November 5, 1964 in his hometown.

Works

Zindler wrote numerous books and poems. He saw himself as a great writer. After the end of the First World War, Zindler wrote down the history of Field Artillery Regiment No. 108 in 1919 and distributed it to his former officers. In 1929 he dealt again with the experiences gained during the war in the book Auf Biegen und Brechen . In 1931 he wrote a novel with Five Braderup Brothers about a German mother. Four years later, Zindler received an award from the “Week of the German Book”. Zindler belonged to the Reich Association of German Writers and from 1934 headed the narrator student council in the north-western part of the association. On personal invitation, he traveled to Berlin , where he took part in the sixth Berlin Poets Week in October 1936 .

Assessment of personality

The historian Uwe Schmidt was of the opinion that Zindler had a variety of motivations, some of which were in competition with one another. An assessment of his personality is therefore difficult, so Schmidt. Schindler made inconsistent and not particularly conspicuous statements about Jews . Anti-Semitism apparently did not play a dominant role in his worldview; fighting and soldier motives would have prevailed. After the end of the Second World War, Zindler emphasized all non-political topics, according to Schmidt. He tried to exclude any entanglements with National Socialism. Significant National Socialists such as Albert Henze apparently valued Zindler's leadership qualities and activities in the political and military field, but less of his work as an educator.

Zindler had conspicuous sympathies for Heinrich Heine all his life .

literature

• Uwe Schmidt: Zindler, Erwin . In: Franklin Kopitzsch, Dirk Brietzke (Hrsg.): Hamburgische Biographie . tape 4 . Wallstein, Göttingen 2008, ISBN 978-3-8353-0229-7 , pp. 395-397 .

Web links

• Literature by and about Erwin Zindler in the catalog of the German National Library