Franz Arrow

Franz Pfeil (* in the 19th century; † April 15, 1945 in Harzgerode ) was a German colonial official and teacher.

Life

Pfeil took up the profession of teacher and started his first job in Köthen in 1905 . In 1911 he went as a teacher at the imperial government school for whites and natives in Apia in German Samoa , where he arrived on February 12, 1911. The school also taught adults from the local upper class. On February 1, 1914, he took over the management of the school, which had around 60 male students. In the course of mobilization in preparation for the First World War , he received on August 8, 1914 from the governor Erich Schultz-Ewerth the order to administer the island of Savai'i as bailiff. However, its activity ends on August 29, 1914 with the occupation of Samoa by New Zealand troops. He returned to Apia and gave private lessons there in his apartment, as the German schools in Samoa had been closed by the New Zealanders. Arrow tried as a stowaway by Germany depose, but fell by treachery in captivity . During interrogation, he is said to have been threatened with shooting three times. However, a local chief stood up for him. On November 7, 1914, he was sentenced to three years in prison in New Zealand for attempting to escape. The prisoner of war and jail term lasted from December 1914 to May 1919. He was taken to a camp for German prisoners in Auckland . In 1917 he got to know Count Felix von Luckner , who was also imprisoned there. Both became friends and later met more often in Germany.

Around 1924, Pfeil went to Harzgerode and became the rector of the middle school there. At the end of the Second World War he took part in deliberations in the Harzgerode Town Hall on April 14, 1945 , as a result of which it was decided to declare Harzgerode an open city in order to avoid destruction in the city in the face of advancing US troops . Pfeil campaigned for a surrender of Harzgerode without a fight. However, a white flag that was hoisted on the town hall on April 15, 1945 had to be recovered because of a surprising German combat unit. Shortly thereafter, the US troops launched an artillery fire on Harzgerode. One of the first grenades hit the market square next to the town hall and killed Franz Pfeil who was inside.

literature

• Hermann Joseph Hiery (ed.), Die deutsche Südsee , Verlag Ferdinand Schöningh, Paderborn, 2001, pages 234/35 and 653.
• Friedhelm Linemann, Andreas Friebe, Harzgerode and the Selketal , Letterado Verlag Quedlinburg 2006, ISBN 3-938579-22-6 , page 61 ff.