Friedrich Ernst (banker)

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Friedrich Ernst, 1929

Friedrich Ernst (born June 9, 1889 in Berlin ; † November 28, 1960 ibid) was a German lawyer , administrative officer , bank manager and politician .

Studies, military service and the Weimar Republic

Friedrich Ernst studied law and political science . He received his doctorate as Dr. jur. and after completing his military service he worked in the Prussian Ministry of Trade and Industry from 1919 to 1931, from 1929 as a ministerial director and head of the trade department. In addition, from 1925 to 1931 he was Prussia's deputy representative to the Reichsrat and from 1928 first state commissioner for the Berlin stock exchange . In 1931 he was appointed Reich Commissioner for the Banking Industry by Chancellor Heinrich Brüning . In this function he was involved in the restructuring of the collapsed major Berlin banks. After the Prussian strike , he was also appointed Reich Commissioner for Prussia on July 22, 1932 and then took over the management of the Ministry of Economics and Labor. On February 4, 1933, he was replaced in this position by Alfred Hugenberg .

Nazi regime

Under the National Socialists Ernst was initially left in his office as Reich Commissioner for the Banking Industry, then in 1935 Reich Minister of Economics Hjalmar Schacht appointed Reich Commissioner for the Credit System. He held this office until September 1939. From the beginning of 1940 he was Reich Commissioner for the Treatment of Hostile Assets. In this role, his jurisdiction was limited to the assets (corporate and private property) of the Western Allies, France, Great Britain and the USA. These guidelines formed an important basis for the Economic Staff East (WiStab Ost) to exploit the conquered eastern areas. In autumn 1941 he retired and in 1942 became a personally liable partner of the private bank Delbrück, Schickler & Co.

Assassination attempt on July 20, 1944

After the assassination attempt on Adolf Hitler on July 20, 1944 , Ernst was arrested and sentenced to two years in prison on April 17, 1945 . His undoing was that the conspirators around Carl Friedrich Goerdeler and Ludwig Beck had designated him for a post as State Secretary after the planned overthrow of Hitler because of his professional aptitude and connections to Hjalmar Schacht . However, just a few days after his imprisonment in the Lehrter Strasse cell prison , he was released on April 25, 1945 during the Battle of Berlin .

Federal Republic

After the war, as head of the Berlin Currency Commission in 1948, Ernst played a key role in the preparation and implementation of the currency reform . From 1949 to 1957 he was chairman of the board of directors of the Berlin Central Bank . At Konrad Adenauer's request , he took over management of the Cabinet Committee for Economics from 1951. Today this institution is regarded as a subsidiary economic government in the Federal Chancellery .

From 1952 to 1958 he was chairman of the research advisory board for questions relating to the reunification of Germany . Every appointment of a member required his approval as chairman. On June 21, 1954, a small currency group met for the first time at the Bank deutscher Länder. Ernst chaired its meetings and decided on its composition. The task of this institution was to draw up proposals for the individual processes involved in a currency conversion for the day of reunification. The GDR civil rights activist Daniela Dahn reports that a plan corresponding to these proposals was presented at a meeting of the Central Bank Council 13 days after the fall of the Berlin Wall . He had planned the introduction of the D-Mark in the GDR.

From 1950 to 1960 Ernst was a member of the AEG Supervisory Board as chairman . In the 1950s he lived in Hamburg at Wentzelstrasse 10 and in Berlin-Nikolassee at Teutonenstrasse 15.

Grave site (right side)

He is buried in the Evangelical Churchyard Nikolassee .

Awards

See also

literature

Web links

Commons : Friedrich Ernst  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Daniela Dahn : We are the state! Reinbek b. Hamburg 2013, p. 105.
  2. ↑ Announcement of awards of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany. In: Federal Gazette . Vol. 3, No. 250, December 29, 1951.
personal data
SURNAME Ernst, Friedrich
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German lawyer, administrator, banker and politician
DATE OF BIRTH June 9, 1889
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin
DATE OF DEATH November 28, 1960
Place of death Berlin