Friedrich Fritz (resistance fighter)

Friedrich Fritz (born September 20, 1888 in Albrechts OT von Suhl ; † April 19, 1945 near Flossenbürg ) was a communist resistance fighter against fascism who succumbed to the inhumane transport conditions on the death march from Ichtershausen to Flossenbürg.

Life

After attending primary school , he learned to be a lathe operator. He became politically active at an early stage, was a member of the Freethinkers Association , the German Metalworkers Association (DMV) and the KPD . He took part in the fighting against the Kapp Putsch and was a member of the action committee calling for a general strike . He found trust among his work colleagues at the Mercedes plant in Suhl and was elected to the works council by them . In 1931 he and other communists were put on the management's list of dismissals. In 1932 the Albrechtser KPD members procured a typewriter and a photocopier, on which they published the village newspaper “Der Besenbinder” until it was confiscated in April 1933. In the March elections in 1933, the KPD provided seven community representatives , including Friedrich Fritz. He did not find out until later, however, as he had already been admitted to “ protective custody ” in Untermaßfeld on March 7th . After his release, he signed a lapel confirming that he would no longer be politically active. However, he did not feel bound by this declaration, but continued his educational work until the Gestapo arrest on June 8, 1944, during which 13 people from Albrechts were arrested, Fritz directly at his workplace in the Reitz & Recknagel workshop. Tied up and blindfolded, he was taken to the former Suhl Gendarmerie School and from there by truck to the Ichtershausen State Penitentiary . After the order to evacuate the concentration camps and penal institutions in March 1945, he and the other prisoners from Ichtershausen were also set on a march to the Czech Republic and from there to Flossenbürg, a route that some prisoners had already taken to escape. However, he was already too weak and was therefore transported in the column by his fellow prisoners August Weiß and Kurt Köhler lying on a cart. Here he died totally weakened. The rest of the column was driven on towards Dachau .

Friedrich Fritz married Anna Bries and had three children. Erich, the son of Friedrich Fritz, later found out that April 19, 1945 was entered in the registry office as the date of death.

memory

A memorial stone commemorates him at the Albrechtser Friedhof Am Bock.

literature

• Gerd Kaiser (ed.), Upright and strong , in it Elke Pudszuhn with a memory of Friedrich Fritz, p. 36ff.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Memorials for the Victims of National Socialism II, p. 885