Friedrich Karl von Eberstein

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Karl von Eberstein (right), Police President of Munich, after signing the Munich Agreement on September 30, 1938
Enlarged detail, Karl von Eberstein, 1938

Friedrich Karl Freiherr von Eberstein (born January 14, 1894 in Halle (Saale) , † February 10, 1979 in Tegernsee ) was a German politician (NSDAP) , police officer and SS leader. During the time of National Socialism he was a member of the Reichstag of the NSDAP, SS-Obergruppenführer and General of the Waffen-SS and the Police , Police President of Munich and Higher SS and Police Leader (HSSPF).

Life

Origin and military career

Eberstein's father was the Prussian major Ernst Freiherr von Eberstein . Karl von Eberstein was educated from 1904 to 1912 in the royal Prussian cadet institution in Naumburg (Saale) and in the main cadet institution in Groß-Lichterfelde near Berlin. Since Eberstein could not do military service for health reasons, he studied agriculture and economics at the University of Halle from 1913 to 1914 . In his youth Eberstein met Reinhard Heydrich , who was ten years his junior ; Eberstein's mother was Heydrich's godmother.

At the beginning of the First World War in August 1914, Eberstein volunteered as a war volunteer. From November 1914 to February 1915 he was a non-commissioned officer in the Mansfeld Field Artillery Regiment No. 75 . After a training course at the field artillery shooting school in Jüterbog , Eberstein was deployed from September 1915 to November 1918 in the 2nd Pomeranian Field Artillery Regiment No. 17 on the Western Front. Eberstein served as a regimental adjutant, as a balloon observer and finally as a battery leader. He was promoted to lieutenant in the reserve on November 25, 1915 and was awarded both classes of the Iron Cross .

In the Weimar Republic

After the end of the war, Eberstein was part of the Reichswehr : from February to May 1919 he was in the Halle Volunteer Regiment and in the Landjäger Volunteer Corps. From April to July 1920 Eberstein led the III. Battery of the Reichswehr Artillery Regiment 16 in Wittenberg , then he left the Reichswehr for good. From 1918 to 1920 he was a member of the German National People's Party (DNVP). Eberstein was one of the founders of the Halle local group of the steel helmet and remained an active member until 1924. At the same time he was involved in the Freikorps : in 1919 and 1920 he was a member of the Freikorps Roßbach and there the adjutant of Wolf-Heinrich von Helldorff . In March 1920 he took part in the Kapp Putsch in Berlin . During the March fighting in Central Germany in 1921, Eberstein was a voluntary sergeant in the police force. From May to September 1921 he was a company commander and regimental commander of the Self-Protection Oberschlesien (SSOS), an association of German free corps during the uprisings in Upper Silesia .

For financial reasons, Eberstein was unable to resume his studies that had been interrupted before the First World War. That is why he worked temporarily as an apprentice at the Halle branch of the Commerz- und Privatbank from the end of 1919 to March 1920 . In 1923 and 1924 he found a job as a commercial clerk at the Leunawerke , after which he worked in agriculture until 1926.

In October 1922 Eberstein joined the “Notbund Halle”, a forerunner organization of the NSDAP . Between 1924 and 1925 he led the " Frontbann " in Naumburg , a cover organization of the SA, which was banned at the time . At the same time he was chief of staff and troop adviser for the group center of the front line in Halle. On August 17, 1925, Eberstein joined the NSDAP ( membership number 15,067), at the same time he was an SA man. On November 30, 1925, he left the NSDAP because he had found work as an employee of the army administration at the command office of the military training area at Ohrdruf . Because of his former membership in the NSDAP, he was dismissed by the Reichswehr in 1927 .

On December 17, 1927, Karl von Eberstein married Helene Meinel-Scholer (1892–1969), the daughter of a manufacturer from Klingenthal . The marriage produced a son. From 1928 to 1929, Eberstein ran a wool and cotton factory in Gotha as an independent manufacturer, and later he was the managing director of a travel agency there.

On February 1, 1929, Eberstein rejoined the NSDAP under the old membership number; on April 1, 1929, he also became a member of the SS (SS No. 1,386). On April 12, 1929, he was appointed SS-Sturmführer Adjutant of SS-Staffel VIII "Thuringia" in Weimar. From May 1930 to January 1931 Eberstein was a city councilor in Gotha. From July 1, 1930, he worked full-time as a leader of the SA or SS, initially as an adjutant to the SS-Oberführer in Thuringia, which at that time had the first state government with the participation of the NSDAP. On February 1, 1931, he changed to the staff of the Supreme SA leadership (OSAF); from November 1931 he was also the Gausturmführer for Munich-Upper Bavaria. Eberstein, who was promoted to SA group leader on September 15, 1932, led the SA group "Hochland" in Munich from July 1, 1932.

1933 to 1945

After the " seizure of power " by the National Socialists, Eberstein moved from the SA back to the SS on February 20, 1933. On February 21, 1933, he took over SS-Group Leader XVIII in Weimar; From November 15, 1933, he led the SS upper section "Middle", initially based in Weimar. This upper section was later moved to Dresden and renamed "Elbe"; Eberstein led him until April 1, 1936.

In the elections on March 5, 1933 , Eberstein was elected to the Reichstag . He retained the mandate of the Reichstag, which was meaningless in the National Socialist German Reich , until the end of the Second World War . From October 20, 1933 to December 29, 1934 Eberstein was State Councilor and member of the Thuringian state government. From July 1934 to December 1938 he was appointed as a people's judge at the People's Court as a loyal high-ranking party official . After changing to Dresden Eberstein was from December 1934 to March 1936 District Chief of Dresden-Bautzen.

On April 1, 1936, Eberstein was transferred to Munich . He had previously been promoted to SS-Obergruppenführer on January 30, 1936 . In Munich, Eberstein took over the office of police chief until October 1, 1942, and became the leader of the SS upper section "South" there. Until December 17, 1942, he was also in charge of the SS upper section "Main" in Nuremberg. On December 15, 1937, Eberstein was also head of the police department in the Bavarian Ministry of the Interior . With the introduction of the function of Higher SS and Police Leader (HSSPF), he took over this post for Military District VII in Munich on March 12, 1938 , and also for Military District XIII in Nuremberg until December 17, 1942 . As HSSPF, from November 1, 1939, Eberstein was also “Supreme Court Lord” in his area of ​​responsibility for all SS and police matters, including the Dachau concentration camp . Eberstein was also promoted further during the Second World War, first on April 8, 1941 to General of the Police and on July 1, 1944 to General of the Police and Waffen-SS . On October 1, 1944, he was appointed Higher Commander of the POWs in Military District VII and was thus responsible for the POW camps in this area.

Shortly before the end of the war, Eberstein was relieved of his functions on April 20, 1945 because of “ defeatism ” at the instigation of Martin Bormann and with Heinrich Himmler's consent ; The initiative for this is said to have come from the Munich Gauleiter Paul Giesler . Eberstein is said to have previously rejected the killing of prisoners in the Dachau concentration camp as well as the defense of Munich against the advancing US army .

After the end of the war

Karl von Eberstein was captured by American troops in Munich on May 8, 1945. He was held in various internment camps and prisons until October 26, 1948 , most recently in the Dachau internment camp . On August 3 and 5, 1946, Eberstein was a witness in the Nuremberg trial of the major war criminals . On November 15, 1948, in the course of denazification , he was classified as a “minor offender” in category III by a court in Munich and sentenced to confiscate 30% of his property. There was no prison sentence, as the three and a half years internment by the Allies was taken into account. Several appeal procedures temporarily led to a classification in category II as a “incriminated person”; on February 19, 1953, Eberstein was classified in category IV as a “fellow traveler”. Investigations by the judiciary against Eberstein as the accused had no consequences: An investigation by the Munich Public Prosecutor's Office in 1950 concerned the selection of “intolerable prisoners of war” for - in National Socialist parlance, “ special treatment ” - murder. The case was dropped, as was a second case in 1961.

From 1950 he lived in the city ​​of Tegernsee . Until his retirement , Karl von Eberstein worked as a banker and as a clerk in the reception of the casino in Bad Wiessee .

His written estate is now administered in the Federal Archives .

Awards

See also

literature

  • Ruth Bettina Birn : The higher SS and police leaders: Himmler's representatives in the Reich and in the occupied territories. Droste Verlag, Düsseldorf 1986, ISBN 3-7700-0710-7 .
  • Michael Heim: If the Führer had known that. Friedrich Karl Freiherr von Eberstein, seduced nobleman and silent hero. In: Tegernseer Tal, Heft 162 (2015), pp. 42–47.
  • Ernst Klee : The dictionary of persons on the Third Reich . Who was what before and after 1945 . 2nd Edition. Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2007, ISBN 978-3-596-16048-8 .
  • Joachim Lilla , Martin Döring, Andreas Schulz: extras in uniform: the members of the Reichstag 1933–1945. A biographical manual. Including the Volkish and National Socialist members of the Reichstag from May 1924 . Droste, Düsseldorf 2004, ISBN 3-7700-5254-4 .
  • Martin Schumacher (Ed.): Md R. The Reichstag Members of the Weimar Republic during the National Socialist era: political persecution, emigration and expatriation 1933–1945; a biographical documentation. 3rd, considerably expanded and revised edition, Droste Verlag, Düsseldorf 1994. ISBN 3-7700-5183-1 .
  • Hermann Weiß (Ed.): Biographical Lexicon for the Third Reich . S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 1998, ISBN 3-10-091052-4 .

Web links

Commons : Karl von Eberstein  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Eberstein, Freiherr Friedrich Karl. WW2 Gravestone, Rob Hopmans, accessed August 4, 2015 .
personal data
SURNAME Eberstein, Friedrich Karl von
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Eberstein, Karl von; Eberstein, Friedrich Karl Freiherr von (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German politician (NSDAP), MdR, SS-Obergruppenführer and general of the Waffen-SS
DATE OF BIRTH January 14, 1894
PLACE OF BIRTH Halle (Saale)
DATE OF DEATH February 10, 1979
Place of death Tegernsee