Fritz-August Wilhelm Markmann

Fritz-August Wilhelm Markmann (born September 23, 1899 in Perleberg ; † March 13, 1949 in Ebstorf / Lower Saxony) was Lord Mayor of Magdeburg from 1933 to 1945 .

Life

The son of a master saddler grew up in Perleberg in western Brandenburg, where he also finished his school years with the Abitur. Immediately afterwards, his military service began, during which he was used, among other things, as an interpreter in a prisoner of war camp in the province of Saxony. After the end of the war, Markmann started studying medicine in Berlin , which he broke off again to study law in Jena . He successfully completed this with a doctorate in 1922.

After having worked as a company lawyer in Bitterfeld and Berlin for three years , he took on a leading position in the Magdeburg medium-sized business association in 1925. Even at this time he was politically active, initially in the economic party. In October 1931 he became a member of the NSDAP , initially not playing an important role there, because his party only placed him in 19th place on the list of candidates for the election of the Magdeburg city council. However, it was enough to become a city councilor.

On March 22, 1933, the Mayor of Magdeburg, Ernst Reuter, was removed from his office by the National Socialists, and the Prussian state government replaced the convinced National Socialist Markmann, as he was expected to have the necessary expertise based on his previous career. The formal election took place on July 6, 1933. In the following years he proved to be primarily a far-sighted economic expert, when he set the expansion of the commercial port in motion, took the initiative for connecting Magdeburg to the motorway and the Mittelland Canal and took the urgently needed Housing construction continued. As part of the National Socialist system, he was also responsible for the abolition of democratic structures in the city administration and exercised his office in an authoritarian manner.

In the course of the transfiguration of German history in the Third Reich, he turned intensively to the development of Magdeburg city law , published numerous papers on this and founded an institute in 1940 under the direction of Theodor Goerlitz to research Magdeburg law . The City History Museum was set up at his instigation as early as 1933.

The beginning of the Second World War stopped his other big plans, such as the construction of a new bridge over the river and the east-west main line. In the face of the destruction of his city by the heavy bombing raids, he increasingly turned away from National Socialism and sought contact with progressive forces, such as the Mayor of Leipzig, Carl Friedrich Goerdeler . In April 1945 he tried in vain to prevent the senseless defense of Magdeburg.

After the Americans marched into the city, Markmann, who, unlike others in charge, had stayed in the city, was arrested and interned. After he was released in September 1946, he moved to live with relatives in Ebstorf in Lower Saxony. The local denazification commission classified him as a “fellow traveler”. Until his death he worked as a commercial clerk.

literature

• Manfred Wille: Markmann, Fritz-August Wilhelm. In: Guido Heinrich, Gunter Schandera (ed.): Magdeburg Biographical Lexicon 19th and 20th centuries. Biographical lexicon for the state capital Magdeburg and the districts of Bördekreis, Jerichower Land, Ohrekreis and Schönebeck. Scriptum, Magdeburg 2002, ISBN 3-933046-49-1 .

Web links

• Literature by and about Fritz-August Wilhelm Markmann in the catalog of the German National Library
• Fritz-August Wilhelm Markmann in the Magdeburg Biographical Lexicon