Fritz Mende

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Fritz Mende around 1872.

Fritz Mende (actually Friedrich Mende ) (born October 26, 1843 in Liebemühl , Königsberg district ; † July 3, 1879 in Homburg ) was an early social democratic politician, president of the Lassalleschen Allgemeine Deutsche Arbeitserverein (LADAV) and a member of the North German Reichstag .

Live and act

Mende's father was the doctor or, according to other reports, the village school teacher Karl Mende. Mende may have entered a teacher training college after leaving school before working as a clerk in retail. (The uncertainties in the early biography were connected with the attempt to create legends and contradictions in Mendes' police files.) He lived in Berlin from 1861 and kept himself afloat with casual work and as a local reporter. A number of newspapers dismissed Mende after a short period of time for being unreliable. In 1861 he was arrested and expelled from Berlin because of his debts. Mende did not have to do military service because of his unsuitability. On November 15, 1866, Mende joined the General German Workers' Association ( ADAV ) in Dresden without initially showing off.

As part of the association, he came into contact with Countess Hatzfeldt . Since then he has lived on their money and has been active in the labor movement on their behalf. In his appearances he tried to imitate Ferdinand Lassalle's habitus as an intellectual and has even at times assumed a doctorate. Since the claim and reality did not match, this earned him multiple ridicule from the press.

As a follower and at times significant Countess Hatzfeldt he was among the founders of the split from the ADAV Lassalle General German Workers' Association ( LADAV ). In July 1867, Mende initially took over the actual management of the association from Friedrich Wilhelm Emil Försterling . In 1868 he assumed the nominal presidency. In the course of his agitation for the LADAV, he was convicted for the first time in 1868 for an incident in Düsseldorf .

In February 1869 four Saxon members of the Reichstag, including Friedrich Raimund Sachße (constituency VIII, Old Liberals ) and Hermann Schreck (constituency IX, German Progressive Party ), resigned from their seats. In the by-election to the Reichstag election in August 1867 , Mende received 1732 votes (25%) in constituency VIII ( Pirna ), but Arthur Eysoldt (German Progressive Party) received the mandate in this constituency. In the IX. Constituency ( Freiberg - Oederan ) won against Mende in the runoff election against Ludwig von Burgsdorff . with 5615 votes against Ludwig von Burgsdorff ( Conservative Party ) with 4488 votes. Mende moved to Berlin and handed over the presidium or vice-presidium of the LADAV to Heinrich Nendel , who moved the headquarters from Dresden to Leipzig.

The arrest of Mendes because of a riot in Mönchen-Gladbach on April 4, 1869, because the police had arrested him as a member of parliament despite his immunity, caused a greater stir . He was only released again after the intervention of the Reichstag. In 1872 these events led to a sentence of six months in prison, which Mende did not have to serve due to illness.

On June 16, 1869, JB von Schweitzer and Mende decided to unite their organizations on the basis of the statute of 1863 and announced this in the Social Democrat on June 18, under the heading "Restoring the unity of the Lassalean party". In her will of July 23, 1869, Countess Hatzfeld determined that Mende should write and publish her biography after her death. Mende died from her.

On November 28, 1870, August Bebel , Wilhelm Liebknecht , Friedrich Wilhelm Fritzsche , Heinrich Ewald , Reinhold Schraps , Schweitzer and Mende voted against the war credits for the Franco-German War .

The last few years of Mendes have been overshadowed by numerous illnesses which forced him to interrupt his political activities. The side effects of the administered morphine made his health worse . The attempt to enter the Reichstag of the new German Reich in 1871 failed. As a result, his health deteriorated more and more. In 1873 Mende gave up his position in the LADAV, which in fact no longer existed. About a year later, Countess Hatzfeldt and Mende moved into a house in Heddernheim to look after Mende, who was now highly addicted to morphine.

In the Reichstag election in 1871 , Mende ran for the last time for the Reichstag in Gladbach . He received 2046 votes there, and Franz Josef Kratz was elected with 7797 votes.

In June 1872 the Free Newspaper had to stop publishing it. The LADAV was practically dead. Friedrich Mende died on July 3, 1879 in Bad Homburg of natural causes.

Publications

  • Political sins. Novel from Russian history 1742. Grunow, Leipzig 1865. Digitized
  • A hazard of love. Novella . In: The Bazaar. Illustrirte of the women's newspaper . Bazar AG, Berlin 1866. XII. Vol. 32, August 23, 1866, pp. 258-260. MDZ reader
  • Mr. JB von Schweitzer and the organization of the Lassalle'schen General German Workers' Association. An application to the board. Publishing house of the Lassalle'schen General German Workers' Association, Leipzig 1869.
  • Restoration of the unity of the Lassalle party. signed F. Mende, JB v. Schweitzer. In: Free newspaper of the Lassalle'schen General German Workers' Association. Leipzig 1869 from June 18, 1869.
  • Organizational issues. In: Free newspaper of the Lassalle'schen General German Workers' Association. Leipzig No. 95 of October 23, 1869 and No. 96 of October 30, 1869.
  • The General German Workers Insurance Cooperative. Publishing house of the Lassalle'schen General German Workers' Association, Leipzig 1870.

literature

  • The petticoat in world history. In: soap bubbles. Humorous-satyrical Sunday paper . Dresden 1868, No. 26 of June 28, 1868, p. 102 and p. 103. Digitized
  • A new refrain . In: Kladderadatsch of May 23, 1869.
  • Heinrich Gröteken: Mr. Fritz Mende and his principles. A word to characterize social democracy and to enlighten the people. Schwann, Cologne / Neuss 1871.
  • August Bebel : From my life . Edited by Ursula Hermann with the assistance of Wilfried Henze and Ruth Rüdiger. Dietz Verlag, Berlin 1983 (= August Bebel. Selected speeches and writings . Volume 6), pp. 132, 162, 164 f., 171, 225 f., 230-233, 235, 237, 251, 257, 260, 308 , 321.
  • Ernst Heilmann : History of the labor movement in Chemnitz and the Erzgebirge . Social Democratic Association for the 16th Saxon Reichtagswahlkreis, Chemnitz 1912, pp. 22–55. Saxony digital
  • Gustav Mayer : Johann Baptist von Schweitzer and the social democracy. A contribution to the history of the German labor movement. Gustav Fischer, Jena 1909, pp. 273, 296 f., 312 ff., 319, 324, 328, 345, 351 f., 355, 438, 447.Digitalized archive.org
  • August Bebel : From my life. Edited by Ursula Hermann with the collaboration of Wilfried Henze and Ruth Rüdiger. Diertz Verlag, Berlin 1983. (= August Bebel. Selected speeches and writings. Volume 6).
  • Werner Ettelt, Hans-Dieter Krause: The struggle for a union policy in the German labor movement from 1868 to 1878 . Verlag Tribüne, Berlin 1975, pp. 132, 142-143, 148-149, 155, 208-211.
  • Dieter Fricke : The German labor movement. 1869-1914. A manual about their organization and activity in the class struggle. Dietz Verlag, Berlin 1976, pp. 62, 71, 84-86, 378, 555.
  • Protocols and materials of the General German Workers' Association (including splinter groups). Reprint ed. by Dieter Dowe . JHW Dietz Nachf., Berlin, Bonn 1980. ISBN 978-3801-22094-5
  • Christine Kling-Mathey: Countess Hatzfeldt. 1805 to 1881. A biography. JHW Dietz Nachf, Bonn 1989. ISBN 3-8012-0142-2 , pp. 196 ff, 200 f., 203-207, 211, 224 f., 230, 247, 298-305, 308 f.
  • Toni Offermann: The first German workers' party. Organization, distribution and social structure of ADAV and LADAV 1863-1871. JHW Dietz Nachf, Bonn 2002, ISBN 3-8012-4122-X , pp. 170–176 (book edition + CD-ROM).

Web links

Commons : Fritz Mende  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ listing of Julius Nöthing. Leipzig in August 1872. In: The presence . No. 32, Berlin 1872, p. 144. Digitized
  2. ↑ Untitled . In: Augsburger Abendzeitung . No. 190 , July 12, 1879, p. 3 , middle column at the bottom of the last paragraph ( MDZ reader [accessed October 31, 2019]): “The well-known social democrat Fritz Mende, whose death was reported from Homburg, was, as the Homburg“ Taunusbote ”reports, had been very much for a long time suffering and lately in a continued violent nervous excitement. The consumption of morphine, which had previously been recommended to him by a doctor and which he was no longer able to renounce, increased this pathological state to the point of threatening mental disturbance. On Thursday July 3rd, a heartbeat brought his life to an abrupt end. The deceased was born in Königsberg [( sic !)], Where his father was a medical officer. He reached an age of only 35 [(sic! Also in the death certificate)] years and leaves an elderly mother behind. The “Berl. B.-K. "writes about him: Fritz Mende was one of the most unsympathetic figures in the ranks of the Social Democrats, yes - he never had any validity among his own party comrades and after a short time was also thoroughly hated by them."
  3. ↑ In the Berlin address books 1861, 1862 and 1863 he is not listed there because he was probably only a subtenant.
  4. ↑ Facsimile of the membership card in: Toni Offermann: The first German workers' party. Organization, distribution and social structure of ADAV and LADAV 1863-1871 , p. 170.
  5. ^ Paul Lindau : Harmless letters from a German small town dweller. Payne, Leipzig 1870, p. 36 ( books.google.de ).
  6. ↑ "The Lause-Mende of the old Hatzfeldt used to be a wandering improviser and declamator , a piece of cattle that belonged to the Lumpenproletariat through and through." ( Karl Marx to Friedrich Engels May 8, 1869 Marx-Engels-Werke , volume 32, p. 316 .)
  7. ^ Toni Offermann: The first German workers' party. Organization, distribution and social structure of ADAV and LADAV 1863-1871 , p. 178.
  8. ↑ Wolfgang Schröder : Leipzig - the cradle of the German labor movement. Roots and development of the workers' education association 1848/49 - 1878/81 . Karl Dietz Verlag, Berlin 2010. ISBN 978-3-320-02214-3 , p. 166.
  9. ↑ Dieter Fricke: The German labor movement. 1869-1914. A manual about their organization and activity in the class struggle. P. 555.
  10. ↑ Democratic weekly paper . No. 13 of March 27, 1869, p. 147.
  11. ^ A. Phillips: The Reichstag elections from 1867-1883. Statistics of the elections to the constituent and north German Reichstag, to the customs parliament, as well as to the first five legislative periods of the German Reichstag . Louis Kerschels Verlag-Buchhandlung, Berlin 1883, p. 138. Digitalized archive.org.
  12. ↑ "If a 'Reichstag deputy' was recently arrested, and he would still be in prison today if the National Liberals hadn't been convinced by Bismarck's smile of the harmlessness of the 'martyr'." ( The Leipzig High Treason Trial of 1872. New edition by Karl-Heinz Leidigkeit, Rütten & Loening, Berlin 1960, p. 246.)
  13. ↑ Rudolf von Bennigsen's motion to release Mendes was accepted by the Reichstag at 107 to 90. (Hans Blum: Personal memories of Prince Bismarck, Albert Langen, Munich 1900, p. 49. Digitized version)
  14. ↑ Allgemeine Zeitung. Augsburg No. 36 of February 5, 1870.
  15. ↑ Berlin Court Newspaper No. 66 of June 11, 1872.
  16. ↑ August Bebel: From my life. Pp. 230-231.
  17. ↑ The article also appeared in the Freie Zeitung at the same time . (Christine Kling-Mathey: Countess Hatzfeldt. 1805 to 1881. A biography. P. 200 ff.)
  18. ^ Christine Kling-Mathey: Countess Hatzfeldt. 1805 to 1881. A biography. P. 303 f.
  19. ↑ Wolfgang Schröder: Leipzig - the cradle of the German labor movement. Roots and Development of the Workers' Education Association 1848/49 - 1878/81 , p. 132.
  20. ↑ August Bebel: From my life , p. 321.
  21. ↑ "Mende was a hollow head, who in the Countess's service had so physically lowered himself that he dared not speak without an injection of morphine, and he ended his speeches with the words: 'I have spoken,' which always aroused great amusement in the Reichstag. "(August Bebel: From my life , p. 321.)
  22. ^ A. Phillips: The Reichstag elections from 1867-1883. Statistics of the elections to the constituent and north German Reichstag, to the customs parliament, as well as to the first five legislative periods of the German Reichstag . Louis Kerschels Verlags-Buchhandlung, Berlin 1883, p. 106. Digitalized archive.org.
  23. ↑ Death entry No. 98/1879 from July 4, 1879.
  24. ↑ "In 1879 Mende took his own life with a firearm" (Toni Offermann: The first German workers' party. Organization, distribution and social structure of ADAV and LADAV 1863-1871 does not name any source for the suicide.)
  25. ↑ Christine Kling-Mathey assumes that Sophie von Hatzfeldt influenced the text considerably. ( Christine Kling-Mathey: Countess Hatzfeldt. 1805 to 1881. A biography , p. 301.)
  26. ↑ Heinrich Gröteken in the lexicon Westphalian authors
personal data
SURNAME Mende, Fritz
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Mende, Friedrich (birth name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German social democratic politician, President of the Lassallescher General German Workers' Association
DATE OF BIRTH October 26, 1843
PLACE OF BIRTH Liebemühl
DATE OF DEATH July 3, 1879
Place of death Homburg