Gau Silesia

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Gaue of the German Reich 1944

The Gau Schlesien was an administrative unit of the NSDAP . In 1941 it was divided into the Gau Oberschlesien and the Gau Lower Silesia , after Upper Silesia had been expanded to include the areas in Eastern Upper Silesia annexed in 1939 . In addition to Eastern Upper Silesia and the rest of the (formerly Austrian-Silesian) area of ​​the Autonomous Silesian Voivodeship and the Hultschiner Ländchen , which was reintegrated in 1939, the new Gau also included Lesser Poland areas with the z. B. cities Sosnowitz , Krenau and Jaworzno , which belonged to the administrative district Katowice of the Prussian province of Upper Silesia .

History and structure

Gaue of the NSDAP 1926, 1928, 1933, 1937, 1939 and 1943

The Gau was established in 1925 under the Gauleiter Helmuth Brückner , who was deposed in 1934 in connection with the Röhm affair . His successor Josef Wagner was also recalled in May 1940 because he did not appear sufficiently hostile to the Church and too friendly to Poland, but remained Gauleiter in Gau Westfalen-Süd until November 1941 . In the area of ​​Gau Oberschlesien there were large concentration camps, including the Auschwitz concentration camp with numerous satellite camps , in the area of ​​Lower Silesia was the Groß-Rosen concentration camp .

On the state side, there was the Prussian Province of Lower Silesia and Province of Upper Silesia , which from 1938 to 1941 were combined in the Province of Silesia . In Silesia there were Reichstag constituencies 7, 8, 9 - which corresponded to the administrative districts of Liegnitz , Breslau and Opole . Hermann Göring had been Reichsstatthalter for Prussia since 1933 ; the tasks were carried out by the respective upper presidents , who were identical to the Gauleiters, which removed the boundaries between state and party. Josef Wagner was senior president for all of Silesia from 1938 to 1941 and since the beginning of the war in 1939 he was Reich Defense Commissioner in District VIII. In early October 1933, Josef Adamczyk took over the post of governor of the province of Upper Silesia. In addition, from December 1936 to March 1937 he was provisional district president in the Opole district . From March 1938 to February 1941 he was governor of the Province of Silesia and then until the end of the Second World War of the Province of Lower Silesia.

The Gauleitung had its seat in Breslau, Eichbornstrasse 2. In the Gau Oberschlesien Katowitz became the Gau capital. The deputy Gauleiter Gottschalk was Gau inspector from October 1935 (until October 1, 1937). Before 1933, the lawyer Willy Gaertner was managing director and later Gauamtsleiter of the legal department. The SS leader Erich von dem Bach-Zelewski was responsible for the south-east border section in the Gau, and as the local commissioner for the consolidation of German nationality (since November 7, 1939), he ordered the construction of the Auschwitz I concentration camp. In April 1935 Erwin Schramm became Gauamtsleiter in the important Gauamt for local politics. Paul Roden was the managing director from 1936 to 1941, then Gauamtsleiter for ethnic issues in Upper Silesia. The mayor of Katowice, Hans Tiessler, was head of the district in Upper Silesia. Wolfgang Graf Yorck von Wartenburg was there for a time Gauamtsleiter for Eastern issues. Dr. Fritz Arlt headed the Racial Political Office and the Central Institute for State Research in Upper Silesia and was also head of the Upper Silesia branch of the Reich Commissioner for the Consolidation of German Ethnicity . The Wroclaw Chamber of Commerce and Industry President Otto Fitzner was a regional economic consultant . Gaufführer schools existed near Liegnitz and in Schloss Bischwitz ( Trebnitz district ) near Hundsfeld . In Weidenhof near Breslau there was another Gau training camp used by the NS teachers' association .

The power of the Gauleiter grew with the new tasks in the war: Bracht became Gau Housing Commissioner for Upper Silesia , Gau Commissioner for the “ Reich Commissioner for the Consolidation of German Ethnicity ”, from April 6, 1942 commissioner of the “General Plenipotentiary for Labor Deployment”, Fritz Sauckel , and from the November 16, 1942 Reich Defense Commissioner . On September 25, 1944, he took command of the Volkssturm . After a heart attack in January 1945, after which he went to the hospital in Neisse , he had to leave the official business to the deputy Metzner.

Administrative districts and counties in the Upper Silesia Gau (1943)

Gauleiter in Gau Silesia were:

Deputy Gauleiter were:

Head of Lower Silesia :

      • Richard Türk (August 1, 1931 - August 31, 1932)
      • Walter Gottschalk (September 1, 1932 - October 1, 1934)

in Untergau Central Silesia :

in Untergau Upper Silesia :

Gauleiter in the Gau Lower Silesia was

Gauleiter in Gau Oberschlesien was

  • Fritz Bracht (January 27, 1941 - May 9, 1945)

Were deputies in the Gau Oberschlesien

literature

  • Michael D. Miller & Andreas Schulz: Gauleiter: The Regional Leaders of the Nazi Party and Their Deputies , Volume I, R. James Bender Publishing, 2012.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Address book NSDAP 1940
  2. Photo Schloss Bischwitz
  3. Andreas Kraaß: Teacher warehouse 1932-1945