Gotthart Ammerlahn

Gotthart Ammerlahn (born February 1, 1907 in Berlin , † after 1945) was a German journalist. After switching from the Bündische Jugend to the Hitler Youth in 1929 , he made a name for himself as the person responsible for the Nazi youth press towards the end of the Weimar Republic . After the National Socialist “ seizure of power ” Ammerlahn carried out a campaign against leaders of the Bundische Jugend in the ranks of the Hitler Youth.

Life

The son of grammar school professor Georg Ammerlahn attended a grammar school in Berlin-Steglitz from 1913 to 1918 and a grammar school from 1918 to 1925. After graduating from high school, he studied history, geography and geopolitics at the University of Berlin from 1925 to 1931. He was involved in the Young National Federation (Junabu) and joined the NSDAP on June 1, 1928 (membership number 89.720). In 1929 he joined the Hitler Youth (HJ) and transferred the Mark Brandenburg organization of Junabu to the HJ. Originally he belonged to the resistance group around Ernst Niekisch , but soon swung to the party line. In 1933 Ammerlahn resigned from the party, only to rejoin in March 1934.

Ammerlahn initially worked as the NSS lead manager for Berlin-Brandenburg and in December 1929 became editor of Der Aufmarsch , the central organ of the NS student union. In this magazine Ammerlahn dealt extremely sharply with the other youth associations represented at the secondary schools, both with the denominational groups and the associations of the youth movement . From August 1931 he acted as the Gaupressewart of the HJ Berlin and in December 1931, as the successor to Johannes Schlecht, became the main editor of both the NS youth publishing house and the entire NS youth press. At that time, this included around six HJ magazines such as Der Junge Sturmtrupp , Der Junge Nationalozialist , the Jungvolkblatt and the student magazine Die deutsche Zukunft , from 1932 Wille und Macht . He also worked as a press officer or press officer at Department II of the Hitler Youth Reichsleitung or the Reich Youth Leader and the National Socialist Student Union. Ammerlahn's columns were notorious and led to a court case in 1931 after a particularly sharp attack on Gustav Stresemann .

In the autumn of 1933 Ammerlahn was appointed Obergebietsführer and used as the leader of HJ-Obergebiet 1 (East) in Potsdam . The HJ offices in East Prussia, Brandenburg, Silesia and Berlin were subordinate to him. In this function he organized a large-scale action with a house search against Eberhard Koebel and other leaders of the dj 1.11 . The aim was to eliminate all Bund leaders in the ranks of the Hitler Youth and also the Günther Wolff publishing house . In August 1934, the office of the Obergebietsführer Ost was dissolved. Ammerlahn undertook a one and a half year trip around the world, was honorably dismissed from the service of the Hitler Youth in November 1937 and started working for Adrian von Renteln in the German Cooperative Association . During the Second World War he was an area leader for special use by the Reich Youth Leader.

After the Second World War, Ammerlahn worked as deputy editor-in-chief of the neutralist weekly newspaper Neue Politik from Wolf Schenke .

literature

• Michael Buddrus : Total education for total war. Hitler Youth and National Socialist Youth Policy. Saur, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-598-11615-2 .
• Tatjana Schruttke: The youth press of the National Socialism . Böhlau, Cologne 1997.

Web links

• Minutes of the conversation between Mr. Gotthart Ammerlahn and Dr. Freiherr von Siegler on behalf of the IfZ Munich, January 10, 1952. ( PDF )

Individual evidence

1. ^ ^{A b} Hans-Christian Brandenburg: The history of the HJ. Paths and wrong turns of a generation . Verlag Wissenschaft und Politik, Cologne 1982, p. 49.
2. ^ Peter D. Stachura: Nazi Youth in the Weimar Republic . Clio, Oxford 1975, p. 188.
3. ↑ Hans-Christian Brandenburg: The history of the HJ. Paths and wrong turns of a generation . Verlag Wissenschaft und Politik, Cologne 1982, p. 203.