Grete Groh-Kummerlöw

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Grete Groh-Kummerlöw , born Margarete Gertrud Groh, (born February 6, 1909 in Plauen , † February 16, 1980 in Karl-Marx-Stadt ) was a German politician. In the Weimar Republic in 1930 she entered the Saxon state parliament for the KPD , making her the youngest member of parliament in Germany. During the time of National Socialism she offered resistance. She represented the FDGB in the Presidium of the People's Chamber for many years .

Life

Weimar Republic and Third Reich

Grete Groh-Kummerlöw was the seventh of nine children of a working class family from Plauen. After attending primary school, from 1924 on, she initially worked as an unskilled worker in the Plauen embroidery works. She joined the German Textile Workers' Association at the age of 16 and began to get involved in politics. In 1927 she became a member of the KVJD and in 1930 she became a member of the KPD. In 1930 she became the youngest member of the Saxon state parliament in Germany. From 1931 Groh-Kummerlöw devoted himself full-time to politics and became organizational manager and instructor for the KJVD district managements in Dresden and Leipzig. After the " seizure of power " by the National Socialists, she initially continued to work illegally as an instructor for the youth association. However, she was arrested in Bitterfeld on June 28, 1933 and initially taken into protective custody. On June 8, 1934, she was sentenced to one year and eight months in prison before the Dresden Higher Regional Court for “preparing for high treason” . She served this sentence in Waldheim penitentiary. After her release from prison in November 1935, Groh-Kummerlöw was placed under police supervision and initially found no work. After a short time in agriculture, she returned to the Plauen textile industry in 1936. After the birth of her son in 1940, she was a housewife and from 1943 again had closer ties to the KPD. Through Kurt Sindermann she made contact with the resistance group around Anton Saefkow . In connection with the events of the assassination attempt on July 20, 1944 , Groh-Kummerlöw was arrested again on August 10, 1944 and again charged with preparing for high treason. On February 9, 1945, she was transferred to Potsdam to try her there before the “ People's Court ”. This did not take place anymore due to the worsening war situation. On April 27, 1945 Grete Groh-Kummerlöw was liberated by soldiers of the Red Army.

SBZ and GDR

At first she worked in Potsdam for the Soviet headquarters. In August 1945 she returned to Plauen in her Vogtland homeland and immediately began to get involved in a union again. She worked as a secretary for the KPD district leadership in Plauen and was responsible for the formation of communist company cells and the establishment of trade unions. In January 1946, Groh-Kummerlöw, as a member of the state board of the textile workers' association, received a mandate as third chairwoman of the FDGB state board of Saxony. In this function she also became a member of the federal executive committee of the FDGB in February 1946, to which she belonged until 1963. In May 1949 Groh-Kummerlöw moved to Berlin and became head of the social policy department in the federal executive committee of the FDGB. After the 3rd FDGB Congress in 1950, she was head of the workers' supply department. The core area of ​​this department was trade union social policy. In addition, she was elected as a member of the General Council of the Communist World Trade Union Federation in 1950. In 1952 she also took over responsibility for social security from Adolf Deter, and she played a key role in its reorganization. In 1957 Groh-Kummerlöw switched to the local business union as secretary of the central executive committee, before she worked as secretary of the FDGB parliamentary group from 1958 to 1966.

In 1946, Grete Groh-Kummerlöw took part in the unification party congresses of the KPD and SPD in Saxony and in the Soviet occupation zone and became a member of the SED's state executive committee . She ran for the SED in the first Saxon state elections after the end of the war and was a member of the state parliament and a member of the presidium of the Saxon state parliament. In December 1949 she left the Saxon state parliament due to her move to Berlin, where she had lived since May 1949. She had previously delegated the party to study at the state party school in Ottendorf . With her move to Berlin, Groh-Kummerlöw also began to work as a member of the German People's Council as a member of the FDGB. With the first Volkskammer election in 1950, Groh-Kummerlöw moved into the Presidium of the Volkskammer. As a member of the FDGB between 1954 and 1967, she held the office of Vice President or Deputy President of the People's Chamber. For health reasons, she gave up all full-time positions in 1967, but was a member of the People's Chamber for the FDGB until 1971.

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personal data
SURNAME Groh-Kummerlöw, Grete
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Groh, Margarete Gertrud
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German trade unionist and politician (KPD, SED), MdV, member of the Presidium of the People's Chamber
DATE OF BIRTH February 6, 1909
PLACE OF BIRTH Plauen
DATE OF DEATH February 16, 1980
Place of death Karl Marx City