Hans Morgenthal

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Hans Morgenthal (born April 4, 1914 in Berlin , † April 25, 1983 ) was a member of the Ministry for State Security (MfS) of the GDR . In the 1950s he built up the MfS's intelligence department . He was involved in the organization of kidnappings from West Berlin in the eastern sector of the city and was considered one of the most important commanding officers at the head office of the Enlightenment .

Youth, Education and Political Struggle

The son of a carpenter, he was born in Prenzlauer Berg in Berlin in 1914 at Stargarder Strasse 69 on the corner of Pappelallee. In his youth he experienced the political clashes between parties and groups on the streets of Berlin. From 1920 to 1928 he attended elementary school and began training as an electrician. In 1928 he also became a member of the Communist Youth Association of Germany (KJVD). From 1930 he worked for the company Julius Gast KG in Berlin-Lichtenberg near the train station there, which manufactured signal systems for railways.

In the street fights of the 1920s and 1930s, he also met the anarchist Max Hoelz . From 1931 he was a member of a communist combat squadron in Prenzlauer Berg. It was inevitable that in 1932 he was sentenced to a three-month suspended prison sentence. A trial followed for illegally possessing a gun. With that he lost his job in 1932.

Resistance struggle against the Nazi regime and military service

From 1933 he made an active fight in the communist underground against the Nazi regime. It was not until 1935 that he was able to find another job at Siemens AG in Berlin-Kreuzberg on Askanischer Platz . There he belonged with like-minded politicians to a resistance group against the Nazi regime. His job consisted of repairing electrical machines that were used in the household. Since this activity was connected with many contacts in Berlin, he could serve well as a contact for the members of his resistance group. In 1942 he was used as a soldier in the 333rd Grenadier Replacement Battalion in Eastern Europe. As early as 1944 he was able to return to his old job as a civilian in Berlin, where he lived at Wörtherstrasse 7 .

Member of the KPD, SED and member of the state security

After the occupation of Berlin by the Red Army , he was able to move into an apartment in Prenzlauer Allee in November 1945 , where a member of the Gestapo had previously lived. In the same year he became a member of the KPD in Prenzlauer Berg and a member of the SED through the compulsory unification of the SPD and KPD . As district chairman of the SED, he worked from 1946 in Prenzlauer Berg.

According to his own statements, he had belonged to the SED's information department since 1947 . Since he and his wife had taken over the sporting goods business Leppin at Eberswalder Straße 25-26 as trustee, this activity became the starting point for a network of informants and so-called scouts in the adjacent sectors of West Berlin. Although he had formally been a member of the People's Police or Criminal Police Office 5 (K5) since October 1948 , he actually worked for Department II (Defense) of the SED in Berlin. On March 3, 1950, he undertook to work at the Ministry of State Security . His first big assignment was to smuggle reliable political employees into several large sports clubs in West Berlin.

Managerial positions at the Ministry of State Security and kidnapping organizer

In 1950 he was also commissioned to set up Department VIII for the State Security in Greater Berlin, which was to serve the observation and arrest of suspects. According to Alfred Weiland , Morgenthal and Hans Rettmann had been involved in the search for political opponents of the SED since 1947. Weiland, who was kidnapped on November 11, 1950, said Morgenthal was the organizer of his kidnapping. He even persecuted a Berliner, whom Morgenthal knew in his youth and who had contacts with the US secret service. However, he had acted as a courier for the combat group against inhumanity in the Soviet occupation zone , which is why he was classified as an agent by the Ministry of State Security.

Critical assessment, relative at the HVA

In the course of dealing with the consequences of the unrest of June 17, 1953 in the GDR, Morgenthal was also examined by the SED. He was sharply criticized in a political assessment. In discussions he would show "the whole primitiveness of his political thinking". It was considered necessary to give him "the most primitive instructions for self-study and for studying political problems" at a district party school. Nevertheless, Morgenthal was able to continue to be used for managerial tasks in the management structure of the MfS. In 1955 he became deputy head of Department VI of the MfS. In 1956, under Markus Wolf, the Enlightenment Headquarters (HVA) was set up in the MfS. Morgenthal used this opportunity to switch to the HVA.

From then on he was employed as one of the most important command officers for secret informers (GI) at the HVA because he had numerous contacts with informants in Berlin. But his methods of binding informants with so-called “high material benefits” and large alcohol consumption soon met with sharp criticism from the HVA. When he was then also proven to have violated foreign currency and the rules of conspiracy , his career with the MfS ended in 1959 with his dismissal. He was a major when he was dismissed.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Hans-Michael Schulze : Comrades in the Kiez - The "Greater Berlin Administration" of the Ministry for State Security and its protagonists (1950-1985) , in: Berlin-Brandenburgische Geschichtswerkstatt (Ed.), Prenzlauer Berg, corner of Fröbelstrasse - Hospital of the Reich capital , Place of detention of the secret services, Prenzlauer Berg district office 1889 - 1989, Berlin 2006, pp. 121–244
  2. ↑ Hans-Michael Schulze: "The whole primitivity of political thinking" - Hans Morgenthal - a "scout" of the State Security, in: Germany Archive, 43rd year, 2010, issue 1, pp. 38–43
  3. ↑ Hans-Joachim Fieber, Günter Wehner: Resistance in Berlin against the Nazi regime 1933 to 1945 - A biographical lexicon , Volume 10, Berlin 2005, p. 20
  4. ^ After Hans-Joachim Fieber the group included: Walter Babrant, Richard Bremer, Rudolf Brüggemann, Hermann Gartmann , Johannes Gloger, Ferdinand Grothe, Alfred Grünberg , Bruno Grünberg, Karl Hübener, Kaschke, Josef Marohn, Kurt Nelke, Erich Orthmann, Alice Rafzey, Albert Reuschler, Wilhelm Richter, Fritz Rolle, Friedrich Rossbach, Bruno Schentke, Alfons Schiewe, Georg Schröder, Erich Schulz, Otto Stepputat (see Hans-Rainer Sandvoss: The "other" Reich capital. Resistance from the workers' movement in Berlin from 1933 to 1945 , Berlin 2007, p. 554), Herbert Strase, Walter Talgenberg, Charlotte Wegner and Marie Woelcken, in: Resistance in Berlin against the Nazi regime 1933 to 1945 , ibid, p. 20
  5. ↑ Hans-Michael Schulze: ibid., 2010, p. 40
  6. ↑ Jens Gieseke: The full-time employees of the State Security - personnel structure and living environment 1950-1989 / 90 , Berlin, 2000, p. 20
  7. ↑ Berliner Adreßbuch 1941, second volume, as of November 7, 1940, published in February 1941, Berlin 1941, p. 535
  8. ↑ Hans-Michael Schulze: ibid 2006, p. 140
  9. ↑ Jens Gieseke, ibid
  10. ↑ Michael Kubina: From Utopia, Resistance and Cold War - The untimely life of the Berlin councilor communist Alfred Weiland (1906-1978) , 2001, p. 392
  11. ↑ Hans-Joachim Schulze, ibid., 2010, p. 41.
  12. ↑ quoted by Hans-Michael Schulze from a source of the SED, in: ibid., 2010, p. 41
  13. ↑ Hans-Michael Schulze, ibid, 2006, p. 140
  14. ^ Jens Gieseke: Anatomy of the State Security history, structure and methods. (pdf) BStU, p. 54 , accessed on May 7, 2015 .
personal data
SURNAME Morgenthal, Hans
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German intelligence officer, command officer at the headquarters of the intelligence service of the GDR
DATE OF BIRTH April 4, 1914
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin
DATE OF DEATH April 25, 1983