Hans Pfundtner

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Hans Pfundtner

Johannes (Hans) Pfundtner (born July 15, 1881 in Gumbinnen , † April 25, 1945 in Berlin ) was a German administrative lawyer. During the Nazi era he was State Secretary in the Reich Ministry of the Interior.

Life

Pfundtner's ancestors sat on the estate, which still exists today, on the Fundner Heimalm above Bad Hofgastein . Expelled with the other Protestants from the Gastein Valley around 1730 , they came to East Prussia as Salzburg exiles . Many Pfundtners became Prussian officials . Hans Pfundtner studied law and economics at Albertus University . In the summer semester of 1899 he became a member of the Corps Masovia .

Customs in East Prussia and Silesia

After the legal traineeship in June 1902, he was transferred to the Gumbinnen District Court and later to the Insterburg District Court. Since his father had died, he returned to Königsberg after only half a year . As a one-year volunteer , he joined the grenadier regiment of King Friedrich Wilhelm I (2nd East Prussian) No. 3 . Back in civil life, he came to the regional court, the public prosecutor's office and the higher regional court in Königsberg. In 1907 he traveled to Berlin to prepare for the assessor exam. As a court assessor back in Königsberg, he reported to the administration of customs duties and indirect taxes . He worked for a few months at the main customs office in Prostken on the Russian border. On September 1, 1909, he was finally transferred to the Prussian administration and appointed government assessor. He was transferred to the customs service in Schottburg (Skodborg) on ​​the Danish border. By his own admission, the half year was "the most strenuous physical activity of his life apart from being a soldier". On February 1, 1910, he came to the Wroclaw Directorate General of Customs , in November back to Koenigsberg as Chief Customs Inspector, and on October 1, 1911 back to Silesia , to Liebau . There he met his future wife, the builder daughter Anne Kliem (* 1895). In order to create a better financial basis for the marriage, Pfundtner entered the Hamburg civil service on February 1, 1914; the salaries were significantly higher than in Prussia.

First World War

After six months in Hamburg , at the beginning of the First World War, he was called up to his unit in Königsberg and seriously wounded in the battle of Tannenberg . The penetration of the right thigh was treated in Stettin and Hamburg. With the remaining stiff leg, Pfundtner reported to the General Command of IX on October 1, 1915 . Army Corps in Altona back on duty.

Berlin

Excursion of the Berlin Masurians, top right Hans Pfundtner (1922)

On October 1, 1917, Pfundtner was appointed to the Reich Office of the Interior and discharged from the Prussian Army as captain of the reserve . In the economic department of the ministry he was particularly involved in the paper industry. He made friends with Karl Helfferich , who had been entrusted with the economic preparation of the peace treaties. After the collapse of the Empire, the Reich Office became the Reich Ministry of the Interior , and the Economic Department became the Reich Ministry of Economics . Moved there, Pfundtner was appointed on March 26, 1919 to the secret government council and lecturing council. In April 1921, for political reasons, he decided to resign from the civil service, waiving his pension rights. He took over the office of "Reich Plenipotentiary of the Foreign Trade Office for the Paper Section" offered by the paper and pulp industry. When he gave up at the end of 1923, he made trips abroad to Austria, Italy, France and Spain - partly on behalf of, partly with the support of industry. Admitted to the bar and notary at the Berlin Chamber of Commerce since 1925 , he looked after clients from politics, business and culture.

politics

Weimar Republic

Pfundtner had been a member of the DNVP since 1919 and was close to Alfred Hugenberg and (in the 1930s) Carl Goerdeler . At times he also had good contacts with the liberal wing around Gottfried Treviranus . Pfundtner was a member of the group Mitte im Stahlhelm, Bund der Frontsoldaten and Vice President of the Berlin National Club . A lecture by Joseph Goebbels to this national-conservative association and contacts with Gregor Strasser prompted Pfundtner to leave the DNVP and to join the NSDAP on March 1, 1932 . In the situation of 1932 with 6 million unemployed and millions of communist voters, an upright German could no longer help but join the “national activists” of the NSDAP.

time of the nationalsocialism

Opening of the 27th German East Fair in Königsberg on August 20, 1939; During a tour of the exhibition, from left to right: Arthur Greiser , Hans Pfundtner, Friedrich Landfried , Erich Koch

With his profound knowledge of the ministerial bureaucracy, after the National Socialists' victory in the state elections in Lippe and the " seizure of power " on January 30th, four days later, on February 3rd, 1933, Pfundtner was appointed Senior State Secretary in the Reich Ministry of the Interior . On August 25, 1933, Pfundtner signed the first expatriation list of 33 Germans on behalf of the Reich Interior Minister , including Lion Feuchtwanger , Wilhelm Pieck , Philipp Scheidemann , Kurt Tucholsky and Otto Wels . In 1933 he was one of the founding members of the National Socialist Academy for German Law of Hans Frank .

In 1935, Pfundtner played a key role in the drafting and formulation of the law for the protection of German blood and German honor ( Nuremberg Laws ). On September 23, 1936, he was appointed president of the examination board for senior administrative officials. In 1939 he created a comprehensive catalog of measures to reduce pension payments to Jews .

Pfundtner was a member of the National Olympic Committee , Deputy President of the Organizing Committee and Chairman of the Construction and Finance Committee for the XI. Olympic Games 1936 . He worked loyally with Theodor Lewald , who, as a former state secretary at department head level, still had many friends in the Ministry of the Interior.

On August 19, 1943, Pfundtner submitted his resignation before Heinrich Himmler succeeded Wilhelm Frick as Minister of the Interior. The post remained vacant . With his wife committed Pfundtner shortly before the arrest by Soviet soldiers suicide . With their youngest son Wolfgang and Pfundtner's sister Else, they both rest in the Evangelical Churchyard in Nikolassee . The city of Berlin declared the resting place to be the “war grave” it is in charge of.

Honors

Pfundtner was the bearer of numerous German and foreign orders and decorations.

Fonts

  • with Reinhard Neubert : The new German imperial law. Supplementary collection of the law in force since the Enabling Act, with explanations, in 19 loose-leaf folders, published with the assistance of Franz Albrecht Medicus , Ministerialrat in the Reich Ministry of the Interior. Industrieverlag Spaeth & Linde, Berlin 1933–1942
  • From the Bismarck Empire to the Third Reich , 1934
  • Dr. Wilhelm Frick and his ministry

Until 1933, Pfundtner was a permanent contributor to various newspapers, including the Sunday edition of “Der Tag”. The newspaper was published by August Scherl .

See also

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Kösener Corpslisten 1960, 87/906.
  2. ^ A b c d Fritz Pfundtner: Biography of Hans Pfundtner. Corpszeitung der Altmärker-Masuren 77, Kiel 1985, pp. 2267–2269.
  3. ↑ a b Ernst Klee : The dictionary of persons on the Third Reich. Who was what before and after 1945. Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag, Second updated edition, Frankfurt am Main 2005, ISBN 978-3-596-16048-8 , p. 460.
  4. ^ Yearbook of the Academy for German Law. 1st year 1933/1934. Schweitzer Verlag, Munich, p. 256.
  5. ^ Arnd Krüger : The Olympic Games 1936 and the world opinion. Its importance in foreign policy, with particular reference to the USA. Sports science work, Volume 7. Bartels & Wernitz, Berlin 1972, ISBN 3-87039-925-2 .
  6. ↑ Stephan Lehnstaedt : The Ministry of the Interior under Heinrich Himmler 1943-1945. VfZ 54 (2006), pp. 639–672, here: p. 652, fn. 58. ( ifz-muenchen.de PDF. Accessed December 25, 2019).
  7. ↑ The book provides a detailed overview and description of the Reich Ministry of the Interior.
  8. ↑ Hans-Heinrich Müller-Dieckert, in: Corpszeitung der Altmärker-Masuren 78, Kiel 1985/86, p. 2307.
personal data
SURNAME Pfundtner, Hans
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Pfundtner, Johannes (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Prussian-German administrative lawyer
DATE OF BIRTH July 15, 1881
PLACE OF BIRTH Gumbinnen
DATE OF DEATH April 25, 1945
Place of death Berlin