Harald Dohrn

Harald Dohrn (born April 17, 1885 in Naples , † April 29, 1945 in Munich ) was managing partner of the Hellerau Festival Theater from 1914 to 1935 . He was a sympathizer of the White Rose and a critic of the regime at the time of National Socialism in Germany.

Life

Dohrn family in Naples in 1905; standing from left to right: Reinhard (1880–1962), Boguslav (1875–1960), Wolf (1878–1914) and Harald (1885–1945); seated: Marie (1856–1918) and Anton Dohrn (1840–1909).

He was one of the sons of the marine biologist Anton Dohrn and graduated from the Wilhelmsgymnasium in Munich in 1904 . In 1912 he took over the management of the "Educational Institute for Music and Rhythm of Émile Jaques-Dalcroze GmbH" in Hellerau at the side of his brother Wolf Dohrn, who was seven years older than him . Over half of the contributions to this GmbH came from Wolf and Harald Dohrn. Today this educational institution is known as the Festspielhaus Hellerau . After the tragic death of Wolf Dohrn in 1914 and Émile Jaques-Dalcroze's final absence in the same year, he took over responsibility for the educational institution as managing director and continued to run it in the spirit of its founders. When the foreign students also left the country due to the First World War , the school had to be closed.

From then on, Harald Dohrn tried tirelessly to find new tenants for the building of the educational institution. He only accepted tenants who were compatible with his liberal and humanist convictions. Largely unsuccessful in this search, he was unable to prevent financial problems, especially from 1933 onwards. After the divorce from his first wife, Johanna, Harald Dohrn sold his shares in the "Bildungsanstalt Jaques-Dalcroze GmbH" to the co-partner, the "Gartenstadtgesellschaft Hellerau GmbH" and moved from Hellerau to Munich in 1935, where he began training as a therapeutic gymnast . At that time he converted to the Catholic faith. In 1941 he moved his residence to Bad Wiessee am Tegernsee and founded a sanatorium for “reform and diet food” there.

His step daughter Herta (1914-2016) married Christoph Probst in 1941 , who was a member of the White Rose. As a sympathizer of this association and a critic of the regime, Dohrn was targeted by the Nazi judiciary, but was initially acquitted in 1943. In 1945 he and his brother-in-law Hans Quecke participated in an appeal by the Bavarian Freedom Campaign . However, he was denounced by domestic workers and on 29 April 1945, shortly before the American invasion, by a SS command in Perlacher Forst shot . Harald Dohrn is buried in the Munich cemetery at Perlacher Forst .

Honors

In Munich, the Harald-Dohrn-Strasse in the Hasenbergl district named after him commemorates him .
His name is also on a plaque for members of the Bavarian Freedom Campaign in today's Bavarian State Ministry for Food, Agriculture and Forestry .
The Catholic Church accepted Harald Dohrn as a witness of faith in the German martyrology of the 20th century .

literature

Helmut Moll (publisher on behalf of the German Bishops' Conference), witnesses for Christ. Das deutsche Martyrologium des 20. Jahrhundert , Paderborn et al. 1999, 7th revised and updated edition 2019, ISBN 978-3-506-78012-6 , Volume I, pp. 476–479.

Web links

Michael Probst: Probst, Christoph Ananda. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 20, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 2001, ISBN 3-428-00201-6 , p. 733 f. ( Digitized version ). (with mention of Dohrn)
Archdiocese of Munich-Freising for the Bavarian freedom campaign
Dohrn's and Hans Quecke's biography

Individual evidence

^ Annual report on the K. Wilhelms-Gymnasium in Munich. ZDB -ID 12448436 , 1903/04.
↑ PDF Hans-Stefan Müller: Festspielhaus Hellerau. Diploma thesis 1996, p. 10.
↑ see Thomas Nitschke: The history of the garden city Hellerau. Hellerau Verlag, Dresden 2009, ISBN 978-3-938122-17-4 , pp. 73 f.
↑ Thomas Nitschke: The history of the garden city Hellerau. Hellerau Verlag, Dresden 2009, ISBN 978-3-938122-17-4 , p. 125.
↑ see Notker Hammerstein , From the circle of friends of the "White Rose": Otmar Hammerstein - a biographical exploration . Wallstein Verlag, 2014, p. 64.
↑ Helga Pfoertner: Living with history. Vol. 1, Literareron, Munich 2001, ISBN 3-89675-859-4 , pp. 67-70 ( PDF; 1.1 MB ( Memento from April 28, 2014 in the Internet Archive )).

personal data
SURNAME	Dohrn, Harald
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	Sympathizer of the White Rose and critic of the regime at the time of National Socialism in Germany
DATE OF BIRTH	April 17, 1885
PLACE OF BIRTH	Naples
DATE OF DEATH	April 29, 1945
Place of death	Munich

[1] Annual report on the K. Wilhelms-Gymnasium in Munich. ZDB -ID 12448436 , 1903/04.

[2] PDF Hans-Stefan Müller: Festspielhaus Hellerau. Diploma thesis 1996, p. 10.

[3] see Thomas Nitschke: The history of the garden city Hellerau. Hellerau Verlag, Dresden 2009, ISBN 978-3-938122-17-4 , pp. 73 f.

[4] Thomas Nitschke: The history of the garden city Hellerau. Hellerau Verlag, Dresden 2009, ISBN 978-3-938122-17-4 , p. 125.

[5] see Notker Hammerstein , From the circle of friends of the "White Rose": Otmar Hammerstein - a biographical exploration . Wallstein Verlag, 2014, p. 64.

[6] Helga Pfoertner: Living with history. Vol. 1, Literareron, Munich 2001, ISBN 3-89675-859-4 , pp. 67-70 ( PDF; 1.1 MB ( Memento from April 28, 2014 in the Internet Archive )).