Harry Kuhn

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Harry Kuhn (born July 4, 1900 in Leipzig , † May 14, 1973 in Berlin ) was a German KPD functionary and resistance fighter against the Nazi regime . From 1949 to 1951 he was general secretary of the Association of Victims of the Nazi Regime .

Life

Harry Kuhn was born into a tailor family. After attending elementary school , he trained as a tailor until 1919 , after which he worked in this profession until 1921. In 1915 he joined the SAJ and the tailors' union. In October 1918 he was one of the co-founders of the Free Socialist Youth , which was renamed the Communist Youth Association of Germany (KJVD) in 1920 . From 1921/22 he was secretary of the KJVD district of Halle-Merseburg, from 1922 to 1924 secretary of the Central Committee of the KJVD. In 1923 he became a member of the KPD. In 1924 he stayed for a long time in the Soviet Union and in England . After his return to Germany he worked again as a tailor in Leipzig between 1924 and 1926.

In 1927 he was an editorial volunteer at the communist Hamburger Volkszeitung , and later editor of the workers' voice in Hanover . From 1927 to 1929 he was an editor and instructor in the press service of the Central Committee of the KPD. From 1929 Kuhn was considered a supporter of the Compromise Group . Between 1929 and 1931 he was unemployed, then a bookseller in Frankfurt am Main . From 1931 to 1933 he worked again as an editor, this time for the communist workers' newspaper in Frankfurt am Main.

After the Nazis seized power in 1933, Kuhn continued to work illegally for the KPD. From 1933 he was the organizational leader of the KPD sub-district Frankfurt (Main). In June 1933 he was arrested and in 1934 by the People's Court because of "conspiracy to commit high treason" to three years in prison convicted, he and Frankfurt (Main) in the penitentiary Luckau spent. After his release in 1936, he initially did temporary work in Berlin and then worked as a tailor in Leipzig again from 1937 to 1939. Since he was still active in the communist resistance, he was arrested again in 1939. Kuhn was brought to the Buchenwald concentration camp and was imprisoned there until 1945 and was a member of the illegal international camp committee from 1943 .

From 1945 he was political director of the Leipzig KPD and actively involved in rebuilding the city administration. From 1945 to 1948 the employee of the German Administration for Labor and Social Welfare was head of the department Work on the Masses, Information and Training . After studying at the SED party college (1948/49), he was General Secretary of the Association of Victims of the Nazi Regime (VVN) until 1951 . In 1951, in an investigation report from the Central Party Control Commission (ZPKK), he was accused of not doing any collective work and of being negligent towards “party enemies” and “Trotskyists”. Since he was not publicly accused because of his high reputation in connection with Buchenwald, he was replaced in the spring by Fritz Beyling as General Secretary of the VVN.

From 1951 to 1953 he was an editor in social security , where he was responsible for setting up the press and information department. From 1953 to 1962 he was secretary and department head for national and international work on the central board of the science union. From 1963 to 1971 Kuhn worked in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the GDR , where he was editor-in-chief of the journal Foreign Policy Correspondence .

He was married to Maria Wiedmaier . Her daughter Sonja married the communist resistance fighter Hermann Axen .

Honors

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Ulrich Schneider : “Lack of vigilance towards class enemies”? Political reprisals also against anti-fascists in Die Rote Hilfe 1/2019, p. 23 (pdf; 2.26 MB)
  2. ↑ egriff = holdings of the Federal Archives  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / www.bundesarchiv.de  
  3. ^ New Germany , October 7, 1957, p. 4.
personal data
SURNAME Kuhn, Harry
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German KPD functionary, anti-fascist resistance fighter, General Secretary of the Association of Victims of the Nazi Regime
DATE OF BIRTH 4th July 1900
PLACE OF BIRTH Leipzig
DATE OF DEATH May 14, 1973
Place of death Berlin