Heinrich Hartmann (Nazi functionary)

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Heinrich Hartmann (born September 10, 1914 in Oelsnitz / Erzgeb. † February 9, 2007 in Reutlingen ) was a member of the Reich Youth Leadership of the Hitler Youth and an officer of the Wehrmacht , after the Second World War co-founder of the International Federation (IB) as well as artist and graphic designer .

Childhood, youth and career under National Socialism

Hartmann was born the son of the shoemaker Otto Hartmann. After graduating from high school , he studied at the Berlin Art Academy from 1934 . In Berlin , Hartmann rose to head of department in the Nazi Reich Youth Leadership and worked as a close associate of Arthur Axmann , who had risen to Reich Youth Leader from 1940 as the successor to Baldur von Schirach . As a liaison man, Hartmann was responsible in particular for contact with Albert Speer , who from 1942 had a key position in the Nazi state as Reich Minister for Armaments and Ammunition . In the Hitler Youth he last assumed the rank of chief ban leader. He was also a member of the NSDAP and participated in World War II from 1939 to 1945 , most recently as an officer . He fought, among other things, in the attack on Poland and in the last days of the war in the " Battle of Berlin ".

Formation of a network of former Hitler Youth leaders 1945–1948

After the end of World War II, Hartmann escaped arrest by the Allies. In December 1945 he met with other former Hitler Youth leaders in Bad Tölz , Bavaria , where the possibility of a National Socialist resistance against the Allies was discussed. Among other things, Hartmann met again with the former Reich Youth Leader Arthur Axmann, who was considering the establishment of a “ labor service ” in southern Germany as a “preliminary stage to a mercenary army” .

From 1946, the state director for justice, education and the arts of the state of South Württemberg-Hohenzollern , the SPD politician Carlo Schmid , prevented Hartmann from being arrested. Schmid opposed the denazification regulations and enforced against Henri Humblot , a member of the French military government of Württemberg-Hohenzollern , not to make Hartmann's role in the Nazi system public and to maintain "the utmost secrecy".

From 1946 Hartmann tried to re-approach the idea of ​​a “labor service” for the youth. In order, so Hartmann literally, to counteract “the terrible neglect of many young people”, “we now have to work ... for the youth on the country road”. From April 1946 Hartmann approached several hundred former Hitler Youth leaders in order to win them over to such an organization and collected them in the “ Schwalldorfer Kreis”. The French authorities arrested some members of the group on April 8, 1948. As in his time for Hartmann, Carlo Schmid now campaigned for their release, which he was able to obtain after a few months with the French military government. Hartmann then took this release as an opportunity to demand the release of all imprisoned Hitler Youth leaders.

Worked at the International Federation from 1949

On January 11, 1949, Hartmann founded together with Carlo Schmid and Henri Humblot on the premises of the Eberhard-Karls-Universität Tübingen the "International Federation for Cultural and Social Work eV", the forerunner of today's International Federation (IB) . The declared aim was (as in Hartmann's earlier efforts) to set up a “labor service” and give uprooted young people a new task. Hartmann gathered former National Socialists around him. In 1957, 75 of the 340 IB employees were former full-time employees of Nazi organizations. In 1957, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution investigated the association, but soon stopped the investigation.

Hartmann remained Deputy Chairman of the IB from 1949 to 1985, with brief interruptions. Between 1985 and 2001 he was chairman of the Federal Board of Trustees of the IB.

Work as an artist

Heinrich Hartmann has dedicated himself to painting since his childhood , initially mainly painting motifs from Saxony . After the Second World War he worked in an advertising agency in Reutlingen and in his studio in Tübingen . A total of 10,000 paintings come from him.

Hartmann went blind in 1999 after an eye disease.

In 2004, on the occasion of his 90th birthday, the "Heinrich-Hartmann-Haus" opened in Oelsnitz in the Ore Mountains. The Saxon Interior Minister Albrecht Buttolo inaugurated the ensemble in front of over 400 guests, which in addition to the house where he was born, also houses a residential building and a gallery on two floors. According to Hartmann's wishes, current exhibitions of young and established artists take place here and part of his own work is presented.

Appreciations

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ According to Arthur Axmann in his memoirs That couldn't have been everything (Koblenz, 2nd edition, 1995), p. 371.
personal data
SURNAME Hartmann, Heinrich
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German artist
DATE OF BIRTH September 10, 1914
PLACE OF BIRTH Oelsnitz / Erzgeb. , Kingdom of Saxony , German Empire
DATE OF DEATH February 9, 2007
Place of death Reutlingen , Baden-Württemberg , Federal Republic of Germany