Heinz Wieland

Heinrich ("Heinz") Robert Wieland (born September 19, 1907 in Mannheim , † June 5, 1980 in Berlin ) was a German politician ( KPD / SED ) and fighter against Spain .

Life

Wieland, son of a dock worker and a factory worker, made after visiting the elementary school from 1922 to 1926 trained as a shaper . He then worked in this profession at Daimler-Benz in Mannheim. From 1922 to 1929 Wieland was a member of the German Metalworkers' Association . In 1931 he became a member of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD), the Red Front Fighter League (RFB) and the Red Aid .

After the " seizure of power " by the National Socialists , Wieland was in " protective custody " from May to July 1933 because of his membership in the RFB . He was arrested again in October 1933 and remained in prison until December 1933. In February 1934 the case was dropped for lack of evidence. Between 1934 and 1936, Wieland worked illegally for the KPD district leadership in Baden .

In May 1936 he emigrated by party decision to Metz , then via Paris to Spain , where he became political commissar of the 2nd company of the XI. International Brigade in Albacete . Then he was captain of the " Hans Beimler " and "Ernst Thälmann" battalions . Wieland was wounded in January 1937 and then attended an officers school in Spain for three months. He was later wounded twice again. In August 1938 he was evacuated as a wounded man to Paris and in May 1939 he traveled to the Soviet Union , where he stayed in various medical institutions.

In 1941 he married Käthe Niederkirchner (1909–1944) in Moscow . He later met Deba Raschkess (1916–1992) in the special sanatorium for Spanish fighters in Peredelkino near Moscow , whom he later married. Together with her he was evacuated to Osh after the German invasion of the Soviet Union and lived there in a home for the disabled. From 1941 to 1943 he was a political instructor for the NKVD among German prisoners of war . In 1945 he attended a training course in the KPD school "Object 12" near Moscow.

In January 1946 Wieland returned to Germany. There he was initially an employee of the Central Committee apparatus of the KPD in the “Organization Instructors” department, then from 1947 an assistant to the “Press and Broadcasting Information” department of the Central Secretariat of the SED. From February 1952 he was head of Sector II (registration of leading cadres / nomenclature) of the "Cadre" department of the SED Central Committee and then sector leader for leading party cadres of the "Governing Bodies, Parties and Mass Organizations" department at the SED Central Committee. From 1951 he was a member of the Central Commission for the Review of Party Members and Candidates. From 1952 to 1968 he was deputy head of the central cadre registry and from 1957 to 1976 also deputy head of the department for cadre issues of the Central Committee of the SED, from 1968 - in succession to Fritz Geißler - also responsible for looking after members of the Central Committee.

From 1962 to 1976 Wieland was also a member of the editorial board of the magazine Neuer Weg .

Awards

• Karl Marx Order (1965)
• Medal for your and our freedom of the People's Republic of Poland (1966)
• Patriotic Order of Merit in silver (May 6, 1955), in gold (1967), bar of honor for the Patriotic Order of Merit (1970)
• NVA Medal of Merit (1970)
• Partisan Medal of the Hungarian People's Republic (1971)
• Star of Friendship of Nations in Silver (1977)

literature

• Bernd-Rainer Barth :  Wieland, Heinrich Robert . In: Who was who in the GDR? 5th edition. Volume 2. Ch. Links, Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-86153-561-4 .