Heinz Willmann

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Robert Havemann (center), Heinz Willmann (right) in front of the Humboldt University Berlin (1950)

Heinrich ("Heinz") Willmann (born July 9, 1906 in Unterliederbach , † February 22, 1991 in Berlin ) was a German KPD functionary. In the GDR he was a functionary in the Kulturbund and the Peace Council as well as a diplomat .

Life

Willmann, the son of a cabinet maker and a seamstress , attended elementary school from 1912 to 1920 and trained in forestry in 1920/21 and as a businessman between 1921 and 1928. He then worked as an advertising specialist and freight forwarder. At the same time, Willmann attended evening courses for English, literature and comparative linguistics at the TH Darmstadt and at the University of Frankfurt .

In 1921 he became a member of the International Workers 'Aid (IAH), in 1922 the Socialist Workers' Youth (SAJ) and the General German Trade Union Federation (ADGB). From 1922 to 1926 was a member of the Communist Youth Association of Germany (KJVD) and from 1926 the KPD. In 1926 Willmann was agitprop leader of the KPD sub-district Hessen-Süd; 1927/28 of the KPD district party school Hessen-Frankfurt. From 1928 he worked for the New German Publishing House in Berlin , and between 1929 and 1933 he was head of their sales offices and instructor. From 1929 to 1931 he was also a consultant and member of the KPD district leadership on Wasserkante, as well as an employee of the Arbeiter Illustrierte Zeitung (AIZ). From 1931 on, Willmann finally worked in the agitprop department of the KPD Central Committee.

After the “ seizure of power ” by the National Socialists in 1933, Willmann continued to be politically illegal and worked on the Brown Book . As a travel agent he collected information for the AIZ editorial team in Prague . In the same year he was arrested for illegal writing and spent seven months in so-called “ protective custody ” in the Fuhlsbüttel concentration camp . 1934 emigrated Willmann in Czechoslovakia and again worked there for the AIZ and wrote about his experiences in a concentration camp in the hell Fuhlsbüttel for the counter-attack by Fritz Erpenbeck . In 1934 he worked briefly as AIZ advertising manager in Switzerland , but was arrested for a passport offense and expelled to France . With the help of the IAH he managed to return to Prague. From November 1934 active in the election work in Saarbrücken against the reorganization of the Saarland into Nazi Germany, Willmann was head of a press office and in December 1934 co-organizer of the Saarland Social Political Struggle Congress. After the Saar vote in January 1935, Willmann went to Paris and worked there on the International Thälmann Liberation Committee. In May 1935, Willmann emigrated to the Soviet Union , where he initially worked on the Thälmann Committee of the Central Committee of the KPD under the direction of Willi Kropp , then worked as a consultant in the German department of the Foreign Workers' Association as well as journalist and publisher.

From 1937 to 1945 he was editor of the journal Internationale Literatur , headed by Johannes R. Becher . German papers as well as literary collaborator of the Moscow radio station . Between October 1941 and 1942 Willmann was evacuated from Kuibyshev , where he worked in the information office of the Soviet Foreign Ministry and Radio Moscow, as well as the author of leaflets. From August to November 1942 he worked as a woodworker on the Volga , then worked for the National Committee Free Germany (NKFD) and in 1944/45 he was involved in drafting KPD programmatic documents for the post-war period (school policy guidelines and curricula).

In June 1945 Willmann returned to Germany and was assigned to the Ulbricht group. He was one of the founders of the Kulturbund . From 1945 to 1950 he was its General Secretary or Federal Secretary, and until 1991 he was a member of its Presidential Council. In 1945 Willmann was one of the founders of the Aufbau Verlag and the magazine Der Sonntag . In 1946 Willmann became a member of the SED . From January to June 1950 he was secretary of the Kulturfonds der GDR , from 1950 to 1966 head or general secretary of the Committee of Fighters for Peace (later Peace Council), then from 1966 to 1990 a member of the Presidium. From 1950 to 1966 he was also a member of the World Peace Council and its office. From 1965 to 1969 he worked in the diplomatic service of the GDR, from 1966/67 among other things as ambassador to Czechoslovakia .

Heinz Willmann's urn was buried in the grave complex for the victims and persecuted of the Nazi regime in the Berlin central cemetery Friedrichsfelde .

Awards

Fonts

  • Hell Fuhlsbüttel . In: The counter-attack. Antifascist weekly . Prague 1934.
  • Two years of the Kulturbund. An activity report . Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin 1947.
  • Peace has to be defended. Speech by Secretary General Heinz Willmann at the presidium meeting of the German Peace Committee in July 1952 . German Peace Committee, Berlin 1952.
  • Japan - in the shadow of Pikadan . Verlag der Nation, Berlin 1959.
  • The idea of ​​peace and striving for peace in our day. For the 15th anniversary of the world peace movement . Berlin 1963. (= notebooks from Burgscheidungen 103)
  • The world peace movement - an important factor in world politics . In: Journal of History . Vol. 12, 1964, pp. 193-212. ISSN  0044-2828
  • History of the Arbeiter-Illustrierte Zeitung 1921 to 1938 . Dietz, Berlin 1974. (Licensed edition: deb, Westberlin 1975, ISBN 3-920-303-21-0 ).
  • You knock stones with your head. Life memories . New Life Publishing House, Berlin 1977.
  • The Soviet people have always been friends and helpers to us . In: Proven in combat. Memories of German comrades of the anti-fascist resistance from 1933 to 1945 . Single and zsgest. by Heinz Voßke . 2. through and exp. Ed. Dietz Verlag, Berlin 1977, pp. 377-415.

literature

personal data
SURNAME Willmann, Heinz
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Willmann, Heinrich; Hammer, Robert (pseudonym)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German KPD functionary, functionary of the Kulturbund and Friedensrat
DATE OF BIRTH July 9, 1906
PLACE OF BIRTH Unterliederbach
DATE OF DEATH February 22, 1991
Place of death Berlin