Helene Kreft

Helene Kreft (née Kletzin ; born January 25, 1897 in Danzig ; † June 5, 1974 in Greifswald ) was a German politician ( KPD / SED ). She was a member of the People's Day of the Free City of Danzig .

Life

Kreft, daughter of a bricklayer , initially worked as a housemaid and later learned to be a seamstress . In July 1920 she joined the Communist Party of Germany (KPD). She acted as a cell cashier and women's leader and was a member of the KPD district leadership in Danzig. From 1923 to 1929 Kreft was a member of the Danzig People's Day. She had to resign from her mandate in 1929 for health reasons. Along with Anton Plenikowski and Meta Totzki , Kreft was one of the most famous KPD functionaries in Danzig.

From 1931 Kreft became involved in the International Workers Aid (IAH) and was chairwoman of the Red Women's and Girls' Union in the Gdansk district. In 1935 she ran again for the Danzig People's Day and took part in the election campaign, which was already suffering greatly from the terror of the National Socialists . In 1937, Kreft was the last elected member of the opposition to resign in the People's Day. From 1937 she belonged to the illegal leadership of the KPD for Danzig. She stayed in touch with the illegal Communist Party of Poland until it was dissolved at Stalin's behest in 1938. From 1935 to 1945 Kreft worked again as a seamstress.

After the invasion of the Red Army in 1945, Kreft was in the leadership of the Danzig communists and organized the so-called Antifa transports to Germany. At the beginning of August 1945 Kreft came to Krakow am See in Mecklenburg and became a member of the local KPD leadership. At the beginning of 1947 she moved to Greifswald, where she acted as head of the women's secretariat of the SED in 1947/48. In 1949/50 she was secretary of the Democratic Women's Union of Germany and then employed by the district committee of the National Front of the GDR and the Greifswald consumer cooperative . In March 1967 she was awarded the Clara Zetkin Medal as a veteran in Greifswald .

literature

• Kreft, Helene . In: Hermann Weber , Andreas Herbst (ed.): German communists. Biographical Handbook 1918 to 1945 . 2nd revised and greatly expanded edition. Karl Dietz Verlag, Berlin 2008, ISBN 978-3-320-02130-6 , p. 494.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Wolfgang Gippert: Childhood and Youth in Danzig 1920 to 1945. Identity formation in the socialist and conservative milieu . Klartext, Essen 2005, ISBN 978-3-89861-388-0 , p. 175.
2. ↑ CHARACTERISTICS . In: Neues Deutschland , March 9, 1967, p. 2.