Hermann Reusch

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Karl Hermann Reusch (born August 2, 1896 in Mährisch-Ostrau ; † December 17, 1971 on the Katharinenhof estate in Oppenweiler ) was a German industrialist and chairman of the Gutehoffnungshütte (GHH).

Life

The son of the later GHH General Director Paul Reusch attended grammar school in Oberhausen and from 1914 took part in the First World War as a volunteer . He then studied mining and German in Tübingen , Berlin and Aachen , and in 1922 he received his doctorate in Giessen . After a number of stays abroad, including in Scandinavia , England , the Netherlands , the USA and South Africa , he passed the mountain assessor exam in 1925 and in 1927 initially took over the management of the Fürst Leopold colliery in Dorsten .

In 1934 Reusch moved to the GHH and in 1935 was first a deputy member, then in 1937 a full board member. In 1942, he and his father resigned from the management board of Gutehoffnungshütte, thus preventing the National Socialists from being dismissed. After his retirement, Hermann Reusch worked as a mining inspector in occupied Yugoslavia and did not return to Oberhausen until 1945. In the meantime, Hermann Kellermann headed the Gutehoffnungshütte group . He was arrested by the Allies after the war , so that Reusch was initially deputized and, from 1947, was given full management of the GHH.

In July 1947 he testified as a witness at the Nuremberg I.G. Farben trial . In doing so, he countered the accusation that large-scale industry had particularly pioneered Adolf Hitler . Hermann Reusch largely organized the additional financing of the defense by German heavy industry in the Flick process in order to ward off allegations against the industry in advance because of its involvement in Aryanization, looting in the occupied territories, forced labor and financing of the rise of the Nazis.

In the coming years Reusch fought against the efforts of the British occupying power to dismantle and dissolve the Haniel family company . However, he could not prevent the separation of Gutehoffnungshütte. From then on, the group had to do without its own iron and coal production, which was outsourced to new companies, and instead concentrated on further processing.

In 1966 Reusch resigned from the company's management and retired. Five years later Reusch died of a heart attack on the Katharinenhof family estate in Baden-Württemberg. Reusch left three children.

In addition, Hermann Reusch was chairman and member of several supervisory boards and committees of industry , business associations and foundations , as well as a member of the executive committee of the Federal Association of German Industry . From 1959 to 1960 he was a member of the Advisory Board of the Friedrich Naumann Foundation .

In 1956 he was awarded the Federal Cross of Merit with a star.

Since 1919 he was a member of the Corps Franconia Tübingen .

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. Kim Christian Priemel: Flick - A corporate history from the German Empire to the Federal Republic . Wallstein 2007. ISBN 978-3-8353-0219-8 , pp. 632 f.
  2. Kösener Corpslisten 1960, 127 , 791