Hugo Graef

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Hugo Gräf (around 1930)

Hugo Gräf (born October 10, 1892 in Rehestädt , † October 23, 1958 in Gotha ) was a German communist politician .

Life

Gräf was born the son of a bricklayer and a maid or farm worker. As early as 1902 he had to work as a farmhand for a farmer. Gräf attended elementary school and trained as a locksmith. He then worked in this profession and went hiking. In 1907 he joined the German Metalworkers' Association and in 1910 the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD). Between 1912 and 1916 he had to do military or war service. He was badly wounded on the Western Front during World War I and lost his left leg. In 1916/17 he was forced to work in the rifle factory in Erfurt. In 1917, Graef was one of the founders of the Reich Association of War Disabled in Thuringia . Gräf joined the Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany in Erfurt in 1917 , played a leading role there in the organization of the January strikes in 1918 and joined the Spartakusbund in 1918 and was one of the founders of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) and the Union of War Victims in Erfurt in 1919 .

In June 1920 Gräf was expelled from the KPD because he had refused to run for the Reichstag . In 1923, however, he was rehabilitated and re-accepted into the party. From 1920 he worked first in Thuringia, then in Hamburg full-time for the International Association of War Disabled and Physically Disabled People, which later became the International Association of Victims of War and Labor . In April 1927 he became the chairman of this association in place of Karl Tiedt, who had been excluded from the KPD and which he led until it was banned in 1933. In 1928, Graef was elected to the Reichstag , to which he belonged until 1933. In 1921 Gräf was one of the founders of the International Workers Aid (IAH) and became a member of its executive. He was also involved in founding the Red Aid in Germany . From 1927 to 1933 he was an employee of the organization department of the Central Committee of the KPD. From 1928 to 1933 Gräf was a member of the Reichstag (constituency Dresden-Bautzen).

In this speech of February 23, 1932 in the Reichstag, Graef gave the typical position of his party on the question of war guilt and the relationship with the Social Democrats:

“I have the following to explain on behalf of the Communist Group. The war victims in Germany are victims of capitalism. The Social Democrats as well as the National Socialists are the pillars of the capitalist system. You are responsible for these victims. The German war victims will wage the mass struggle against new wars, against new unheard of war victims together with the proletariat. The German war victims do not identify with those who, on every occasion, cannot emphasize loudly enough the need for new wars and the defense of the causes of the wars of the capitalist system. "

After the " seizure of power " by the National Socialists , Graef was arrested on March 13, 1933 in Dresden . Between March and November 1933, he was in police custody in Dresden, then he was until 24 June 1935 as the so-called " Schutzhäfling " in Sachsenburg concentration camp , in May 1934 at the concentration camp Colditz detained. In Colditz he headed the illegal KPD group, the camp library and the bookbindery. Gräf was particularly harassed by the SS in the Colditz concentration camp. The amputated Count was not allowed to use his stick, nor was he released from roll calls or marching exercises.

After his release he managed to emigrate to Prague . Under the code name “Engler” he attended the Communist University of the National Minorities of the West (KUNMS) in Moscow in 1935 . On July 10, 1938, he was one of the signatories of the Prague Popular Front Call. In December 1938 he emigrated via France to Great Britain , where he headed the Red Aid organization in exile and in 1939 was political director of the KPD emigrants in Scotland. From July 1940 to October 1941 he was interned on the Isle of Man . He then joined the Free German Cultural Association in Great Britain and was a founding member of the German Free Movement in 1943. From 1942 to 1945 he worked as a toolmaker in Glasgow . In 1945 he headed the Scottish Refugee Center in Glasgow.

In August 1946, Graef returned to Germany in the Soviet zone of occupation , where he worked for the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) and in the administration of the health care system. From 1946 to 1948 he was a consultant, then head of the health department of the Central Secretariat of the SED party leadership. From 1949 to 1951 he was chairman of the central board of the health care union in the Free German Trade Union Confederation (FDGB). From 1950 to 1954 he was also a member of the federal executive committee of the FDGB.

From November 1951 to 1953 he was District Administrator, from 1952 Chairman of the Gotha District Council . In May 1953 he was relieved of all functions for health reasons. From 1955 until his death, however, he was a member of the SED district leadership in Gotha.

Awards

literature

Web links

  • Hugo Gräf in the database of members of the Reichstag

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Hugo Graef took this fundamental position for the KPD following a speech by the National Socialist Joseph Goebbels . As part of an insult to the Reich President, Goebbels had also attacked war veterans by calling the SPD the “party of deserters”. The next day in parliament, the member of the SPD, Rudolf Breitscheid, criticized the refusal of the communists, as summarized by Hugo Graef: Instead of opposing the National Socialists, they saw their main opponent in the Social Democrats.
personal data
SURNAME Count, Hugo
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German politician (KPD), MdR
DATE OF BIRTH October 10, 1892
PLACE OF BIRTH Rehestädt
DATE OF DEATH October 23, 1958
Place of death Gotha