Johannes Steyer

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Johannes Steyer (born September 28, 1908 in Röhrsdorf ; † March 1, 1998 Wittgensdorf ) was a German metal worker with a confession as a Jehovah's Witness who, as a survivor of four concentration camps, painted pictures from his experience in prison in Buchenwald .

Life

Johannes Steyer was born in Röhrsdorf, Saxony. After graduating from school, he learned a metal trade and then lived in Kändler near Limbach . He was an avowed member of the Jehovah's Witnesses religious community. At the age of 27, in March 1935, he was sent to the early Sachsenburg concentration camp as a “ Bible Researcher ” . On August 19, 1937, he was transferred to the construction command of the planned Buchenwald concentration camp, where he was given the prisoner number 1795. On May 6, 1940, he was transported to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp . Here he came to work in SS Construction Brigade 5. Because of a change in the subordination of this brigade, he was first transferred to the Neuengamme concentration camp and on September 22, 1944 again to the former Dora branch of the Buchenwald concentration camp with prisoner number 88534.

In the 1970s he painted a cycle of pictures from memory that depicts his story of persecution. 27 copies of his watercolor series “Buchenwald” formed the centerpiece of an exhibition that was shown in Tel Aviv .

memory

  • In 2017 an exhibition was shown in preparation for a memorial path in the city of Regensburg . Curator Hans Simon-Pelanda created an exhibition with watercolors and drawings by Johannes Steyer and another concentration camp survivor from Buchenwald, Heinz Tetzner.

literature

  • Hans Hesse (Ed.): "The most courageous were always the Jehovah's Witnesses". Persecution and Resistance of Jehovah's Witnesses under National Socialism , Bremen 1998, ISBN 3-86108-724-3 .
  • Gerhard Besier , Katarzyna Stokłosa (Ed.): Jehovah's Witnesses in Europe - Past and Present: Volume 3, Albania, Bulgaria, Germany, Yugoslavia, Liechtenstein, Austria, Poland, Switzerland, Czechoslovakia and Hungary , Berlin 2018, ISBN 978-3- 643-14127-9 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ https://www.dubistanders.de/mediafiles/lightbox_view/428
  2. ↑ https://www.jw.org/de/nachrichten/pressemitteilungen/pressemitteilungen-nach-regionen/israel/tel-aviv-ausstellung-zeugen-jehovas/
personal data
SURNAME Steyer, Johannes
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German metalworker and painter of the concentration camp experience
DATE OF BIRTH September 28, 1908
PLACE OF BIRTH Röhrsdorf near Chemnitz
DATE OF DEATH March 1, 1998
Place of death Wittgensdorf (Kreischa)