John Rittmeister

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John Karl Friedrich Rittmeister (born August 21, 1898 in Hamburg , † May 13, 1943 in Berlin-Plötzensee ), often abbreviated as John F. Rittmeister , was a German doctor , psychoanalyst and resistance fighter against National Socialism .

Life

Stumbling block for John Rittmeister in front of the house at Agnesstrasse 30 in Winterhude .
Memorial plaque for John Rittmeister on the facade of House 5 of the Asklepios Clinic North , Ochsenzoll location in Langenhorn .

Rittmeister grew up as the eldest son in an upper-class Hamburg merchant family who came into contact with the social tensions on the fringes of this well-protected world at an early age.Rittmeister was drafted into military service after graduating from high school in 1917 and worked as a telephone operator in France and Italy. From 1919 he studied in Marburg , Göttingen , Kiel , Hamburg and Munich Medicine , where he remained until 1929 a 1926 psychiatric - neurological completed training.

In Munich he met the doctor who had emigrated from Russia, Dr. Hugo Schmorell and his niece Ella Wiegand ("Dunja") know, with whom he entered into a relationship. Ella aroused his interest in the Soviet Union, to which he also made a trip in 1932. Hugo Schmorell's son, Alexander Schmorell , later became a member of the White Rose .

In a subsequent time as a volunteer and assistant at the well-known Burghölzli Psychiatric Clinic in Zurich , he came into contact with the circle around CG Jung and Marxist circles, was also politically active and organized help for emigrants from Germany. Since 1934 he was therefore suspected and monitored by the Swiss Aliens Police as a communist, as he was also a member of the International Workers Aid and the Friends of the New Russia . In 1937, after completing an internship at the Münsingen sanatorium , where he worked with Alfred Storch , he did not receive any further extension of his residence permit in Switzerland because of “communist activities” .

In 1938 he was first senior physician under Heinrich Schulte at the Waldhaus mental health clinic in Berlin-Nikolassee and from the beginning of the war until his arrest he worked at the polyclinic of the Berlin Göring Institute , the German Institute for Psychological Research and Psychotherapy headed by Matthias Heinrich Göring . There he underwent a training analysis with Werner Kemper and also took part in aid campaigns for Jews and foreign workers.

In Berlin he met the nurse Eva Knieper, whom he married in 1939. Since his wife Eva attended the Heilsche Abendgymnasium in Schöneberg to prepare for the Abitur, she got to know Ursula Goetze , Liane Berkowitz , Fritz Thiel and Friedrich Rehmer , among others . From the joint preparation of lessons, under Rittmeister's guidance, a group of young people who rejected National Socialism grew , to which his childhood friend, the Romanist Werner Krauss , later joined. Ursula Goetze made contact with a KPD group in Neukölln and with foreign workers.

At the end of 1941 Rittmeister met Harro Schulze-Boysen , with whose views he agreed on all essential points. Rittmeister and Schulze-Boysen drafted the programmatic text “ Concern for Germany's future goes through the people ”, in which the political and military situation was analyzed and which was later sent several hundred times to mainly academic circles, according to the Reich Court Martial “The lowest and most dangerous work by Schulze-Boysen ”. Rittmeister was not involved in the sticky note campaign carried out by Schulze-Boysen and his wife's circle of friends against the exhibition The Soviet Paradise .

Arrested on September 27, 1942, Rittmeister was sentenced to death as a member of the Rote Kapelle group on February 12, 1943 for “preparing for high treason and favoring the enemy” and executed by guillotine in Plötzensee on May 13, 1943 . His wife had successfully played the unsuspecting and vehemently defended herself against all allegations; she got away with only three years in prison for "listening to enemy stations", probably also because her husband had not incriminated her.

John Rittmeister described himself in court as a left-wing pacifist, saw himself more as an educator and scientist . However, during the Reichspogromnacht , for example, he had also actively campaigned for Jews in distress . His numerous scientific and political contacts, such as those with the British left around Victor Gollancz , have largely remained unexplored.

He left only a few published texts, some on special medical topics, but also on more general social, psychological and philosophical problems. He was particularly interested in the French philosopher René Descartes . His early death after an eventful life full of work and relationships prevented him from being able to publish his thoughts in book form.

Fonts

  • “The world is on fire here”. Prison Records and Other Writings. Edited by Christine Teller. Gütersloh 1991.

literature

  • Karen Brecht, Volker Friedrich, Ludger M. Hermann, Isidor J. Kaminer and Dierk H. Juelich (eds.): "Here life goes on in a very strange way ..." On the history of psychoanalysis in Germany. Catalog and material collection for the [eponymous] exhibition on the occasion of the 34th Congress of the International Psychoanalytic Association (IPV) in Hamburg from July 28th to 2nd. August 1985. Kellner, Hamburg 1985 ISBN 3-922035-97-5 , corrected ISBN 3-922035-98-1 .
  • Regina Griebel as well as Marlies Coburger and Heinrich Scheel : "Captured?" - The Gestapo album for the Red Orchestra . A photo documentation. Edited in connection with the German Resistance Memorial Center . audioscop, Halle 1992, ISBN 3-88384-044-0 .
  • Regine Lockot: Remembering and working through. On the history of psychoanalysis and psychotherapy under National Socialism. Fischer, Frankfurt 1985; Reprint (with extended list of persons, otherwise - including misprints - text and pages identical) at: Psychosozial Verlag, Gießen 2002 (PV Library of Psychoanalysis ) ISBN 3-89806-171-X
  • Gert Rosiejka: The Red Chapel. "Treason" as an anti-fascist resistance. - With an introduction by Heinrich Scheel. results, Hamburg 1986, ISBN 3-925622-16-0
  • Walter Groom; John Rittmeister. Life and death . Ebenhausen, Langewiesche-Brandt, 1987.
  • Müller-Braunschweig, G: In Memoriam: From the diary sheets of Dr. John Rittmeister, recorded in prison from September 26th, 1942 until the day of his execution on May 13th, 1943. Journal for Psychoanalysis I (1949) 60-66
  • M. Schulz: Dr. John Rittmeister. Neurologist and resistance fighter. Dissertation. Medical Faculty Humboldt University Berlin 1981
  • John Rittmeister: Here the world is on fire, Ed. Christine Teller 1992. From the estate of John Rittmeister, Here the world is on fire '. Prison Records 1942-1943 and other writings. Verlag Jakob van Hoddis, Gütersloh 1992

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ W. Kemper (1968). John F. Rittmeister zum Gedächtnis , Journal for Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychoanalysis Journal for Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychoanalysis 14 (2), pp. 147–149
  2. ↑ Walter Bräutigam, Christine Teller: John Rittmeister on the 100th birthday - life and works , magazine for psychosomatic medicine and psychoanalysis 44 (3), (1998), p. 206
  3. ↑ https://paib-dpg.de/kurze-geschichte-der-deutschen-psychoanalytischen-gesellschaft/
  4. ^ Walter Bräutigam, Christine Teller: John Rittmeister on the 100th birthday - life and works , magazine for psychosomatic medicine and psychoanalysis 44 (3), (1998), p. 207
  5. ↑ Biography in the German Resistance Memorial Center, accessed on August 19, 2018.
personal data
SURNAME Captain, John
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Rittmeister, John Karl Friedrich (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German doctor, psychoanalyst and resistance fighter
DATE OF BIRTH August 21, 1898
PLACE OF BIRTH Hamburg
DATE OF DEATH May 13, 1943
Place of death Berlin-Plötzensee