Josef Frank (politician, 1909)

Josef Frank on the III. SED Party Congress (1950)

Josef Frank (born February 15, 1909 in Plumau , Moravia , † December 3, 1952 in Prague ) was a Czechoslovak communist and trade unionist .

Life

Frank joined the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (KPTsch) in 1926 . In the 1930s he was the Central Secretary of the Federation of Private Employees ( Federace soukromých zaměstnanců ). In 1939 he was arrested by the Gestapo and taken to the Buchenwald concentration camp , where he was imprisoned until 1945. After his liberation in 1945 he became a member of the Central Committee and the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPTsch. In 1948 he was elected deputy general secretary of the CPC Central Committee and a member of the National Assembly. In 1951 he was arrested, charged, and expelled from the party. In the 1952 show trial of Rudolf Slánský , he was sentenced to death for alleged collaboration with the SS in Buchenwald concentration camp . Frank was executed in Prague on December 3, 1952 .

In 1963 Frank was rehabilitated by the party and the state. In 1968 he was posthumously awarded the title "Hero of the ČSSR" by Czechoslovak President Ludvík Svoboda .

literature

• Ilustrovaný encyclopedický slovník . Vol. I [a-i]. Academia, Prague 1980, p. 685.
• Harry Stein (Ed.): Buchenwald Concentration Camp 1937–1945. Accompanying volume for the permanent historical exhibition . Wallstein, Göttingen 1998, ISBN 3-89244-222-3 , p. 297.
• Jan Gerber : A trial in Prague. The people against Rudolf Slansky and comrades (Writings of the Simon Dubnow Institute, Volume 26). Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2016, ISBN 978-3-525-37047-6 .