Karl Abel (politician)

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Karl Abel (born February 10, 1897 in Obernkirchen ; † April 27, 1971 there ) was a German trade unionist and politician ( KPD ).

Life

After graduating from primary school, Abel completed an apprenticeship as a shoemaker, which he completed in 1914 with the journeyman's examination. From 1916 to 1918 he took part in the First World War as a soldier . He was used as an infantryman in the Balkans and France, but never promoted during the war. In 1919 Abel was released from the Reichswehr . He then went on a hike in Silesia, among others, before, after returning to Obernkirchen in 1920 and briefly unemployed in 1921, he took up a job as a miner for the Prussian Mining and Huts Company (Preussag).

Abel joined the Socialist Youth in 1916 and joined the KPD in 1921 . He was elected to the town council of Obernkirchen in 1924 and from 1926 belonged to the district council of the Grafschaft Schaumburg. From 1925 he was Gauleiter of the Red Front Fighters Association (RFB) in Lower Saxony and from 1929 organizational leader in the Lower Saxony KPD district leadership. Abel was a member of the Prussian state parliament from 1924 to 1933 .

Abel had already joined the union in 1914. He was dismissed from Preussag in 1926, then worked as a union secretary and also worked as a full-time party functionary for the communists. In 1927 he became head of a labor bookshop in Hanover . Because of his work in the Revolutionary Trade Union Opposition (RGO), he was expelled from the miners' association in 1929.

After the National Socialists came to power, Abel was mistreated and arrested in Wesermünde on February 12, 1933 , and imprisoned in Hamburg-Bergedorf in 1933/34 . He then worked as an orthopedic shoemaker . Abel had been an independent master shoemaker in Obernkirchen since 1938. For political reasons, he was arrested again on August 25, 1938 and held in Sachsenhausen concentration camp until January 16, 1940 . In the same year he was drafted into the Wehrmacht and took part in the Second World War as a soldier until 1941 . It was used in France and the Balkans. After he was released from military service for health reasons as a result of his imprisonment, he went back to work as a shoemaker.

In 1941 he joined the Reich Air Protection Association and the NSV . Another arrest on August 22, 1944 in Rinteln led to an imprisonment in the police prison in Rinteln and then finally to a renewed imprisonment in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp (prisoner number: 107.394), which until its liberation by the Soviet Army after a "death march" to the Baltic Sea lasted near Schwerin in 1945.

From 1946 to 1951 he was a member of the Lower Saxony state parliament , where he was chairman of the KPD parliamentary group in 1950/51. He also belonged to the council of the city of Obernkirchen and the district council of the county of Schaumburg for the KPD. On November 25, 1946, Abel was appointed Minister for Public Health and State Welfare in the government of the State of Lower Saxony led by Prime Minister Hinrich Wilhelm Kopf . From June 11, 1947 until his resignation on February 5, 1948, he served as state minister without portfolio.

After leaving state politics, Abel worked as an orthopedic master shoemaker and shoe dealer in Obernkirchen . In addition, he was involved in the Association for Peace and Security (VFS) and was chairman of the Association of those persecuted by the Nazi regime (VVN) in Lower Saxony. When the KPD was banned in 1956, Abel was deprived of his civil rights, so that he could no longer exercise public offices.

literature

  • Christian Heppner (ed.): As a socialist and communist under four regimes. The memoirs of Lower Saxony's first social minister, Karl Abel (1897–1971) (= Schaumburger Studien. 67). Bielefeld 2008, ISBN 978-3-89534-677-4 .
  • Klaus Maiwald: Who were the political victims? The example of Karl Abel. In: Ways to Remember. The project to commemorate the victims of National Socialism in Schaumburg 2007–2008 (= Kulturlandschaft Schaumburg. 19). Bielefeld 2008.
  • Klaus Maiwald: Karl Abel Bergmann, shoemaker, concentration camp prisoner and minister In: Against the current, resistance and moral courage under National Socialism in Schaumburg . Pages 21–29 (= Kulturlandschaft Schaumburg Volume 11), Verlag für Regionalgeschichte Bielefeld 2005, ISBN 3-89534-571-7
  • Hermann Weber , Andreas Herbst : German communists . Biographisches Handbuch 1918 to 1945. 2nd, revised and greatly expanded edition. Dietz, Berlin 2008, ISBN 978-3-320-02130-6 ( online ).
  • Ernst Kienast (edit.): Handbook for the Prussian Landtag. Edition for the 3rd electoral term. R. v. Decker's Verlag (G. Schenck), Berlin 1928. P. 499. (Note: here since 1925 member of the district council in the Rinteln (Weser) district ).

Web link

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ http://id.loc.gov/authorities/names/no2009007379.html
  2. ↑ Stephan A. Glienke: The Nazi past of a later member of the Lower Saxony state parliament . Final report on a project of the Historical Commission for Lower Saxony and Bremen on behalf of the Lower Saxony State Parliament. Published by the President of the Lower Saxony State Parliament. Revised reprint of the first edition. Hannover 2012, p. 52 ( online as PDF) .
personal data
SURNAME Abel, Karl
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German trade unionists and politicians (KPD), MdL
DATE OF BIRTH February 10, 1897
PLACE OF BIRTH Obernkirchen
DATE OF DEATH April 27, 1971
Place of death Obernkirchen