Karl August Balser

Karl August Balser (born May 1, 1887 in Assenheim , † February 27, 1956 in Gießen ) was a German consul general and cultural researcher.

Life

Balser was the son of the doctor August Hugo Wilhelm Karl Balser (1858-1937) and his wife Agnes, née Dieffenbach (1859-1925). His father rose to the position of medical and senior medical officer, and his brother Eduard also embarked on a medical career. He himself married Marie Balser, née Theobald (1890–1981), with whom he had four sons.

Balser passed his Abitur in 1905 and, after studying law and sinology in Leipzig , Edinburgh , Gießen and Berlin , Balser entered the diplomatic service in 1909. In the following time until 1917 he worked in Tianjin (Tientsin), Changchun (Xinjing, Hsinking), Mukden and Jinan in the Republic of China as an interpreter and assistant to the envoy Count Rex and his successors . In addition, he devoted himself to cultural studies. His family was evacuated from China when China entered World War I on behalf of the Allies .

During the last two years of the war he served as a reserve officer on the Western Front. Before the end of the war in 1918, he was part of an embassy to Stockholm and in March 1919 was appointed Vice Consul in Turku , Finland. In 1921 he returned to Poznan and passed his consular examination. He was again sent to Tientsin, and in February 1922 he also made a longer stop in Peking . During this time the family had contact with the imperial family through Puyi's grandmother, among other things .

From the summer of 1926, after a home leave - there were increasing disputes in China and civil war broke out from 1927 - he worked at the Foreign Office in Department IV (East Asia, Scandinavia, Eastern Europe). In March 1928, Balser was appointed consul in Vladivostok , where he arrived in June of that year and at the same time served as acting consulate in Harbin . In the latter city he was consul from 1933 to 1935, subordinate to the legation in Beijing; Due to the explosive situation in the Manchukuo Empire , he always handed over copies of his correspondence to Tokyo. Balser continued to study the culture and economy of the host country. During this time, he corresponded a lot with Herbert von Dirksen , ambassador to Japan, and not just professionally . After two years in Germany, he was sent to Osaka / Kobe as a first class councilor , where he took over the business in November 1938. In June 1941 he was promoted to Consul General 1st class.

After the end of the Second World War , Balser took over a "teaching position" in Japan until 1948 and only then returned to Germany. After 1950 he worked as a lecturer for East Asian culture and economic history in Darmstadt at the Technical University.

He maintained close friendships with famous contemporaries such as Sven Hedin .

literature

• Maria Keipert (Red.): Biographical Handbook of the German Foreign Service 1871–1945. Published by the Foreign Office, Historical Service. Volume 1: Johannes Hürter : A – F. Schöningh, Paderborn et al. 2000, ISBN 3-506-71840-1 .
• Marie Balser: East and West Area. Our life in East and West told to the grandchildren. Giessen, von Münchow'sche Universitätsdruckerei 1958. (Reprint and T .: Eastern and Western terrain. Our life tells the grandchildren. Longtai-Verlag Gießen, Heuchelheim 2007, ISBN 978-3-938946-07-7 .)

Individual evidence

1. ^ Balser, August Hugo Wilhelm Karl. Hessian biography. In: Landesgeschichtliches Informationssystem Hessen (LAGIS).
2. ↑ Gerald Mund: East Asia in the Mirror of German Diplomacy. The private correspondence of the diplomat Herbert von Dirksen from 1933 to 1938. Munich 2006. ISBN 3-515-08732-X