Leonhard Roth (clergyman)

Leonhard Roth , also called Leo (born May 28, 1904 in Saldenburg ; † probably June 22, 1960 near Braz , Vorarlberg ) was a German Catholic priest, Dominican with the religious name Korbinian and as a prisoner a carer in the Dachau concentration camp . After the liberation from National Socialism , he was a pastor in Dachau and, as a delegate of the concentration camp priests of the Comité International de Dachau, made a contribution to the establishment of the Dachau concentration camp memorial .

Life

Roth, son of the master brewer Joseph Roth and his wife Anna (née Riß), grew up in a conservative Catholic home. Like his brothers Franz (1899–1985) and Joseph (1897–1941), he became a Catholic priest. He first attended the mission seminar in Schweiklberg Abbey and completed his school career at the Ordensgymnasium of the Dominican Province of Teutonia in Vechta in March 1924 with the Abitur . He was given the name Korbinian by the Dominican Order of the Teutonia Order, was clad on September 26, 1924 and, after spiritual studies in Walberberg and Düsseldorf, ordained a priest in early August 1931.

time of the nationalsocialism

Roth worked as a pastor and leader of the Thomaskreis for young academics and in November 1935, after an election, became prior of the new study convention in Walberberg. Critical sermons and lectures finally brought the rhetorically gifted and well-known Roth into conflict with the Nazi regime. As part of the morality trials against religious and priests under National Socialism , Roth was also suspected of having committed homosexual acts according to Section 175 of the Criminal Code . Roth then fled to Switzerland on January 29, 1937 , protested his innocence from there and was expelled from the Dominican order at the end of June 1937. In early September 1937, the Bonn Regional Court sentenced Roth to two years' imprisonment for “moral misconduct”. In Constance , Roth was arrested by the German border police on March 5, 1941, after he had been deported by the Swiss authorities. He spent the two-year prison sentence in the Rottenburg am Neckar prison and was sent to the Dachau concentration camp a few weeks after his imprisonment on May 21, 1943, where he was given prisoner number 47,968. He was given - unusual for a clerical prisoner - the black triangle which, by order of the Secret State Police , was supposed to mark him as an " anti-social " prisoner. This exposed him to particular harassment from the camp SS. Because of his helping and caring efforts, he was highly respected among the inmates. From November 1944, together with 14 other imprisoned clergy, he voluntarily cared for fellow inmates who had typhus . Just one more clergyman and he did not get infected with typhus and survived this mission. On April 29, 1945, Roth saw the liberation of Dachau concentration camp by the US Army .

After the end of the war

Roth continued to look after the sick prisoners who remained in the camp and was also active in pastoral care. When the former concentration camp was converted into the Dachau internment camp after the liberation by the US Army , Roth took care of the imprisoned SS men after his appointment. He administered the sacraments to numerous SS men sentenced to death before their execution . Over 1,300 prisoners found their way back to the church through his work. He also had a camp church built there by former SS members. The re-entry into the Dominican province of Teutonia was initially denied him. He was not rehabilitated until 1947. Commissioned by the Archdiocese of Munich , he took care of refugees and displaced persons who were now housed in the camp as curate from 1948 . However, his activity brought him to his physical and psychological limits in the early 1950s, so that in mid-October 1953, at the end of June 1955 and again in mid-December 1957, he asked for his release from the camp counseling.

Roth campaigned vehemently with the city of Dachau and the state of Bavaria for the establishment of a concentration camp memorial and the preservation of the area on the former camp site in Dachau. As the German representative of the Comité International de Dachau, after the displaced persons had left the camp and moved into apartments, he campaigned for the camp area not to be re-occupied with homeless people, but to be rededicated as a concentration camp memorial. His views on the good camaraderie of spiritual and communist prisoners in the Dachau concentration camp and the denunciation of the renewed careers of former NSDAP members also brought Roth criticism during the political climate of the 1950s. Roth publicly protested against the mayor of Dachau, Hans Zauner , who he accused of collaborating with the Nazi regime. This scandal brought Roth considerable rejection from the local population and the press. As a result, Roth was given leave of absence from his post from the end of March 1960 to the end of June 1960 with the option of continuing to work in pastoral care in a new post.

Auxiliary Bishop Johannes Neuhäusler , also a former Dachau prisoner, wrote to the pastor of Landeck on July 30, 1960 , asking for news of Roth, who had been missing in the meantime and who had last reported from there:

“[...] His nerves are so strained by the concentration camp years and by the overzealous concern for the welfare of his parishioners that there were difficulties and disputes of all kinds, so that we had to release him from his job and for 3 months on leave […] Now we are worried […] he has committed some crime on himself in desperation […] ”.

On August 15, 1960, his already decaying body was discovered in the Klostertal Alps near Braz. His death gave rise to much speculation in the press. Falling as a cause of death was considered the least likely, but murder was also considered a cause of death. However, the results suggest that the more likely causes of death are exhaustion or suicide .

literature

• Elias H. Füllenbach:  Roth, Leonhard. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 17, Bautz, Herzberg 2000, ISBN 3-88309-080-8 , Sp. 1167-1171.
• Hans-Günter Richardi : Leonhard Roth. In: Hans-Günter Richardi (Ed.): Curricula vitae - fates of people who were in the Dachau concentration camp. BoD - Books on Demand 2001, Dachauer Documents Vol. 2, ISBN 978-3-8311-2190-8 .
• Norbert Göttler : The files of Father Leonhard Roth: his life and death in action for justice and historical truth , Verein Zum example Dachau, 2004
• Paulus Engelhardt: Korbinian Leonhard Roth OP (1904-1960) and the "morality trials" against priests and religious during the Nazi era. From: word and answer. Journal of Questions of Faith. Edited by the German Dominicans. Special issue "Homosexuality". 39th year, issue 2, April / June 1998, p. 88f. on-line
• Comite Internationale de Dachau; Barbara Distel, Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial (ed.): Dachau Concentration Camp 1933 to 1945 - Text and image documents for the exhibition. Munich 2005, ISBN 3-87490-750-3 .
• Norbert Göttler (Ed.): After the zero hour. City and district of Dachau 1945 to 1949. in volume 2 of the series Dachauer Diskurse (Eds. Bernhard Schoßig and Robert Sigel), Herbert Utz Verlag GmbH, Munich 2008, ISBN 978-3-8316-0803-4 .

Web links

• Leonhard Roth on the homepage of the North German Province of the Dominican Order ( Memento from June 11, 2003 in the Internet Archive )
• Leonhard Roth Page in English by Dachau researcher H. Marcuse (with many other links)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c} Elias H. Füllenbach:  Roth, Leonhard. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 17, Bautz, Herzberg 2000, ISBN 3-88309-080-8 , Sp. 1167-1171.
2. ^ ^{A b} Paulus Engelhardt: Korbinian Leonhard Roth OP (1904-1960) and the "morality trials" against priests and religious during the Nazi era. From: word and answer. Journal of Questions of Faith. Edited by the German Dominicans. Special issue "Homosexuality". 39th year, issue 2, April / June 1998, p. 88ff.
3. ↑ Hans-Günter Richardi: CVs - fates of people who were in the Dachau concentration camp. 2001, Books on Demand, pp. 39-45, ISBN 978-3-8311-2190-8 . Inside is a photo of Roth made by the Gestapo with the signature "Roth Leo" (not "Roth Leonhard")
4. ↑ ^{a b c} Hans-Günter Richardi: Leonhard Roth ( Memento of the original from May 29, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
5. ↑ Former churches in today's concentration camp memorial (so-called camp churches)
6. ^ Comite Internationale de Dachau; Barbara Distel , Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial (ed.): "Dachau Concentration Camp 1933 to 1945 - Text and Image Documents for the Exhibition", Munich 2005, p. 218
7. ^ Letter from Johannes Neuhäusler to the pastor of Landeck on July 30, 1960 Quoted in: Paulus Engelhardt: "Korbinian Leonhard Roth OP (1904-1960) and the" morality processes "against priests and religious during the Nazi era" ( Memento of the original dated May 9, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , from: word and answer. Journal of Questions of Faith. Edited by the German Dominicans. Special issue "Homosexuality". 39th year, issue 2, April / June 1998, p. 88f.