Martin Schwantes

Martin Paul Albert Schwantes (born August 20, 1904 in Drengfurth near Rastenburg / East Prussia ; † February 5, 1945 in Brandenburg (Havel) ) was a German resistance fighter against National Socialism .

Life

Schwantes was born as the first child of the master watchmaker Hermann Schwantes. In 1906 the family moved to Gommern , where Schwantes attended elementary school from 1910 . From 1918 to 1924 he completed the preparatory institute and the teachers' seminar in Quedlinburg , where he was also involved in the Johannes poet community.

After being unemployed after completing his training , he emigrated to the USA in 1924 , where he worked as a casual worker. In 1926 he returned to Gommern, where he received an auxiliary position as a teacher. He made friends with Fritz Heicke, who also worked as a teacher in Gommern . From 1927 he worked at various Magdeburg schools.

In 1928 Schwantes joined the KPD and soon became a member of the KPD district leadership in Magdeburg-Anhalt. In 1931 he made a trip to the Soviet Union with the Free Teachers' Union of Germany . In 1931 Schwantes passed the second teacher examination. From 1932 he also worked for the KPD newspaper Tribüne .

After the seizure of power by the Nazis in 1933 had Schwantes leave the teaching profession. He worked as a district instructor in the region for the KPD, which operated illegally . He worked with Walter Kaßner and Ernst Brandt . A short time later, Schwantes was appointed instructor of the Central Committee of the KPD. The arrest took place in 1934. After living in the prison hospital , in several prisons and so-called protective custody in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp , he was released 1,941th

Schwantes found a job in Otto Krieger's shoe factory in Gommern, but also continued his illegal work. Together with Hermann Danz , Eva Lippold , Friedrich Rödel and Johann Schellheimer , he formed a resistance group active in the Magdeburg area. From 1943 he belonged to the National Committee for Free Germany and had contact with the resistance group around Anton Saefkow in Berlin . Schwantes was responsible for illegal work in Central Germany and was part of the operational state management of the KPD in what would later become Saxony-Anhalt . Schwantes also developed concepts for the school system and youth work after the end of National Socialism.

He was arrested again in 1944 and sentenced to death. The sentence was carried out on February 5, 1945 in the Brandenburg prison .

Honors

During the GDR era , various facilities were named after Schwantes. The streets named in his honor still exist in the cities of Magdeburg , Leipzig , Gommern and in the Dannigkow district .

literature

• Elke Klitzschmüller: Schwantes, Martin Paul Albert. In: Guido Heinrich, Gunter Schandera (ed.): Magdeburg Biographical Lexicon 19th and 20th centuries. Biographical lexicon for the state capital Magdeburg and the districts of Bördekreis, Jerichower Land, Ohrekreis and Schönebeck. Scriptum, Magdeburg 2002, ISBN 3-933046-49-1 .
• Schwantes, Martin . In: 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 .