Otto Beuer

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Otto Beuer (born September 25, 1898 in Reichenberg , † August 29, 1986 in Potsdam ) was a German political functionary. He was a member of the People's Chamber of the GDR .

Life and activity

Beuer's older brother was the communist functionary and KPČ co- founder Gustav Beuer . After completing a commercial apprenticeship and attending a trade school he was in 1917 for forcibly military service in World War I in the k-and-k - Army dug. He then worked as a self-employed businessman. He worked as a sales representative and later as a sales point manager in workers' consumption. In 1929 he was promoted to manager of railway consumption in Česká Lípa . In 1931 he became director of the consumer association Vorwärts in the Liberec district (German Reichenberg ).

Politically, Beuer, who had been a member of the Socialist Workers' Youth since 1912, joined the Social Democratic Party. In 1921 he switched to the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (KPČ). For this he took on tasks as a member of the city and district management. In 1938 he was elected to the city council.

On the occasion of the German occupation of Czechoslovakia in April 1939, Beuer emigrated. He settled in England, where he became executive director of the Czechoslovak-British Friendship Club. In June 1941 he was interned by the British authorities as an "enemy alien" until September 1943.

Due to his anti-National Socialist activities, Beuer came under the sights of the National Socialist police officers at the end of the 1930s, who classified him as an important target: In the spring of 1940, the Reich Security Main Office in Berlin put him on the special wanted list GB , a directory of people who, in the event of a successful Invasion and occupation of the British Isles by the Wehrmacht should be located and arrested by the occupying troops following special commandos of the SS with special priority.

In 1946 Beuer settled in the Soviet zone of occupation . In the period that followed, he was involved in setting up the consumer cooperative in Saxony-Anhalt, of which he was a member of the board from April 1946 to November 1949. In December 1949 he became head (chairman of the board) of the Brandenburg Consumer Cooperative Association, a position he retained until 1951.

From 1950 to 1951 Beuer belonged to the 1st People's Chamber of the GDR as a member of the faction of the cooperatives. Beuer was arrested in April 1951 and sentenced to two and a half years in prison in 1952. After his dismissal, Beuer took over the post of 2nd Secretary of the Kulturbund in Potsdam in 1954 . In 1956 he was rehabilitated by the commission of the Central Committee of the SED to review the affairs of party members. However, Beuer did not get back into any noteworthy functions.

Beuer died at the age of 87. His urn was buried in the New Cemetery in Potsdam on Heinrich-Mann-Allee.

Honors

  • A symbolic sign of Beuer's rehabilitation was the award of the Patriotic Order of Merit in bronze as part of the celebrations for Republic Day in the GDR on October 7, 1973. Beuer's 75th birthday was also coming up. Beuer was officially awarded the medal “in recognition of special merits in the construction and development of the socialist social order and the strengthening of the German Democratic Republic”.
  • Beuer was also the recipient of the medal for fighters against fascism from 1933 to 1945 .

literature

  • SBZ manual: State administrations, parties, social organizations and their executives in the Soviet occupation zone of Germany 1945–1949 , 1990, p. 870.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Entry on Otto Beuer on the special wanted list GB (reproduced on the website of the Imperial War Museum in London) .
  2. ↑ For dismissal are proposed ...: Work and work results of the commission of the Central Committee for the review of affairs of party members 1956. Documents , 1991, p. 82 (“Otto Beuer, Wilhelmshorst near Potsdam, is informed by the ZPKK that his sentence has been canceled and that he is seen as rehabilitated ”).
  3. ↑ Obituary notice of his family . In: Neues Deutschland , September 16, 1986, p. 7.
  4. ↑ Awarded for high performance . In: Berliner Zeitung , September 21, 1973, p. 2.
personal data
SURNAME Beuer, Otto
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German political functionary
DATE OF BIRTH September 25, 1898
PLACE OF BIRTH Reichenberg
DATE OF DEATH August 29, 1986
Place of death Potsdam