Otto Karl Bachmann

Otto Karl Bachmann (born February 18, 1877 in Hintersee-Prettin ; † January 18, 1954 in Potsdam ) was a communist politician , trade unionist and the first KPD - mayor of a municipality in Germany.

Life

Coming from a family of butchers, Bachmann completed an apprenticeship as a bricklayer and, after a few years of wandering, initially settled in Chemnitz . Early on as a union member , he joined the SPD in 1897 and in 1908 became a full-time functionary of the free trade union construction workers' association (BAV) in Breslau , from 1911 to 1916 second secretary of the local union cartel in Chemnitz.

Belonging to the left wing of the SPD, Bachmann rejected the truce policy of the party majority during the First World War and joined the Spartakusbund in 1918 and the KPD in 1919 . During the November Revolution he was a member of the Workers 'and Soldiers' Council in Chemnitz and in 1919 became chairman of the local association of the BAV in the KPD stronghold of Chemnitz, where he worked closely with Heinrich Brandler . In 1921, the Chemnitz BAV, together with other local associations dominated by the KPD, was excluded from the association by the union headquarters dominated by the Social Democrats; the Red Construction Workers Association was founded under Bachmann's leadership ; as chairman until he is reconnected to the BAV. In 1921, Bachmann also represented his association at the founding congress of the Red Trade Union International in Moscow and from 1922 worked in the trade union department of the KPD Central Committee .

In June 1927 Bachmann was elected mayor in the local elections in Oelsnitz in the Vogtland region . Bachmann was the first KPD member to become mayor of a German city. In March 1929 he was expelled from the KPD because he rejected the ultra-left line of the leadership around Ernst Thälmann and had shown solidarity with Heinrich Brandler, who had previously been excluded. Together with most of the local KPD, he joined the KPO around Brandler and August Thalheimer and remained Mayor of Oelsnitz until 1933.

After the takeover of the NSDAP Bachmann was arrested on 8 March 1933 as he had personally the swastika flag from the Town Hall and by February 1934 at the concentration camp Osterstein Castle / Zwickau held. After his release, Bachmann moved to Berlin, where he again worked as a bricklayer and was active in a resistance group around Jakob Schloer, who also came from the KPO .

After the liberation in 1945, Bachmann was briefly mayor of Eggersdorf and rejoined the KPD. In 1946, after the forced unification of the SPD and KPD, he became a member of the SED and from autumn 1945 headed the IG Bau and Holz in the FDGB in the state of Brandenburg . He resigned from his position in 1949 due to age and illness and thus escaped the internal SED purges against former KPO members at the beginning of the fifties.

literature

• 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 ).