Otto Kohlhofer

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Otto Kohlhofer (born August 29, 1915 in Munich , † August 14, 1988 in Wolfratshausen ) was a German communist and prisoner in the Dachau concentration camp . After the liberation from National Socialism , he was chairman of the Dachau camp community and made a contribution to the establishment of the Dachau concentration camp memorial .

Live and act

Kohlhofer, the son of a brewery worker, grew up with five siblings in poor circumstances in Munich. After attending primary school, Kohlhofer began training as a precision mechanic at the company Rodenstock . Due to the difficult economic situation and the resulting poor working conditions, Kohlhofer tried to organize a strike together with other apprentices without success. Due to his political activity, his employment relationship was terminated before he finished his training. At the end of 1932 he became a member of the KJVD . Kohlhofer became a member of the Red Aid between late 1932 and early 1933 and worked as a chauffeur after he was unemployed until April 1934 .

time of the nationalsocialism

After the National Socialists came to power , Kohlhofer was head (code name Betti Gerber ) of a communist resistance group that was active in the Munich underground. Members of the resistance group distributed conspiratorial communist leaflets, including the publication “Im Mörderlager Dachau” by communist Hans Beimler . Members of the resistance group were arrested by the Gestapo in July 1935 . Kohlhofer was established in March 1936 as the main accused to two and a half years prison sentenced, he in prison Amberg spent in solitary confinement. In February 1938 he was transferred from prison to Dachau concentration camp. There he was active in several work units. After the Dachau concentration camp was evacuated in autumn 1939 for training purposes for members of the Waffen-SS , Kohlhofer's relocation to the Flossenbürg concentration camp , where he also had to work in the quarry.

In a physically weakened condition, the prisoners were transferred back to the Dachau concentration camp in February 1940. Kohlhofer expressed his solidarity with Polish and Russian prisoners in particular and tried to get additional food for sick prisoners. He was also involved in building a radio to listen to illegal enemy broadcasts . In the course of 1943 Kohlhofer volunteered to be transferred to the Kottern satellite camp near Kempten, where Messerschmitt AG had armaments manufactured. In February 1944 he was transferred back to the Dachau concentration camp. At the end of 1944, Kohlhofer was released from the camp in Olomouc to join his unit , with the condition that he would join a probation battalion of the Wehrmacht . He managed to escape in April 1945. Then he was able to go into hiding until the liberation .

After the end of the war

On his return to Munich in November 1945, Kohlhofer married his girlfriend Resi, whom he had met during his time as a concentration camp inmate in the Kottern subcamp who was responsible for the milk supply in the neighboring town. Kohlhofer got a job in the Bavarian Ministry of Agriculture in 1946 , where he worked until his retirement. As a former German inmate at Dachau, he and three other members of the Comité International de Dachau formed a working group to set up a memorial on the former camp site.

As early as the early 1950s, Kohlhofer was committed to building a memorial and recruited former Dachau prisoners for this project, both the Catholic clergy Leonhard Roth and Johannes Neuhäusler , and the Bavarian Minister of Agriculture Alois Hundhammer . The memorial was finally opened on May 9, 1965, and the International Memorial was inaugurated on September 8, 1968. From the beginning of the 1970s Kohlhofer was involved in the peace movement and was a member of the board of the “Förderverein Internationale Jugendbegegnungsstätte” after a rift within the Dachau Committee. Kohlhofer died of a heart attack in his hut in mid-August 1988.

literature

  • Angelika Pisarski: Otto Kohlhofer , in: Hans-Günter Richardi (Hrsg.): Curricula vitae - fates of people who were in the Dachau concentration camp , BoD - Books on Demand 2001, Dachau documents vol. 2, ISBN 9783831121908
  • 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 .
  • Christa and Peter Willmitzer: Code name »Betti Gerber«. From resistance in Neuhausen to Dachau concentration camp memorial site - Otto Kohlhofer 1915-1988 , Allitera Verlag, Munich 2006, ISBN 3-86520-183-0 [1]
  • Norbert Göttler (Ed.): “After the zero hour. Stadt und Landkreis Dachau 1945 to 1949 ”, in Volume 2 of the Dachauer Discourse series (Ed. Bernhard Schoßig and Robert Sigel), Herbert Utz Verlag GmbH, Munich 2008, ISBN 978-3-8316-0803-4
  • Martin Broszat and Hartmut Mehringer (eds.): Bavaria in the Nazi era V. The parties KPD, SPD, BVP in persecution and resistance. By Hartmut Mehringer, Anton Grossmann and Klaus Schönhoven, Oldenbourg 1983, ISBN 3-486-42401-7

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Angelika Pisarski Otto Kohlhofer ( Memento of the original dated May 30, 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. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.zbdachau.de
  2. ↑ a b Martin Broszat and Hartmut Mehringer (eds.): Bavaria in the Nazi era V. The parties KPD, SPD, BVP in persecution and resistance. , 1983, 137f.
  3. ↑ “You can't imagine how dangerous it was” - Interview with Resi Kohlhofer - Interview with Resi Kohlhofer
  4. ^ The former Dachau concentration camp, 1945-1968
personal data
SURNAME Kohlhofer, Otto
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German communist and concentration camp prisoner
DATE OF BIRTH August 29, 1915
PLACE OF BIRTH Munich
DATE OF DEATH August 14, 1988
Place of death Wolfratshausen