Otto Schmidt (petty criminal)

Otto Schmidt (born August 16, 1906 in Berlin ; † October 30, 1942 in Sachsenhausen concentration camp ) was a German petty criminal. Schmidt became known as a key figure in the political intrigue of the spring of 1938, known as the Fritsch crisis , in the course of which Adolf Hitler removed the conservative head of the army command Werner von Fritsch from his office on allegations of homosexuality , in order to subsequently exercise command over the Wehrmacht himself take over.

Life

Life before 1935

Otto Schmidt embarked on a career in the Berlin demi-world as a teenager, where he made his way as a thief , blackmailer and pimp . Between 1921 and 1937 he was imprisoned several times: In 1921/22 Schmidt was sentenced three times for theft to prison terms totaling two months, three weeks and 30 days. In 1924 another four months' imprisonment for theft followed. In 1927 he served a month's imprisonment for embezzlement , in 1928 a four-month sentence for extortion, and a six-month sentence for extortion . In 1929 two weeks' imprisonment for fraud followed .

On November 22, 1933, Schmidt observed how his friend, the stick boy Martin Weingärtner (nickname: Bayern-Seppl ), met an older gentleman at Potsdamer Platz (U2) underground station for a homosexual encounter: Weingärtner and the man moved towards each other for this purpose, return to a toilet in the subway station. When the act was completed, the stranger paid the vineyard operator for his services and handed him his card. Schmidt used his knowledge and made the man, the Rittmeister a. D. Joachim (Achim) von Frisch, his attendance soon afterwards: he presented himself to the officer as a member of the SA and, in exchange for his silence, demanded that he participate in homosexual practices and a considerable amount of money.

Schmidt's role in the intrigue against Werner von Fritsch

After Schmidt was arrested again for theft in 1935, he testified in 1936 during an interrogation by the Gestapo about the November 1933 incident. The occasion for the interrogation was a large-scale action carried out by the Gestapo this year, during which arrested homosexuals were to be questioned about all their contacts in order to obtain information with which the Gestapo and SD could induce useful people to cooperate or cooperate could harm their opponents. When he heard Schmidt's testimony about Weingärtner's encounter with an officer named Frisch, the officer who carried out the interrogation, Josef Meisinger from Department II H in the Berlin Secret State Police Office (Gestapa) , wrongly assumed that he was the named head of the Army Command the Wehrmacht, General Werner von Fritsch, had to act. He then passed the supposedly delicate information on to the heads of the SS and SD, Heinrich Himmler and Reinhard Heydrich . Both saw the report as a welcome opportunity to get Fritsch, who they disliked, out of the way as Chief of Army Command. They created an incriminating file on Schmidt, which they finally presented to Hitler. However, he did not want to know about the matter and ordered the files to be burned. Schmidt was sentenced on December 28, 1936 for extortion in fourteen cases and nine times offense against § 175 StGB to seven years imprisonment and loss of civil rights to ten years.

Less than a year and a half later, Hitler's attitude towards Fritsch had fundamentally changed after the general had shown himself to be little open to his war plans. Himmler and Heydrich took the opportunity and now, supported by Göring, reminded the dictator of the allegedly incriminating acts of 1936. Hitler gratefully took up the accusation of homosexuality , knowing that this accusation Fritsch as Commander in Chief of the Army and thus as a political obstacle for his war plans out of the way.

On January 26, 1938, Fritsch was summoned to the Reich Chancellery by Hitler and confronted with the allegations made against him. Fritsch denied this vigorously, whereupon Hitler called Schmidt, who was waiting in an adjoining room, and had Fritsch confronted him. Schmidt immediately pointed to Fritsch and confirmed that he was the man he had seen with Weingärtner. Previously, Schmidt's false testimony had been bought from the Gestapo with the offer to him early from prison to dismiss if he burden Fritsch.

Following Schmidt's "identification", Hitler offered Fritsch to dismiss him from the army with all honors if he agreed to submit his departure as Commander-in-Chief. Fritsch, who thought that Hitler had been the victim of an error, did not respond, but asked for a judicial investigation. Hitler then dismissed him, but a few weeks later, against the resistance of Himmler and Heydrich, under pressure from the generals , declared himself ready to allow a court martial.

The court of honor proceedings against Fritsch

In the following hearing, Schmidt admitted, in response to inquiries from the judge whether anyone had influenced or even threatened him in his original testimony, that SS-Obersturmführer Meisinger had told him the day before that if he did not stand by his earlier statements, there will be an "ascension" tomorrow. Meisinger denied this statement, but stated that it was merely a "drastic warning of the truth".

The examining magistrate then practically checked Schmidt's statement by going to the address he had given to Fritsch at Ferdinandstrasse 20 in Berlin-Lichterfelde: On the front door of the neighboring house 21 he discovered a sign with the name Frisch and learned from the housekeeper, that the Gestapo arrested the resident Joachim Frisch on January 15, before the Fritsch / Schmidt confrontation. Under pressure from the Ministry of Justice , the judge succeeded in getting Frisch transferred by the Gestapo, who confirmed that he, Frisch, had actually been the victim of Schmidt's blackmail. Although Hitler felt compelled to take him back into the army due to the innocence of Colonel General von Fritsch, which was subsequently established in the main hearing, he did not give him back his post as commander-in-chief, but kept it for himself - Fritsch was resigned to a meaningless honorary position.

Marion Countess Dönhoff later summed up that the intrigue against Fritsch and his dismissal in favor of an expansion of Hitler's power had been nothing more than the “completion of the Nazis' seizure of power.

Schmidt's end

Contrary to the promises of the Gestapo and SS leadership, Schmidt remained imprisoned. Four years later, in the summer of 1942, Himmler wrote to Hermann Goering "asking for your consent that I propose Schmidt to the Fuehrer for approval of the execution ". Goering added the margin note to Himmler's letter: "He should have been shot long ago ". Schmidt was shot in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp on October 30, 1942 .

literature

• Werner Abelshauser : Economy and Armaments, Sovereignty and Security. 1982.
• Bernd-Ulrich Hergemöller: Man for man. Biographical lexicon on the history of love for friends and male sexuality in the German-speaking area. 1998

Movies

The case of von Fritsch, in which Schmidt appeared as a witness, was filmed in 1988 by BR and ORF in the two-part television series " Geheime Reichssache ", directed by Michael Kehlmann . The role of Schmidt was played by Werner Pochath .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Klaus Jürgen Müller: The Army and Hitler. Army and National Socialist Regime , 1969, p. 637.
2. ^ The time of January 27, 1984.
3. ↑ Martin Kitchen: The Third Reich. Charisma and Community. 2008, p. 241.