Otto Wittgen

Otto Wittgen (born August 6, 1881 in Neunkirchen (Westerwald) , † January 31, 1941 in Koblenz ) was a German politician ( NSDAP ) and the first Protestant mayor of Koblenz from 1933 to 1939.

Life and work

Wittgen studied law and political science in Frankfurt am Main and Berlin, as well as mechanical engineering from 1900 to 1902 at the Technical University of Hanover, where he was a member of the Polytechnic Choral Society , which later became the Hansea Hanover gymnastics club . Then he went to Hirschberg, Hanover and Itzehoe as an assessor . After participating in the First World War as a soldier, he worked for the district governments of Düsseldorf and Wiesbaden . From 1924 he was employed as a government and trade councilor for the district government in Koblenz . In addition, he was also chairman of the Association for the Retraining of Voluntary Workers founded in August 1932 on the Karthauser , a forerunner of the later Reich Labor Service .

Acting as the Lord Mayor of Koblenz

Since 1932 the NSDAP was represented in the Koblenz city council with 19 of 34 seats. After Karl Carius seized power and dismissed Lord Mayor Hugo Rosendahl on March 8, 1933 , Wittgen was appointed acting Lord Mayor by the Prussian Interior Minister Hermann Göring on March 16, 1933. On August 4, 1933, he was elected the first Protestant Lord Mayor of Koblenz for the next twelve years. Previously, political opponents were removed from the city council and city administration.

Only a short time after taking office, on April 1, 1933, the first incitement and boycott actions against Jewish citizens took place in Koblenz. The Koblenz police and Gestapo carried out a series of raids against SPD and KPD members, and pastors were also subjected to repression. On August 31, 1934, Adolf Hitler was given the "honorary citizenship" of the city of Koblenz , which had been the capital of the " Gau Koblenz-Trier " (from 1941 " Gau Moselland ") under Gauleiter Gustav Simon since 1931 . A high point in the persecution of the Jews was the Reichspogromnacht 1938, during which the synagogue in the Bürresheimer Hof on Florinsmarkt in Koblenz was damaged and the interior was destroyed. Jews' homes and businesses were destroyed and many Jews were mistreated.

During Wittgen's tenure, the inauguration of the Adolf-Hitler-Brücke (1934), the construction of the stadium on the Oberwerth (1935), the construction of a place in front of the Electoral Palace (1935), the German occupation of the Rhineland (1936) and the incorporation followed Koblenz von Metternich, Ehrenbreitstein, Pfaffendorf, Horchheim, Neudorf and Niederberg (1937). The aim was to turn the Gau capital Koblenz into a major city . This did not succeed, however, because the population only rose from 65,257 (1933) to 91,098 (1939).

With the construction of barracks after the occupation of the Rhineland, Koblenz became a garrison town again, and the participation of Koblenz companies in the construction of motorways and the West Wall led to an economic boom in Koblenz. The Reich Labor Service under Konstantin Hierl settled in Koblenz and made Wittgen an honorary leader. In return, Hierl was made an "honorary citizen" of the city of Koblenz.

At the urging of the Upper President of the Rhine Province Josef Terboven and Gauleiter Gustav Simon, Mayor Wittgen had to retire early on March 20, 1939, because they were dissatisfied with his administration. The NSDAP appointed Theodor Habicht as his successor. Wittgen died two years later in Koblenz and was buried in the main cemetery.

literature

• Erich Stockhorst: Five thousand heads. Who was what in the Third Reich , 1967.
• Wolfgang Schütz: Koblenz heads. People from the city's history - namesake for streets and squares. Verlag für Werbung Blätter GmbH Mülheim-Kärlich, Ed .: Bernd Weber, 2005 (2nd revised and expanded edition).
• Energieversorgung Mittelrhein GmbH (ed.): History of the city of Koblenz . Overall editing: Ingrid Bátori in conjunction with Dieter Kerber and Hans Josef Schmidt
  • Vol. 1: From the beginning to the end of the electoral era . Theiss, Stuttgart 1992, ISBN 3-8062-0876-X
  • Vol. 2: From the French city to the present . Theiss, Stuttgart 1993, ISBN 3-8062-1036-5
• Gau-Chronik RAD Arbeitsgau XXIV Middle Rhine, Koblenz no year, p. 3–12.
• Petra Weiß: Otto Wittgen (1881-1941), National Socialist Lord Mayor of Koblenz (1933-1939) , Koblenz 2013.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ http://www.rheinische-geschichte.lvr.de/persoenitäten/W/Seiten/OttoWittgen.aspx
2. ^ History of the City of Koblenz, Volume 2, page 171.