Fritz Rettmann

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Fritz Rettmann (born February 5, 1902 in Berlin ; † July 20, 1981 there ) was a German communist politician , trade unionist , resistance fighter and Spain fighter .

Life

1902-1933

Rettmann, son of a worker, attended elementary school and then completed an apprenticeship as a toolmaker . In 1916 he joined the German Metalworkers' Association (DMV). In 1919 he became a member of the Free Socialist Youth . From 1920 to 1928 he was a member of the Communist Workers' Party of Germany (KAPD). From 1920 to 1930 he worked as a toolmaker in various Berlin companies, including AEG , Siemens and C. Lorenz . From 1921 to 1928 he was a member of the executive board of the General Workers Union . In 1928 he joined the KPD and became a member of the AEG Ackerstrasse cell. From the end of 1930 he was secretary for agitation of the communist union of metal workers in Berlin (EVMB). In mid-January 1933, Rettmann was elected organizational secretary and at the same time deputy chairman of the EVMB.

1933-1945

After the " seizure of power " by the National Socialists, Rettmann initially worked in the illegal structures of the EVMB, which from March 1933 resisted as a union cadre organization. Between February and August 1933, Rettmann was head of the illegal EVMB. After he was replaced by Rudolf Lentzsch in this position , he worked illegally as an instructor for the Berlin KPD sub-districts of Weißensee , Lichtenberg , Friedrichshain and Kreuzberg . In 1934/35 he attended the International Lenin School in Moscow . In 1935 he took part as a delegate at the VII World Congress of the Comintern . In the same year he returned illegally to Germany for four weeks on behalf of the party, then he emigrated to the Netherlands . From October 1936 to 1938 he was a member of the International Brigades and took part in the Spanish Civil War. There he became captain and political commissioner of the second company of the Etgar André battalion . After being wounded, he became political director of the Second Party School and instructor of the officers' school at Poso Rubio . In July 1938 he fled to France and became a training leader for the KPD in Paris . He was arrested in 1939 and interned in France until 1943, most recently in Camp de Gurs . Extradited to Germany in 1943, he was imprisoned in Sachsenhausen concentration camp until 1945 . On the night of May 1, 1945, he was liberated by the Red Army .

1945-1981

In May 1945 Rettmann returned to Berlin and was initially responsible for cultural work in the Reinickendorf district office . From 1945 to 1951 he was first chairman of IG Metall von Groß-Berlin and a board member of the FDGB . Since 1946 he was a member of the SED . In 1952 he became the municipal director for vocational training in Berlin, then in 1953 director for work in the VEB large lathe construction company “7. October “in Berlin-Weißensee . From 1955 he was first secretary of the Berlin district management of the Society for Sport and Technology (GST) and deputy chairman of the GST. Between 1957 and 1962, Rettmann was head of the trade union, social and health service department or the trade unions and social policy department at the SED Central Committee. In 1958 he became a member of the SED district leadership in Berlin. From 1959 to 1972 Rettmann was a member of the FDGB federal executive board, from 1962 honorary chairman of the working group “Honored Union Veterans” and employee of the history chair at the FDGB “Fritz Heckert” college . He was a volunteer member of the Western Commission of the Central Committee of the SED. In 1963 he was one of the founders of the Solidarity Committee for the Spanish People and became its deputy chairman.

tomb

He was married to Maria Rentmeister .

Rettmanns urn was in the grave conditioning Pergolenweg the memorial of the socialists at the Berlin Central Cemetery Friedrichsfelde buried.

Honors

Works

  • From the life of a socialist . Grandstand, Berlin 1963.
  • From the life of a Spanish fighter . Young World Publishing House, Berlin 1972.

literature

  • Andreas Herbst (eds.), Winfried Ranke, Jürgen Winkler: This is how the GDR worked. Volume 3: Lexicon of functionaries (= rororo manual. Vol. 6350). Rowohlt, Reinbek bei Hamburg 1994, ISBN 3-499-16350-0 , p. 274.
  • Gabriele Baumgartner, Dieter Hebig (Hrsg.): Biographisches Handbuch der SBZ / DDR. 1945–1990 . Volume 2: Maassen - Zylla . KG Saur, Munich 1997, ISBN 3-598-11177-0 , p. 706.
  • Andreas Herbst: Rettmann, Fritz. In: Dieter Dowe , Karlheinz Kuba, Manfred Wilke (Hrsg.): FDGB-Lexikon. Function, structure, cadre and development of a mass organization of the SED (1945–1990) . Berlin 2009, ISBN 978-3-86872-240-6 .
  • Stefan Heinz : Moscow's mercenaries? The "Union of Metalworkers in Berlin". Development and failure of a communist union . VSA-Verlag, Hamburg 2010, ISBN 978-3-89965-406-6 , pp. 150, 234, 290, 310f., 369, 395, 397-399, 527f.
  • Elke Reuter, Bernd-Rainer Barth :  Rettmann, Fritz . In: Who was who in the GDR? 5th edition. Volume 2. Ch. Links, Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-86153-561-4 .
  • Joachim Arndt: Fritz Rettmann (1902–1981) . In: Stefan Heinz , Siegfried Mielke (ed.): Functionaries of the unified association of metal workers in Berlin in the Nazi state. Resistance and persecution (= trade unionists under National Socialism. Persecution - resistance - emigration. Volume 2). Metropol, Berlin 2012, ISBN 978-3-86331-062-2 , pp. 230-235.
  • Stefan Heinz: Exile and the rebuilding of the union after 1945: Kuno Brandel and Fritz Rettmann - two paths through life from the point of view of the history of experience and memory . In: Stefan Berger (ed.): Trade union history as memory history. May 2, 1933 in the trade union remembrance and positioning after 1945 (= publications of the Institute for Social Movements - Series A: Representations , Vol. 60), Klartext Verlag, Essen 2015, ISBN 978-3-8375-1580-0 , p 191-211.
  • Siegfried Mielke , Stefan Heinz (eds.) With the collaboration of Julia Pietsch: Emigrated metal trade unionists in the fight against the Nazi regime (= trade unionists under National Socialism. Persecution - Resistance - Emigration. Volume 3). Metropol, Berlin 2014, ISBN 978-3-86331-210-7 , pp. 31, 56, 59-60, 66-67, 607, 841-842 (short biography).

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Grandstand of May 8, 1980.
  2. ^ New Germany from September 4, 1958.
personal data
SURNAME Rettmann, Fritz
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German politician (SED) and trade unionist
DATE OF BIRTH February 5, 1902
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin
DATE OF DEATH July 20, 1981
Place of death Berlin