Robey Leibbrandt

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Sidney Robey Leibbrandt , who by the defense as Robert Leibbrand was performed (* 25. January 1913 in Potchefstroom , Transvaal , † 1. August 1966 in Ladybrand , Free State Province , South Africa ) was a Boer heavyweight boxer who, after the 1936 Summer Olympics as National Socialist agent and politician tried to bring about a political overthrow for the German defense in his native South Africa.

The boxer Leibbrandt

Leibbrandt's greatest international success was the bronze medal in the light heavyweight division at the British Empire Games in London in 1934 . In 1936 he represented South Africa at the Boxing Olympics in Berlin . On July 31, 1937, he became the South African heavyweight champion with a win over Jim Pentz .

After the Second World War he started boxing again in 1948 and won two fights.

Operation hawthorn

Following the Olympic Games in 1936, Leibbrandt returned to Berlin in 1938 to study at the Reich Sports School in Berlin. When war broke out in 1939, he stayed in Germany. He signed up for the Wehrmacht and was the first South African to be trained as a paratrooper .

The German defense under Admiral Wilhelm Canaris developed a plan under the operation name Weißdorn to build a National Socialist movement in South Africa with the aim of overthrowing the government there under General Jan Smuts , since it entered the war against the German Reich on the side of the Allies was. The deployment order for this operation was issued by Colonel Erwin von Lahousen , head of the Department of Defense II. To this end, Leibbrandt was ocean-experienced by a crew of German agents sailors long with the confiscated for this purpose 21-meter French Kutteryacht Kyloe of St. Malo on Trinidade sailed non-stop to South Africa in 68 days and landed there in a rubber dinghy off the coast of Namaqualand northwest of Cape Town . The Kyloe was left behind by her crew under Lieutenant Christian Nissen and the "master navigator" Paul Temme after 14,400 nautical miles in the Spanish Sahara . The way home from Villa Cisneros to Germany continued with Italian aircraft via Rome to Berlin. The crew included well-known German ocean sailors such as the agent sailor and knight's cross holder Heinrich Garbers and the painter Age Nissen .

Leibbrandt founded the Nasionaal Sosialistiese Rebelle in South Africa and through agitation and propaganda he succeeded in building an organization that secretly prepared some of its members for sabotage and acts of terrorism . There was no collaboration with the German-friendly Ossewabrandwag under Johannes van Rensburg because the chemistry between the two leaders was not consistent.

Leibbrandt was exposed by a smuggled English secret agent of the Secret Intelligence Service . Although he initially tried to evade his arrest, he was then arrested after receiving a reward for treason from his own ranks. The police officer who made the arrest was his boxing colleague Claude Sterley from Springbok . Leibbrandt was sentenced to death in the subsequent court proceedings for high treason , but due to his sympathy for the Leibbrandt family , General Smuts was also pardoned to life imprisonment in 1943 and was amnestied by the National Party government under Daniel François Malan, which came to power in 1948 .

post war period

Leibbrandt remained politically active and founded an anti-communist protective front in South Africa in 1962 . He published his memoirs in Afrikaans in 1961 under the title Geen Genade (in German: No Mercy ). His life is the subject of the book by Hans Strydom: For Volk und Führer (1983), which was later filmed as The Fourth Reich . Robert Leibbrand, “ the faithful follower ”, was married to Margaretha “Etha” Cornelia Botha and they had five children: Hermann, Remer, Izan, Rayna, Meyder Johannes. He died in 1966 with his family, the required military honors were denied him by the South African government.

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Col McGill Alexander: Paratrooping Pioneer: David McCombe, South Africa's first serving paratrooper . In: Military History Journal, South African Military History Society . 10, No. 2, December 1995.
  2. ↑ The ghost sailors of defense ; see also Brandenburg (special unit)
  3. ↑ Charles Whiteing: Robey Leibbrandt and Operation Hawthorn . In: The South African Military History Society KwaZulu-Natal Branch Newsletter . No. 326, July 2002.
  4. ^ Research results on the family tree

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Leibbrandt, Robey
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Leibbrandt, Sidney Robey
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Boer heavyweight boxer and South African National Socialist politician
DATE OF BIRTH January 25, 1913
PLACE OF BIRTH Potchefstroom , Transvaal
DATE OF DEATH August 1, 1966
Place of death Ladybrand , Free State Province , South Africa