Ruth Austria

Ruth Oesterreich, Resistance, executed in Berlin-Plötzensee

Ruth Oesterreich (born June 6, 1894 in Dresden , † June 25, 1943 in Berlin-Plötzensee ) was a German communist politician and resistance fighter .

Life

Austria was a member of the socialist movement from an early age. She worked as an editorial secretary for the " Dresdner Volkszeitung ", then as a secretary in the Comintern's Western European office . She was a member of the KPD until 1928 . There she turned against the policy of Stalinization . In 1929 she joined the KPD-O . There she worked in the management and administration of the Arbeiterpresse publishing cooperative, which published the daily “ Arbeiterpolitik ”. With the KPD-O minority she went to the SAPD at the end of 1931 .

In 1933 she had with her young daughter first for Prague to emigrate where they temporarily Secretary of Willi mud was. She suggested the creation of a central aid center for German émigré children and worked in this. In 1938 she went to Paris and - since her residence permit was refused - on to Brussels . Despite her own economic hardship while emigrating, she was helpful and politically active in the fight against National Socialism . She worked in a small group to locate and prevent arms deliveries from Germany to Spain during the time of the Spanish Civil War .

Together with her daughter Ruth, she was arrested by the Gestapo in Brussels on April 21, 1941 and taken to Aachen and Karlsruhe. While the daughter was being released, the mother came to Berlin and was sentenced to death by the 1st Senate of the People's Court for high treason . On June 25, 1943, she was executed in the Berlin-Plötzensee prison .

literature

• Ulla Plener (Hg): Women from Germany in the French Resistance. Workers' Movement Series: Researches, Documents, Biographies; Berlin 2005 ISBN 3-929390-80-9 p. 91ff
• Nicei Sutro: Youth on the run 1933-1948 , Zurich 1952
• Walter Hammer : This is how Ruth Oesterreich died . In: Equality , 20, 12, Bonn 1957 pp. 452f.
• Theodor Bergmann : Against the current. The history of the KPD (opposition) . Hamburg 2004 (therein: Short biography of Ruth Oesterreichs p. 505)
• Birgit Schmidt : Who was Ruth Oesterreich? On the trail of a forgotten socialist. Series: Resistance Women, 13th Edition AV , Lich 2011 ISBN 978-3-86841-058-7 With references
• Hermann Weber , Andreas Herbst : Reich, Jakob (Thomas) . In: German Communists. Biographisches Handbuch 1918 to 1945. 2nd, revised and greatly expanded edition. Dietz, Berlin 2008, ISBN 978-3-320-02130-6 (entry on her temporary partner Jakob Reich , with a short section on Ruth Oesterreich).