Schild-Verlag (Munich)

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The former Schild-Verlag , based in Munich, was founded in 1950 by Helmut Damerau and other former officials of the Nazi state . The most well-known publications of the publisher were the German soldiers newspaper (published until 1957) and the German soldiers yearbook . In the early Federal Republic of Germany , the publishing house was financially supported by the Americans and the press and information office of the federal government for reasons of defense policy. In 2004 the publishing program was taken over by the VDM Heinz Nickel publishing house .

The journalists Thomas Assheuer and Hans Sarkowicz count the Schild-Verlag among the publishers that specialize in "memoirs of Nazi functionaries and officers, with scientifically disguised justification literature and with the 'Third Reich' glorifying or at least belittling illustrated books". These publishers "turn to publications that make World War II a positive experience, especially to members of traditional military associations and to the (often young) readers of the so-called ' Landser ' 'magazines."

Publishing history

The founding group of the publishing house were former Nazi officials who were interned in a prisoner of war camp in Garmisch-Partenkirchen . Helmut Damerau, formerly NSDAP district leader and district administrator of Prussian Holland ( East Prussia ) and close collaborator of Erich Kochs founded the publishing house in 1950 together with Heinrich Detloff von Kalben (second main shareholder), formerly a member of the NSDAP state parliament. The third co-owner was the master carpenter Leo Giess. Also involved were Joachim Ruoff , formerly an employee of the SS leadership main office and, in the background, the former general of the Waffen-SS Felix Steiner .

One of the goals was the publication of a "German Soldier Newspaper" (DSZ), which was supposed to be "anti-Bolshevik" in content and to promote a "German defense readiness". For this purpose, supposedly private German-American donors were initially found, other authors assume direct funding from the US administration . The DSZ was aggressively anti-communist and anti-union, the authors often generals, officers or members of the propaganda companies that glorified the battles and campaigns of the Second World War, the restoration of the models of front soldiers and defamed the military resistance against Hitler as treason. The circulation reached 30,000 copies.

In 1953 the funding collapsed. In order to close the financial gap, Damerau signed a funding contract with the Federal Press Office, which brought him DM 11,000 a month. The interest of the Federal Press Office was the influence on the veterans and veterans associations in the context of the rearmament of the Federal Republic. The Federal Press Office's influence on the content of the newspaper failed, and funding was discontinued in 1954. In 1957, the federal government stopped the subsidy because it was not friendly enough to the armed forces in the context of rearmament . The publisher sued against the suspension of the subsidy and was unsuccessful in court. In 1957 the SPD parliamentary group asked the federal government how long the soldiers newspaper had received financial support from the federal press office. Konrad Adenauer replied that anti-democratic and anti-Semitic publications were generally not supported.

During the subsidy years , the Schild-Hefte was published - comrades in the fight , a series of penny books that glorified war . According to the publisher's advertising, the novels heralded “the deeds that German soldiers performed on all fronts for their fatherland.” As with the other publications of the publisher, activities for Nazi and / or Wehrmacht propaganda can be proven for a number of the authors .

Several takeover attempts followed, which affected the DSZ as initially also the most economically important publication. The federal government tried to push Damerau with an offer to take over debt for sale to the Cologne publisher Stoph, Damerau refused. When the subsidy ended, the magazine ran into economic difficulties and became more radical. Due to financial difficulties, the publication frequency was reduced to fortnightly and then monthly. In 1957 Georg von Waldburg zu Zeil and Trauchburg negotiated a participation or takeover of the DSZ, but the contract was not signed. Hans Kapfinger , in whose Passau print shop the DSZ was printed, also made takeover offers.

In 1958, Gerhard Frey founded the German Soldiers-Zeitungs-Verlags-GmbH, in which the Schild-Verlag kept a stake. The DSZ was sold to this publisher in 1958 for DM 70,000. The common owners were Frey and Damerau. In 1959 Frey was listed as publisher and editor-in-chief in the legal notice. In 1960 Frey was the sole owner.

The connections between Amt Blank (1950–1955) and the resulting Federal Defense Ministry to the early Schild publishing house are unclear. In addition to the official stance that the DSZ is a "sheet for unteachable people and gourmet buttons", there was a second unofficial stance, at least in parts of the ministry.

From 1991 the publishing house was continued by Damerau's son Gunther and his daughter Dagmar Urban. Ultimately, in 2004, the publishing house VDM Heinz Nickel took over the publishing program of the Schild publishing house.

More periodicals

Apart from the early phase of the Deutsche Soldatenzeitung and its book production, the publisher's periodicals are important. In addition to “Soldat in the People” organ of the Association of German Soldiers (see also Irnfried von Wechmar ) and the marine magazine “Leinen los!” (1953 to 1968) and the German Soldiers' Yearbook (1952 to 2004).

Soldier in the People (1954–1955)

From May 1954 to June 1955 Soldat im Volk appeared as an organ of the Association of German Soldiers eV (VDS) in the Schild-Verlag. From 1953 to 1957, the acting chairman of the VDS was Gottfried Hansen . As chairman of the VDS, Hansen actively pursued a policy of repression and trivialization of the crimes of the National Socialist era .

German soldiers calendar (1952–1963) then German soldiers yearbook (published until 2004)

In the German Soldier's Yearbook, convicted war criminals such as Alfred Jodl , Kurt Meyer , Georg von Küchler or Erich Raeder , right-wing extremists and history revisionists such as Emil Schlee , Lothar Greil , Georg Franz-Willing and Erich Kern as well as military writers wrote apologetic tendencies in relation to the Nazi era represented, such as Fritz von Forell , Werner Haupt and Franz Kurowski . Former NSDAP politicians such as Heinrich Detloff von Kalben , Reinhard Pozorny and other former NS soldiers, "war heroes" and representatives of veterans 'associations also wrote articles for the soldiers' yearbook .

In an obituary for Damerau for the Ostpreußenblatt and the Landsmannschaft Ostpreußen eV Wilhelm von Gottberg described the German Soldiers ' Yearbook as "Helmut Damerau's very own and personal life's work".

Book production, authors

The Munich District Court banned on November 7, 1962, the book appeared in the shield-Verlag Israel - Dream and Reality of historical revisionists Franz Josef Scheidl . A forensic psychiatric report in the context of an Austrian prohibition proceeding against a book by the same author, Germany and the Jews , which appeared hardly later in self-publishing, found in 1969 that Scheidl was “dominated by delusional ideas and completely deprived of the use of reason”.

In 1977 the Schild Verlag took the book with the programmatic title Marzabotto, Concept of an infamous world fraud by Lothar Greil in commission, that denies the massacre of Marzabotto perpetrated by Germans . The historian Joachim Staron names Greil's publication on Marzabotto, alongside publications by Werner Haupt, who also contributed to Damerau's soldiers' yearbook, and Rudolf Aschenauer as the third example of right-wing extremist denial of the massacre. Lothar Greil published in Schild-Verlag about the Malmedy massacre perpetrated by the Germans . Kurt Meyer's “Grenadiers” has been published in several editions by Schild-Verlag since 1957, Meyer is a war criminal convicted of the Malmedy massacre. Meyer and Greil were federal managers of the SS veteran organization HIAG .

Numerous right-wing extremists are also among the authors, for example: Erich Kern as well as expellee officials such as Horst-Günter Benkmann .

Anton Bossi Fedrigotti , formerly a member of NSDAP and SA, is represented with several books about Tyrol. Several authors belong to the CSU , according to the expellee functionary Fritz Wittmann : "The order of the future" (1973), Josef Prentl "Flak combat group Prentl: an experience report." (1978) or Helmut Bärwald, who is the source of the BND in the SPD executive committee : "Trojan Cavalry" (1976).

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Thomas Assheuer, Hans Sarkowicz: right-wing radicals in Germany. Beck-Verlag Munich 1990, p. 64.
  2. ^ Thomas Assheuer, Hans Sarkowicz: right-wing radicals in Germany. Beck-Verlag Munich 1990, p. 66.
  3. ^ Peter Dudek / Hans-Gerd Jaschke : The German national newspaper. Munich 1981 p. 18.
  4. ↑ Bert-Oliver Manig: The politics of honor: the rehabilitation of professional soldiers in the early Federal Republic. Wallstein Verlag, 2004, p. 350.
  5. ↑ a b c d e f Press Office: Subsidies for soldiers . In: Der Spiegel . No.  22 , 1957, pp. 14-16 ( Online - May 29, 1957 ).
  6. ^ Annette Linke: The multimillionaire Frey and the DVU. Essen 1992, p. 73.
  7. ^ A b Deutsche National-Zeitung: mouthpiece of the people . In: Der Spiegel . No.  11 , 1963, pp. 46-52 ( Online - Mar. 13, 1963 ).
  8. ↑ a b Dudek / Jaschke 1981, p. 18.
  9. ↑ The wrong first name "Paul Steiner" is often found in the literature. Manig gives the correct first name based on correspondence in the Federal Archives. Bert-Oliver Manig: The politics of honor: the rehabilitation of professional soldiers in the early Federal Republic. Wallstein Verlag, 2004, p. 350.
  10. ^ Annette Linke: The multimillionaire Frey and the DVU. Essen 1992, p. 72.
  11. ↑ Dudek / Jaschke 1981, p. 19 f.
  12. ↑ a b Dudek / Jaschke 1981, p. 20 f.
  13. ↑ a b c d Dudek / Jaschke 1981, p. 22.
  14. ^ AJR Information ( Memento from November 1, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF; 4.5 MB) from October 1957, accessed on April 1, 2012.
  15. ↑ Norbert Hethke, Peter Skodzik: General German Roman price catalog . New expanded 8th edition. Norbert Hethke Verlag , Schönau 2003, ISBN 3-89207-999-4 , p. 451 .
  16. ^ Heinz J. Galle: People's books and book novels . Volume 1, The boom after 1945. 2nd revised edition. Dieter von Reeken, Lüneburg 2009, ISBN 978-3-940679-21-5 , p. 278 .
  17. ↑ a b Dudek / Jaschke 1981, p. 21.
  18. ^ Annette Linke: The multimillionaire Frey and the DVU. Essen 1992, p. 74.
  19. ↑ a b Annette Linke: The multimillionaire Frey and the DVU. Essen 1992, p. 75.
  20. ^ Rainer Fromm : On the right edge. Lexicon of right-wing radicalism. Schüren 1993, p. 47.
  21. ↑ Quoting from Dudek / Jaschke 1981, p. 21.
  22. ↑ Dudek / Jaschke 1981, p. 22 f.
  23. ↑ Always uncompromising for East Prussia. District Administrator a. D. Helmut Damerau completed the age of 85 (PDF; 14.3 MB) Ostpreußenblatt of November 23, 1991, p. 19.
  24. ^ Schild Verlag. Schild Verlag, accessed October 27, 2016 .
  25. ↑ www.archive.nrw.de
  26. ↑ DNB
  27. ↑ DNB entry 'Soldier in the People'
  28. ^ Federal Archives : The Federal Archives and its holdings (= publications of the Federal Archives 10.) Boldt, Boppard am Rhein 1977, ISBN 3-7646-1688-1 , p. 478. ( Preview on Google )
  29. ↑ Jürgen Förster: The Wehrmacht in the Nazi state. A structural-historical analysis Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag, 2007, ISBN 978-3-486-58098-3 , fn. 134 (p. 128).
  30. ↑ For example conference participants u. a. at the Institute for Historical Review see www.h-ref.de
  31. ^ Obituary for the Ostpreußenblatt and Landsmannschaft Ostpreußen eV dated March 11, 2000
  32. ↑ Lorenz Bessel-Lorck, Heinrich Sippel, Wolfgang Götz: National or radical. Mainz 1966, p. 83.
  33. ^ DÖW: Handbook of Austrian Right-Wing Extremism. Vienna 1993, p. 319.
  34. ↑ Joachim Staron: Fosse Ardeatine and Marzabotto: German war crimes and resistance. History and national myth-making in Germany and Italy (1944–1999) . Diss. Paderborn; Munich, ...: Schöningh 2002 Digitized version accessed on December 6, 2011 p. 16.
  35. ↑ a) The Truth About Malmedy. Documentary series No. 1. 3rd ed. Schild-Verl. Munich-Lochhausen 1958; b) Colonel of the Waffen SS Joachim Peiper and the Malmedy Trial - Munich-Lochhausen: Schild-Verlag, 1977, 4th, revised. u. exp. Ed.
  36. ↑ Astrid Lange: What the Right Read. Munich CH Beck 1993, evidence for Greil: p. 103, Meyer’s article.
  37. ↑ Example: a) Home in the fire. Schild-Hefte, Volume 15. 1954 ZDB -ID 2462544-9 ; b) The golden field. Novel from Ukraine. 1957.
  38. ↑ Example: "Goodbye, my Land Tirol ...!" - Munich: Schild-Verlag, 1983, [2. Ed.], New edition, [45. -] 46th thousand
  39. ↑ "" No. 55207 "delivered news from the SPD executive committee", was the headline of the Frankfurter Rundschau . after Hans-Dieter Bamberg: Die Deutschland-Stiftung eV , Hain Verlag 1978, p. 453.