Technical emergency aid

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Manual of the technical emergency aid from 1925

The Technische Nothilfe , TN or (unofficially) TeNo for short , was a formally independent volunteer organization until 1939, but de facto maintained by the German Reich . In the first five years of its existence, it was primarily used to fight strikes in companies classified as vital, but later the focus shifted to technical disaster control , civil air protection and voluntary labor service . The TN was the predecessor organization of the Technical Relief Organization (THW) of the Federal Republic of Germany .

Weimar Republic

The technical emergency aid emerged from the military "Technical Department" (TA) founded in January 1919 by the then pioneer lieutenant Otto Lummitzsch , a technical free corps in the association of the Guard Cavalry Rifle Division in Berlin . To reinforce the TA, technical temporary volunteer associations were set up in spring / summer 1919 both in the Reich capital and in other German cities, for which the term "technical emergency aid" began to prevail. This term was also adopted for the nationwide organization established by Reich Defense Minister Gustav Noske on September 30, 1919 . For political reasons - among other things to avoid that the helpers would be counted as soldiers and thus the combat strength of the Reichswehr limited by the Versailles Treaty would decrease accordingly - the TN was transferred to the responsibility of the Reich Ministry of the Interior at the turn of the year 1919/20 .

In the TN, which already had 50,000 members a few months after it was founded, former soldiers and unemployed engineers were particularly active.

The main purpose of the participants was initially to carry out emergency work in companies on strike that were classified as vital ( gas works , water works , electricity works , Reichsbahn , Reichspost , agriculture , food production, etc.), provided that this was not carried out by their own workforce. The activities of the TN not infrequently led to violent political controversies between their supporters in politics, administration, business associations and large sections of the bourgeoisie and their opponents in the free trade unions , the SPD and especially in the KPD . The TN fought the latter during the entire period of the Weimar Republic as a strike breaker organization. After the number and extent of strikes from 1925 onwards made it less and less necessary for the TN to be involved, the organization shifted its activities to the areas of disaster control and air protection , and from 1932 even to voluntary labor service . The number of members of the TN shrank between 1924 and 1930 from almost half a million to just under 186,000.

National Socialism

Advertisement poster for technical emergency aid 1933
Technical emergency aid demonstration exercise in 1939
1944 units of the Technical Emergency Relief are on the destruction of Warsaw involved
September 10, 1944: TN demolition squad destroying the Royal Castle in Warsaw

During the time of National Socialism, the participants concentrated on the technical service (for the elimination of emergencies in vital companies) and the air raid protection service and was also available for disaster control. The participants provided the units of the LS repair service as part of air protection and security and auxiliary services . From 1936, the Reich Office of the TN was transferred to the main office of the Ordnungspolizei of the Reichsführer SS and Chief of the German Police in the Reich Ministry of the Interior.

Organizationally, the Reichsamt TN in Berlin-Steglitz was at the top , followed by state, district and local groups. Founder Otto Lummitzsch had to vacate his post as head of the organization in 1934 because he was married to a “ half-Jewish woman ” (see Nuremberg Laws ). Erich Hampe became head of operations - already during the Weimar Republic - and later also Deputy Head of the Reich Office for Technical Emergency Aid .

Lummitzsch's successors as Reichsführer or from 1937 as head of the TN were SS ranks in the general rank: April 1934 to September 1943 Hans Weinreich , October 15, 1943 to May 1945 Willy Schmelcher . During the Second World War , TN commandos in the wake of the Wehrmacht were active in many areas occupied by the German Reich . In some countries (for example the Netherlands , Norway ) branch organizations have even been set up. When the uprising in the Warsaw Ghetto was suppressed by the SS in April / May 1943, a small unit of technical emergency aid was also deployed.

Some of the conscript helpers of the TN were drafted into the technical force of the Wehrmacht from 1941 under the leadership of Lieutenant Colonel (at the end of the war Major General of the Technical Troops) Erich Hampe . Task forces of the TN came as technical auxiliary police to combat resistance, for example when the cellars of the Edelweiss pirates were blown up in Cologne in 1944/45.

In 1945 the TN was dissolved by the Allies through the Control Council Act No. 2 .

Ranks in the TN

1933 1943
  • TN candidate
  • TN man
  • TN foreman
  • TN head foreman
  • Squad Leader
  • Oberscharfuhrer
  • Hauptscharführer
  • Stabsscharführer
  • Comradeship leader
  • Community leader
  • Followers
  • Standby leader
  • Chief readiness leader
  • District Leader
  • Country Guide
  • Deputy Head of the TN
  • Head of the TN
  • Contender for the TeNo (Sagittarius)
  • Sergeant of the TeNo (private)
  • Rottwachtmeister of the TeNo (Corporal)
  • Sergeant of the TeNo (NCO)
  • Oberwachtmeister of the TeNo (Unterfeldwebel)
  • Platoon sergeant of the TeNo (Sergeant)
  • Stand-by leader of the TeNo (Oberfeldwebel)
  • Chief Sergeant of the TeNo (Oberfeldwebel)
  • Master of the TeNo (Staff Sergeant)
  • Platoon leader of the TeNo (lieutenant)
  • Oberzugführer of the TeNo (first lieutenant)
  • Stand-by leader of the TeNo (captain)
  • Head of Department of TeNo (Major)
  • Senior Department Leader of the TeNo (Lieutenant Colonel)
  • Country Leader (Colonel)


  • Chief of the TeNo (Lieutenant General)

Succession organization

After the establishment of the Federal Republic of Germany, it was Otto Lummitzsch who founded the Technische Hilfswerk (THW) in 1950 . Today the THW is a federal agency in the Federal Ministry of the Interior .

literature

Web links

Commons : Technical Emergency Aid  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Ernst Lorenz (editor): Manual for the operation of the technical emergency aid at the Reich Ministry of the Interior. (pdf; 287 MB) Berlin-Steglitz, 1921/22, accessed on August 22, 2020 (reproduced on bbk.bund.de Fachinformationsstelle).
  2. ↑ In the Control Council Act No. 2 the abbreviation "TENO" is used.
  3. ^ Matthias Bertsch : 100 years of technical emergency aid: the forerunner of the THW is founded. In: Deutschlandfunk broadcast “Calendar Sheet”. September 30, 2019, accessed August 22, 2020 .
  4. ↑ Photography ze źródeł niemieckich. In: lodz.pl. Archived from the original on June 26, 2008 ; accessed on August 22, 2020 (Polish).
  5. ↑ Jürgen Stroop: There is no longer a Jewish residential area in Warsaw! May 16, 1943, archived from the original on January 10, 2015 ; Retrieved on August 22, 2020 (reproduced on holocaust-history.org, title page).
  6. ↑ HyperWar: Handbook on German Military Forces (Chapter 3). March 15, 1945, accessed on August 22, 2020 (English, reproduced on ibiblio.org).