Association of People's Sports
The Volkssport Association (in Czech rarely Svaz Lidového sportu ) was a paramilitary National Socialist organization of the DNSAP in Czechoslovakia . It was founded in 1929 under the guise of a German national sports association and banned in 1932.
history
The Volkssport Association was founded on May 15, 1929 based on the SA model on the initiative of Hans Krebs and Paul Illing under the guise of a popular sports association . The mayor of Fulnek , Leo Schubert, was elected leader of the 5000-member association . His deputies were Krebs, who was responsible for political leadership, and Illing, who was responsible for organization. The underground control center of the association, which, as a protective force, secured the DNSAP events, was located in Leitmeritz .
During the Völkische Tage von Sternberg and Gablonz there were larger marches in the same year in a "brown shirt" uniform based on the uniform of the SA . In August 1929 300-strong delegation traveled the national sport association to the Nazi Party of the NSDAP after Nuremberg and presented itself there with a big banner "Sudetenland loyal to Hitler." During the party congress, Volkssport joined the Munich SA as a subgroup and at the same time agreed with SA Standard 100 in Dresden that their area in Koppelsdorf should be used as a training area.
In 1930, after the Wagstadt and Hohenstadt district authorities in particular tried to prevent the goings-on under the Austrian Ministerial Ordinance on the Wearing of Uniforms of February 26, 1917 by punishing them for wearing forbidden uniforms, the German national MPs Ernst Teschner and comrades in the Senate in 1930 interpellated to the Minister of the Interior because of the persecution of those who wear uniform clothes, especially brown shirts. In 1931 the government banned the public wearing of "brown shirts" and SA caps. In their place, the popular sport introduced a different colored uniform with white shirts and blue caps.
Joint exercises took place with the SA, including one in January 1931 in the border area, during which SA members advanced across the border into Czechoslovak territory. The increasing marches of the association, which had grown to 40,000 members by 1932. For example, in Buchau, “the struggle to liberate the homeland from the Slavic and Jewish yoke” was publicly propagated, prompted the government on March 1, 1932 to dissolve and forbid popular sport because of anti-subversive activities.
Popular sports trial 1932
After the ban, the investigations began against the leaders of the popular sport, initially unknown to the authorities. The Eger sports teacher Alexander Petermichel was arrested in Prague on March 2nd . The next day, medical student Anton Schwabe was arrested there. Based on the results of the interrogations, Rudolf Heider, Adolf Metzner, Peter Donnhäuser , Fritz Paliega and Paul Illing were arrested shortly afterwards . However, with the exception of Illing, these did not belong to the leadership of the association. The investigations were also directed against other people from the leadership of the Volkssport, who, however, enjoyed immunity as parliamentary representatives. By the end of March, 81 officials of the Volkssport were arrested in the entire border area, and another 167 were searched.
On August 8, the criminal case against the leadership of the association, later known as the People's Sports Trial , was opened in Brno and lasted until September 24. In the course of the process, the DNSAP MPs Hans Krebs , Leo Schubert , Rudolf Jung and Rudolf Kasper, who together with Illing, formed the management team, were heavily burdened. The trial ended with prison terms ranging from one to four years for all of the defendants.
In November 1932, the court filed applications for criminal prosecution against the above. DNSAP MPs. After their immunity had been lifted, the arrests took place in late February 1933. Immediately after the handover of power to the National Socialists, Adolf Hitler intervened against the arrests in his first audience with the Czechoslovak ambassador Vojtěch Mastný . They were then released on bail . The continuation of the proceedings was not possible because all the accused had fled to the German Reich after their release , where they were celebrated as heroes and anticipated their loss of immunity due to the self-dissolution of the party on October 4, 1933.
literature
- Josef Mikš: Proces s Volkssportem Publikace KSH č. 67
- The Volkssport Trial. A factual report based on the stenographic protocols and the newspaper reports on the Brno court hearings from August 8th to September 14th 1932 , Aussig 1932 (representation from the perspective of the DNSAP)
Individual evidence
- ↑ http://www.bohemistik.de/sudetistikdaten.html
- ↑ http://www.senat.cz/zajimavosti/tisky/3vo/tisky/T0146_01.htm ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ^ Debates on the ban on popular sport
- ↑ http://www.psp.cz/eknih/1929ns/ps/stenprot/251schuz/prilohy/priloh07.htm
- ↑ http://www.ceskenarodnilisty.cz/clanky/067%20Proces%20s%20Volkssportem.pdf
