Walter Empacher

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Walter Empacher (born February 1, 1906 in Stettin ; † February 9, 1945 there ) was a German resistance fighter and one of the organizers of the anti-fascist resistance in Pomerania .

Life

Walter Empacher's father was a blacksmith whose income did not allow his son to get an education. So Empacher had to earn his living as an office delivery boy, farm worker, gardener and construction worker. Later he qualified by self-study for a job as an employee of an IG Farben branch. In 1926 he became a member of the KPD . First he became active in looking after communist children's groups. In 1929 he became head of the Roter Wecker theater group .

In April 1933 Empacher was arrested because of his participation in the resistance against National Socialism and taken into " protective custody " in the Sonnenburg concentration camp , from which he was only released in early 1934. In August 1935 he was arrested by the Gestapo for helping functionaries of the KPD district leadership in Pomerania, including Hermann Matern , after their escape from the Szczecin court prison. He was sentenced to nine months in prison.

From 1937, together with his school friend Werner Krause , he organized one of the largest illegal resistance groups in Stettin, which at times consisted of up to 300 people, including communists and social democrats as well as non-party members. During the Second World War, they also had contacts with ecclesiastical-Catholic and foreign resistance groups, with whom they worked closely and propagated the goals of the NKFD . Herta Geffke also belonged to the Empacher resistance organization in 1943/44 . In 1943 Empacher was conscripted from the Pölitz hydrogenation works to Auschwitz. He used the trips to work to distribute the leaflets produced by his resistance organization in Breslau and from there in other German cities.

As a result of the wave of arrests against the Pomeranian resistance group that began in November 1944, Empacher was arrested on December 23, 1944. In a hastily brought about process he was sentenced to death on February 9, 1945 and murdered on the same day because of the fear of the Nazi judicial authorities of the advancing Red Army .

Honors

  • In Eberswalde - Finow there is a memorial for Walter Empacher and the anti-fascist resistance in Pomerania.
  • There is a memorial stone for Walter Empacher in Löbau.
  • The 21st Panzer Regiment of the NVA's 9th Panzer Division in Spechtberg ( Torgelow ) was named after him.

literature

  • Luise Kraushaar et al .: German resistance fighters 1933–1945. Biographies and letters . Dietz-Verlag: Berlin 1970, Volume 1, pp. 226-228.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Monument of the Month November 2009 (Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania State Monument Preservation)
  2. ↑ Tombstone Walter Empacher www.loebaufoto.de
personal data
SURNAME Empacher, Walter
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German communist and resistance fighter against National Socialism
DATE OF BIRTH February 1, 1906
PLACE OF BIRTH Szczecin
DATE OF DEATH February 9, 1945
Place of death Szczecin