Walter Krämer (politician)

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Walter Krämer (before 1933)

Walter Krämer (born June 21, 1892 in Siegen , † November 6, 1941 in Hahndorf ) was a German politician of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) and resistance fighter against National Socialism . He was a member of the Prussian state parliament in 1932/33 , arrested in 1933 and murdered in a satellite camp of the Buchenwald concentration camp in Hahndorf near Goslar in 1941 . Previously, as the “Buchenwald Doctor”, he had helped many prisoners medically, for which the State of Israel posthumously awarded him the title of Righteous Among the Nations in 2000 .

Life

Weimar Republic

Walter Krämer was a locksmith by profession , and from 1910 a voluntary soldier in the Imperial Navy . At the end of the First World War he was imprisoned for breaking into an officers' food depot and later for participating in the revolts of revolutionary sailors in Kiel . Liberated by the November Revolution, Krämer returned to Siegen in 1918, where he was involved in the workers 'and soldiers' council . He joined the Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany (USPD) and in March 1920 took part in the fighting following the Kapp Putsch on the side of the Red Ruhr Army , in which he served as a section commander. At the end of 1920 he joined the KPD, whose organizational secretary in the Siegen subdistrict he was from 1923. From 1925 he represented the KPD in the city council. He worked as a subdistrict and district secretary in Krefeld, Wuppertal, Kassel and Hanover. In 1932/33 he was a member of the Prussian state parliament. Along with Fritz Fränken (KPD) and Fritz Fries (SPD), he was one of three members of the Weimar state parliament of the political left who were active in the Siegerland.

In an attack by National Socialist MPs on members of the KPD parliamentary group in May 1932, Krämer was seriously injured. Krämer was a member of the German Peace Society (DFG).

National Socialism

After the Reichstag fire in 1933, Krämer was arrested on February 28 in Hanover . He was sentenced to three and a half years in prison for high treason . From January 1935 , the places of detention were Hameln , Hanover and Hildesheim . When he was arrested he was arrested again by the Gestapo and imprisoned in Lichtenburg concentration camp on January 15, 1937 and in Buchenwald concentration camp in August 1937 .

After the "habitual criminals" used as kapos were ousted by the KPD in the underground camp, Krämer became the Kapo of the prisoner infirmary. According to the Buchenwald Report , which was largely drawn up by Eugen Kogon , “[i] n particularly through the initiative of the communist state parliament member Walter Krämer […] the conditions in the infirmary changed fundamentally. From this point on, the infirmary became a main base for the struggle against the SS and an oasis for the safety of the endangered prisoners. "

He acquired medical knowledge through self-study, organized patient care and also carried out operations himself , for example to save the lives of inmates injured by the mistreatment of the SS or those affected by frozen limbs. He was considered to be "a very excellent wound therapist and surgeon". He refused to give the Soviet prisoners of war the death sentence " TB sick ". In the spring of 1940 he achieved the closure of a special camp for mostly stateless Jews from Vienna and the occupied eastern regions, characterized by fellow prisoners as a “murder cave”, with reference to the risk of epidemics also for the SS and the surrounding villages. "This rescue operation brought 500 barely viable skeletons to the large camp."

In the first days of November 1941, Krämer and his deputy Karl Peix were initially imprisoned in the camp's "bunker" before being transferred to the Goslar satellite camp. On the instructions of the camp commandant Karl Otto Koch, both were "shot while trying to escape" by the SS on the morning of November 6th - Krämer in a sand pit near Hahndorf , Peix on the Goslar air base. There are different assumptions about the motive for murder. Kramer stood for the illegal structures of the political prisoners in the camp, which the SS had not completely hidden from view. The camp Gestapo had noted on him, “May not be released!” Kramer had a great deal of knowledge about violations of official duties by SS members. He knew of the camp commandant's corruption. He had had to secretly treat Koch for syphilis .

His widow Elisabeth "Liesel" Krämer, b. Lehmann, received an urn with his ashes from the concentration camp administration, which was buried in Siegen in November 1941.

Reception - reminder

Outside the home region

Memorial stone for the Goslar external command of the Buchenwald concentration camp, erected on Krämer's 110th birthday in 2002
Stumbling block for Walter Krämer in Hanover, relocated on December 4, 2012

After 1945, Krämer's work in the camp's infirmary led to the nickname “Doctor of Buchenwald”. The publicist and political scientist Eugen Kogon (CDU) praised his Buchenwald fellow prisoner in Der SS-Staat among other things as a “strong, courageous personality” (1946). The GDR writer and fellow prisoner Bruno Apitz set him an international monument in Nackt unter Wölfen (1956, film version 1963) by naming the main character Walter Krämer. Kramer was well known, especially among the youth of the GDR , as Apitz's novel was required reading in schools. Christine Wenzel received her doctorate from the Martin Luther University in Halle with a dissertation on "The Life and Work of the German Communist Walter Krämer" (1970). In Weimar and Neukirchen / Erzgeb. two medical schools were named after Krämer from 1970 to 1992/93. Relics from Krämer's private and political life exhibited and preserved in the Weimar “Traditionskabinett Walter Krämer” (1975 ff.) Have now been removed and partially destroyed, and the Nazi memorial in his home town, Active Museum Südwestfalen, was able to save and display more . There was a stomatological clinic in Berlin-Lichtenberg (1976 ff.), Which was named after Krämer. At the Suhl Clinic there was a “Walter Krämer work collective” (1986 ff.) And a few other names elsewhere.

In 1999, Krämer was posthumously awarded the title Righteous Among the Nations by the Israeli Yad Vashem Memorial . More than 400 people took part in the award ceremony in Siegen by the Israeli ambassador on April 11, 2000, the 55th anniversary of the liberation of the Buchenwald concentration camp.

In West Germany, Krämer was largely unknown outside of his region of origin, where his vita was controversial and he remained without honor for a long time. On his 110th birthday in 2002, a memorial stone was set in Goslar for the former subcamp to which Krämer had belonged, on the initiative of the Harz Region search for traces. In 2017, a street was named after him in the new Fliegerhorst residential and commercial area in Goslar. On April 25, 2011, the 66th anniversary of the liberation by the Third United States Army , the Buchenwald-Dora concentration camp community honored him with a plaque. It was the first honor for a German. Groups from the Association of Victims of the Nazi Regime - Bund der Antifaschisteninnen and Antifaschisten (VVN-BdA) and the DKP took part in it. Speakers included the media scientist Karl Prümm, who was temporarily active in Siegen, and Romani Rose , chairman of the Central Council of German Sinti and Roma . In Hanover, Gunter Demnig laid a stumbling block for shopkeepers in front of the entrance to the Lehmanns bookstore at Heiligerstrasse 16 on December 4, 2012 . The party office of the KPD, in which Kramer had worked as district leader, was located there. The VVN-BdA Siegerland-Wittgenstein had donated the stone.

Within the home region

Since the end of National Socialism, there has been an annual wreath-laying ceremony at Kramer's grave in Siegen on the second Sunday in September, the “Day of the Victims of Fascism ”, which Krämer represented. In the first few years, the city of Siegen and non-communist regional politicians also took part in this and accompanying events.

As early as 1946, in the context of several street renaming, the KPD demanded that a Siegener Straße be named after Walter Krämer, with which it was left alone. After a majority in the council wanted to name a Siegener Strasse after the National Socialist Lord Mayor Alfred Fissmer in 1947 , which the British military government forbade, the KPD suggested Walter Krämer. The application was rejected by the CDU, SPD and FDP. In the political climate of the Cold War , the KPD and with it the VVN remained marginalized in Siegerland. It is different in the neighboring district of Altenkirchen . A convalescent home there was named after Krämer in 1948.

Portrait stele in front of the Siegen District Hospital on Walter-Krämer-Platz, inaugurated in November 2016

With the KPD ban in 1956, all efforts to pay tribute to Krämer ended for the time being. In 1975 the Jewish chairman of the Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation Hugo Herrmann spoke publicly and referred to Krämer, who had tried in Buchenwald to “put an end to the tortures of the Jews”, which he had paid with his life. That remained a single voice. In November 1979, the VVN applied to the city's cultural committee to rename the street named after the anti-Semite Adolf Stoecker after Krämer, which was only supported by the German Communist Party (DKP) and met with minimal public response. The application was rejected after months of waiting.

There have been new initiatives in the memory discourse since the mid-1980s. They met with unanimous rejection from politics and administration. The trade unions and the SPD, traditional bodies of the labor movement , remained silent. Streets, squares, schools and hospitals were named after National Socialists, their pioneers or those convicted of Nazi crimes. There was a wave of new names in the 1960s and 1970s, such as Friedrich Flick , Lothar Irle , Jakob Henrich , Ernst Bach , Bernhard Weiß and others. They were not viewed as problematic until the 1980s and were also viewed by broad political majorities vehemently defended against strong criticism.

The literary scholar Karl Prümm, who teaches in Siegen, and Klaus Dietermann, member of the board of the Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation, developed a biography of Krämer, which appeared in 1986. The CDU local politician Paul Tigges (Lennestadt), founding and board member of the Christine Koch Society, formulated a violent opposition to the publication . In 1985 the DKP applied to set up a reminder and memorial site for Walter Krämer. The council and administration did not respond. In 1991 the Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation organized a "Walter Krämer Week". A proposal in 1997 to name a central square in Siegen after Krämer was again only supported by a minority in the city council. In 1998 the city council finally decided to honor Krämer with a plaque on the house where he was born - in a residential area away from the city center. It was installed on January 27, 1999, the day to commemorate the victims of National Socialism . In 2007, a citizen's application to “change historically contaminated and dubious street names” failed, including the renaming of Adolf-Stöckerstraße to Walter-Krämer-Straße . The city's main committee refused. The naming proposals meanwhile extended to a street, a central Victory Bridge and a hospital. They were unsuccessful. On May 24, 2011, a proposal from the parliamentary groups of the Greens, the Left and the SPD (“Siegbrücke”) was rejected by a majority. In the public discussion that followed, the historian Ulrich Opfermann criticized the CDU's stance as "little history-conscious". She said she had "missed a good chance by choosing Krämer". Sacrificemann explained the process with “roots” of this party “in the anti-democratic and anti-Semitic DNVP”. He referred to the Siegen CDU politician and contemporary of Krämer Ernst Bach , who, despite his right-wing extremist past and corrupt practices, had been given a street name by council resolution. On the 70th anniversary of his death, the Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation and the Siegen NS memorial “ Active Museum Südwestfalen ” organized a Walter Krämer Memorial Week and the regional VVN-BdA together with the Buchenwald-Dora camp community organized a symposium on Krämer. In the meantime, however, the CDU faction had opened up. In 2012, the city council of Siegen finally decided by a majority to designate the square in front of the main entrance of the district hospital in the Weidenau district as Walter-Krämer-Platz .

In November 2014, the Walter-Krämer-Platz was completed at the Siegener Kreisklinikum. It was designed by Erwin Wortelkamp . Several elements can be seen that symbolize the life and work of Walter Krämer. A stele shows Krämer's likeness, a saying by the French-Jewish philosopher Emmanuel Levinas on the floor guides visitors into the clinic: “Care for others wins out over care for oneself.” District Administrator Andreas spoke at the official inauguration in December 2014 Müller (SPD) of a “dignified event and a significant day for victories”, to which it was “a long way”, since Krämer was one of the “unwanted victims of Nazi Germany”. Mayor Steffen Mues (CDU) said that Krämer's exemplary humanitarian commitment and resistance to the Nazi regime should be valued much higher than the criticism. He remembered District Administrator Paul Breuer (CDU) and his active commitment to naming the square. That was "courageous, groundbreaking - in short: right". The Krämer biographer and head of the Nazi memorial site Klaus Dietermann sees Breuer and Mues as important supporters of the Krämer appreciation.

In February 2015, the AStA of the University of Siegen decided to name student bodies after Krämer in the future.

In a survey on the "largest" Siegen-Wittgensteiner on the occasion of the 200th anniversary "200 years of Siegen and Wittgenstein districts", Krämer sat down with 44% of the votes against Fritz Busch (33.7%) and Johann Heinrich Jung-Stilling (6, 8%) clearly through.

In November 2017, the Association of those persecuted by the Nazi regime - Association of Antifascists (VVN-BdA) issued two stamps on the occasion of the murder of Walter Krämer 76 years ago and in memory of the "Doctor of Buchenwald".

literature

  • Bruno Apitz : Naked Among Wolves , Berlin 1998, 9th edition.
  • Klaus Dietermann, Karl Prümm : Walter Krämer. Locksmith, politician, doctor von Buchenwald , publishing house of the Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation Siegerland, Siegen 2015
  • Klaus Dietermann: Late partial recognition . In: Siegener contributions. Yearbook for Regional History 4 (1999), pp. 153–157
  • Klaus Dietermann, Karl Prümm: Walter Krämer - from Siegen to Buchenwald. Publishing house of the Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation Siegerland, Siegen 1986
  • David A. Hacket: The Buchenwald Report. Report on the Buchenwald concentration camp near Weimar , Munich 1996
  • Liesel Krämer: All due respect, dear Liesel, some would have filled their pants. In: Hannoversche Women against Fascism 1933–1945, life reports, ed. by VVN / BdA, Hannover 1982, pp. 36-40
  • Walter Poller : Doctor's clerk in Buchenwald. Report by inmate 996 from Block 36 , Offenbach 1960, 2nd ed.
  • Bodo Ritscher : Doctor for the prisoners. From the life of Walter Krämer. Weimar-Buchenwald 1988
  • Christine Roßberg (Wenzel): Doctor without exam , Berlin (GDR) 1982
  • Kramer, Walter . In: Hermann Weber , Andreas Herbst : German Communists. Biographical Handbook 1918 to 1945 . 2nd, revised and greatly expanded edition. Karl Dietz, Berlin 2008, ISBN 978-3-320-02130-6 .

Web links

Commons : Walter Krämer  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Temporary sub-district secretary of the KPD was Rudolf Hennig , member of the Reichstag (1930–1933): Communism in the Siegerland, in: Siegener Zeitung, April 5, 1933.
  2. ↑ Bodo Ritscher , physician for prisoners, Weimar-Buchenwald , 1988, p. 21.
  3. ↑ For details, see: Ulrich Friedrich Opfermann, Siegerland and Wittgenstein in National Socialism. People, data, literature. A handbook on regional contemporary history (= Siegen contributions, special volume 2001), Siegen 2000; 2nd edition 2001; Hermann Weber, Andreas Herbst: German communists. Biographisches Handbuch 1918 to 1945. Dietz, Berlin 2004, ISBN 3-320-02044-7 , p. 404.
  4. ↑ David A. Hackett (ed.), The Buchenwald Report. Report on the Buchenwald concentration camp near Weimar , Munich 2002, p. 247.
  5. ↑ David A. Hackett (ed.), The Buchenwald Report. Report on the Buchenwald concentration camp near Weimar , Munich 2002, p. 91.
  6. ↑ David A. Hackett (ed.), The Buchenwald Report. Report on the Buchenwald concentration camp near Weimar , Munich 2002, p. 197.
  7. ^ Co- inmate Paul Grünewald (inmate paramedic and clerk in Buchenwald), in: The Bell from Ettersberg . Bulletin of the Buchenwald-Dora camp community, Frankfurt a. M., 1974, H. 55, p. 6f.
  8. ↑ Eugen Kogon: The SS State. The system of the German concentration camps , Reinbek 1974, p. 304f.
  9. ↑ All respect, dear Liesel, because some would have filled their pants , in: Hannoversche Women against Fascism 1933–1945, issue 3, Hanover 1981–1983.
  10. ↑ Walter Krämer on erinnerungundzukunft.de.
  11. ↑ Eugen Kogon, The SS State. The system of the German concentration camps , Berlin 1946, p. 132.
  12. ↑ Bruno Apitz, Naked among wolves , Halle 1958.
  13. ^ Klaus Dietermann, Karl Prümm: Walter Krämer. Locksmith, politician, doctor von Buchenwald , publisher of the Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation Siegerland, Siegen 2015, p. 227.
  14. ^ Christine Wenzel (Rossberg): The life and work of the German communist Walter Krämer, a role model for health care workers in the German Democratic Republic , Diss. A, Halle 1970.
  15. ^ Klaus Dietermann, Karl Prümm: Walter Krämer. Locksmith, politician, doctor von Buchenwald , publishing house of the Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation Siegerland, Siegen 2015, p. 228.
  16. ^ Klaus Dietermann, Karl Prümm: Walter Krämer. Locksmith, politician, doctor von Buchenwald , publishing house of the Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation Siegerland, Siegen 2015, p. 235.
  17. ^ Klaus Dietermann, Karl Prümm: Walter Krämer. Locksmith, politician, doctor von Buchenwald , publisher of the Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation Siegerland, Siegen 2015, p. 236.
  18. ↑ regionalgoslar.de
  19. ^ VVN-BdA: 66th anniversary of the self-liberation of the prisoners: Buchenwald concentration camp
  20. ↑ Veronika Thomas: 21 new stumbling blocks for Hanover , Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung of November 29, 2012.
  21. ^ Siegener Zeitung, print edition, December 11, 2012.
  22. ^ Klaus Dietermann, Karl Prümm: Walter Krämer. Locksmith, politician, doctor von Buchenwald , publisher of the Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation Siegerland, Siegen 2015, p. 232.
  23. ↑ Do not forget the dear dead. In: Freiheit, September 21, 1948.
  24. ↑ New street names in Siegen. In: Freiheit, June 7, 1946.
  25. ↑ Renaming of the streets. In: Freiheit, February 18, 1947.
  26. ↑ Walter Krämer rest home. Tribute to a murdered Siegerland anti-fascist. In: Freiheit, February 10, 1948.
  27. ^ Klaus Dietermann, Karl Prümm: Walter Krämer. Locksmith, politician, doctor von Buchenwald , publisher of the Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation Siegerland, Siegen 2015, p. 229.
  28. ^ Heiner Walter, now renaming Adolf-Stöcker-Strasse, in: Westfälische Rundschau , December 7, 1979.
  29. ↑ In the 1980s a discussion about the name of the Friedrich-Flick-Gymnasium began , which was repeated several times. The opponents in the name were successful in 2009.
  30. ^ Klaus Dietermann / Karl Prümm, Walter Krämer - from Siegen to Buchenwald , Siegen 1986; New edition 1991.
  31. ↑ Murdered in a concentration camp 50 years ago. Walter Krämer from Siegen: Forgotten ?. In: Westfälische Rundschau, November 6, 1991.
  32. ↑ There is still no agreement on naming: “The square is a square” minority [on “Walter-Krämer-Platz”], in: Westfälische Rundschau, September 18, 1997.
  33. ↑ Memorial plaque to remember Walter Krämer. Late honor for the "Doctor of Buchenwald", in: Siegener Zeitung, May 20, 1998; Dietermann, Klaus, Late Partial Recognition, in: Siegener Contributions. Yearbook for Regional History 4 (1999), pp. 153–157.
  34. ↑ Birthplace of Walter Krämer aufiegen-guide.de
  35. ^ Treatment of the motion in the main committee of the City Council of Siegen on August 15, 2007. See submission 1498/2007, minutes of the meeting on August 15, 2007; Bastian Föst, mass murderer with distinction. In: Westfälische Rundschau, August 13, 2007.
  36. ↑ Georg Maag, Walter Krämer. Honors are a long way off , in: Westfälische Rundschau, January 26, 2010, online:.
  37. ↑ Alexander Völkel: Council says no. Walter Krämer is not honored in Siegen , in: Westfälische Rundschau, May 25, 2011, Alexander Völkel: A shame for Siegen , in: Westfälische Rundschau, May 25, 2011. The following page from WDR Radio gives an overview of the recent discussion: [1] .
  38. ↑ Alexander Völkel, Council says no. Walter Krämer is not honored in Siegen. In: Westfälische Rundschau, May 25, 2011, comments, see: [2] .
  39. ↑ Group majority sees positive things. CDU wants to pay tribute to Krämer , in: Siegener Zeitung, May 31, 2011.
  40. ↑ No victory in Siegen yet. For 65 years in South Westphalia a communist, anti-fascist and those murdered in a concentration camp have been denied the honor in: new germany , April 2, 2011.
  41. ^ Walter-Krämer-Platz - Ideologische Schlammschlacht , Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung online from March 1, 2012
  42. ↑ "Courageous, pointing the way - right". Walter Krämer-Platz officially opened ( Memento of the original from December 14, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Siegerland-Kurier from 10 December 2014. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.siegerlandkurier.de
  43. ^ Klaus Dietermann, Karl Prümm: Walter Krämer. Locksmith, politician, doctor von Buchenwald, publishing house of the Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation Siegerland, Siegen 2015, p. 237.
  44. ↑ Stupa decides to name student committees after Walter Krämer ( Memento of the original from May 18, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Website of the AStA of the University of Siegen, accessed on May 12, 2015. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.asta.uni-siegen.de
  45. ↑ Voting: Walter Krämer is the greatest Siegen Wittgensteiner. In: Westfalenpost July 10, 2017
  46. ↑ Postage stamps are reminiscent of Walter Krämer . ( wp.de [accessed November 25, 2017]).
personal data
SURNAME Kramer, Walter
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German politician (KPD), resistance fighters and Nazi victims
DATE OF BIRTH June 21, 1892
PLACE OF BIRTH Wins
DATE OF DEATH November 6, 1941
Place of death Hahndorf