Wilhelm Bachem

Wilhelm Bachem (born March 19, 1903 in Mülheim an der Ruhr ; † October 4, 1962 ) was a German politician of the Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU) in the early German Democratic Republic (GDR). He was a member of the First People's Chamber , Minister of Transport in Thuringia and State Secretary in the Ministry of Transport of the GDR . In 1951 he fled to West Berlin .

Life

After training as a druggist , Wilhelm Bachem worked as a freelance druggist until 1938 and became a member of the German Democratic Party (DDP), which later became part of the German State Party (DStP). In 1930, the DStP was a candidate for the Reichstag in the Düsseldorf- East and West constituency , but was not elected. Bachem was a member of the Young German Order .

After the National Socialists came to power , Bachem became a member of the National Socialist Motor Vehicle Corps (NSKK) in 1933 . In 1939/40 he fought in World War II , but was discharged from the German armed forces due to illness . Until the end of the war he worked as the owner of a haulage company and a medicinal herb estate.

After the end of the war, Bachem joined the CDU and in 1946 became administrative director of the CDU regional office in Thuringia . In 1947 he became head of the main transport department in the Ministry of Economics, Labor and Transport of the State of Thuringia with the rank of ministerial director. From October 1947 to February 1950 he was Minister of Transport in Thuringia and a member of the German Economic Commission .

In 1947 Bachem became a member of the standing committee of the German People's Congress . From 1948 to 1950 he was a member of the main CDU board and chairman of the party's central revision committee. In 1949 Bachem became deputy chairman of the CDU regional association in East Berlin and from 1950 was a member of the political committee of the CDU main board. He was also the managing director of the CDU's central asset management.

In 1949/50 Bachem was a member of the German People's Council , later a member of the first People's Chamber . From March to November 1950 he was State Secretary in the Ministry of Transport of the GDR.

In January 1951 Bachem fled to West Berlin and fled to the Federal Republic of Germany , where he no longer appeared politically. Later he worked as a commercial clerk and owner of a company for caravans.

literature

• Andreas Herbst , Helmut Müller-Enbergs :  Wilhelm Bachem . In: Who was who in the GDR? 5th edition. Volume 2. Ch. Links, Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-86153-561-4 .

Web links

• Wilhelm Bachem in the Munzinger archive ( beginning of article freely accessible)
• You become a minister. There is everything in Bachems Zoo . In: Der Spiegel . No. 51 , 1949, pp. 10-11 ( online ).