Wilhelm Kox
Wilhelm Kox (born November 8, 1900 in Aachen , † August 10, 1940 in Plötzensee , Berlin ) (code names: Schenk, Stegmann, Rudolf) was a German communist functionary and a victim of the Nazi justice system.
Life and activity
Kox was the son of a working class family. He learned the butcher's trade . He spent part of his youth in a childcare facility after being arrested for attempting theft. In 1918 he was called up for military service.
After the war, Kox became a metal worker in Hürth . He worked as a locksmith on the United Ville lignite mine . In 1924 he became a shop steward for the German Metalworkers' Association , and he had already joined the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) in 1920. In later years he was unemployed for a long time, but finally found a job as a butcher in a large butchery.
In 1929 he became an unpaid alderman in the mayor's office in Hürth. At the end of 1930, as a salaried secretary of the KPD in the Koblenz sub-district, Kox became a full-time party functionary of the KPD. From May 1931 to October 1933 he received in - depth training as a course student at the International Lenin School in Moscow , which was to serve as the basis for his further political activities.
In autumn 1933 Kox returned to Berlin, where he and Herbert Wehner established the illegal state leadership of the underground KPD in Berlin, of which he himself belonged from mid-November 1933 to May 1934. In this organization, Kox was responsible for maintaining the connection to the upper districts of Central, Southwest and South. In June 1934 this task was passed on to his successor Adolf Rembte . Instead, Kox was transferred to the underground organization in Saarbrücken , which at that time was not part of the German Reich, as a "Reich technician" (a kind of security officer who was responsible for organizing the shielding of the apparatus from the outside) .
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In March 1935, Kox was called to Paris , where several party inquiries were carried out by the Comintern's International Control Commission on allegations of sabotage of party work against him. In January 1936 he was arrested in Prague . During his imprisonment in May 1936 he was informed by the Central Committee of the KPD that he had been expelled from the party, which was justified by his differences of opinion with the Central Committee, insufficient self-criticism, negligent behavior in the eviction of the illegal printing company in Saarbrücken. Kox refused to apply for parole, return to Moscow or fight on the side of the International Brigades in the Spanish Civil War. Instead, he returned to Germany, where he was arrested several times, most recently on September 16, 1939 on suspicion that he had worked in the intelligence service of Czechoslovakia.
On March 20, 1940, Kox was sentenced to death by the 2nd Senate of the People's Court . The execution took place on August 10, 1940 in the Berlin-Plötzensee prison with the guillotine .
Today a stumbling stone in front of Mathiasstrasse 4 in Alt-Hürth reminds of Kox.
marriage and family
Kox had been married to Adolfine Stammen since 1926. Their son Wilhelm, born in 1926, emerged from the marriage.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Manfred Faust: History of the City of Hürth , ed. from Heimat und Kulturverein Hürth, Cologne, JP Bachem Verlag, 2009, p. 119
Web links
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Kox, Wilhelm |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German communist functionary and victim of the Nazi justice system |
| DATE OF BIRTH | November 8, 1900 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Aachen |
| DATE OF DEATH | August 10, 1940 |
| Place of death | Plötzensee , Berlin |