Willi Ahrem

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Willi Ahrem (* 1902 in Elberfeld ; † June 20, 1967 in Wuppertal ) was a German member of the Wehrmacht who saved several Jews , whom he initially hid and then smuggled out of the country.

His father Ewald Ahrem owned an export company in which Willi Ahrem was a partner. In 1941 Willi Ahrem, now a family man, was drafted into the Wehrmacht .

In 1941 he became a senior squad leader of a construction team and the commandant of a forced labor camp in Nemirow ( Ukraine ). In November 1941 and July 1942, he warned Yehoshua Menzer, who spoke German and informed other Jews, about an SS "action" against Jews there . Both times he brought Menzer's family and other Jews into the basement of his house. In 1942 he smuggled them into the Djurin ghetto in Romanian-occupied Transnistria and, as before, provided them with food and other necessities. He also carried out courier services for other ghetto inmates, but was denounced as a Jewish helper and transferred to Germany in 1943, where - as before - he was used as an interpreter for the Wehrmacht.

Ahrem was honored as Righteous Among the Nations in Yad Vashem on June 15, 1965 . The city of Wuppertal named a staircase after him on October 19, 2007.

literature

  • Beate Kosmala, Revital Ludewig-Kedmi: Forbidden help. German rescuers during the Holocaust . Auer-Verlag et al., Donauwörth et al. 2003, ISBN 3-403-04085-2 , pp. 80-85.
  • Wolfram Wette : Willi Ahrem, chief troop leader of the Todt organization. The murder of the Jews in Nemirow and its rescue operation . In: Wolfram Wette (ed.): Moral courage. Outraged, helpers and rescuers from the Wehrmacht, police and SS . S. Fischer, Frankfurt / Main 2004, ISBN 3-596-15852-4 , pp. 145-159.
  • Nemirov , in: Guy Miron (Ed.): The Yad Vashem encyclopedia of the ghettos during the Holocaust . Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 2009 ISBN 978-965-308-345-5 , pp. 518f.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Willi-Ahrem finally honored! ( Memento of the original from October 15, 2014 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. dated November 13, 2007. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.ns-gedenkstaetten.de
  2. ↑ Above paragraph according to Daniel Fraenkel, Jakob Borut (ed.): Willi Ahrem , article in: Lexicon of the Righteous Among the Nations: Germans and Austrians, Volume 1, Wallstein Verlag 2005, ISBN 3-89244-900-7 , file 0102, P. 56, online
  3. ↑ Fraenkel / Borut, lc; Willi-Ahrem finally honored! ( Memento of the original from October 15, 2014 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. states 1968. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.ns-gedenkstaetten.de
  4. ↑ Willi Ahrem on the website of Yad Vashem (English)
  5. ↑ See [1] . The stairs run between Oberer Grifflenberg / Gausstrasse and Fuhltottstrasse.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Ahrem, Willi
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German member of the Wehrmacht and rescuer of the Jews
DATE OF BIRTH 1902
PLACE OF BIRTH Elberfeld
DATE OF DEATH June 20, 1967
Place of death Wuppertal - Elberfeld