Willi Mai

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Frederick William May (* 21st November 1912 in Pirmasens , † 9. March 1945 in Székesfehérvár ) was a German folklorists in the era of National Socialism . As a scientist he lived in Berlin .

Life

Willi Mai passed the scientific state examination for the higher subjects in German , history and geography in 1938 and was awarded in the same year due to the dissertation The Palatinate folk tales and their creative forces; Part I: Sayings from religious experience after the oral examination summa cum laude, doctorate .

On the recommendation of his speaker, Prof. Otto Maußer of the Albertus University in Königsberg , he went to the “Central Archive of German Folk Tales, Berlin” to continue the second part of his doctoral thesis in preparation for his habilitation .

After the central archive was incorporated into the “ Forschungsgemeinschaft Deutsches Ahnenerbe e. V. ”, which was subordinate to the Schutzstaffel (SS) , he was asked to join the SS“ pro forma ”shortly after taking up service, which he ultimately did. However, this also resulted in private problems in connection with the planned wedding with Marianne Direder.

Between September 1938 and April 1939 Willi Mai was asked several times to do "pre-military service" in the SS, which he refused on the grounds that he was firstly a lieutenant in the reserve and had done a year of voluntary military service and secondly, he was promised and was thinking of doing scientific work to work. After a further refusal and a written reprimand, he was released without notice in May 1939 and at the same time demoted to a common soldier.

Nevertheless, he was awarded for the “Forschungsgemeinschaft Deutsches Ahnenerbe e. V. ”continued to be employed as an employee and received the order, under the overall direction of Wolfram Sievers, to work as head of the“ Folk Counting ”department at the“ South Tyrol Culture Commission ”established in July 1940.

Heinrich Himmler set up the “Culture Commission South Tyrol” specifically to organize the resettlement of South Tyroleans as part of the option in South Tyrol in accordance with the Hitler - Mussolini Agreement and to preserve important “ people's goods ”.

In accordance with his mandate, May to the beginning of March 1941 collected approx. 2000 records of folk tales. To do this, he traveled through South Tyrol with a notepad or tape recorder to record stories such as legends , quarrels , purrs and jokes from South Tyrol and the Canal Valley .

The degradation, which was perceived as a flaw, and the subsequent surveillance (many of his field post letters arrived open) led him to volunteer for the Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler in 1941 for deployment to the front. He was therefore drafted in December 1941 and took part in the war against the Soviet Union .

From September 1942, Mai was in the "Germanic Scientific Mission" for the "Forschungsgemeinschaft Deutsches Ahnenerbe e. V. ”was looking for volunteers for the Waffen-SS in the occupied Netherlands before he was drafted again in the spring of 1943.

May fell on March 9, 1945 as a first lieutenant in Székesfehérvár in Hungary.

See also

Fonts (selection)

  • Leander Petzoldt (ed.): Legends, fairy tales and tales from South Tyrol . Tyrolia-Verlag, Innsbruck, Vienna 2000/2002 (2 volumes, on behalf of the Society for Tyrolean Folk Culture).
  1. Wipptal, Pustertal, Gadertal . 2000, ISBN 3-7022-2227-8 .
  2. Bolzano, Vinschgau and Adige Valley . 2002, ISBN 3-7022-2228-6 .
  • The Palatinate folk tales and their formative powers. Legends from religious experience . Noske, Borna 1940 (also dissertation, University of Königsberg).

literature

personal data
SURNAME May, Willi
ALTERNATIVE NAMES May, Friedrich Wilhelm
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German folklorist in the time of National Socialism
DATE OF BIRTH November 21, 1912
PLACE OF BIRTH Pirmasens
DATE OF DEATH March 9, 1945
Place of death Székesfehérvár