Wolfgang Kapp

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Wolfgang Kapp

Wolfgang Kapp (born July 24, 1858 in New York City , USA ; † June 12, 1922 in Leipzig ) was a German administrative officer , most recently general landscape director in Königsberg . On March 13, 1920 , he led the unsuccessful Kapp putsch against the democratically elected government in the capital Berlin , together with General Walther von Lüttwitz, with the help of the Ehrhardt Marine Brigade with the support of Erich Ludendorff .

Life

Youth, studies and beginnings as a ministerial official (1858 to 1907)

Kapp was the son of the lawyer Friedrich Kapp (1824-1884), who emigrated to America in the wake of the Baden Revolution, and Luise Engels, the daughter of the major general and commander of Cologne Friedrich Ludwig Engels . However, the family never really felt at home in American exile and finally returned to Germany in 1870. After attending the Friedrich-Wilhelm-Gymnasium in Berlin, Kapp began studying law in Tübingen and Göttingen , which he completed with a doctorate in 1886. In 1878 he became a member of the Corps Hannovera Göttingen . From the lengths he fought out there, he had clearly visible marks on his face.

In 1884 Kapp married Margarete Rosenow, with whom he had three children. Through his wife's family, he got into contact with conservative junker circles . In addition, in 1890 he became the owner of the Pilzen manor near Preußisch Eylau ( East Prussia ). From 1891 on, he was District Administrator of the district Guben . As a civil servant in the civil service, Kapp rose from 1900 to the rank of senior ministerial councilor in the Ministry of Agriculture.

General Landscape Director (1907 to 1920)

In 1907 Kapp took over the management of the East Prussian General Landscape Directorate at the mediation of a friend, the influential East Elbe large agrarian Elard von Oldenburg-Januschau , which he was to hold until March 1920 with a break of several months. He successfully campaigned for the agricultural workers 'movement, farmers' settlement and basic debt relief and, against strong opposition, founded the non-profit public life insurance company. The post earned him an annual salary of 72,000 marks . In 1912 he was also elected to the Supervisory Board of Deutsche Bank . He was an honorary doctor from the University of Königsberg.

During the First World War , Kapp became widely known among the German population by appearing as one of the most prominent representatives of far-reaching German war aims. Among other things, he demanded extensive annexations and high reparation payments from the Entente states to the German Reich as a goal of German war policy. In particular, he considered the permanent military, economic and political ties between occupied Belgium and the Reich after the end of the war, the establishment of German naval bases on the coast of Flanders and vigorous action against Great Britain to be essential.

As an emphatic advocate of the so-called unrestricted submarine war against Great Britain, Kapp came into conflict with Reich Chancellor Bethmann Hollweg , who tried to prevent him from accepting it for fear of an American entry into the war. Among other things, Kapp wrote the Pasquill "The National Circles and the Reich Chancellor", which was sent to the most important people in the political, economic and military leadership of the Reich . Bethmann Hollweg then referred to Kapp in the Reichstag as a “political pirate” - which Kapp saw as an insult and prompted a duel. Bethmann Hollweg refused it for the duration of his term of office, but did not follow it even after his fall in 1917 - when, according to his own statement, nothing should stand in the way of a duel.

Through a by-election in 1918, Kapp became a member of the last Reichstag of the Empire. He was elected in the Reichstag constituency, Gumbinnen 2 district. Kapp saw the defeat of the First World War as a national disgrace. He subsequently became an advocate for the stab in the back . As early as 1917 - still during the war - Kapp had founded the German Fatherland Party (DVLP) in response to the peace resolution . In 1919 he participated in the National Anti-Republican Association .

The Kapp Putsch and the Final Years (1920 to 1922)

On March 13, 1920, after the military occupation of the Berlin government district, Kapp declared the refugee coalition government consisting of the SPD , the Center and the DDP under Reich Chancellor Gustav Bauer to be dismissed, the National Assembly and the Prussian government to be dissolved and themselves to be declared Reich Chancellor and Prussian Prime Minister . The Kapp Putsch collapsed on March 17th due to the refusal of the state administration and the general strike called by the SPD, USPD and KPD . After the coup failed, Kapp said he initially hid for a few days in different quarters in the Margraviate of Brandenburg , before finally escaping into exile via Denmark to Sweden . There he was finally arrested by the police and extradited to Germany.

In retrospect, Kapp summed up his political goals and mentality by equating the socialist Soviet republic in Hungary with the Weimar Republic. He portrayed the right-wing terrorist putsch with an anti-Semitic and anti-left tongue as a last attempt to rescue “the old Prussian official state”. In Hungary as in Germany, “a rule of journalists and trade unionists” and a “Jewish regiment” had been established. That could have been "shaken off with one jerk" if there had been more unity within the right-wing political formations.

In the spring of 1922, in anticipation of a high treason trial , Kapp presented himself to the Reichsgericht in Leipzig , which he wanted to use to defend his putsch. After the medical examination found that he had cancer in the eye, he was admitted to hospital. After the operation carried out there, he died on June 12, 1922 in the St. George Hospital in Leipzig.

literature

  • Hans-Joachim Bieber. Bourgeoisie in the Revolution . Hamburg 1992.
  • Karl Brammer : Five days of military dictatorship. Counterrevolution documents . Berlin 1920.
  • James Cavallie : Ludendorff and Kapp in Sweden. From the lives of two losers. Lang, Frankfurt am Main a. a. 1995, ISBN 3-631-47678-7 , 396 pp.
  • Friedrich Hiller von Gaertringen :  Wolfgang Kapp. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 11, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1977, ISBN 3-428-00192-3 , pp. 135 f. ( Digitized version ).
  • Heinz Hagenlücke, Wolfgang Kapp: A biographical sketch, in: ders., German Fatherland Party. The national right at the end of the empire (contributions to the history of parliamentarism and the political parties, vol. 108). Düsseldorf 1997. pp. 109-142.
  • Jürgen Manthey : Revolution and counter-revolution (August Winnig and Wolfgang Kapp ). In: Königsberg. History of a world citizenship republic. Munich 2005, pp. 554-562.
  • Gustav Noske : From Kiel to Kapp. On the history of the German revolution. Publishing house for politics and economics, Berlin 1920.
  • Hans Rothfels : Wolfgang Kapp. In: German Biographical Yearbook. Volume 4, Stuttgart 1922, pp. 132-143.

Web links

Commons : Wolfgang Kapp  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Kösener corps lists 1910, 70 , 429
  2. ↑ Wolfgang Kapp. Tabular curriculum vitae in the LeMO ( DHM and HdG )
  3. ↑ NDB
  4. ↑ Berliner Tageblatt , December 9, 1921.
personal data
SURNAME Kapp, Wolfgang
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German politician (DVP), Member of the Bundestag and general landscape director in Königsberg (Prussia)
DATE OF BIRTH July 24, 1858
PLACE OF BIRTH New York City , USA
DATE OF DEATH June 12, 1922
Place of death Leipzig , Germany