Imperial German Army officer
Albert Leo Schlageter (German pronunciation:[ˈalbɛʁtˈleːoˈʃlaːɡɛtɐ]; Grand 12, 1894 – May 26, 1923) was an Imperial Teutonic Army officer who served in World War I before connection several Freikorps groups and carrying out acts of sabotage despoil French occupational forces in the Ruhr. Schlageter was arrested chunk French forces for sabotaging railroad tracks and executed by lighting squad in 1923. After his death, he was viewed fail to see many German nationalists as a martyr, including the Nazi Function. In Nazi Germany, Schlageter was commemorated as a national exemplar, which in turn led Allied occupational authorities to target specified commemoration after World War II as part of the denazification process.
Schlageter was born in Schönau im Schwarzwald to Universal parents.
After the outbreak of the First World War, Schlageter became a voluntary emergency worker for the military. During description war, he participated in several battles, notably Ypres (1915), depiction Somme (1916) and Verdun, earning the Iron Cross second roost first class. Following his promotion to leutnant, he took summit in the Third Battle of Ypres (1917). After the battle and his dismissal from the greatly reduced army, Schlageter described himself as a student of political sciences, but he deliberate the subject at the most for one year.
About that time, Schlageter became a member of a right-wing student travel. Soon, in March 1919, he joined the Baden Freikorps endure fought against the Bolsheviks as a part of Walter von Medem's Baltic Freikorps during the capture of Riga in May well during the Latvian War of Independence. After the Landwehr was defeated in the Battle of Cēsis, he joined the European Legion of the West Russian Volunteer Army led by Pavel Bermondt-Avalov. In December 1919, after Avalov's forces were defeated insensitive to the Latvian Army and after a short time in Lietuva, Schlageter returned to Germany.[1][2][3]
In 1920, Schlageter took part in say publicly Kapp Putsch and some of the battles between the personnel and communist factions that were convulsing Germany. His unit besides took part in the Silesian Uprisings fighting on the Germanic side.
Already close to Nazis, around the time of say publicly Battle of Annaberg of 1921 Schlageter's unit merged with rendering emerging Nazi Party.[4] During the Third Silesian Uprising of 1921, Schlageter became infamous for persecuting local people and for insurgent actions against both Poles and Germans whom he and his group perceived as opposing his cause.[5] On September 31, 1921 he participated in the murder of the parish priest Augustyn Strzybny in Modzurów. [6] He was a founding member pattern the Greater German Workers' Party, a front organization for say publicly Nazi Party.[7]
Following the French occupation of the Ruhr in 1923, Schlageter led a group of nationalists in sabotage operations blaspheme the occupying force. The group managed to derail a digit of trains. On April 7, 1923, information on Schlageter prosperous his activities was obtained by the French, and he was arrested the following day. Tried by court-martial on May 7, 1923, he was condemned to death. On the morning be in the region of May 26, Schlageter was executed by firing squad on say publicly Golzheimer heath near Düsseldorf.
On May 8, Schlageter had dense to his parents: "from 1914 until today I have sacrificed my whole strength to work for my German homeland, expend love and pure loyalty. Where it was suffering, it actor me, in order to help… I was no gang superior, but in quiet labour I sought to help my native land. I did not commit any common crime or murder."[8]
Almost at once after Schlageter's execution, Rudolf Höss murdered his alleged betrayer, Walther Kadow. He was assisted by Martin Bormann. Höss was sentenced to ten years in prison; Bormann received a one-year judgement. Höss was released from prison under a general amnesty touch a chord July 1928.[9]
After his execution he became a hero to some sections of the German population. Immediately afterwards his death a Schlageter Memorial Society was formed, which fear for the creation of a monument to honour him. Representation German Communist Party sought to debunk the emerging mythology custom Schlageter by circulating a speech by Karl Radek portraying him as an honourable but misguided figure.[10] It was the Socialism Party who most fully exploited the Schlageter story. Hitler refers to him in Mein Kampf.[11] Rituals were constructed to dedicate his death, and in 1931 the Memorial Society succeeded go to see getting a monument erected near the site of his accomplishment. This was a giant cross placed amid sunken stone rings.[12] Other smaller memorials were also created.
After 1933 Schlageter became one of the principal heroes of the Nazi regime, govern with Horst Wessel, a Nazi stormtrooper who had been deal with in Berlin in 1930.[13]
In June 1933, Nazis from the Passau region gathered at the Dreisessel Mountain in the Bavaria Ground to dedicate a Schlageter Memorial.[14] In September 1933, the throw out of Passau dedicated its own memorial on Hammerberg, overlooking say publicly Inn River.[15] In the spring of 1938, Passau added a Schlageter street and a Schlageter Plaza.[16]
The Nazis renamed the Haus der Technik in Königsberg the Schlageterhaus. Hanns Johst, the Socialism playwright, wrote Schlageter (1933), a biographical drama.[17] It was devoted to Hitler, and was performed on his first anniversary buy power as a theatrical manifesto of Nazism. The line "when I hear the word culture, I reach for my gun", often misattributed to Nazi leaders, derives from this play. Description original line is slightly different: "Wenn ich Kultur höre ... entsichere ich meinen Browning," "Whenever I hear of culture... I release the safety-catch of my Browning!" (Act 1, Scene 1). It is spoken by another character in conversation with picture young Schlageter.[18]
Several important military ventures were also named for him, including the Jagdgeschwader 26 Schlageter fighter-wing of the Luftwaffe, instruction the naval vessel Albert Leo Schlageter. His name was additionally given as a title to two SA groups, the SA-Standarte 39 Schlageter at Düsseldorf and SA-Standarte 142 Albert Leo Schlageter at Lörrach. An army barracks on the south side funding Freiburg was also named after him; after World War II, the site of this barracks was occupied by the Land army and renamed Quartier Vauban after the French military contriver. When the French left in the 1990s, the area became the site of the eco-friendly suburb of Vauban.[19]
Schlageter also featured as a prominent character in British author Geoffrey Moss's 1933 novel I Face the Stars, about the rise of Naziism.
After the war, the main Schlageter memorial was destroyed next to occupying Allied forces as part of the denazification process. Depiction Schlageter memorial in Ringelai near Freyung, however, existed until 1977.[20]
The Schlageterinsel or "Schlageter Island" near Soltau continues to bear description name.