Emil Heinrich Meyer (6 May 1886 in
Wiesbaden
Wiesbaden (; ) is the capital of the German state of Hesse, and the second-largest Hessian city after Frankfurt am Main. With around 283,000 inhabitants, it is List of cities in Germany by population, Germany's 24th-largest city. Wiesbaden form ...
– 9 May 1945 in
Berlin
Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...
) was a German business executive. Meyer was a board member at the
ITT Corporation
ITT Inc., formerly ITT Corporation, is an American worldwide manufacturing company based in Stamford, Connecticut. The company produces specialty components for the aerospace, transportation, energy and industrial markets. ITT's three businesses ...
's Germany-based subsidiaries Standard Elektrik Lorenz and
Mix & Genest
Mix & Genest was founded on 1 October 1879 by the businessman Wilhelm Mix and the engineer Werner Genest in Berlin-Schöneberg. The company was initially an 1879 branch of the ITT Corporation. It was very successful and became one of the pioneers ...
as well as
AEG The initials AEG are used for or may refer to:
Common meanings
* AEG (German company)
; AEG) was a German producer of electrical equipment. It was established in 1883 by Emil Rathenau as the ''Deutsche Edison-Gesellschaft für angewandte El ...
.
[CHAPTER NINE – Wall Street and the Nazi Inner Circle](_blank)
/ref>
Meyer was a cousin of the industrialist Wilhelm Keppler
Wilhelm Karl Keppler (14 December 1882 – 13 June 1960) was a German businessman and one of Adolf Hitler's early financial backers. Introduced to Hitler by Heinrich Himmler, Keppler helped to finance the Nazi Party and later served as one of Hi ...
and became a member of the ''Freundeskreis der Wirtschaft
The (), which became known as (also ) after the Nazi seizure of power, or " Keppler Circle", was a group of German industrialists whose aim was to strengthen the ties between the Nazi Party and business and industry. The group was formed and co- ...
'', a group of industrialists committed to racialism
Scientific racism, sometimes termed biological racism, is the pseudoscientific belief that the human species is divided into biologically distinct taxa called " races", and that empirical evidence exists to support or justify racial discri ...
and close to far right
Far-right politics, often termed right-wing extremism, encompasses a range of ideologies that are marked by ultraconservatism, authoritarianism, ultranationalism, and Nativism (politics), nativism. This political spectrum situates itself on ...
politics, led by Keppler. The group supported the Nazi Party
The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party ( or NSDAP), was a far-right politics, far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported the ideology of Nazism. Its precursor ...
, which Meyer joined in 1933.[Ernst Klee, ''Das Personenlexikon zum Dritten Reich. Wer war was vor und nach 1945'', Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag, Zweite aktualisierte Auflage, Frankfurt am Main 2005, p. 407.] He was one of three directors of the Dresdner Bank
Dresdner Bank AG () was a German bank, founded in 1872 in Dresden, then headquartered in Berlin from 1884 to 1945 and in Frankfurt from 1963 onwards after a postwar hiatus. Long Germany's second-largest bank behind Deutsche Bank, it was eventually ...
, the others being Karl Rasche
Karl Emil August Rasche (23 August 1892 – 13 September 1951) was an SS-Obersturmbannführer and a Ph.D. in law as well as a board member and banker, later spokesman, of the Dresdner Bank during the Third Reich. On 11 April 1949 he was sentenc ...
and Fritz Kranefuss, to belong to the exclusive ''Freunde des Reichsführer-SS
(, ) was a special title and rank that existed between the years of 1925 and 1945 for the commander of the (SS). ''Reichsführer-SS'' was a title from 1925 to 1933, and from 1934 to 1945 it was the highest Uniforms and insignia of the Schut ...
'' circle, a development of Keppler's group.[G.S. Graber, ''History of the SS'', Diamond Books, 1994, p. 123] As such he had the courtesy rank of Standartenführer
__NOTOC__
''Standartenführer'' (short: ''Staf'', , ) was a Nazi Party (NSDAP) paramilitary rank that was used in several NSDAP organizations, such as the SA, SS, NSKK and the NSFK. First founded as a title in 1925, in 1928 it became one of ...
in the SS. In 1935 he was made an honorary professor for Genossenschaftswesen at the prestigious Handelshochschule Berlin as well as a member of the Nazi Academy for German Law.
During the latter stages of the Second World War
World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
, Meyer was involved in Ostindustrie GmbH, a forced labour enterprise attached to the SS Main Economic and Administrative Office
The SS Main Economic and Administrative Office (; SS-WVHA) was a Nazi organization responsible for managing the finances, supply systems and business projects of the (a main branch of the ; SS). It also ran the concentration camps and was instru ...
set up by Oswald Pohl
Oswald Ludwig Pohl (; 30 June 1892 – 7 June 1951) was a German high-ranking SS official during the Nazi era. As the head of the SS Main Economic and Administrative Office and the head administrator of the Nazi concentration camps, he was a ke ...
in the General Government
The General Government (, ; ; ), formally the General Governorate for the Occupied Polish Region (), was a German zone of occupation established after the invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany, Slovak Republic (1939–1945), Slovakia and the Soviet ...
area of Poland
Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...
in 1943. Meyer committed suicide
Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death.
Risk factors for suicide include mental disorders, physical disorders, and substance abuse. Some suicides are impulsive acts driven by stress (such as from financial or ac ...
in Berlin
Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...
in 1945.
Sources
*Johannes Bähr: ''Die Dresdner Bank im Dritten Reich'', Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag, 2006 (co-authors: Ralf Ahrens, Michael C. Schneider, Harald Wixforth, Dieter Ziegler; see especially first volume, p. 92/93)
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Meyer, Emil
1886 births
1945 suicides
1945 deaths
Bankers in the Nazi Party
Businesspeople from Hesse
Dresdner Bank
Nazis who died by suicide in Germany
SS-Standartenführer
Nazi war criminals