Dr. Herbert Michaelis (3 September 1898 — 14 June 1939) was a German lawyer and Communist, and a member of the German Resistance during the

Third Reich Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a totalitarian dictat ...

Biography

Michaelis was born in

Hamburg Hamburg (, ; ), officially the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg,. is the List of cities in Germany by population, second-largest city in Germany after Berlin and List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, 7th-lar ...

, the son of a Jewish businessman. He served from 1916 to 1918, during the

First World War World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

. He started his law practice in Hamburg in 1928, and that same year, he married Marie-Luise Rom, with whom he had three children. He joined the

Communist Party of Germany The Communist Party of Germany (, ; KPD ) was a major Far-left politics, far-left political party in the Weimar Republic during the interwar period, German resistance to Nazism, underground resistance movement in Nazi Germany, and minor party ...

(KPD) in 1924. In 1933, the year the

Nazis Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During H ...

seized power, someone anonymously denounced him to the

Gestapo The (, ), Syllabic abbreviation, abbreviated Gestapo (), was the official secret police of Nazi Germany and in German-occupied Europe. The force was created by Hermann Göring in 1933 by combining the various political police agencies of F ...

. The Nazis began to restrict what Jews could do, and Michaelis was prohibited from practicing his profession, as a result. Shortly after that, he was fraudulently accused of an offense, and was sentenced to two years in a Zuchthaus. At Lübeck Zuchthaus, he got to know the lathe operator, Bruno Rieboldt, and metalworker, Dagobert Biermann (father of former

East German East Germany, officially known as the German Democratic Republic (GDR), was a country in Central Europe from its formation on 7 October 1949 until its reunification with West Germany (FRG) on 3 October 1990. Until 1989, it was generally vie ...

dissident,

Wolf Biermann Karl Wolf Biermann (; born 15 November 1936) is a German singer-songwriter, poet, and former East German dissident. He is perhaps best known for the 1968 song " Ermutigung" and his expatriation from East Germany in 1976. Early life Biermann was ...

). After their release, Rieboldt and Biermann went to work at the Hamburg wharves for

Blohm + Voss Blohm is a surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Hans Blohm C.M. (born 1927), photographer and author * Hermann Blohm (1848–1930), German businessman and co-founder of German company Blohm+Voss * Irma Blohm (1909–1997), German pol ...

. Rieboldt informed Michaelis about armaments work at Blohm + Voss, particularly regarding the construction of airplane motors and warships. The goal of the Resistance group around Michaelis was to expose to the world the Nazi's secret involvement in the

Spanish Civil War The Spanish Civil War () was a military conflict fought from 1936 to 1939 between the Republican faction (Spanish Civil War), Republicans and the Nationalist faction (Spanish Civil War), Nationalists. Republicans were loyal to the Left-wing p ...

.Hans Michael Kloth
"Mein Nachbar, der KZ-Kommandant"
("My neighbor, the concentration camp commandant"). Spiegel Online (January 21, 2008) Biermann and his brother-in-law, Karl Dietrich, a ship captain, reported to Michaelis on the weapons shipments from January to March 1937 to

Francisco Franco Francisco Franco Bahamonde (born Francisco Paulino Hermenegildo Teódulo Franco Bahamonde; 4 December 1892 – 20 November 1975) was a Spanish general and dictator who led the Nationalist faction (Spanish Civil War), Nationalist forces i ...

. Michaelis relayed this information in January and February 1937 through a middle man, Richard Bähre, who, in turn, forwarded it to the exiled KPD leadership in

Basel Basel ( ; ), also known as Basle ( ), ; ; ; . is a city in northwestern Switzerland on the river Rhine (at the transition from the High Rhine, High to the Upper Rhine). Basel is Switzerland's List of cities in Switzerland, third-most-populo ...

. On March 26, 1937, Rieboldt was arrested. Two days later, Michaelis and Biermann were arrested. Michaelis was convicted by the second Senate of the Volksgerichtshof in Hamburg and sentenced to death. He was executed on 14 June 1939 at

Plötzensee Prison Plötzensee Prison (, JVA Plötzensee) is a men's prison in the Charlottenburg-Nord locality of Berlin with a capacity for 577 prisoners, operated by the State of Berlin judicial administration. The detention centre established in 1868 has a lon ...

in Berlin. Reiboldt received a 12-year sentence, and Biermann was sentenced to six years at hard labor in a ''Zuchthaus''. Only Dietrich was allowed to go free.

Memorials

Michaelis is included in the names on the monument unveiled in 2007, honoring the lawyers who perished at the hands of the Nazis. The monument stands in front of the House of German Lawyers' Association in Berlin. There is a

stolperstein A (; plural ) is a concrete cube bearing a brass plate inscribed with the name and life dates of victims of Nazi extermination or persecution. Literal translation, Literally, it means 'stumbling stone' and metaphorically 'stumbling block'. ...

for him at Isestraße 23, in Hamburg.Stolperstein for Dr. Herbert Michaelis
Retrieved March 29, 2010

References

External links

"About the project"
Stolpersteine in Hamburg. Retrieved March 29, 2010
German National Archive

Family Tree on GENI.com
{{DEFAULTSORT:Michaelis, Herbert 1898 births 1939 deaths People from Hamburg executed at Plötzensee Prison People executed by guillotine at Plötzensee Prison Jews in the German resistance Communist Party of Germany politicians Executed communists in the German Resistance Lists of stolpersteine in Germany

Biography

Memorials

Further reading

References

External links