Robert Uhrig (; March 8, 1903 – August 21, 1944) was a German communist and
resistance fighter against
National Socialism
Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During Hitler's rise to power, it was frequ ...
.
Background
Born in
Leipzig
Leipzig (, ; ; Upper Saxon: ; ) is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Saxony. The city has a population of 628,718 inhabitants as of 2023. It is the List of cities in Germany by population, eighth-largest city in Ge ...
, the son of a metalworker, Uhrig grew up to become a
journeyman
A journeyman is a worker, skilled in a given building trade or craft, who has successfully completed an official apprenticeship qualification. Journeymen are considered competent and authorized to work in that field as a fully qualified employee ...
toolmaker. 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 1920 and took several courses at the Marxist Workers' School.
[Short biography of Robert Uhrig](_blank)
German Resistance Memorial Center, Berlin. Retrieved March 25, 2010 From 1929 on, he worked at
Osram
OSRAM Licht AG is a German company that makes electric lights, headquartered in Munich and Premstätten (Austria). OSRAM positions itself as a high-tech photonics company that is increasingly focusing on sensor technology, visualization and trea ...
in
Berlin-Moabit and joined the KPD workplace cell. By the end of 1932, The KPD was the third largest party in Germany, with 3,600,000 members and had received some six million votes in the previous election.
Wolfgang Benz
Wolfgang Benz (born 9 June 1941) is a German historian and Antisemitism, anti-semitism researcher from Ellwangen (Jagst), Ellwangen. He was the director of the Berlin Research Centre on Anti-Semitism, Center for Research on Antisemitism of the Te ...
"Opposition und Widerstand der Arbeiterbewegung"
("Opposition and Resistance of the Workers' Movement") Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung. Retrieved March 27, 2010. He took leadership of the cell in 1933.
Legality rescinded
The
Reichstag Fire Decree
The Reichstag Fire Decree () is the common name of the Decree of the Reich President for the Protection of People and State () issued by German President Paul von Hindenburg on the advice of Chancellor Adolf Hitler on 28 February 1933 in immed ...
pushed by
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler (20 April 1889 – 30 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was the dictator of Nazi Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his suicide in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the lea ...
in response to the
Reichstag fire
The Reichstag fire (, ) was an arson attack on the Reichstag building, home of the German parliament in Berlin, on Monday, 27 February 1933, precisely four weeks after Adolf Hitler was sworn in as Chancellor of Germany. Marinus van der Lubbe, ...
on February 27, 1933, and signed into law by President
Paul von Hindenburg
Paul Ludwig Hans Anton von Beneckendorff und von Hindenburg (2 October 1847 – 2 August 1934) was a German military and political leader who led the Imperial German Army during the First World War and later became President of Germany (1919� ...
withdrew civil liberties and enabled the Nazis, then in key positions in government, to arrest anyone they deemed to be an enemy. This became first and foremost a confrontation with the KPD, but in effect, outlawed all political parties in Germany other than the Nazi Party. The
Enabling Act
An enabling act is a piece of legislation by which a legislative body grants an entity which depends on it (for authorization or legitimacy) for the delegation of the legislative body's power to take certain actions. For example, enabling act ...
of March 27, 1933, consolidated their power and authority. In the first weeks of March 1933, there were 11,000 Communists arrested and by June 1933, more than half of the KPD district leaders were in detention.
Arrest and further resistance
Uhrig was arrested by 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 ...
in 1934 and sentenced to hard labor
at the
Zuchthaus in
Luckau
Luckau (Lower Sorbian: ''Łuków'') is a city in the district of Dahme-Spreewald in the States of Germany#States, federal state of Brandenburg, in eastern Germany. Known for its beauty, it has been dubbed "the Pearl of Lower Lusatia".
Origin of t ...
. After his release in summer 1936, he went underground, working in the leadership of the Berlin KPD. Starting in 1938, he led a network of resistance groups in over 20 factories in Berlin, which became part of one of the largest anti-fascist resistance organizations in Berlin. Through his relationships with
Wilhelm Guddorf,
John Sieg and others, he was in regular contact with the
Red Orchestra and with groups 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 ...
,
Mannheim
Mannheim (; Palatine German language, Palatine German: or ), officially the University City of Mannheim (), is the List of cities in Baden-Württemberg by population, second-largest city in Baden-Württemberg after Stuttgart, the States of Ger ...
,
Leipzig
Leipzig (, ; ; Upper Saxon: ; ) is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Saxony. The city has a population of 628,718 inhabitants as of 2023. It is the List of cities in Germany by population, eighth-largest city in Ge ...
,
Munich
Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is no ...
and elsewhere.
Starting in 1940-1941, he also worked extensively with
Beppo Römer. Around this period, he was regarded as the leader of KPD resistance in Berlin.
In 1941,
Charlotte Bischoff came to Germany by freight ship, entering illegally and bringing instructions from the International Relations department of the
Communist International
The Communist International, abbreviated as Comintern and also known as the Third International, was a political international which existed from 1919 to 1943 and advocated world communism. Emerging from the collapse of the Second Internationa ...
. She worked with the group around Uhrig and with others, such as the
Saefkow-Jacob-Bästlein Organization The Saefkow-Jacob-Bästlein Organization was an underground German resistance movement acting during the Second World War, that published the illegal magazine, ''Die Innere Front'' ("The Internal Front").
In the 1940s, the Communist Party of German ...
and
Kurt and
Elisabeth Schumacher. Acting as a courier, she gave "micro materials" to contact people within these groups.
Uhrig and Römer published an underground paper, called ''Informationdienst'' ("Information Service"), one of the most important Resistance newspapers.
[Robert-Uhrig-Straße Geschichte](_blank)
Background information about the street. March 27, 2010 Issued regularly, it endeavored to report on the economic and military situation. It also called for acts of sabotage. The goal of the group was to establish a socialist state after the fall of Hitler's dictatorship.
Werner Seelenbinder worked part-time with the Uhrig Group. Other members of the group were
Ernst Knaack,
Paul Schultz-Liebisch and
Charlotte Eisenblätter.
Arrest and sentence
In 1941, the Gestapo infiltrated the Uhrig Group with informers and in February 1942, Uhrig and 200 other members of the Uhrig Group were arrested. Uhrig was sent to
Sachsenhausen concentration camp
Sachsenhausen () or Sachsenhausen-Oranienburg was a German Nazi concentration camp in Oranienburg, Germany, used from 1936 until April 1945, shortly before the defeat of Nazi Germany in May later that year. It mainly held political prisoners t ...
. He was sentenced to death by the ''
Volksgerichtshof'' on June 7, 1944. The sentence was carried out by
guillotine
A guillotine ( ) is an apparatus designed for effectively carrying out executions by Decapitation, beheading. The device consists of a tall, upright frame with a weighted and angled blade suspended at the top. The condemned person is secur ...
August 21, 1944 at the
Brandenburg-Görden Prison.
Family
Uhrig was married to Charlotte Kirst Uhrig (February 26, 1907 – October 17, 1992). She was also active in the anti-Nazi resistance and was arrested on September 3, 1943. She was "released" by the ''Voksgerichthof'' on April 17, 1944, but was nonetheless sent to
Ravensbrück concentration camp
Ravensbrück () was a Nazi concentration camp exclusively for women from 1939 to 1945, located in northern Germany, north of Berlin at a site near the village of Ravensbrück (part of Fürstenberg/Havel). The camp memorial's estimated figure of 1 ...
, which she survived. After liberation, she and Ellen Kuntz founded the Women's Committee at the Schöneberg district office in Berlin, which mobilized women for the recovery effort in the aftermath of the war.
[Götz and Hannelore Dieckmann (Editors)]
"Albert Kuntz: »Liebste Ellen…«"
eDoc.ViFaPol Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung, Texte 21, Karl Dietz Verlag, Berlin (2005), p. 20. Retrieved April 14, 2011 She lived in East Germany.
Memorials
* The town cemetery in
Berlin-Niederschönhausen, Pankow IV, has a symbolic grave site for Uhrig.
* Robert-Uhrig-Straße, a street in
Berlin-Lichtenberg, is named after Uhrig,
* Until the
reunification of Germany
German reunification () was the process of re-establishing Germany as a single sovereign state, which began on 9 November 1989 and culminated on 3 October 1990 with the dissolution of the German Democratic Republic and the integration of i ...
, the 19th Polytechnische Oberschule, a university in Berlin-Lichtenberg, was named after Uhrig.
* There is a memorial plaque at Wartburgstraße 4, in
Berlin-Schöneberg, where Uhrig once lived.
Further reading
*Michael C. Thomsett. ''The German opposition to Hitler'', McFarland (1997) , 9780786403721
*Terence Prittie. ''Germans against Hitler'', Little, Brown (1964)
* Hermann Weber and Andreas Herbst. ''Deutsche Kommunisten. Biographisches Handbuch 1918 bis 1945'', Karl Dietz Verlag, Berlin (2004) pp. 802–803.
* Gert Rosiejka. ''Die Rote Kapelle. „Landesverrat“ als antifaschistischer Widerstand.'' Ergebnisse Verlag, Hamburg (1986)
*
Luise Kraushaar. ''Berliner Kommunisten im Kampf gegen den Faschismus 1936 – 1942. Robert Uhrig und Genossen'', Dietz Verlag, Berlin (1980)
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Uhrig, Robert
1903 births
1944 deaths
Politicians from Leipzig
Communist Party of Germany politicians
Executed Red Orchestra members
Executed communists in the German Resistance
People executed by Nazi Germany by guillotine
People from Saxony executed by Nazi Germany
People executed by Nazi courts