function

diocesan priest

creed

Latin (Roman Catholic) Church
more on: en.wikipedia.org [access: 2014.09.21]

diocese / province

Warmia diocese
more on: en.wikipedia.org [access: 2018.09.02]
Osnabrück diocese
more on: en.wikipedia.org [access: 2018.11.18]

nationality

German

date and place of death

27.05.1945

Stalino labour camp
Yenakiyeve, Donetsk obl., Ukraine

details of death

In 1938 released from prefect duties in Reszel, prob. for making remarks deemed by German Nazi authorities as hostile. During Russian winter offensive of 1945 ending World War II started by German and Russian invasion of Poland in 09.1939, escaping left on c. 20.01.1945 his parish. Reached Bartoszyce where his car broke down. There convinced by a local parish priest, Fr Richard Ziegler, decided to stay in the town. Few days after capture of Bartoszyce (04.02.1945) arrested by the Russians. Prob. brought to Wystruć transit camp and from there transported by train east into Russia. Jailed in Russian slave labour concentration camp Yenakiyeve n. Stalino (now Donetsk) in Donbas region. There perished.

cause of death

extermination

perpetrators

Russians

date and place of birth

24.07.1894

Hamburg
Hamburg, Germany

presbyter (holy orders)/
ordination

15.08.1920

positions held

1938–1945 — curatus/rector/expositus {parish: Ryn; church: Giżycko, St Bruno from Querfurt}, titular pastor
1933–1938 — prefect {Reszel, junior high school(s)}
till 1933 — prefect {Iława, junior high school(s)}
1930–1933 — councillor {Iława}
vicar {parish: Güstrow; Mecklenburg}
vicar {parish: Hamburg}

others related in death

ZIEGLER Richard, FRANK John, HEINRICH Charles, JASCHOLTOWSKI Anthony, PODLECH Ferdinand, ZINT Helmut

murder sites
camps (+ prisoner no)

Yenakiyeve: Russian slave labour concentration camp organised by the large steel mill. At the end of II World War in 04.‑05.1945 Russians sent tens of thousands of prisoners from Silesia and Warmia to Donbas coal mining region to slave in mines and steel mills. Prisoners on Yenakiyeve prob. slaved in the mill. Less than half of them returned home — 10 years later. (more on: katowice.gosc.pl [access: 2014.11.28])

Stalino camps: Headquarters of a series of Russian slave labour concentration and POW camps, founded starting from 1942‑3, in Stalino (now Donetsk), centre of Donbas coal mining and steel making region in southern Ukraine. In 1944‑6 a control and filtration camp no 240 was set up and at the beginning of 1945 had c. sub camps, including in Yenakiyeve. POW camp no 280 was operational longer. Russians brought there internees from the regions captured by their army who had not managed to escape with withdrawing Germans, among others from Warmia. Most slaved in Donbas coal mines. Among those held were c. 4,782 soldiers of Polish Home Army AK and other independent resistance organizations (part of Polish Clandestine State). In 04‑05.1945 Russians sent tens of thousands of miners from Silesia to slave labour in Donbas mines — only some returned to Poland, 10 years later. (more on: pl.wikipedia.org [access: 2018.09.02])

Gulag: Network of Russian slave labour concentration camps. At any given time up to 12 mln inmates where held in them, milions perished. (more on: pl.wikipedia.org [access: 2014.05.09], en.wikipedia.org [access: 2014.05.09])

Wystruć: Russian transit camp set up in 1945 for German population of East Prussia — one of concentration centers of defeated Germans marked for slave work in Russia. In Wystruć (now: Chernyakhovsk) and in nearby Jurbork c. 60,000 people were held: men, women, girls and old. All were transported — in rail transfers lasting 4‑7 weeks, without hot food, proper sanitation — to Russians slave labour camps. Many perished before reaching destination… (more on: bazhum.muzhp.pl [access: 2018.09.02])

Deportation of Germans to Russia in 1945: On 06.02.19454 Russian State Defence Committee issued an order to intern all Germans, mainly men, able to work from the German territories captured by Russian army and transport them into Russia — to slave labour camps in Donbas region in Ukraine, to industrial centers in Ural mountains, to Russian occupied Belarus, etc. — in order to rebuild destroyed by the war Russia. It was planned to use c. 500,000 Germans, 17‑50 years old, although in practice much older were also arrested. From Upper Silesia only c. 90,000 Germans and Poles were deported 20% of which returned after many years. Among the victims were members of Polish clandestine Home Army AK (part of Polish Clandestine State) fighting with Germans. Tens of thousands were deported from Warmia and Mazurian regions. (more on: en.wikipedia.org [access: 2018.11.18])

Ribbentrop-Molotov: Genocidal Russian–German alliance pact between Russian leader Joseph Stalin and German leader Adolf Hitler signed on 23.08.1939 in Moscow by respective foreign ministers, Mr. Vyacheslav Molotov for Russia and Joachim von Ribbentrop for Germany. The pact sanctioned and was the direct cause of joint Russian and German invasion of Poland and the outbreak of the II World War in 09.1939. „The war was one of the greatest calamities and dramas of humanity in history, for two atheistic and anti–Christian ideologies — national and international socialism — rejected God and His fifth Decalogue commandment: Thou shall not kill!” (Abp Stanislaus Gądecki, 01.09.2019). The decisions taken — backed up by the betrayal of the formal allies of Poland, France and Germany, which on 12.09.1939, at a joint conference in Abbeville, decided not to provide aid to attacked Poland and not to take military action against Germany (a clear breach of treaty obligations with Poland) — were on 28.09.1939 slightly altered and made more precise when a treaty on „German–Russian boundaries and friendship” was agreed by the same murderous signatories. One of its findings was establishment of spheres of influence in Central and Eastern Europe and in consequence IV partition of Poland. In one of its secret annexes agreed, that: „the Signatories will not tolerate on its respective territories any Polish propaganda that affects the territory of the other Side. On their respective territories they will suppress all such propaganda and inform each other of the measures taken to accomplish it”. The agreements resulted in a series of meeting between two genocidal organization representing both sides — German Gestapo and Russian NKVD when coordination of efforts to exterminate Polish intelligentsia and Polish leading classes (in Germany called Intelligenzaktion, in Russia took the form of Katyń massacres) where discussed. Resulted in deaths of hundreds of thousands of Polish intelligentsia, including thousands of priests presented here, and tens of millions of ordinary people,. The results of this Russian–German pact lasted till 1989 and are still in evidence even today. (more on: en.wikipedia.org [access: 2015.09.30])

sources

personal:
files.bildarchiv-ostpreussen.de [access: 2018.11.18]
original images:
www.katholische-kirche-guestrow.de [access: 2014.11.28], www.bildarchiv-ostpreussen.de [access: 2018.11.18]