Gustav Sobottka
Encyclopedia
Gustav Sobottka was a German politician in East Germany. He was a member of the Communist Party
and was in exile during the Nazi era
. He returned to Germany in 1945 as head of the Sobottka Group and later worked in the East German government.
(Turowo), in the administrative district of Johannisburg
(Pisz) in East Prussia
. His father, Adam Sobottka, was a roofer and day laborer, his mother was Auguste Sobottka. In 1895, the family moved to Röhlinghausen, today the southwestern part of Herne
, in the Ruhr region. The family were Pietists
, a pious movement within the Lutheran church. Sobottka was confirmed in 1901 and began working in the coal mines that same year. In 1909 he married Henriette (called "Jettchen") Schantowski, he and his wife had a daughter and two sons. In World War I
Sobottka served in the German Army
from August 1914 to November 1918.
in 1910 and his wife joined in 1912. Later, he was one of the founders of the Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany
. At the end of 1920, he joined the Communist Party
(Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands, or KPD). He was also one of the founding members and head of the "Miners' Group" in the communist-leaning Union of Manual and Intellectual Workers
, whose 1925 merger into the confederation of unions, the Allgemeiner Deutscher Gewerkschaftsbund
, he initially opposed, but later worked to accomplish.
Sobottka served in the Prussian Landtag as a representative of the KPD and he was the leader of the mining industry group of the KPD Central Committee
. After he was expelled in 1928 from the Free Trade Unions'
Miners' Association, in 1929, he became one of the founders and leading members of the Revolutionary Trade Union Opposition. In 1930, he became general secretary of the International Commitee of Miners. In 1932, he was not nominated to be a candidate for the Prussian Landtag and began working with the Rote Hilfe
(Red Aid). After the Nazi Party seized power
, as communists were threatened by arrest and attack, he worked underground, then went to the Saarland, then still under foreign occupation. He then went to Paris and continued his work. In spring 1935, the International Red Aid
summoned him to Moscow
.
Toward the end of 1935, his wife and son, Gustav, Jr. (April 10, 1915 – September 1940) managed to travel to the Soviet Union
via Paris. His other son, Bernhard (June 6, 1911 – July 20, 1945), remained in Germany. He was arrested and imprisoned in Nazi concentration camp. He was liberated from Fuhlsbüttel, but died in the infirmary, shortly afterward. Before fleeing to the Soviet Union, Gustav Sobottka, Jr. had been in two Nazi concentration camps. He was arrested by the NKVD
on February 5, 1938, as part of the Hitler Youth Conspiracy
, after which his mother had a nervous breakdown
. Sobottka, Jr. was tortured and tried to commit suicide. In a letter he wrote after more than two years in custody, he said he'd given up all hope. He died in Moscow's Butyrka prison
in September 1940. Because of his son's arrest, Sobottka, Sr. was fired from his job on the unions' central council of in March 1938 and was himself investigated.
and the Ackermann Group, were sent to lay the groundwork for the Soviet Military Administration in Germany
. Sobottka's group was sent to Mecklenburg
, today Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.
From 1947 to 1948, he was president of the Central Administration for the Combustible Fuel Industry.His secretary was Elli Barczatis, later tried and executed for spying. From 1949 to 1951, he worked for the East German Ministry for Heavy Industry.
Sobottka retired with an honorary pension as an "Honored Miner of the German Democratic Republic
", but was depressed about his son's death in Moscow and his wife's ill health. On March 5, 1953, he learned about the death of Joseph Stalin
and was so overcome, he died the following day in Berlin. His wife was away at a health resort at the time. Gustav Sobottka, Jr. was rehabilitated
in 1956.
Communist Party of Germany
The Communist Party of Germany was a major political party in Germany between 1918 and 1933, and a minor party in West Germany in the postwar period until it was banned in 1956...
and was in exile during the Nazi era
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
. He returned to Germany in 1945 as head of the Sobottka Group and later worked in the East German government.
Early life
Gustav Sobottka was born in TurowenTurowo, Pisz County
Turowo is a village in the administrative district of Gmina Pisz, within Pisz County, Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship, in northern Poland. It lies approximately south-east of Pisz and east of the regional capital Olsztyn....
(Turowo), in the administrative district of Johannisburg
Pisz
Pisz is a town in the Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship in Poland, with a population of 19,328 in 2004. It is the seat of Pisz County. Pisz is located at the junction of Lake Roś and the Pisa River.- Etymology :...
(Pisz) in East Prussia
East Prussia
East Prussia is the main part of the region of Prussia along the southeastern Baltic Coast from the 13th century to the end of World War II in May 1945. From 1772–1829 and 1878–1945, the Province of East Prussia was part of the German state of Prussia. The capital city was Königsberg.East Prussia...
. His father, Adam Sobottka, was a roofer and day laborer, his mother was Auguste Sobottka. In 1895, the family moved to Röhlinghausen, today the southwestern part of Herne
Herne
Herne may refer to:Places in England* Herne, Kent, near the town of Herne Bay* Herne Bay, Kent, seaside town located in southeastern Kent* Herne Common, Kent* Herne Hill in LondonPlaces in Australia* Herne Hill, Victoria...
, in the Ruhr region. The family were Pietists
Pietism
Pietism was a movement within Lutheranism, lasting from the late 17th century to the mid-18th century and later. It proved to be very influential throughout Protestantism and Anabaptism, inspiring not only Anglican priest John Wesley to begin the Methodist movement, but also Alexander Mack to...
, a pious movement within the Lutheran church. Sobottka was confirmed in 1901 and began working in the coal mines that same year. In 1909 he married Henriette (called "Jettchen") Schantowski, he and his wife had a daughter and two sons. In World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
Sobottka served in the German Army
German Army (German Empire)
The German Army was the name given the combined land forces of the German Empire, also known as the National Army , Imperial Army or Imperial German Army. The term "Deutsches Heer" is also used for the modern German Army, the land component of the German Bundeswehr...
from August 1914 to November 1918.
Political life
Sobottka joined the Social DemocratsSocial Democratic Party of Germany
The Social Democratic Party of Germany is a social-democratic political party in Germany...
in 1910 and his wife joined in 1912. Later, he was one of the founders of the Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany
Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany
The Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany was a short-lived political party in Germany during the Second Reich and the Weimar Republic. The organization was established in 1917 as the result of a split of left wing members of the Social Democratic Party of Germany...
. At the end of 1920, he joined the Communist Party
Communist Party of Germany
The Communist Party of Germany was a major political party in Germany between 1918 and 1933, and a minor party in West Germany in the postwar period until it was banned in 1956...
(Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands, or KPD). He was also one of the founding members and head of the "Miners' Group" in the communist-leaning Union of Manual and Intellectual Workers
Union of Manual and Intellectual Workers
The Union of Manual and Intellectual Workers was a German trade union that was politically close to the Communist Party of Germany...
, whose 1925 merger into the confederation of unions, the Allgemeiner Deutscher Gewerkschaftsbund
Allgemeiner Deutscher Gewerkschaftsbund
The Allgemeiner Deutscher Gewerkschaftsbund was a confederation of German trade unions in Germany founded during the Weimar Republic. It was founded in 1919 and was initially powerful enough to organize a general strike in 1920 against a right-wing coup d'état. After the 1929 Wall Street crash,...
, he initially opposed, but later worked to accomplish.
Sobottka served in the Prussian Landtag as a representative of the KPD and he was the leader of the mining industry group of the KPD Central Committee
Central Committee
Central Committee was the common designation of a standing administrative body of communist parties, analogous to a board of directors, whether ruling or non-ruling in the twentieth century and of the surviving, mostly Trotskyist, states in the early twenty first. In such party organizations the...
. After he was expelled in 1928 from the Free Trade Unions'
Free Trade Unions (Germany)
The Free Trade Unions comprised the socialist trade union movement in Germany from 1890 to 1933. The term distinguished them from the liberal and Christian labor unions in Germany...
Miners' Association, in 1929, he became one of the founders and leading members of the Revolutionary Trade Union Opposition. In 1930, he became general secretary of the International Commitee of Miners. In 1932, he was not nominated to be a candidate for the Prussian Landtag and began working with the Rote Hilfe
Rote Hilfe
The Rote Hilfe was the German affiliate of the International Red Aid. The Rote Hilfe was affiliated with the Communist Party of Germany and existed between 1924 and 1936.- Origin :...
(Red Aid). After the Nazi Party seized power
Machtergreifung
Machtergreifung is a German word meaning "seizure of power". It is normally used specifically to refer to the Nazi takeover of power in the democratic Weimar Republic on 30 January 1933, the day Hitler was sworn in as Chancellor of Germany, turning it into the Nazi German dictatorship.-Term:The...
, as communists were threatened by arrest and attack, he worked underground, then went to the Saarland, then still under foreign occupation. He then went to Paris and continued his work. In spring 1935, the International Red Aid
International Red Aid
International Red Aid was an international social service organization established by the Communist International...
summoned him to Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...
.
Toward the end of 1935, his wife and son, Gustav, Jr. (April 10, 1915 – September 1940) managed to travel to the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
via Paris. His other son, Bernhard (June 6, 1911 – July 20, 1945), remained in Germany. He was arrested and imprisoned in Nazi concentration camp. He was liberated from Fuhlsbüttel, but died in the infirmary, shortly afterward. Before fleeing to the Soviet Union, Gustav Sobottka, Jr. had been in two Nazi concentration camps. He was arrested by the NKVD
NKVD
The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs was the public and secret police organization of the Soviet Union that directly executed the rule of power of the Soviets, including political repression, during the era of Joseph Stalin....
on February 5, 1938, as part of the Hitler Youth Conspiracy
Hitler Youth Conspiracy
The Hitler Youth Conspiracy was a case investigated by the Soviet secret police, during the Great Purge in the late 1930s. Essentially a theory in search of evidence, it nonetheless resulted in the arrest of numerous German teenagers and some in their twenties and beyond, who were accused of having...
, after which his mother had a nervous breakdown
Nervous breakdown
Mental breakdown is a non-medical term used to describe an acute, time-limited phase of a specific disorder that presents primarily with features of depression or anxiety.-Definition:...
. Sobottka, Jr. was tortured and tried to commit suicide. In a letter he wrote after more than two years in custody, he said he'd given up all hope. He died in Moscow's Butyrka prison
Butyrka prison
Butyrka prison was the central transit prison in pre-Revolutionary Russia, located in Moscow.The first references to Butyrka prison may be traced back to the 17th century. The present prison building was erected in 1879 near the Butyrsk gate on the site of a prison-fortress which had been built...
in September 1940. Because of his son's arrest, Sobottka, Sr. was fired from his job on the unions' central council of in March 1938 and was himself investigated.
Postwar and final years
In 1945, Sobottka returned to Germany from the Soviet Union as leader of the Sobottka Group, which along with the Ulbricht GroupUlbricht group
The Ulbricht Group, led by Walter Ulbricht, was a group of exiled German communists who flew from the Soviet Union back to Germany on April 30, 1945...
and the Ackermann Group, were sent to lay the groundwork for the Soviet Military Administration in Germany
Soviet Military Administration in Germany
The Soviet Military Administration in Germany was the Soviet military government, headquartered in Berlin-Karlshorst, that directly ruled the Soviet occupation zone of Germany from the German surrender in May 1945 until after the establishment of the German Democratic Republic in October...
. Sobottka's group was sent to Mecklenburg
Mecklenburg
Mecklenburg is a historical region in northern Germany comprising the western and larger part of the federal-state Mecklenburg-Vorpommern...
, today Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.
From 1947 to 1948, he was president of the Central Administration for the Combustible Fuel Industry.His secretary was Elli Barczatis, later tried and executed for spying. From 1949 to 1951, he worked for the East German Ministry for Heavy Industry.
Sobottka retired with an honorary pension as an "Honored Miner of the German Democratic Republic
German Democratic Republic
The German Democratic Republic , informally called East Germany by West Germany and other countries, was a socialist state established in 1949 in the Soviet zone of occupied Germany, including East Berlin of the Allied-occupied capital city...
", but was depressed about his son's death in Moscow and his wife's ill health. On March 5, 1953, he learned about the death of Joseph Stalin
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...
and was so overcome, he died the following day in Berlin. His wife was away at a health resort at the time. Gustav Sobottka, Jr. was rehabilitated
Rehabilitation (Soviet)
Rehabilitation in the context of the former Soviet Union, and the Post-Soviet states, was the restoration of a person who was criminally prosecuted without due basis, to the state of acquittal...
in 1956.
Recognition
- Honorary pension, Fighter against Fascism
- Honored Miner of the German Democratic Republic
- VEBVolkseigener BetriebThe Volkseigener Betrieb was the legal form of industrial enterprise in East Germany...
Braunkohlenwerk in Röblingen (1953–1986) was named for Gustav Sobottka, as were many streets and schools. Some have since been renamed, but in ZeitzZeitzZeitz is a town in the Burgenlandkreis district, in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. It is situated on the river Weiße Elster, in the middle of the triangle of the federal states Saxony-Anhalt, Thuringia and Saxony.-History:...
there is still a Gustav-Sobottka-Straße - A number of units in the National People's ArmyNational People's ArmyThe National People’s Army were the armed forces of the German Democratic Republic .The NVA was established in 1956 and disestablished in 1990. There were frequent reports of East German advisors with Communist African countries during the Cold War...
were named after Gustav Sobottka
Sources
- Hermann Weber, Die Wandlung des deutschen Kommunismus. Die Stalinisierung der KPD in der Weimarer Republik. Band 2. Frankfurt am Main (1969), p. 308
- Peter Erler, Helmut Müller-Enbergs, Wer war wer in der DDR?, 5th edition. Ch. Links Verlag, Berlin (2010) ISBN 978-3-86153-561-4, Band 2
External links
- Heinrich Lührig, Ein Röhlinghauser Revolutionär Auf den Spuren von Gustav Sobottka Wanne-Eickel.de Short biography. Retrieved November 25, 2011
- Sobottka jun., Gustav / Hans Boden NKVD and Gestapo. Retrieved November 26, 2011
- Catherine Epstein, "The Last Revolutionaries: German Communists and Their Century President and Fellows of Harvard College (2003), p. 57. ISBN 0-674-01045-0. Retrieved November 30, 2011