Theodor Duesterberg
Theodor Duesterberg (* October 19, 1875 in Darmstadt, † November 4, 1950 in Hameln ) was in the Weimar Republic top official and longtime chairman of the German national paramilitary Stahlhelm Federal.
Life
Theodor Duesterberg (b. Collmann ) was born as the son of General George Duesterberg doctor and his wife Elis. In 1893 he resigned after a training in the cadet schools in Potsdam and large light field in the Prussian army. 1900-1901 he was a member of the occasion of the Boxer Rebellion sent to China Far East Expeditionary Corps. Two years later Duesterberg was appointed officer.
During the First World War Duesterberg worked as Head of the Department in the Prussian Ministry of War allies armies and was eventually promoted to lieutenant colonel.
In protest against the Treaty of Versailles, he resigned from the service in 1919, listening to history lectures at the University of Berlin and decided to become politically active. In the same year he joined the German National People's Party ( DNVP ) and was established in October as party secretary in Halle ( Saale) appointed. He left the party in 1923 but after several disagreements with the party leadership again and now joined the monarchist- nationalist military organization Stahlhelm. Duesterberg doing here fast career, even the year of his accession he was leader of the Union means he built up Germany and a year later in common besides Franz Seldte one of the two federal leaders.
1929 initiated the helmet together with the DNVP and the National Socialist German Workers' Party ( NSDAP) a referendum against the Young Plan. Two years later Duesterberg put her in the right brittle Harzburg Front for the cooperation of the steel helmet with the DNVP, NSDAP and other anti - republican groups of the extreme right. 1932 Duesterberg was established by the DNVP as a candidate for the office of President, cut, however, perhaps influenced by the discrediting of pages of the Nazi Party due to its non- pure " Aryan origin " ( " quarter- Jew " ) with 6.8% of the votes in the first ballot badly and withdrew his candidacy. Despite the campaign him a post in 1933 offered in hastily formed Hitler's cabinet as Minister of Labour, the then but Franz Seldte occupied. Due to the direct connection of the steel helmet Duesterberg gave the chair on there.
During the so-called by the Nazis Röhm putsch Duesterberg was imprisoned in 1934 in the short term in Dachau concentration camp. After his release, it was quiet around him. It is known that he sought contact with Carl Friedrich Goerdeler, but never became a member of the resistance.
In 1949 he published the magazine Der Stahlhelm and Hitler, in which he defended his political activities and emphasized his distance from Nazism.
Writings
- The steel helmet and Hitler. With a foreword by Wolfgang Müller. Wolfenbütteler Publishing Company, Wolfenbüttel and Hanover 1949