Erich Klausener

Erich Klausener
Erich Klausener in 1933
Personal details
Born	Erich Klausener (1885-01-25)25 January 1885 Düsseldorf, Kingdom of Prussia, German Empire
Died	30 June 1934(1934-06-30) (aged 38) Berlin, German Reich
Nationality	German
Parents	Peter Klausener (father) Elisabeth Biesenbach (mother)
Profession	Politician Professor
Known for	Head of Catholic Action Berlin
Religion	Roman Catholicism
Military service
Allegiance	Kingdom of Prussia  German Empire
Battles/wars	World War I

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Erich Klausener (25 January 1885 – 30 June 1934) was a German Catholic politician and Catholic martyr in the "Night of the Long Knives", a purge that took place in Nazi Germany from 30 June to 2 July 1934, when the Nazi regime carried out a series of political murders.

Family[]

Born in Düsseldorf to a strict Catholic family.^[1] His father, Peter Klausener (1844-1904), was a member of the Austrian Flirsch Klausener family, who came to the Rhineland in 1740, and are relatives of the Cluysenaar family. His father studied law and served as an assessor and justice of the peace in Malmedy, Prussia. His mother, Elisabeth Bisenbach (1864-1944), was from an upper-class family in Düsseldorf.^[2] Klausener followed his father's career in public service, serving for a time in the Prussian Ministry of Commerce.^[3] He served as an artillery officer in Belgium, France and on the eastern front of World War I, and was awarded the Iron Cross Second Class in 1914 and the Iron Cross First Class in 1917.^{[citation needed]} Klausener's participation in a boycott during the French occupancy of Ruhr in 1923 and 1924, however, earned him a sentence of two months in prison.^{[citation needed]}

Career[]

From 1924, Klausener served in Prussia in the Ministry of Welfare, and later headed the police division Ministry of Interior of that state. From 1928, Klausener became head of the group Catholic Action (German: Katholische Aktion). Before 1933, he strongly supported the police battle against illegal Nazi activities. After Adolf Hitler and Nazis came to power in 1933, Hermann Göring became minister-president of Prussia. Klausener was displaced from the ministry of transport of Prussia when Göring started to Nazify the Prussian police, and Klausener was transferred to the Reich Ministry of Transportation.^[3]

Chair of Catholic Action Berlin[]

Kalusener was elected to the board of the Katholischen Akademikerverbandes (Catholic Academic Association).^[1][4]

Assassination[]

A close associate of Vice Chancellor Franz von Papen, Klausener contributed to his Marburg speech delivered on 17 June 1934. The speech was largely written by Edgar Jung, but the contributions of Klausener and Secretary Herbert von Bose cost them their lives.^[3][5] The speech, though moderate in tone, criticized the violence and repression that had followed since Hitler became Chancellor.^[3] It called for an end to the revolution, Nazi terror and for the restoration of normalcy, freedom, and freedom of the press.^[5]

On 24 June 1934, Klausener spoke at the Catholic Congress in the Berlin's Hoppegarten. His passionate criticism of the repression was viewed by the Nazis as an open challenge.^[3]

Six days later, on 30 June 1934, during the "Night of the Long Knives", SS officer Kurt Gildisch was ordered by Reinhard Heydrich to go to Klausener's office at the Ministry of Transport to assassinate him.^[5][6] After the killing, Gildisch was promoted in rank to SS-Sturmbannführer.^[6]

Martyr[]

After the end of the Nazi regime and after World War II, a monument was erected to Klausener in Berlin. In 1963, his ashes were buried in a grave in the Catholic Church Maria Regina Martyrum, in commemoration of the martyrs of the Nazi era.^[7] In 1999, the Catholic Church in Germany accepted Klausener into the German martyrology as a witness of faith.^[8]

Klausener's Monument in the cemetery of St. Matthias Church, Berlin

Legacy[]

Tributes and memorials[]

• Erich-Klausener-Gymnasium (State High-School) in Adenau is named after him^[9]

Klausener had seven Straßen (streets) named after him:

• Erich-Klausener-Straße, Düsseldorf
• Erich-Klausener-Straße, Neuss
• Erich-Klausener-Straße, Krefeld
• Erich-Klausener-Straße, Monheim am Rhein
• Erich-Klausener-Straße, Ludwigsfelde
• Erich-Klausener-Straße, Brieselang
• Erich-Klausener-Straße, Blankenfelde-Mahlow

Leo-Statz-Platz in Unterbilk, Düsseldorf

• Memorial stone
• Stolperstein

Gallery[]

• 

  Klausener (Right) behind Prussian Interior Minister Albert Grzesinski (Centre) at the Constitutional Celebration of the Berlin Police in August 1929

• 

  Klausener circa 1928

• 

  Memorial stone for Klausener and Leo Statz in Leo-Statz-Platz in Unterbilk, Düsseldorf

• 

  Klausener's Stolperstein in Düsseldorf, Leo-Statz-Platz on Kronprinzenstaße

• 

  Klausener memorial stamp from Soviet Occupation Zone (SBZ), Mecklenburg-Vorpommern in 1945

• 

  50th Death Anniversary Stamp of Klausener from the West Berlin Deutsche Bundespost Berlin in 1984

• 

  Klausener Memorial Plaque in Keithstrasse 8, Schöneberg, Berlin

See also[]

• Herbert von Bose
• Edgar Julius Jung
• Franz von Papen

References[]

External links[]

• Brief biography of Erich Klausener – from the German Resistance Memorial Center
• Martin Persch (1992). "Erich Klausener". In Bautz, Friedrich Wilhelm (ed.). Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL) (in German). 3. Herzberg: Bautz. cols. 1570–1573. ISBN 3-88309-035-2.
• Newspaper clippings about Erich Klausener in the 20th Century Press Archives of the ZBW