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Albert von Appen * 1896

Unzerstraße 16 (Altona, Altona-Altstadt)

HIER WOHNTE
ALBERT VON APPEN
JG. 1896
IM WIDERSTAND / SPD
VERHAFTET 20.3.1935
SACHSENHAUSEN
1940 DACHAU
"VERLEGT" 18.2.1942
HARTHEIM
ERMORDET 18.2.1942

Albert Heinrich Friedrich von Appen, born on 31.12.1896, arrested because of resistance (SPD) and imprisoned in the concentration camps Sachsenhausen and Dachau, murdered in the killing center Hartheim on 18.2.1942

Unzerstrasse 16 (Altona-Altstadt)

Albert Heinrich Friedrich von Appen was born as the second of three sons of the worker Johann Friedrich Heinrich von Appen (born 17.11.1867), and his wife Sophie Marie Amelie, née Dehn (born 31.12.1896) in the now defunct Große Johannisstraße 51 in the then independent city of Altona.

The older brother, Heinrich Friedrich Wilhelm, was born on 11.12.1894, the younger brother, Karl Wilhelm Hermann, on 5.1.1899. (Heinrich Friedrich Wilhelm died a few months after his birth on 17.3.895, Karl Wilhelm Hermann on 20.1.1943 in the Altona Hospital).

Albert von Appen's parents were protestants and had their children baptized such.

We know nothing about Albert von Appen's childhood and school years. He learned the profession of a lathe operator, a qualified apprenticeship.

During World War I, Albert von Appen was drafted into the military from October 10, 1915 to June 22, 1918, where and in what capacity we do not know. Since a wound in 1916, Albert von Appen suffered from left-sided paralysis, which affected him during the rest of his life.

In 1915 he joined the Social Democrats (SPD) and remained a member until it’s forced end on June 22, 1933. In 1924 he served as district leader of the party for Bahrenfeld, Sülldorf, Steenkamp, Niendorf, Wedel and Altona.

From 1924 to 1927, Albert von Appen also belonged to the Reichsbanner "Schwarz-Rot-Gold." During the Weimar Republic, this self-defense organization served to ward off the violent activities of right-wing extremist associations. Towards the end of the Weimar Republic, the Reichsbanner had around one to two million members, mainly from the SPD and trade unions. The organization was banned by the National Socialists in March 1933.

Contrary to the expectations of many Social Democrats, who believed that a powerful and resolute resistance of democratic parties and organizations against the National Socialist regime was necessary after the transfer of power to Adolf Hitler on January 30, 1933, but at the latest after the passing of the so-called Enabling Act ("Ermächtigungsgesetz”) on March 23, 1933, the SPD party executive stuck to its line of adherence to the law in order to avoid coercive measures against the party and organizations close to it. Even at the last Reich conference, held on April 26, 1933, in lieu of a Reich Party Congress, the party executive's policy of not causing offense won a majority.

Despite or because of the disappointment of many Social Democrats with the defensive behavior of the SPD leadership, groups of Social Democrats soon formed everywhere in the German Reich, including in Hamburg and in Altona, which was still independent at the time, in addition to Communist resistance groups, who wanted to take up the fight against the National Socialist dictatorship in illegality. Albert von Appen joined them.

From the indictment against the resistance group, which was active in Altona and the surrounding area and to which Albert von Appen belonged, we know that since the spring of 1934, the police there had noted "a lively anti-state activity of circles formerly belonging to the SPD and the Reichsbanner 'Schwarz-Rot-Gold'." Fritz Kessler, a journeyman carpenter born in 1911, was the central figure of the resistance in Altona. Among other things, the group circulated among trusted individuals the training pamphlets "Sozialistische Aktion," "Rote Blätter," and the Prague resolutions of the exiled SPD, which were concealed in a pamphlet with the cover name "Die Kunst des Selbstrasierens" (the art of self-shaving). In addition, small amounts of money were collected for resistance work and to support needy SPD comrades.

Albert von Appen agreed to cooperate in the illegal work in July 1934 when Fritz Kessler approached him. According to the indictment, the underground work took the following form: "One or two weeks later [Hermann] Evers came to von Appen and handed him in an envelope three pieces each of the 'Rote Blätter' and the 'Sozialistische Aktion,' as well as 15 tokens á 5 pieces at 50 Reichspfennig and ten pieces at ten Rpf. Evers explained that the proceeds were intended to cover costs and for the political prisoners, and agreed with von Appen on a date for the settlement. Von Appen distributed the writings and the stamps to six of his acquaintances named Meyer, Novak, Baumhauer, Wegner, Haberlandt, and Kielbasewicz; he took some stamps totaling 70 Rpf. himself. Two stamps of 50 Rpf. he destroyed, two others of the same value he returned to Evers. From Meyer, Novak, Wegner, and Haberlandt, von Appen received amounts of 10-20 Rpf. In total, he delivered to Evers about one Reichsmark to 1.50 Reichsmark."

Albert von Appen was arrested on January 3, 1935, taken into "protective custody" and transferred to the Altona court prison on March 20, 1935, pending trial.
He had previously lived with his parents at Christiansstraße 21 (the street no longer exists) in Altona until his arrest.

In July 1935, in two high treason trials with the names "Kessler and Comrades" and "Imbeck and Comrades," a total of 58 people, including two women, were accused of "acting in concert in 1934 in Altona and the surrounding area to prepare the highly treasonable enterprise, to change the constitution of the Reich by force or by threat of force, whereby the act was aimed at establishing or maintaining organizational cohesion in preparation for high treason, and, in the case of some of the accused, also at influencing the masses by disseminating writings. " Another accusation was that the defendants, including Albert von Appen, had committed preparations for high treason by pursuing the reconstruction of the SPD.

On November 26, 1935, the Berlin Court of Appeals, sitting in Altona, pronounced its verdict: Albert von Appen received a prison sentence of one year and six months, with deprivation of his civil rights for two years. The sentence of von Appens and the others was published in the newspaper Altonaer Nachrichten.

After his release from prison, Albert von Appen was again taken into "protective custody" on September 2, 1939, but this time without giving a reason for his arrest, and sent to the Fuhlsbüttel police prison. A few days later, on September 9, he was transferred to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp.

From Sachsenhausen, 1000 prisoners were transferred to the Dachau concentration camp on August 28, 1940. Among them was Albert von Appen. In Dachau he was listed under prisoner number 15664.

With the aim of "relieving" the concentration camps under the control of the SS of "sick" and "no longer able to work" prisoners, the so-called "special treatment 14f13" began in April 1941. The combination of numbers and letters was composed of the number "14" for the inspector of the concentration camps, the letter "f" for deaths, and the number "13" for the manner of death, in this case killing by gas in killing facilities of the T4 "Euthanasia" organization. Medical commissions, composed of experts from the "Euthanasia" murders, selected from the prisoners pre-selected by the camp commanders those who were to be given "special treatment", i.e. murder. This included prisoners with incurable physical ailments or war injuries, as well as those imprisoned for criminal offenses, and prisoners designated as "ballast existences" and deemed to be of no further use.

One of these medical commissions assigned Albert von Appen, who was paralyzed on his left side, to those destined to die in the Dachau concentration camp. He was transferred to the killing facility "Schloss Hartheim" near Linz on February 18, 1942, and murdered with carbon monoxide on the same day. The officially cause of death was given as "failure of heart and circulation with ascites and oedema".

Albert von Appen's body was cremated and his supposed ashes sent to the Altona Cemetery, Stadionstraße, on February 23, 1942. The urn was interred in grave UI.III.03.76 at Altona Main Cemetery on April 22, 1942.

After the end of the war, the remains were reburied. Since then, they have been located at the Altona War Gravesite, also known as the Cemetery of Honor.

Since Albert von Appen's last known residential address, Christiansstraße, no longer exists, a stumbling stone commemorates him at nearby Unzerstraße 18.

Translation Beate Meyer

Stand: February 2023
© Bärbel Klein

Quellen: StaH 213-8_976 monatliche Verzeichnisse der entstandenen Schutzhaftkosten; Geburtsurkunde 332-5_3742/1894; Geburtsurkunde 332-5_644/1895; Geburtsurkunde 332-5_57/1897; Geburtsurkunde 332-5_145/1899; Heiratsurkunde 332-5_1183/1927; Sterbeurkunde 332-5_495/1942; 741-4_K 4376; 741-4_K 4360; 741-4_K 4175; BBA R 3018/ NJ 4195; BBA R 3018 NJ 902; Nachweis Sachsenhausen D 1 A/1024, Bl. 272,273; Copy of 1.1.38.1 [4076783], ITS Digital Archive Bad Arolsen; Copy of 1.1.38.1 [4076723] ITS Digital Archive Bad Arolsen; Copy of 1.1.6.2 [9963690] 7105; ITS Digital Archive Bad Arolsen Einsicht 7.3.2017, www.ancestry.de; Hauptfriedhof Altona UI.II.03.76; Ehrenfriedhof 30.XVI.10.355b; FZH die Signatur: 833-8, SPD 1933-1945, Prozesse II. (Einsicht 26.4.2020). Karl Ditt, Sozialdemokraten im Widerstand, Hamburg 1984, S. 51. Astrid Ley, Vom Krankenmord zum Genozid, Die "Aktion 14f13" in den Konzentrationslagern, in Dachauer Hefte 25, s. 36 ff.