Lecture: Editor-in-chief, politician, resistance fighter - Karl Böchel and the Chemnitzer Volksstimme
The next event in the series "The City Archive presents" will take place on Wednesday, 6 May 2015 at 6 pm in the City Archive building, Aue 16, 09112 Chemnitz.
Dr Mike Schmeitzner from the Hannah Arendt Institute at TU Dresden will give a talk entitled Editor-in-chief, politician, resistance fighter - Karl Böchel (1884-1946) and the Chemnitzer Volksstimme. Admission is free.
Karl Böchel was one of the best-known publicists and politicians in Chemnitz and Saxony before 1933. For twelve years, he was at the helm of the then widely read social democratic newspaper "Volksstimme". He shaped the paper into a modern, politically and culturally committed newspaper, which was widely distributed among the labour force and employees until it was banned in 1933. In the Chemnitz city council, but above all in the Saxon state parliament, Böchel was a defender of the republic and an opponent of the Nazis. On 9 March 1933, he narrowly escaped the fatal consequences of an attack by the SA in the state parliament. Seriously injured, he fled into exile in Czechoslovakia shortly afterwards. From there, he continued his fight against the 'Third Reich', primarily as a journalist. After fleeing to Norway in 1938, he died there at the beginning of 1946 after a serious illness. Willy Brandt held the eulogy at his grave in Oslo.