Gustav Simon
Encyclopedia
Gustav Simon was, as the Nazi
Gauleiter
in the Moselland Gau from 1940 until 1944, the Chief of the Civil Administration in Luxembourg
, which was occupied at that time by Nazi Germany
.
. Simon went to a Volksschule
in Saarbrücken, and thereafter underwent training as a schoolteacher in Merzig
. Although he got his diploma, he did not get a teaching job. He then decided to fake his Abitur
, and meanwhile he helped out on the railway and with customs. After his Abitur, he studied economics at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University
in Frankfurt am Main with a view to becoming a teacher in the subject. After completing his studies in 1927, he taught in Völklingen
. Before the year was even out, though, he left the school and began as his main occupation working for the National Socialist German Workers' Party – the Nazis.
Shortly after joining, Simon founded the Hochschulgruppe Frankfurt of the National Socialist German Students' League
. In 1927, he was chosen by the majority of students to be the National Socialist President of the Students' Board.
Not only was he already active for the Nazis during his time studying, but he furthermore set up more Party locals (Ortsgruppen) in the Hunsrück.
Beginning in 1928, Simon quickly rose in the Party hierarchy. In 1928 he became NSDAP "district leader" (Bezirksleiter) for the Trier
-Birkenfeld
district, and in 1929 also for the Koblenz
-Trier district, as well as a member of the Rhineland
Provincial Landtag
. In 1930, he became a member of the Reichstag
for the electoral district of Koblenz-Trier. On 1 June 1931, Adolf Hitler
appointed him Gauleiter of the newly created Gau of Koblenz-Trier. Unlike almost all other Gauleiters, Simon did not belong to the SA
or the SS
; however, he was an Obergruppenführer
in the National Socialist Motor Corps
(Nationalsozialistisches Kraftfahrerkorps or NSKK).
and Northern France
in Brussels
, namely General Alexander von Falkenhausen
. Under this commander, Gustav Simon took over civil administration of Luxembourg on 25 July 1940. The occupation status ended on 2 August 1940, when Simon was appointed Chef der Zivilverwaltung (CdZ) by a decree from the Führer
(Führererlass). His representative in this function was the district president (Regierungspräsident) of Trier, Heinrich Siekmeier. Their job was to give the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg – now the CdZ-Gebiet Luxemburg– German administrative structures, and to make it an integral part of the Greater German Reich.
, Westphalia
, where he posed as a gardener. On 10 December 1945, he was seized by Captain Hanns Alexander and local soldiers and taken to a British Army prison
in Paderborn
.
About his death there have been since late 1945 – and there still are – many rumours that contradict each other as to where and under what circumstances Simon met his end. The stories, however, can be grouped into two fundamental versions. The official version has it that Simon died in Paderborn, as the registry office there put on the death certificate. Simon is said to have hanged himself shortly before he was to have been handed over to Luxembourg. It does stand out, though, that the registration number 66/1946 was only written in February 1946, some two months after the date of Simon's death.
The second – and to this day unofficial – version has it that Simon died in Luxembourg. After the British Occupation Administration agreed to hand him over, he was to have been taken by car by two Luxembourgers from Paderborn to the Luxembourgish capital (also called Luxembourg) so that he could be brought to book before a court
there. Shortly before reaching Luxembourg, at Waldhaff, there was an incident provoked by Simon in which he was killed. Simon's body was nonetheless taken to the prison in Grund, a neighbourhood in the capital, where it was photographed by the press, and then in the end buried. His premature death thwarted any trial. To suppress the whole business, the media, among them the agency DANA (Deutsch-Amerikanische Nachrichtenagentur) and the Tageblatt, were furnished with information by the British Captain Hanns Alexander, about the "suicide in Paderborn".
This so-called second version is merely a fiction, as has been proved by studies based on both British and luxembourgish archival documents.
Nazism
Nazism, the common short form name of National Socialism was the ideology and practice of the Nazi Party and of Nazi Germany...
Gauleiter
Gauleiter
A Gauleiter was the party leader of a regional branch of the NSDAP or the head of a Gau or of a Reichsgau.-Creation and Early Usage:...
in the Moselland Gau from 1940 until 1944, the Chief of the Civil Administration in Luxembourg
Luxembourg
Luxembourg , officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg , is a landlocked country in western Europe, bordered by Belgium, France, and Germany. It has two principal regions: the Oesling in the North as part of the Ardennes massif, and the Gutland in the south...
, which was occupied at that time by Nazi Germany
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...
.
Family, schooling and profession
Gustav Simon's father was a railway official. His parents farmed small plots on the HunsrückHunsrück
The Hunsrück is a low mountain range in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is bounded by the river valleys of the Moselle , the Nahe , and the Rhine . The Hunsrück is continued by the Taunus mountains on the eastern side of the Rhine. In the north behind the Moselle it is continued by the Eifel...
. Simon went to a Volksschule
Volksschule
A Volksschule was an 18th century system of state-supported primary schools established in the Habsburg Austrian Empire and Prussia . Attendance was supposedly compulsory, but a 1781 census reveals that only one fourth of school-age children attended. At the time, this was one of the few examples...
in Saarbrücken, and thereafter underwent training as a schoolteacher in Merzig
Merzig
Merzig is the capital of the district Merzig-Wadern, in Saarland, Germany. It is situated on the river Saar, approx. 35 km south of Trier, and 35 km northwest of Saarbrücken.-Municipalities:...
. Although he got his diploma, he did not get a teaching job. He then decided to fake his Abitur
Abitur
Abitur is a designation used in Germany, Finland and Estonia for final exams that pupils take at the end of their secondary education, usually after 12 or 13 years of schooling, see also for Germany Abitur after twelve years.The Zeugnis der Allgemeinen Hochschulreife, often referred to as...
, and meanwhile he helped out on the railway and with customs. After his Abitur, he studied economics at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University
Johann Wolfgang Goethe University of Frankfurt am Main
The Goethe University Frankfurt was founded in 1914 as a Citizens' University, which means that, while it was a State university of Prussia, it had been founded and financed by the wealthy and active liberal citizenry of Frankfurt am Main, a unique feature in German university history...
in Frankfurt am Main with a view to becoming a teacher in the subject. After completing his studies in 1927, he taught in Völklingen
Völklingen
Völklingen is a town in the district of Saarbrücken, in Saarland, Germany. It is situated near the border with France, on the river Saar, approx. 10 km west of Saarbrücken....
. Before the year was even out, though, he left the school and began as his main occupation working for the National Socialist German Workers' Party – the Nazis.
NSDAP
By 1923, Simon was a member of a völkisch College Group (völkischen Hochschulgruppe) in Frankfurt. Already on 14 August 1925, he joined the NSDAP, membership number 17 017, thereby becoming one of the "Old Fighters" ("alte Kämpfer") who would later automatically be decorated with the "Golden Party Badge".Golden Party Badge
The Golden Party Badge was a special badge of the Nazi Party. The first 100,000 members who had joined and had uninterrupted service in the Party were given the right to wear it...
Shortly after joining, Simon founded the Hochschulgruppe Frankfurt of the National Socialist German Students' League
National Socialist German Students' League
The National Socialist German Students' League was founded in 1926 as a division of the NSDAP with the mission of integrating University-level education and academic life within the framework of the National Socialist worldview...
. In 1927, he was chosen by the majority of students to be the National Socialist President of the Students' Board.
Not only was he already active for the Nazis during his time studying, but he furthermore set up more Party locals (Ortsgruppen) in the Hunsrück.
Beginning in 1928, Simon quickly rose in the Party hierarchy. In 1928 he became NSDAP "district leader" (Bezirksleiter) for the Trier
Trier
Trier, historically called in English Treves is a city in Germany on the banks of the Moselle. It is the oldest city in Germany, founded in or before 16 BC....
-Birkenfeld
Birkenfeld
Birkenfeld is a town and the district seat of the Birkenfeld district in southwest Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is also the seat of the like-named Verbandsgemeinde.-Location:...
district, and in 1929 also for the Koblenz
Koblenz
Koblenz is a German city situated on both banks of the Rhine at its confluence with the Moselle, where the Deutsches Eck and its monument are situated.As Koblenz was one of the military posts established by Drusus about 8 BC, the...
-Trier district, as well as a member of the Rhineland
Rhineland
Historically, the Rhinelands refers to a loosely-defined region embracing the land on either bank of the River Rhine in central Europe....
Provincial Landtag
Landtag
A Landtag is a representative assembly or parliament in German-speaking countries with some legislative authority.- Name :...
. In 1930, he became a member of the Reichstag
Reichstag (Weimar Republic)
The Reichstag was the parliament of Weimar Republic .German constitution commentators consider only the Reichstag and now the Bundestag the German parliament. Another organ deals with legislation too: in 1867-1918 the Bundesrat, in 1919–1933 the Reichsrat and from 1949 on the Bundesrat...
for the electoral district of Koblenz-Trier. On 1 June 1931, Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...
appointed him Gauleiter of the newly created Gau of Koblenz-Trier. Unlike almost all other Gauleiters, Simon did not belong to the SA
Sturmabteilung
The Sturmabteilung functioned as a paramilitary organization of the National Socialist German Workers' Party . It played a key role in Adolf Hitler's rise to power in the 1920s and 1930s...
or the SS
Schutzstaffel
The Schutzstaffel |Sig runes]]) was a major paramilitary organization under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. Built upon the Nazi ideology, the SS under Heinrich Himmler's command was responsible for many of the crimes against humanity during World War II...
; however, he was an Obergruppenführer
Obergruppenführer
Obergruppenführer was a Nazi Party paramilitary rank that was first created in 1932 as a rank of the SA and until 1942 it was the highest SS rank inferior only to Reichsführer-SS...
in the National Socialist Motor Corps
National Socialist Motor Corps
The National Socialist Motor Corps , also known as the National Socialist Drivers Corps, was a paramilitary organization of the Nazi Party that existed from 1931 to 1945. The group was a successor organization to the older National Socialist Automobile Corps, which had existed since the beginning...
(Nationalsozialistisches Kraftfahrerkorps or NSKK).
Chief of Civil Administration in Luxembourg
After the German aggression on 10 May 1940, the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg first fell under the administration of the German Military Commander of BelgiumBelgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...
and Northern France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
in Brussels
Brussels
Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...
, namely General Alexander von Falkenhausen
Alexander von Falkenhausen
Alexander Ernst Alfred Hermann Freiherr von Falkenhausen was a German general. He was the head of the military government of Belgium from 1940–44 during its occupation by Germany in World War II....
. Under this commander, Gustav Simon took over civil administration of Luxembourg on 25 July 1940. The occupation status ended on 2 August 1940, when Simon was appointed Chef der Zivilverwaltung (CdZ) by a decree from the Führer
Führer
Führer , alternatively spelled Fuehrer in both English and German when the umlaut is not available, is a German title meaning leader or guide now most associated with Adolf Hitler, who modelled it on Benito Mussolini's title il Duce, as well as with Georg von Schönerer, whose followers also...
(Führererlass). His representative in this function was the district president (Regierungspräsident) of Trier, Heinrich Siekmeier. Their job was to give the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg – now the CdZ-Gebiet Luxemburg– German administrative structures, and to make it an integral part of the Greater German Reich.
Simon's death
When the war ended, Simon went into hiding using his mother's maiden name in Upsprunge, a community in SalzkottenSalzkotten
Salzkotten is a town in the district of Paderborn, in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. The name Salzkotten is based on the former salt production, which gave Salzkotten its raison d'être...
, Westphalia
Westphalia
Westphalia is a region in Germany, centred on the cities of Arnsberg, Bielefeld, Dortmund, Minden and Münster.Westphalia is roughly the region between the rivers Rhine and Weser, located north and south of the Ruhr River. No exact definition of borders can be given, because the name "Westphalia"...
, where he posed as a gardener. On 10 December 1945, he was seized by Captain Hanns Alexander and local soldiers and taken to a British Army prison
Prison
A prison is a place in which people are physically confined and, usually, deprived of a range of personal freedoms. Imprisonment or incarceration is a legal penalty that may be imposed by the state for the commission of a crime...
in Paderborn
Paderborn
Paderborn is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, capital of the Paderborn district. The name of the city derives from the river Pader, which originates in more than 200 springs near Paderborn Cathedral, where St. Liborius is buried.-History:...
.
About his death there have been since late 1945 – and there still are – many rumours that contradict each other as to where and under what circumstances Simon met his end. The stories, however, can be grouped into two fundamental versions. The official version has it that Simon died in Paderborn, as the registry office there put on the death certificate. Simon is said to have hanged himself shortly before he was to have been handed over to Luxembourg. It does stand out, though, that the registration number 66/1946 was only written in February 1946, some two months after the date of Simon's death.
The second – and to this day unofficial – version has it that Simon died in Luxembourg. After the British Occupation Administration agreed to hand him over, he was to have been taken by car by two Luxembourgers from Paderborn to the Luxembourgish capital (also called Luxembourg) so that he could be brought to book before a court
Court
A court is a form of tribunal, often a governmental institution, with the authority to adjudicate legal disputes between parties and carry out the administration of justice in civil, criminal, and administrative matters in accordance with the rule of law...
there. Shortly before reaching Luxembourg, at Waldhaff, there was an incident provoked by Simon in which he was killed. Simon's body was nonetheless taken to the prison in Grund, a neighbourhood in the capital, where it was photographed by the press, and then in the end buried. His premature death thwarted any trial. To suppress the whole business, the media, among them the agency DANA (Deutsch-Amerikanische Nachrichtenagentur) and the Tageblatt, were furnished with information by the British Captain Hanns Alexander, about the "suicide in Paderborn".
This so-called second version is merely a fiction, as has been proved by studies based on both British and luxembourgish archival documents.
Literature
- Dostert, Paul: Luxemburg zwischen Selbstbehauptung und nationaler Selbstaufgabe. Die deutsche Besatzungspolitik und die Volksdeutsche Bewegung 1940-1945. Diss. Freiburg, Luxembourg 1985.
- Schneider, Volker: Gauleiter Gustav Simon, der "Moselgau" und das ehemalige SS-Sonderlager/KZ Hinzert. In: Hans-Georg Meyer/Hans Berkessel (Hg.): Die Zeit des Nationalsozialismus in Rhineland-PalatinateRhineland-PalatinateRhineland-Palatinate is one of the 16 states of the Federal Republic of Germany. It has an area of and about four million inhabitants. The capital is Mainz. English speakers also commonly refer to the state by its German name, Rheinland-Pfalz ....
. Für die Außenwelt seid ihr tot. Hermann Schmidt, Mainz 2000, Bd. 2, S. 276-307, ISBN 978-3-87439-454-3. - Spang, Paul: Gustav Simons Ende. In: Hémecht. Zeitschrift für Luxemburger Geschichte. Revue d'histoire luxembourgeoise 44 (1992) 3, S. 303-317.
- Kienast, E. (Hg.): Der Großdeutsche Reichstag. IV. Wahlperiode, Beginn am 10. April 1938, verlängert bis zum 30. Januar 1947. Berlin 1943.
- Arndt, Ino: Luxemburg. In: Wolfgang BenzWolfgang BenzWolfgang Benz is a German historian. He has been the director of the Center for Research on Antisemitism of the Technische Universität Berlin since 1990.-Personal life:...
(Hg.): Dimension des Völkermords. Die Zahl der jüdischen Opfer des Nationalsozialismus. Sources and accounts of contemporary history, published by the Institut für Zeitgeschichte, Band 33, R. Oldenbourg Verlag, München 1991, S. 95-104, ISBN 978-3-486-54631-6.