WW2 Civilian "Mention In Dispatches" 1 Life

[Guest Rick Research]

I'll start off with this appropriate view from the Neust?dtliche Kirchstrasse side, one of two taken this past weekend (update: May 21) by our own GlennJ of the "Dienstgeb?ude" at 21 Dorotheenstra?e, just northeast of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin.

[attachmentid=40175]

Now apparently still administrative offices for the Bundestag or some such vaguely sinister Off Limits bureaucratic function (after all these years and FOUR changes of government!!!!! ), just a bit down the street from the old Kriegsakademie in the very heart of imperial Berlin, I'm sure none of the workers who pass this "fire lane" sign every day give it a second glance.

And yet, there is one man who is solely responsible FOR this building still being there. I may be the only person alive who knows even part of his story. I may even be the only person alive who cares. No matter.

This building's very existence is a link, a moment in that forgotten life spanning the trenches of World War One, a direct connection to the ONLY time in the Third Reich when Jews were actually rescued by public demonstration, and...

well

on with the saga

[Guest Rick Research]

It dosn't look like much. Most German official paperwork does not. But this is one of only three German official citations for civilian valor during the Second World War that I have ever seen:

[attachmentid=31724]

and my own crude effort to place this at the heart of the Third Reich's capital city:

[attachmentid=31725]

[Guest Rick Research]

8) VERY RARE Citation For Bravery During An Air Raid as shown above: On letterhead of the Prussian Minister-President (Hermann G?ring) at Leipzigerstrasse 8 Berlin W8, dated 26 March 1943, and signed by actual de facto chief of all Prussian civil administration, G?ring?s nominal deputy, SS Obergruppenf?hrer Paul ?Pilli? K?rner. Born 2 October 1893 in Pirna, K?rner was a typical social climbing Nazi phony?claiming in his 1935 ?Wer Ist?s?? entry to have been a Captain when in fact he was only a Saxon Leutnant dR, and wearing a Gold Party Badge with asserted membership since 1926, when his actual membership # 714,328 shows he joined in 1931. He was a Staatssekret?r 20.4.33, and rose from SS Sturmbannf?hrer 17.2.32 to SS Obergruppenf?hrer 30.1.42, making him the 32nd senior SS General in November 1944. Also nominally a Luftwaffe Oberstleutnant dR, in fact he never left his full-time job as actual head of Prussian administration and G?ring?s again supposed ?deputy? in the Office of the Four Year Plan (from 1937 on). K?rner was also head of Wirtschaftsf?hrungsstab Ost from 1941. He it was who, called to General Ernst Udet?s apartment after the WW1 Pour le Merite winner?s suicide, wiped the former ace?s despondent anti-G?ring lipstick scrawl off the bathroom mirror. Sentenced by an American military tribunal to 15 years imprisonment for economic war crimes, K?rner was released in 1951 and died on the Tegernsee 29 November 1957. Citation text for the ?Mention in Dispatches? reads:

?For your energetic action in fighting the great fire started in the service building, Dorotheenstrasse 21, by terror attack of the British Air Force on 1 March 1943?I express to you my thanks and my appreciation. In deputation [of G?ring] K?rner.?

[attachmentid=40176]

The evening air raid of 1 March 1943 (sirens went on at 8:30 PM and the actual raid was over in an hour) for which Drews was cited was Allied operational assessment considered an ?unsuccessful? H2S Pathfinder marked raid which scattered bombs over a 100 mile radius. Planned as a political ?punch? to Hermann ?Meyer? G?ring on what had been declared German national ?Day of the Luftwaffe,? 302 RAF bombers took part, of which 17 were lost and 44 returned damaged. (See Noble & Franklin?s ?The Strategic Air Offensive? volume 2, page 107.) BUT?

perhaps unnoted at the time, THIS air raid was remarkable not only for actually causing more loss of life (1,000 killed and 3,000 injured) and destruction (between three and four thousand homes ruined) than every other previous air raid on Berlin combined?

it also sparked widespread public anti-regime action, most notably in the ?Rosenstrasse action.? As part of Goebbels? plan to make Berlin ?Jew free,? 2,000 spouses in mixed marriages had been arrested on 27 February and were being processed for the Auschwitz death camps from a holding facility on Berlin?s Rosenstrasse. Crowds, mainly of women, initiated public demonstrations in the streets around that building, where they were joined by citizens enraged over the Nazi regime?s failure to prevent the 1 March air raid. In the ONLY instance where public protest saved Jews from the ?Final Solution? in Germany during the war, all of these mixed marriage spouses were released and never re-arrested again. A few who had accidentally been shipped to Auschwitz already were withdrawn from the death camp and held incommunicado but also survived the war. See ?Der Spiegel? 22 February 1993 issue and Nathan Stoltzfus?s 1996 ?Resistance of the Heart: Intermarriage and the Rosenstrasse Protest in Nazi Germany.?

Goebbels?who had been off with his F?hrer in the Bavarian Alps at the time of the raid, returned to Berlin and noted in his diary entry of 6 March that THIS air raid had turned the population of Berlin against the Party and the war. THIS air raid was the first in a series of 1943 blows that would be the death-knells of the Thousand Year Reich.

[Guest Rick Research]

Drews was probably a reserve officer in WW1?see Xerox of ?Die Woche? of 9.9.16 Issue #37 p. 1310 showing photos of Iron Cross 1st Class winners including a Feldwebelleutnant Drews in uniform of Inf Rgt 28 ?von Goeben? (Rhenish No. 2), which was in 16th Division, VII Corps in France August 1914 to October 1916, Galicia then to May 1917, and then returned to France. The Drews family were leading Prussian administrators from the 19th century. He served in the Prussian Staatsministerium (executive department for all civil administration), which under the Third Reich (as a senior Section Chief) authorized him to wear the dark blue ?diplomatic? uniform with silver collar piping.

1) Six Medal Bar: 1914 Iron Cross 2nd Class, Honor Cross for Frontfighters, Austrian WW1 Commemorative Medal, Third Reich 25 Years Civil Service Cross, 1936 Olympics Medal, Hungarian WW1 Commemorative Medal. In wide topped ?U? shaped ?Westphalian? or ?Dutch? style mounting, on field gray backing.

[attachmentid=31727]

2) 1914 Iron Cross 1st Class: Vaulted, marked ?800? with a needle pin deliberately bent to assist staying on.

3) 1918 Army Wound Badge in Silver: REAL silver cut-out ?swank? style marked ?800,? with wide flat ?Popsicle? pin often seen in 1930s photos.

[attachmentid=31728]

4) Honor Cross for Frontfighters Award Document: to Ministerial-Amtmann Heinrich Drews of Berlin-Wilmersdorf, issued in Berlin 15 November 1934 with Berlin Police stamp and signature of an assistant to the Police President (either ?Scholz? or ?Schulz?)

[attachmentid=31729]

5) 1936 Olympics Commemorative Medal Award Document: To Amtsrat Heinrich Drews on 20 February 1937. 54,915 of these were bestowed for organizational work etc relating to the Nazi Olympic Games in Berlin.

[attachmentid=31730]

[Guest Rick Research]

6) Civil Service 25 Years Service Cross Award Document: to Amtsrat Heinrich Drews, Berlin-Wilmersdorf, dated Berlin 20 April 1938 (one of the first awarded). Hitler?s birthday as an award date indicates this was probably saved up with the other first awards being made for a special presentation ceremony.

[attachmentid=31732]

7) 1918 Army Wound Badge Award Document: to Amtsrat Heinrich Drews, Wetzlarerstrasse 6, Berlin-Wilmersdorf. Issued at Berlin-Sch?neberg 6 August 1940 with stamp of Versorgungsamt I Berlin and signature ?Frhr. v. Bock.? (Baron Bock?s wife?/sister?/mother? Felicitas Freiin von Bock is listed as a holder of the Prussian Lifesaving Medal On Ribbon in the LSM Winners Association Directory for 1938). This is a particularly late award for WW1, based on 1936 changes in regulations that upgraded class of badge based (from then on) on severity of wounds rather than number of wounds. Given Drews? prompt and early HCX and 25 Years awards above (his Olympics was on the standard date), it seems unlikely that he waited around in medal-mad Nazi Germany for over 3 years after he COULD upgrade?when he worked one block from the main parade corridor in Berlin! Reasons for upgrading from a ?black? to a ?matte white? (the old WW1 color designation was still used) were: loss of an eye, hand, or foot, or deafness. Only gradual hearing loss would seem to fit the bill for someone who remained on the public payroll into the 1950s (see below).

[attachmentid=31733]

9) War Merit Cross 2nd Class Award Document: to Amtsrat Heinrich Drews of Berlin-Wilmersdorf on 30 January 1944. The large ?generic? format with facsimile Hitler and Meissner ?autographs? and embossed seal., under huge spread-winged eagle heading. As another ?party anniversary date? bestowal, this indicates a general, ?saved up in a batch for the next special occasion? award, rather than anything for a specific event. With Berlin then in the midst of RAF Bomber Command?s ?Battle of Berlin? (October 1943 to March 1944), this ?lowly? award after 4 ? years of war to a senior (see below) bureaucrat at the literal heart of the Reich indicates how far from the ?action? Drews was, despite how high up in the civil government he was.

[attachmentid=31734]

By 1943 a full 50% of the pre-war civil service had been drafted away to the Wehrmacht or Occupied East duties, producing an almost unbearable strain on the remaining functionaries?those too old or too unfit for any military service, and those without any prior experience now being asked to make do. Civil government?s traditional and statutory duties were more and more being directly usurped by Nazi Party organizations. At Reichsleiter Martin Bormann?s petty behest, career civil servants were deliberately excluded from recognition of war effort merit and consistently vilified in internal Party memoranda?with the approval of ?Beamtentum? ?hating Adolf Hitler. As an example: in 1942 every Kreisleiter was allowed FIFTY annual KVK2s at his personal disposal?whereas his civil service counterpart, a Landrat, was only authorized to grant THREE of the same awards on annual quota.

[Guest Rick Research]

10) Civil Service Appointment ?Commission:? to Regierungs-Obersekret?r (equivalent of an army Captain) for ?the former Regierungs-B?ro-Di?tar? ( = initial probationary ?officer? level appointment as a salaried ?higher? civil servant) Heinrich Drews in Arnsberg (Westphalia/Ruhr, capital city of Regierungsbezirk Arnsberg, with 12,00 residents in a ?District? of 2,600,000!) dated at Arnsberg 28 April 1926. With Weimar eagle stamp of the Regierungspr?sident (34 of them in all of Germany) and an assistant?s illegible signature ?Frh v ?.? This pay grade level ?rank? was normally reached after eight years in the higher civil service. All ?commissions? at this level are this same ?letter? format.

[attachmentid=31735]

11) Civil Service Appointment Commission: printed ?In the Name of the Reich? heading to the ?former Regierungs-Obersekret?r beim Preussischen Staats-Ministerium? Heinrich Drews, appointing him Ministerialamtmann effective 1 April, and dated Berlin 16 April 1934, with autograph (see above} ?K?rner.? This shows that Drews had moved on from his provincial posting as a civil service ?Captain? already in the central Prussian state administration. ?Amtmann? was the civil service equivalent of a ?Major? for those without the state legal diplomas required for advancement to the top positions. ?Ministerial? denotes his permanent service at the Ministry. In 1933 there had been 1,663 civil servants of this rank and higher, but 469 had been purged 1933-34 on Nazi racial and political grounds, so as of 1937 Drews was among only 1,194 Prussian state officials of this rank and higher.

[attachmentid=31736]

12) Cover Letter Accompanying Above Promotion: on the letterhead of the Prussian Minister-President dated Berlin 16 April 1934, informing Drews of his permanent appointment as Ministerialamtmann in Pay Group A 2 c (higher civil service grade which required a university undergraduate degree ), and that other related salary matters would soon be attended too. With yet another ?K?rner? autograph.

[attachmentid=31737]

By 1937 (Olympics Medal) Drews had been advanced again, to Amtsrat. This was?if there had been such a thing?the equivalent of a ?Senior Major,? and was the top level a university graduate without higher legal degrees could progress in the German civil service?the ?glass ceiling? for most career bureaucrats. THAT appointment was undoubtedly ?winkled out? of this group (along with all his actual WW1 award paperwork) by the D?sseldorf dealer from which this partial group was obtained?because from Amtsrat and up, Adolf Hitler personally approved and signed their commissions, and in this case so probably would have K?rner?s boss G?ring.

It remains a mystery as to WHICH, exactly section of the central Prussian State Ministry Drews was employed by. An abutting edifice to the unknown ?service building? at Dorotheenstrasse 21 was (right through the DDR, since this street, renamed ?Clara Zetkin Strasse,? was just the other side of the Berlin Wall at the Brandenburg Gate) the main postal money order processing facility of the German Post Office.

13) Retirement Document: Stating that ?at his request? Recalled Office Councilor (Amtsrat z. Wv.??zur Wiederverwendung?) Heinrich Drews was retired from the Nieders?chsischen Landesministerium, dated Hannover 10 March 1955. With embossed provincial seal and signature of an assistant to the Lower Saxon Minister of the Interior. German retirements normally took place on the day preceding the person?s 66th birthday, but Drews was only 62 in 1955. Note that per below?

[attachmentid=31738]

[Guest Rick Research]

14) Official Government 90th Birthday Card: from the Minister-President of Schleswig-Holstein to Herr Heinrich Drews. Large four page art paper card with embossed state seal on the outer cover and a smaller one inside, dated at Kiel 31 March 1983. All pre-printed, so whether this was Drews?s actual birth DAY, or how batches were sent out every month, I?m not sure. Signed by the ill-fated Dr. Uwe Barschel, who was found fully clothed in a Swiss hotel bathtub, murdered by the then notorious ?Bulgarian poison umbrella pellet? in 1987!

[attachmentid=31739]

Drews died sometime between 1983 and when I obtained this group in 1989. Scion of one of the most eminent civil service families of Prussia, veteran of one and survivor of two World Wars, Drews outlived two Empires, only to die JUST before reunification. In these random scraps of paper from his long, eventful--and almost forgotten--life, he links the stuff of fiction in real life. Despite all the odds, his papers remain. Despite all the odds, his legacy in stone endures--

21 Dorotheenstra?e.

And of course--

More research needed!!!

[Glenn J]

Super stuff Rick

I have attached a map of 1944 Berlin.

Regards

Glenn

[attachmentid=31764]

[Ulsterman]

I think your man was in the RIR 28. I have the history of IR 28 along with the officers' association lists etc. through 1935 and there is no Drews therein.

[Guest Rick Research]

David Gregory and his 1941 Berlin telephone book has solved the mystery of Dorotheenstrasse 21 elsewhere but haven't been able to COMBINE 2 separate threads--

that was the ARCHIVES for the Prussian State Ministry-- so no wonder they were relieved that Drews was able to put out the incendiary fire started there--

the whole of Prussian paperwork would have gone up.

What do you bet it has all been thrown away since, though.

[Guest Rick Research]

Updated with NEW photos of the building (still "im Dienste!") taken this very weekend by Glenn.

So who of us over 35 could ever have imagined an internet global travel service, able to take us to a specific BUILDING across the globe...

all without ever leaving home?*

*well, I didn't leave home-- Glenn did! He was a lot closer!