Fritz Thyssen facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Fritz Thyssen
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Fritz Thyssen in 1928
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Friedrich Thyssen
9 November 1873 Mülheim, Germany
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| Died | 8 February 1951 (aged 77) Buenos Aires, Argentina
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| Occupation | Businessman |
| Spouse(s) | Amelie Helle |
| Children | Anita |
Friedrich "Fritz" Thyssen (born November 9, 1873 – died February 8, 1951) was a German businessman. He came from one of Germany's most important industrial families. He first supported the Nazi Party but later disagreed with them.
Contents
Biography
Early Life and Family
Fritz Thyssen was born in Mülheim, a city in the Ruhr Area of Germany. His father, August Thyssen, led the family's large mining and steelmaking company. This company was started by Fritz's grandfather, Friedrich Thyssen, and was based in Duisburg.
Fritz studied mining and metallurgy (the science of metals) in London, Liège, and Berlin. After serving a short time in the German Army, he joined the family business. In 1900, he married Amelie Helle. Their only child, Anita, was born in 1909. Thyssen joined the army again in 1914 but left soon after due to a lung problem.
Germany After World War I
Thyssen was a German nationalist. He believed in strong national pride and supported Nazism because he feared communism. He thought that some government control over businesses and banks could stop communism from spreading.
In 1923, French and Belgian troops occupied the Ruhr region. This happened because Germany had not fully paid its reparations (payments for war damages). Thyssen joined the resistance against the occupiers. He led steelmakers in the Ruhr to refuse to produce coal and steel for them. He was arrested, put in prison, and fined a lot of money. This made him a national hero in Germany.
During the 1920s, the Thyssen companies grew even larger. When his father died in 1926, Fritz Thyssen took over the family businesses. That same year, he created United Steelworks (Vereinigte Stahlwerke AG). This company controlled over 75 percent of Germany's iron ore and employed 200,000 people. He became a very important person in German business.
Supporting the Nazi Party
In 1923, Thyssen met Adolf Hitler, the leader of the Nazi Party. Thyssen was impressed by Hitler's strong opposition to the Treaty of Versailles, which had placed harsh terms on Germany after World War I. Thyssen began to give large amounts of money to the Nazi Party. He was one of the few German business leaders to support the Nazis early on. Most other business leaders were traditional conservatives and were suspicious of the Nazis.
Thyssen's main reason for supporting the Nazis was his great fear of communism. He worried that other German groups would not be able to stop a Soviet-style revolution in Germany. He believed the Nazis could offer an alternative that would appeal to the working class. Records show he donated a lot of money to right-wing parties, mostly to the Nazis. He remained a member of the German National People's Party until 1932 and joined the Nazi Party in 1933.
In 1930, the artist John Heartfield showed Thyssen as a puppet master controlling Hitler on the cover of a communist magazine called Arbeiter Illustrierte Zeitung.
In November 1932, Thyssen and Hjalmar Schacht helped organize a letter to President Paul von Hindenburg. The letter asked the President to make Hitler the Chancellor of Germany. Thyssen also convinced German industrialists to donate three million Reichsmarks to the Nazi Party for the March 1933 Reichstag election. As a reward, he was chosen to run as a Nazi candidate and was elected to the Reichstag. He was also appointed to the Council of State of Prussia, Germany's largest state.
Life in Nazi Germany
Thyssen was happy when the Nazis stopped groups like the Communist Party, the Social Democratic Party, and trade unions. In 1934, he was one of the business leaders who convinced Hitler to reduce the power of a Nazi group called the SA.
Thyssen became a member of Hans Frank's Academy for German Law. He accepted the anti-Jewish legislation in pre-war Nazi Germany that removed Jewish people from business and professional jobs. He also fired his Jewish employees. However, as a Catholic, he did not like the increasing Nazi persecution of the Catholic Church in Germany after 1935. In 1937, he sent a letter to Hitler protesting the persecution of Christians in Germany.
The turning point for Thyssen was the violent attack against Jewish people in November 1938, known as Kristallnacht. After this event, he resigned from the Prussian Council of State. By 1939, he also strongly criticized the Nazi economic policies, which focused on preparing for war.
During World War II
On September 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland, starting World War II. Thyssen sent a telegram to Hermann Göring saying he was against the war. He had just arrived in Switzerland with his family. He was then removed from the Nazi Party and the Reichstag, and his company was taken over by the government. The company was returned to other members of the Thyssen family several years after the war.
In 1940, Thyssen went to France, planning to move to Argentina. However, he was caught during the German invasion of France while visiting his sick mother in Belgium. He was arrested by Vichy France (the French government that cooperated with Germany) and sent back to Germany. He was first held in a sanatorium near Berlin. From 1943, he was held in Sachsenhausen concentration camp. His wife, Amelie, also spent the war in the concentration camp with him.
In February 1945, Thyssen was moved to Dachau concentration camp. He was treated relatively well. In late April 1945, he was moved to Tyrol with other important prisoners. The SS (a major Nazi organization) left the prisoners there. He was freed by American soldiers on May 5, 1945.
Later Life and Legacy
While Thyssen was imprisoned, a book called I Paid Hitler was published in the United States in 1941. The journalist Emery Reves wrote the book based on Thyssen's memories. The book suggested that German industrialists as a group supported and funded Hitler and helped him gain power.
After the war, Thyssen was tried for supporting the Nazi Party. He admitted that he had been a Nazi supporter until 1938. He also accepted responsibility for his companies treating Jewish employees unfairly in the 1930s. However, he denied being involved in using forced labor during the war. On October 2, 1948, a court decided Thyssen was a "lesser offender." He was fined 15% of his money. Thyssen agreed to pay 500,000 Deutschmarks to help those who suffered because of his actions. He was found not guilty of other charges. In January 1950, he and his wife moved to Buenos Aires, Argentina. He died there the next year. Thyssen was buried in his family's mausoleum in Mülheim.
In 1959, Thyssen's widow, Amélie, and daughter, Anita Gräfin Zichy-Thyssen, created the Fritz Thyssen Foundation. This foundation supports science and humanities research. It started with 100 million Deutschmarks. Amélie Thyssen died in 1965. Anita Gräfin Zichy-Thyssen managed the Foundation until her death in 1990. The Thyssen family no longer has a say in how the Foundation is run.
See also
In Spanish: Fritz Thyssen para niños
