Hermann-Eberhard Wildermuth

Dr. jur. Hermann-Eberhard Wildermuth
Hermann-Eberhard Wildermuth (far right standing) in Trent Park, November 1944
Born	(1890-10-23)23 October 1890 Stuttgart
Died	Tübingen
Allegiance	German Empire (to 1918) Weimar Republic (to 1921) Nazi Germany
Service/branch	Heer
Years of service	1908–21 ?–1945
Rank	Oberst
Battles/wars	World War I World War II Battle of France Invasion of Yugoslavia Battles of Rzhev Italian Campaign Invasion of Normandy Operation Astonia
Awards	Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross
Other work	Politician

Dr. jur. Hermann-Eberhard Wildermuth (23 October 1890 – 9 March 1952) was a German politician and a member of the FDP/DVP. From 1949 until his death he was the Federal Minister for Housing under Konrad Adenauer. During World War II Wildermuth was a highly decorated colonel in the Wehrmacht and was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross. He was a grandson of the Swabian writer Ottilie Wildermuth.

Early Life and Career

After Wildermuth completed secondary schooling in 1908 he studied law and political sciences in Tübingen, Leipzig and Berlin from 1909 to 1914. In Tübingen, Wildermuth was a member of the South German liberal fraternity "Academic Society Stuttgardia". Here he met future political associates Reinhold Maier, Karl Georg Pfleiderer, Konrad Wittwer and Wolfgang Haussmann. After graduation in 1921 Wildermuth worked at the Imperial Institute for Job Placement and Unemployment in Berlin, and later as a senior executive officer eventually worked in the Ministry of Labour. From 1928 Wildermuth was director of Deutsche Bank's construction operations and in addition from 1930, board member, later president of the German Society for Public Works.

Military Service

Wildermuth served in 1908/09 as a one-year volunteer in the 1st Württemberg Infantry Regiment. He returned as an officer of this regiment in the First World War, serving from 1914 to 1918 on the Western and Eastern Fronts and in Italy. From 1919 to 1921 he was commander of a battalion composed of students in Tübingen to quell uprisings against the Weimar republic. At the outbreak of the Second World War Wildermuth was drafted as a reserve major and during the Battle of France was commander of the Second Battalion of Infantry Regiment 272. In 1941/42 he served as commander of Infantry Regiment 737 in Serbia, where he was promoted to lieutenant colonel in December 1941. As of 1 May 1942, Wildermuth was commander of Infantry Regiment 371 at Army Group Center on the Eastern Front and then from May 1943 as commander of Infantry Regiment 578 in Italy.

On 12 August 1944 Wildermuth became "Fortress Commandant" of Le Havre in France. Prior to the early September launch of the British-led Operation Astonia to take the port city he requested that French citizens be evacuated before heavy pre-assault naval and air bombardment commenced. His humanitarian offer was rebuffed by British officials, who preferred that noncombatant citizens remained in order to weaken the German position in a potential siege; in response, British officer William Douglas-Home refused to participate in the operation. A second request from Wildermuth several days into the bombardment was also denied. French losses from the aerial campaign alone were 2,000 dead to 19 Germans lost. Douglas-Home was subsequently arrested, court martialed, tried, convicted, and imprisoned for one year at hard labor.

Upon his 12 September surrender Wildermuth was interned in England at the Trent Park senior officers' prisoner of war camp. British intelligence considered Wildermuth a convinced patriot and brave officer but vehemently opposed the Nazi regime. In a wiretapped conversation in Trent Park, Carl Friedrich Goerdeler said that Wildermuth had in May 1944 been willing to participate in a coup against Hitler.

Party

In 1918 Wildermuth was a member of a soldier Council and joined the left-liberal DDP party in 1919.

After the war he joined the DVP. From 1947 to 1949 Wildermuth was a member of the FDP / DVP regional executive committee. In 1948 he was elected to the FDP Federal Executive. Wildermuth was next to Carl-Hubert Schwennicke from Berlin as the only candidate receiving all 89 delegate votes. From January 1952 until his death, he was Deputy National Chairman of the FDP.

Parliamentary Seat

From 1947 to 1950 Wildermuth was a member of the Landtag of Württemberg-Hohenzollern and from 1949 until his death was also a member of the German Bundestag.

Public offices

In 1946 Wildermuth was appointed Secretary of State for Economics in the Württemberg-Hohenzollern provisional government. From 22 July 1947 until 20 September 1949 he was then Minister of Economic Affairs of Württemberg-Hohenzollern in the cabinet of Gebhard Müller.

After the general election in 1949 he was on 20 September 1949 appointed Federal Minister for Reconstruction (from 1950: Federal Minister for Housing) in the First cabinet of Chancellor Konrad Adenauer. He is one of the few federal ministers who died in office.

Wildermuth was constantly aware of the difficulty of his work. The German "economic miracle" had not yet begun, but the devastated West Germany had lost several million homes. He therefore sponsored the "First Housing Act". In the year of its enactment, (1950) 370.000 housing units were completed. Overall, more than four million homes were built with assistance provided by this Act in the eight years to 1957.

He was highly regarded even by political opponents. The Social Democratic press wrote about his death: it was "here was a man divorced from political life, his human decency, businesslike effort and democratic reliability were always appreciated by the opposition."

Wildermuth, who had himself been severely wounded in both world wars, particularly supported the construction of wheelchair accessible homes for severely disabled veterans.

Honours and legacy

Wildermuth was highly decorated in both World Wars. During the First World War Wildermuth earned the Iron Cross 2nd Class and 1st Class in 1914; he also earned two awards for wounds and the Honor Cross. In the Second World War he again earned the Iron Cross 2nd Class and 1st Class, both in 1939, was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross in 1940, and the German Cross in Gold on Christmas Day in 1942.

Various streets in German cities are named after Eberhard Wildermuth, including in Hamburg (Wildermuthring) and Kassel and Herne (Eberhard Wildermuth Street). The barracks of the border and Railway Police Office in Stuttgart and the 5th Riot police department in Böblingen were renamed "Eberhard Wildermuth Barracks" in 1965. In Tübingen, new housing estatees built in the 1960s and 1970s on the Denzenberg were also named after Wildermuth.

Awards and decorations

• Iron Cross (1914)
  • 2nd Class
  • 1st Class
• Wound Badge (1914)
  • in Black
  • in Silver
• Honour Cross of the World War 1914/1918
• Iron Cross (1939)
  • 2nd Class
  • 1st Class
• Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross on 15 August 1940 as Major of the Reserves and commander of the II./Infanterie-Regiment 272
• German Cross in Gold on 25 December 1942

External links

• Lexikon der Wehrmacht
• World War 2 Awards.com