Written information from Mattis Dänhardt, son of Artur Dänhardt, 24 June 2025 (excerpt)
Photo of Artur Dänhardt, around 1949
Hauptstaatsarchiv Dresden, 11430 Nr. VdN 951, Bl. 99
Artur Dänhardt
3 January 1905 – 28 November 1995
Life Before Imprisonment
Artur Dänhardt was born on 3 January 1905 in Mettmann in the Bergisches Land. He grew up with two younger siblings in a middle-class family. In 1909, the family moved to Erfurt, ten years later to Dresden. From an early age, Dänhardt struggled with illness, while at the same time developing an interest in art and music. His profession as a publishing bookseller took him to Ravensburg in 1925 and, a year and a half later, to Hamburg. At the age of 22, he married Bertha Bachmann there. The couple soon had two sons; in 1940 a daughter followed.
Resistance and Imprisonment
In autumn 1933, Artur Dänhardt – since 1928 a member of the Social Democrats (SPD) and the German Peace Society – joined a resistance group and secretly printed leaflets.
“… standing by one’s beliefs”
Mattis Dänhardt
son of Artur Dänhardt, 2025
The group was betrayed, and on 9 November 1933, Artur Dänhardt was arrested. He was held in the Stadthaus, the headquarters of the Hamburg State Police, and in Fuhlsbüttel Concentration CampDetention centres established from March 1933 in the Reich territory and later in the occupied territories, initially for opponents of the Nazi regime, whose daily life was marked by arbitrary violence and terror. The Gestapo was responsible for the internment of concentration camp inmates, using the instrument of so-called protective custody. The inmate community was subject to an internal camp hierarchy and was increasingly used for forced labour in the German armaments industry from 1942 onwards. Thousands of inmates fell victim to the Nazi programme of “extermination through labour.”, where for a month he was repeatedly tortured. Only after being transferred to Hamburg remand prison did his situation improve.
Questionnaire from the Berlin Main Committee “Victims of Fascism”
BArch, DY 54/40
Sentenced by the Hanseatic Special CourtEstablished in each higher regional court district from 21 March 1933, the special courts served to quickly punish regime-critical behaviour. In so-called summary proceedings, several thousand people of different backgrounds were sentenced to death. to 16 months’ imprisonment, he was committed on 5 February 1934 to Wolfenbüttel Prison, where he remained until 8 March 1935. There he worked in the prison library. He found support in the prison teacher Ziese, who helped maintain contact with relatives and strengthened the prisoners’ will to resist. Nevertheless, Artur Dänhardt’s letters to his family conveyed “dark, gloomy moods.”
Release and Later Life
Immediately after his release, Artur Dänhardt returned to Hamburg and supported himself with a stationery shop, which he had to give up again for health reasons. He probably also resumed activity in a resistance circle. In 1940, he found work at a publishing house in Bad Oeynhausen. He was not conscripted, being physically unfit and, due to his conviction, deemed “unworthy of military service.” In 1942, he rose to publishing director in Berlin. On 1 April 1945, shortly before the Red Army’s advance, the family fled to Langebrück near Dresden.
In Saxony, now part of the Soviet Occupation Zone, Artur Dänhardt immediately engaged in political reconstruction. He joined the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) and founded an adult education centre. Recognized as a “fighter against fascism,” he applied in 1946 to be appointed head of a publishing house. The Dresden city council rejected his request, as no suitable enterprise was available.
In the same year Artur Dänhardt met Lilo Richter, for whom he left his family. Professionally, he established himself as an official in the Arts and Literature Union. After a period at the Cultural Association, he became director of Maecenas Publishing House in March 1951. Only a year later, however, he was demoted – following a politically mandated restructuring of the publishing sector – to chief editor of the newly founded “Verlag der Kunst”. In 1955, he moved to Dresden Adult Education Centre as lecturer. That same year his second wife died. In 1957, he married Anneliese Max; their son Mattis was born the following year. On 3 January 1959, the Dresden city council appointed Artur Dänhardt director of the “Green Vault”, the historic treasury of the Saxon princes. Within months he had to relinquish the post for health reasons, but remained active in cultural politics until the late 1980s.
“… so he was always at his desk, every day”
Mattis Dänhardt
son of Artur Dänhardt, 2025
Rudolf Bergander (1909–1970), Portrait of Artur Dänhardt, oil on canvas, 1967
Artur Dänhardt was also highly regarded in the art world.
He supported the GDR, yet fought for intellectual freedoms. He received numerous honours, including the Patriotic Order of Merit in Bronze in 1970. He met the German Reunification in 1990 with scepticism.
Private collection
Compensation
In the early postwar years, Artur Dänhardt was in poor health and severely undernourished. As a recognized “victim of fascism,” he benefited from free medical examinations and convalescent stays. In 1952, he was granted a loan for furniture. One of his sons received study grants. Later, Dänhardt also received an honorary pension. For his family, this supplementary income was of great importance.
“… if one has preserved integrity under such conditions”
Mattis Dänhardt
son of Artur Dänhardt, 2025
Report of the Examination Board to the Dresden City Council, December 6, 1950
Following Artur Dänhardt's recognition as a “fighter against fascism” in Berlin on 21 May 1946, he was recognized in Saxony on 2 June 1947, and his status was reviewed in 1950.
Sächsisches Staatsarchiv, 11430 Bezirkstag / Rat des Bezirkes Dresden, Nr. VdN 951
Impact on the Family
His imprisonment as a resistance fighter in 1933 had an immediate impact on his wife Bertha and the children, who now depended on support from his parents. Nightmares haunted him for years, yet with his third wife Anneliese and his son Mattis Dänhardt, he no longer spoke of his experiences.
“… like another life”
Mattis Dänhardt
son of Artur Dänhardt, 2025
