1st Biographical Information on Wolfgang Kapp Wolfgang Kapp was born in New York on July 24, 1858, the son of the lawyer Friedrich Kapp, who had played an important role in the bourgeois-democratic revolution of 1848 and had to emigrate to the United States because of his participation in the Baden uprising. Wolfgang Kapp's mother was Louise Engels and was the daughter of the Major General and Commander of Cologne Engels. The family was originally called d'Ange and immigrated from France to Germany in 1687 after the Edict of Nantes. In 1870 Friedrich Kapp returned to Germany with his family; he lived in Berlin and was a national liberal, later a liberal member of the Reichstag from 1872-1877 and 1881-1884; he also worked as a renowned historian. Friedrich Kapp died in 1884, his son Wolfgang studied in Tübingen and Göttingen. He completed his studies in 1880 with a doctorate. Probably in 1881 Wolfgang Kapp married Margarete Rosenow, the daughter of a landowner in Dülzen (district Preußisch Eylau). After his marriage Kapp seems to have familiarized himself with the administration of a large agricultural business on his father-in-law's estate, because it was not until 1885 that he began his actual professional career as a trainee with the government in Minden. In 1886 he joined the Ministry of Finance, Department II, Administration of Direct Taxes, as a government assistant. From 1890 to 1899 he was district administrator in Guben. In 1890, at the beginning of his time as district administrator, Kapp bought the Rittergut Pilzen estate near the Rosenov estate and thus entered the circle of the East Prussian Great Agrarians. Out of his interest for the interests of agriculture a work of agricultural policy content arose in Guben, which attracted a great deal of attention in the Ministry of Agriculture, so that an appointment as a government council followed in 1900. Kapp was appointed to the I. Dept. Administration of Agricultural and Stud Affairs, Department of Agricultural Workers' Affairs, but during the era of Reich Chancellor von Bülow as Commissioner of the Prussian Ministry of Agriculture he was primarily active in the preparation of the customs tariff of 1902 and in the initiation of the new trade agreements of 1904-1906. Kapp gained his first foreign policy experience in negotiations with representatives of foreign countries. Kapp soon gained a closer relationship with the then Reich Chancellor von Bülow, with whom he shared similar political views. During his time at the Ministry of Agriculture, Kapp seems to have had ambitious plans for his future professional and political career and at least aspired to the position of district president. That his plans went even further can be seen from the recording of a conversation between Kaiser Wilhelm II and the General Field Marshal von der Goltz, in which the possibility of Kapp's successor in the Reich Chancellery was considered. However, this conversation, whose date lies between 1909 and 1911, took place at a time when Kapp had already left the Prussian civil service. The reason for his resignation from the Ministry of Agriculture seems to have been his annoyance at not taking his person into account when appointing district presidents. On 5 April 1906, the East Prussian countryside elected the owner of the Pilzen manor as general landscape director. It is very characteristic of Kapp's personality under what circumstances he became known in East Prussia through a trial he conducted against the landscape. The landscapes of the Prussian provinces were self-governing bodies and as such primarily representations of landowners. But the landscape also served as a representative body for state fiscal policy. Its real task, of course, lay outside the political sphere in granting credit to cooperatives. However, the credit policy has had a decisive influence on the distribution of property and the social structure of the provinces and has thus had political repercussions. Through the incorporation of agricultural banks and fire societies in the 19th century, the landscapes had become efficient organisations at provincial level. Kapp took on the new tasks with his own vehemence. He continued the landscape in the specified direction, primarily by developing the branch network of the Landschaftsbank, by merging the landscape with the East Prussian Feuersozietät, by granting more loans, particularly for small property, and by increasing the landscape funds. His policy was aimed at freeing agriculture, which was in a serious crisis at the beginning of the 20th century, from its dependence on state aid and enabling it to help itself by means of credit policy measures. In the course of these efforts, Kapp tackled three major tasks. First and foremost the question of agricultural debt relief, which the Prussian state initiated in 1906 with the law on the debt limit. Kapp was the first to try to make this framework law effective from the initiative of the parties themselves without further state aid by showing different ways of debt relief. The inclusion of life insurance as a means of reducing debt proved particularly effective. Instead of debt repayment, the premium payment was made to an agricultural life insurance company. This ensured that a certain amount of capital was available for debt reduction in the event of death. The second task resulted from the former. The desire to combine public-law life insurance with debt relief necessitated the creation of a number of public-law life insurance institutions, which were merged into an association chaired by Kapp. These facilities were especially designed to prevent the outflow of premium money from the countryside to the large cities, where it had been used especially for the construction of tenements. However, the outflow of capital was only one danger, the other was the rural exodus that began in the 19th century. He tried to strengthen small agricultural holdings with a colonization and agricultural workers' bill, which was accepted by the General Landtag in 1908. This measure was based on the recognition of the untenability of the institution of instants and deputants, who were in the closest dependence on the lord of the manor and who emigrated from this situation in masses to the large cities, where they strengthened the ranks of the industrial proletariat. The organ for settlement policy should be a landscaped settlement bank. The third task that Kapp set himself was the creation of a public-law national insurance scheme following the public-law life insurance scheme. This measure was primarily directed against the Volksversicherungsanstalt "Volksfürsorge", created by the Social Democrats, and was intended to secure capital for agricultural workers to buy their own farms by means of abbreviated insurance. These plans did not lead to the hoped-for success, but ended in a bitter feud with the private insurance companies, especially the Deutsche Volksversicherungs-Aktiengesellschaft. In addition to his functions within the East Prussian landscape, Kapp was also active in various other bodies. In December 1906 he was appointed to the Stock Exchange Committee of the Reichsamt des Innern and in 1912 to the Supervisory Board of Deutsche Bank. The First World War gave Kapp's life and work a whole new direction. Kapp's biography is too little researched to judge how far he had buried his ambitious plans, which apparently pushed him to the top of the Reich government, or postponed them only for a better opportunity. Although Kapp had been a member of the German Conservative Party since at least 1906, he did not take the path of an existing party to make a political career. This path probably did not correspond to his personality, described as authoritarian, ambitious and independent. He made the great leap into high politics through his sensational conflict with Reich Chancellor von Bethmann Hollweg. In his memo of 26 May 1916 "Die nationalen Kreise und der Reichs-Kanzler", which he sent to 300 public figures, including Bethmann Hollweg himself, he sharply criticised what he considered to be the weak policy of the Reich Chancellor, to whom he v. a. accused him of his alleged pacting with social democracy, his reluctance to America and his rejection of the unrestricted submarine war demanded by extremely militaristic circles, but also of a false war economic policy. The sharp reaction of Bethmann Hollweg, who spoke in a Reichstag session of "pirates of public opinion", among others, who abused "with the flag of the national parties", Kapp perceived as a personal affront to which he reacted with a demand for a duel. On the contrary, Kapp had to take an official reprimand and his re-election as General Landscape Director, which had taken place in March 1916 on a rotational basis, was refused confirmation by the Prussian State Ministry. Since his friends held on to Kapp in the East Prussian landscape, he was re-elected in 1917. This time - since Bethmann Hollweg had been overthrown in the meantime - he was able to take up his post as general landscape director again. At first, the events of 1916 led him even more into politics. Here he expressed solidarity with a circle of extremely reactionary and aggressive military forces around General Ludendorff and Grand Admiral von Tirpitz, who pursued a ruthless internal perseverance policy that tightened up all the forces of the people and a policy of unrestrained annexation and total warfare towards the outside world. Emperor Wilhelm II, who in principle sympathized with this extreme direction, had to refrain from supporting this group out of various considerations of public opinion and the negative attitude of the party majorities in the Reichstag. Kapp and his comrades-in-arms assumed in their political ambitions the complete certainty of the German final victory. They closed their eyes to the already looming possibility of defeat for Germany, especially after America entered the war. The war and peace goals they represented, especially the annexation plans at the expense of Russia and Poland, which were later only surpassed by Hitler, were marked by uncontrolled wishful thinking that in no way corresponded to objective reality. His extreme attitude drove Kapp into a blind hatred against any social and democratic movement; his fierce opposition against social democracy was mainly based on the legend of the dagger thrust against the imperialist Germany struggling to win. This military and National Socialist sharpening, for which Kapp found moral and financial support in certain circles of military leadership, but also among a number of university professors, writers, local politicians, agriculturalists, industrialists and bankers, culminated in the founding of the German National Party, which took place on 2 September 1917 (the "Sedan Day") in the Yorksaal of the East Prussian landscape. Although Kapp was clearly the spiritus rector of this "collection party", two other persons were pushed into the foreground, intended for the eyes of the public: These were the Grand Admiral von Tirpitz as 1st chairman and Duke Johann Albrecht von Mecklenburg as honorary chairman of this party. The German Fatherland Party did not seek seats in the Reichstag, but saw itself as a pool of national forces to bring about Germany's final victory. The statute provided for the immediate dissolution of the party once its purpose had been achieved. In addition to mobilising all forces to achieve military victory, Kapp's founding of the party also had another purpose that was not made so public. Tirpitz, then 68 years old, was to be launched as a "strong man" to replace the "weak" chancellors Bethmann Hollweg and Michaelis. It was obvious that in this case Kapp would join the leadership of the imperial government as advisor to the politically ultimately inexperienced Grand Admiral. The November Revolution of 1918 and the immediate surrender of Germany put an abrupt end to these lofty plans. But Kapp and his friends did not admit defeat. Although the German Fatherland Party was dissolved in December 1918, it was immediately replaced by a new party, the German National People's Party, which developed into a bourgeois mass party during the Weimar Republic, but no longer under Kapp's leadership. After the fall of the Hohenzollern monarchy, Kapp immediately opposed the revolution and the Weimar Republic. He could not or did not want to accept the social and political conditions that had arisen in the meantime; his goal was clearly the restoration of pre-war conditions. The sources, which were only incomplete at that time, do not show when the idea of a coup d'état was born and how the conspiracy developed in all its branches. A close associate of Kapp's, Reichswehrhauptmann Pabst, had already attempted a failed coup in July 1919. Together with Kapp, Pabst created the "National Unification" as a pool of all counter-revolutionary forces and associations. This Reich organisation was to coordinate the preparations for the coup in Prussia and Bavaria, while Kapp was to develop East Prussia into the decisive base of counterrevolution. From here, with the help of the Freikorps operating in the Baltic States, the Reichswehr and the East Prussian Heimatbund, whose chairman was Kapp, the survey was to be carried to Berlin with the immediate aim of preventing the signing of the Versailles Treaty. The approval of the Versailles Treaty by the parliamentary majority has created a new situation. Now Ludendorff, one of the co-conspirators, proposed to carry out the coup directly in Berlin, whereby the Baltic people, who were disguised as work detachments on the large Eastern Elbe goods, were to take over the military support. Meanwhile, the conspirators, headed by Kapp and Reichswehr General Lüttwitz, tried to gain the mass base absolutely necessary for the execution of the coup d'état through a broad-based nationalist smear campaign. The company was already at risk before it could even begin. Kapp had demanded that his military allies inform him at least 14 days before the strike so that he could make the necessary political preparations. That the coup d'état had just begun on 13 March 1920 depended not so much on carefully considered planning, but on coincidences that were not predictable. One of the reasons for the premature strike was the dissolution of the Freikorps, especially the Ehrhardt Brigade, decided by the Reich government. This revealed the fact that, in the absence of a party of their own, the conspirators were unable to avoid relying on the loose organization of the resident defence forces, which to a certain extent were also influenced by social democracy. The whole weakness of the company was evident in the question on which forces the new government should actually be based. While the military saw an arrangement with the strongest party, social democracy, as unavoidable, Kapp categorically rejected pacting with social democracy. He wanted to put the Social Democrat-led government as a whole into protective custody. But now the government was warned; for its part, it issued protective arrest warrants against the heads of the conspirators and left Berlin on March 12. In the early morning of March 13, the Navy Brigade Ehrhardt marched into Berlin without encountering armed resistance, as would have been the duty of the Reichswehr. Kapp proclaimed himself Chancellor of the Reich and began with the reorganisation of the government. The order of the new rulers to arrest the escaped imperial government and to remove the state government if they did not stand on the side of the putschists was only partially executed by the local commanders. The proclamation of the general strike on 13 March and the reports arriving from the most important cities and industrial centres about joint actions of the working class prompted the indirect supporters of Kapp, the large industrialists and the Reichswehr generals, to adopt a wait-and-see attitude. Kapp had to see the hopelessness of his company. Eyewitnesses reported that Kapp had spent almost 3 days of his time as Chancellor of the Reich "with gossip". On March 15, the "adventure" was over. Kapp apparently stayed hidden with friends near Berlin for some time after the failed coup and then flew to Sweden in a provided plane. Here he initially lived under different false names in different places, at last in a pension in Robäck, but was soon recognized and temporarily taken into custody. The Swedish government granted asylum to the refugee, but he had to commit himself to refrain from all political activities. When the high treason trial against the heads of the March company in Leipzig began, Kapp was moved by the question of his position in court. At first, he justified his non-appearance with the incompetence of the Ebert government and with the constitution, which in his opinion did not exist. Kapp said that there was no high treason in the legal sense against the "high treason" of social democracy. When in December 1921 one of the co-conspirators, the former district president of Jagow, was sentenced to a fortress sentence by the Imperial Court, Kapp changed his mind. Still in Sweden he worked out a justification for the process ahead of him, in which he denied any guilt in both an objective and a subjective sense. On the contrary, he intended to appear before the court with a charge against the then government. It didn't come to that anymore. Kapp had already fallen ill in Sweden. At the beginning of 1922 he returned to Germany and was remanded in custody. On 24 April 1922, he underwent surgery in Leipzig to remove a malignant tumour from the left eye. Kapp died on 12 June 1922; he was buried on 22 June at the village churchyard in Klein Dexen near his estate Pilzen. 2. inventory history The inventory, which had been formed in its essential parts by Kapp himself, was transferred by the family to the Prussian Secret State Archives as a deposit in 1935. Here the archivist Dr. Weise started already in the year of submission with the archival processing, which could not be completed, however. In the course of the repatriation of the holdings of the Secret State Archives, which had been removed during the Second World War, the Kapp estate was transferred to the Central State Archives, Merseburg Office. In 1951, Irmela Weiland, a trainee, classified and listed the stock here. As a result of the processing a find-book was created, which was until the new processing in the year 1984 the kurrente find-auxiliary. 1984 the stock was to be prepared for the backup filming. It turned out that the processing carried out in 1951 did not meet today's archival requirements, so that a general revision was considered necessary. The graduate archivists Renate Endler and Dr. Elisabeth Schwarze rearranged and simply listed the holdings according to the principles of order and indexing for the state archives of the German Democratic Republic, Potsdam 1964. The found file units were essentially retained, in individual cases they were dissolved and new indexing units were formed. In addition, 0.50 m of unprocessed documents were incorporated into the estate. The old regulatory scheme, which was essentially broken down chronologically, was replaced by a new regulatory scheme based on Kapp's areas of activity. In the course of the revision, the portfolio was re-signed. The relationship between the old and the new signatures was established through a concordance. The new find book replaces the previously valid find book from 1951. The stock is to be quoted: GStA PK, VI. HA Family Archives and Bequests, Nl Wolfgang Kapp, No... 3) Some remarks on the content of the holdings The Kapp estate contains 7.50 running metres of archival material from the period from 1885 to 1922, including some earlier and later individual pieces. The holdings mainly contain documents from Kapp's official and political activities, to a lesser extent also correspondence within the family and documents from the administration of the Knights' Manor Pilzen. The density of transmission to the individual sections of Kapp's professional and political development is quite different. While his activities with the Minden government, in the Prussian Ministry of Finance and as district administrator in Guben are relatively poorly documented, there is a rather dense tradition about his activities as director of the general landscape and as chairman of the German Fatherland Party. The documentation on the preparation and implementation of the coup shows gaps which can be explained, among other things, by the fact that important agreements were only reached orally at the stage of preparing the coup. Moreover, Kapp, who had to flee hastily to Sweden after the coup d'état failed, was no longer able to give this part of his estate the same care as the former one. Overall, however, it is a legacy of great political importance and significance. Merseburg, 2. 10.1984 signed Dr. Elisabeth Schwarze Diplomarchivar Compiled and slightly shortened: Berlin, April 1997 (Ute Dietsch) The clean copy of the find book was made by Britta Baumgarten. Note After the reunification of the two German states, the Merseburg office was closed, the archival records and thus also the Kapp estate were returned to the Secret State Archives in Berlin (1993). From the inventory maps, this reference book was created after maps that no longer existed were replaced (post-distortion of files). XIII Bibliography (selection) Bauer, Max : March 13, 1920 Berlin 1920 Bernstein, Richard : Der Kapp-Putsch und seine Lehren. Berlin 1920 Brammer, Karl : Five days of military dictatorship. Berlin 1920 Documents on the Counterrevolution using official material: The same: Constitutional Foundations and High Treason. According to stenographic reports and official documents of the Jagow trial. Berlin 1922 Erger, Johannes : The Kapp-Lüttwitz Putsch. Düsseldorf 1967 Falkenhausen, Fri. from : Wolfgang Kapp. In: Conservative Monthly July/August 1922 Kern, Fritz : Das Kappsche Abenteuer. Impressions and findings. Leipzig/Berlin 1920 Könnemann, Erwin : Residents' Weirs and Time Volunteer Associations. Berlin 1971 Noske, Gustav : From Kiel to Kapp. Berlin 1920 Rothfels, Hans : Article "Wolfgang Kapp" in: Deutsches biogra- phisches Jahrbuch Bd 4 (1922) Berlin/Leipzig 1929, correspondence. 132-143 (Here also a drawing of the works Kapps) Schemann, Ludwig : Wolfgang Kapp and the March company. A word of atonement. Munich/Berlin 1937 Taube, Max : Causes and course of the coup of 13 March 1920 and his teachings for the working class and the middle classes. Munich 1920 Wauer, W. : Behind the scenes of the Kapp government. Berlin 1920 Wortmann, K. Geschichte der Deutschen Vaterlandspartei In: Hallische Forschungen zur neueren Geschichte. Volume 3, Hall 1926 Contents I. Introduction Page II 1 Biographical Information on Wolfgang Kapp Page II 2 History of the Collection Page X 3 Some Remarks on the Content of the Collection Page XI 4 Literature in Selection Page XIII II Structure of the Collection Page XIV III Collection Page XVII (Order Numbers, Title, Duration Page 1-106)) XVII III. holdings (order numbers, file title, duration) Description of holdings: Lebenssdaten: 1858 - 1921 Finds: database; find book, 1 vol.
