Franz Eugen Grimminger (29 July 1892 – 10 April 1986) was a member of the

White Rose The White Rose (german: Weiße Rose, ) was a Nonviolence, non-violent, intellectual German resistance to Nazism, resistance group in Nazi Germany which was led by five students (and one professor) at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, ...

resistance group in

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

Early life

Eugen Grimminger, son of a train driver, participated as a volunteer in the First World War and then worked as a civil servant in

Crailsheim Crailsheim is a town in the German state of Baden-Württemberg. Incorporated in 1338, it lies east of Schwäbisch Hall and southwest of Ansbach in the Schwäbisch Hall district. The city's main attractions include two Evangelical churches, ...

. After his war experiences he became a pacifist. He read books about Mahatma Gandhi and Buddhism and left the protestant church. According to Grimminger, he adhered to Buddhist beliefs. In 1922, he married Jenny Stern in Stuttgart. The marriage with a Jewess was rejected in the circle of acquaintances and relatives. The young married couple settled in Stuttgart, where Grimminger was employed as an auditor at the Association of Agricultural Cooperatives. In 1925 he became a dairy inspector of the association and in 1930 was auditor-in-chief and head of the department.

In Nazi Germany

In 1935 Grimminger lost his job because of his being married to a Jewish woman. Two years later, Eugen Grimminger became a self-employed certified auditor. He also helped people to flee to Switzerland, for which fake documents were necessary. In 1942 Eugen Grimminger took over the book-keeping office of his friend Robert Scholl, who had been denounced for "anti-state statements" and had to serve a four month prison sentence. This office was located in the residential building of the Scholl family. As a result, Grimminger met Inge, Hans and

Sophie Scholl Sophia Magdalena Scholl (9 May 1921 – 22 February 1943) was a German student and anti-Nazi political activist, active within the White Rose non-violent resistance group in Nazi Germany. She was convicted of high treason after having bee ...

and came in contact with the

resistance group. The group was supported by Grimminger mainly by donations in kind and sums of money, which he had partly collected from his acquaintances. He was assisted by his secretary Tilly Hahn. On 18 February 1943, the

Gestapo The (), abbreviated Gestapo (; ), was the official secret police of Nazi Germany and in German-occupied Europe. The force was created by Hermann Göring in 1933 by combining the various political police agencies of Prussia into one orga ...

arrested Hans and Sophie Scholl for spreading leaflets. In the course of the subsequent interrogations, Grimmingers name was mentioned. On 2 March 1943, he was arrested and on 19 April 1943, in the second trial against members of the White Rose, he was sentenced for support to high treason to ten years in prison. The public prosecutor had also demanded the death penalty for him, however, ultimately could prove only a transfer of money, not what he actually knew about how the money was intended to be used. His Jewish wife, until then protected from persecution, was arrested on 10 April 1943, then deported and murdered in Auschwitz. Eugen Grimminger was imprisoned in the Zuchthaus Ludwigsburg until April 1945.

After the war

After the war he became president of the regional association of agricultural cooperatives in Stuttgart.Deutsche Biographie: Eugen Grimminger
/ref> In 1947 he married Tilly Hahn. In 1958 he retired. He was involved in animal welfare and was chairman of the Tierschutzverein Stuttgart for many years. He also founded the Grimminger Foundation for Anthropozoonosis Research to research and control animal diseases that are transmissible to humans. The foundation was later renamed the Grimminger Foundation for Zoonotic Research.

Early life

In Nazi Germany

After the war

See also

References

Further reading