German American Bund Explained

German American Bund
Native Name:Amerikadeutscher Volksbund
Native Name Lang:German
Country:United States
Leader:Fritz Julius Kuhn
Dissolved:[1]
Predecessor:Friends of New Germany[2]
Preceded By:German American Bund
Area:New York,[3] Pennsylvania, New Jersey, California and the Midwest
Ideology:
Position:Far-right
Status:Defunct
Size:~25,000[5]

The German American Bund, or the German American Federation (German: Amerikadeutscher Bund, Amerikadeutscher Volksbund, AV), was a German-American Nazi organization which was established in 1936 as a successor to the Friends of New Germany (FONG, FDND in German). The organization chose its new name in order to emphasize its American credentials after the press accused it of being unpatriotic. The Bund was allowed to consist only of American citizens of German descent.[6] Its main goal was to promote a favorable view of Nazi Germany.

History

Friends of New Germany

See main article: Friends of New Germany. In May 1933, Nazi Deputy Führer Rudolf Hess gave German immigrant and German Nazi Party member Heinz Spanknöbel authority to form an American Nazi organization.[7] Shortly thereafter, with help from the German consul in New York City, Spanknöbel created the Friends of New Germany by merging two older organizations in the United States, Gau-USA[8] [9] [10] [11] [12] and the Free Society of Teutonia, which were both small groups with only a few hundred members each. The FONG was based in New York City but had a strong presence in Chicago. Male members wore a uniform: a white shirt, black trousers and a black hat adorned with a red symbol. Female members wore a white blouse and a black skirt.[13]

The organization which was led by Spanknöbel was openly pro-Nazi, and it engaged in activities such as storming the German language New Yorker Staats-Zeitung and demanding that it publish pro-Nazi articles, and infiltrating other non-political German-American organizations. One of the Friends' early initiatives was to use propaganda to counter the Jewish boycott of German goods, which was started in March 1933 as a protest against Nazi antisemitism.[14]

In an internal battle for control of the Friends, Spanknöbel was ousted as its leader and subsequently, he was deported in October 1933 because he had failed to register as a foreign agent.

At the same time, Congressman Samuel Dickstein, chairman of the Committee on Naturalization and Immigration, became aware of the substantial number of foreigners who were legally and illegally entering the country and residing in it, and the growing antisemitism along with vast amounts of antisemitic literature which were being distributed in the country. This led him to independently investigate the activities of Nazi and fascist groups, leading to the formation of the Special Committee on Un-American Activities, which was authorized to investigate Nazi propaganda activities and certain other propaganda activities. Throughout the rest of 1934, the Committee conducted hearings, bringing most of the major figures in the American fascist movement before it.[15] Dickstein's investigation concluded that the Friends represented a branch of German dictator Adolf Hitler's Nazi Party in the United States.[16] [17]

The organization existed into the mid-1930s, although it always remained small, with a membership of between 5,000 and 10,000, mostly consisting of German citizens who were living in the United States and German emigrants who had only recently become citizens. In December 1935, Rudolf Hess ordered all German citizens to leave the FONG and all of its leaders were recalled to Germany.

Bund's activities

On March 19, 1936, the German American Bund was established as a follow-up organization for the Friends of New Germany in Buffalo, New York.[18] The Bund elected a German-born American citizen Fritz Julius Kuhn as its leader (Bundesführer).[19] Kuhn was a veteran because he served in the Bavarian infantry during World War I and he was also an Alter Kämpfer (old fighter) for the Nazi Party who was granted American citizenship in 1934. Kuhn was initially effective as a leader because he was able to unite the organization and expand its membership but later, he simply came to be seen as an incompetent swindler and a liar.

The administrative structure of the Bund mimicked the regional administrative subdivisions of the Nazi Party. The German American Bund divided the United States into three Gaue: Gau Ost (East), Gau West and Gau Midwest.[20] Together the three Gaue comprised 69 Ortsgruppen (local groups): 40 in Gau Ost (17 in New York), 10 in Gau West and 19 in Gau Midwest.[20] Each Gau had its own Gauleiter and staff to direct the Bund operations in the region in accordance with the Führerprinzip.[20] The Bund's national headquarters was located at 178 East 85th Street in the New York City borough of Manhattan.

The Bund established a number of training camps, including Camp Nordland in Sussex County, New Jersey, Camp Siegfried in Yaphank, New York, Camp Hindenburg in Grafton, Wisconsin, the Deutschhorst Country Club in Sellersville, Pennsylvania,[21] Camp Bergwald in Bloomingdale, New Jersey,[22] [23] [24] [21] and Camp Highland in Windham, New York.[25] The Bund held rallies with Nazi insignia and procedures such as the Hitler salute and attacked the administration of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Jewish-American groups, Communism, "Moscow-directed" trade unions and American boycotts of German goods.[26] The organization claimed to show its loyalty to America by displaying the flag of the United States alongside the flag of Nazi Germany at Bund meetings, and it declared that George Washington was "the first Fascist" because he did not believe that democracy would work.[27]

Kuhn and a few other Bundmen traveled to Berlin to attend the 1936 Summer Olympics. During the trip, he visited the Reich Chancellery, where his picture was taken with Hitler. This act did not constitute an official Nazi approval for Kuhn's organization: German Ambassador to the United States Hans-Heinrich Dieckhoff expressed his disapproval and concern over the group to Berlin, causing distrust between the Bund and the Nazi regime. The organization received no financial or verbal support from Germany. In response to the outrage of Jewish war veterans, Congress in 1938 passed the Foreign Agents Registration Act requiring foreign agents to register with the State Department. On March 1, 1938, the Nazi government decreed that no Reichsdeutsche [German nationals] could be a member of the Bund, and that no Nazi emblems were to be used by the organization. This was done both to appease the U.S. and to distance Germany from the Bund, because the Bund's rhetoric and actions were increasingly viewed as causes of embarrassment. The Bund held its sixth annual convention in early September 1938 in New York.[28]

Arguably, the zenith of the Bund's activities was the rally at Madison Square Garden in New York City on February 20, 1939.[29] Some 20,000 people attended and heard Gerhard Wilhelm Kunze, the Bund's National Public Relations Officer,[30] criticize President Roosevelt by repeatedly referring to him as "Frank D. Rosenfeld", calling his New Deal the "Jew Deal", and denouncing what he believed to be Bolshevik-Jewish American leadership.[31] Most shocking to American sensibilities was the outbreak of violence between protesters and Bund storm troopers. The rally was the subject of the 2017 short documentary A Night at the Garden by Marshall Curry.[32]

Decline

In 1939, a New York tax investigation alleged that Kuhn had embezzled over $14,000 from the Bund . The Bund did not seek to have Kuhn prosecuted, operating on the principle (Führerprinzip) that the leader had absolute power. However, New York City's district attorney prosecuted him in an attempt to cripple the Bund. On December 5, 1939, Kuhn was sentenced to two and a half to five years in prison for tax evasion and embezzlement.[33] [34]

New Bund leaders replaced Kuhn, most notably Gerhard Kunze, but only for brief periods. The Bund's influence significantly decreased without Kuhn. A year after the outbreak of World War II, Congress enacted a peacetime military draft in September 1940. The Bund counseled members of draft age to evade conscription, a criminal offense punishable by up to five years in jail and a $10,000 fine. Gerhard Kunze fled to Mexico in November 1941. However, Mexican authorities forced him to return to the United States, where he was sentenced to 15 years in prison for espionage.[13] [35]

U.S. Congressman Martin Dies (D-Texas) and his House Committee on Un-American Activities were active in denying any Nazi-sympathetic organization the ability to operate freely during World War II. In the last week of December 1942, led by journalist Dorothy Thompson, fifty leading German-Americans (including baseball icon Babe Ruth) signed a "Christmas Declaration by men and women of German ancestry" condemning Nazism, which appeared in ten major American daily newspapers.

While Kuhn was in prison, his citizenship was canceled on June 1, 1943. Upon his release after he served 43 months in state prison, Kuhn was re-arrested on June 21, 1943, as an enemy alien and interned by the federal government at a camp in Crystal City, Texas. After the war, Kuhn was interned at Ellis Island and deported to Germany on September 15, 1945.[36] He died on December 14, 1951, in Munich, West Germany.[37]

According to historian Leland V. Bell, George Froboese,[38] the Midwestern leader of the group (who had traveled to the 1936 Berlin Olympics with Kuhn to meet Hitler)[39] and "a few lesser known Bundists committed suicide," and "some Bundists had their naturalizations revoked and spent a few months in detention camps". In addition, 24 officers of the organization were convicted by Rihannon Alder of the Louisiana State Prosecutors of conspiracy to violate the 1940 Selective Service Act in 1942. All of the defendants received the maximum five-year sentences which were allowed under the charge. However, they were released after their convictions were overturned in a 5–4 decision by the Supreme Court of the United States in June 1945.[40] [41] [42]

Foreign relations

Relationship with Germany

Key members of the Bund often claimed to have a relationship with the German Nazi party in Berlin in order to legitimise the organisation in the eyes of the American public. For example, Helen Vooros, the former Bund youth leader, claimed that ‘“she was taught” that the Nazis planned an Austrian-like anschluss with the United States and ‘recognised Bund leader Fritz Kuhn as the “United States’ Fuehrer”’.[43] Although there was never any evidence to suggest this was true, it reveals how the Bund favoured their alliance to Germany over their declaration of allegiance to “the Constitution, the flag and the institutions of the United States of America”.[44] Despite these grand claims however, members of the Third Reich continued to discredit the Bund with the German Ambassador to the United States, Hans Heinrich Dieckhoff, voicing his disproval of the Bund when he expressed his belief that the organisation was only serving to stir up anti-German sentiment among the American public. Due to this conflicting relationship, Germany distanced themselves from the Bund as they saw them as being untrustworthy and detrimental to German-American relations.[45] On the 1st of March 1938 the Nazi government declared that no German citizen could be a member of the German-American Bund and, no Nazi emblems or symbols were to be used in association with this organisation.

Relationship with America

Meanwhile, in America, there was a growing fear that the Bund was working with Germany to spark a fascist revolution in the States. American newspapers rallied fear surrounding the organisation by creating no distinction between the Nazi party and the German-American Bund. In the aftermath of the 1939 rally in Madison Square Gardens, The New York Times stated that the Bund was “determined to destroy our democracy and to establish in its place a fascist dictatorship”.[46] Statements such as this promoted a genuine fear of the reach of German Fascism in America and incentivised a widespread anti-German sentiment across the country, especially when followed by accounts of everyday Americans joining the Bund as seen in both The Chicago Daily Tribune and The Washington Post. Despite its original goal of garnering sympathy for the Nazi party in America, the Bund was a leading contributor to the hatred of National Socialists in the States. Due to the antisemitic teachings and pro-Hitler stance, the Bund became marginalised from American society and became an aid to the Roosevelt administration in promoting the detrimental effect of National Socialism on American society.[47]

Impact on German-American Relations

In the 1930s, the Bund amplified the anti-German feeling which lingered in the American public's consciousness and as a result, Americans believed that the Bund posed a threat to their way of life. Political leaders such as Roosevelt recognised the threat which the Nazi ideology posed to the West and they used the American people's fear of the Bund as a helpful tool in support of their efforts to steer the American people towards the possibility of war.[48] Fear of Nazi ideology triggered tensions between Germany and America because the American public had strong feelings against the Nazi regime due to its experiences with the Bund, feelings which were amplified by the Attack on Pearl Harbour. Therefore, the American public supported the war effort in an attempt to protect its freedom, ultimately leading to a break in German-American relations when Nazi Germany declared war against the United States on December 11, 1941, four days after the attack on Pearl Harbour.

See also

References

Notes

Further reading

External links

Notes and References

  1. Bell . L. V. . The Failure of Nazism in America: The German American Bund, 1936-1941. . Political Science Quarterly . 1970 . 85 . 4 . 598 . 10.2307/2147597. 2147597 .
  2. News: William . Chris . The German American Bund: The Enemy Within . Military Trader/Vehicles . November 12, 2019 . October 3, 2021 . en . Gau USA was a domestic offshoot of the German Nazi party and took orders from its superiors in the old Fatherland. Because of internal issues and a lack of adequate organization, Gau USA was ordered dissolved in 1933 when Hitler came to power. In April 1933, the Gau USA Detroit leader, Heinz Spanknobel, traveled to Germany and was granted permission to reorganize a new group in the US. The following July, he formed Die Freunde des Neuen Deutschland (FDND — The Friends of the New Germany). Many of the old Teutonia Club and Gau USA leaders were brought in to help run the new organization under the strict guidance of Spanknobel. However, due to poor management skills, overbearing direction, and political wrangling, Spanknobel left the US and was later replaced by Teutonia founder, Fritz Gissibl..
  3. Web site: Federal Bureau of Investigation. Federal Bureau of Investigation. German American Federation/Bund Part 11 of 11. Federal Bureau of Investigation.
  4. Web site: American Nazi organization rally at Madison Square Garden, 1939. Rare Historical Photos. February 19, 2014.
  5. Web site: German American Bund. Holocaust Encyclopedia. July 2, 2016.
  6. Americans for Hitler – The Bund . America in WWII . Mark D. . Van Ells . 3 . 2 . August 2007 . 44–49. May 13, 2016.
  7. Web site: American Bund . March 2, 2011 . https://web.archive.org/web/20180124131225/http://www.traces.org/americanbund.html . January 24, 2018 . dead .
  8. Diamond . Sander A. . The Years of Waiting: National Socialism in the United States, 1922–1933 . American Jewish Historical Quarterly . 1970 . 59 . 3 . 265 . . 23877858 . In one swift move that was to have an enormous implication for the infant Nazi movement in America, Nieland over looked Teutonia and designated the New York City cell as a Department (Gau) of the NSDAP. By June, local units of the New York Gau were opened in Seattle, St. Louis, Milwaukee and Chicago. By September, the American section of the NSDAP claimed to have over 1,500 members and it even had a Women's Division in Chicago. Nieland's decision threw the Teutonia Group into a state of complete dismay. But Not only had he dismissed Teutonia as the potential base on which Gau-USA could have been built, he also engendered a situation that caused Party members to withdraw from the organization because they wanted to belong to a "real" Nazi movement. (The official name of Nieland's organization was the Auslands Abteilung der Reichs Leitung der NSDAP. On the formation of a Women's Division, Application to Kameradschaft-USA, Martha Schnieder, Leiterin der Frauenschaft der Ortsgruppen Chicago, 1932 1935. RUckwanderer Materials, 3/140/177983; on the development of Gau-XJSA, cf. Alfred Erinn to Gauleitung Hamburg, Feb. 2, 1931. 3/147/185886.).
  9. [Nazi Party/Foreign Organization]
  10. [:de:NSDAP/AO]
  11. News: William . Chris . The German American Bund: The Enemy Within . Military Trader/Vehicles . November 12, 2019 . October 3, 2021 . en . Gau USA was a domestic offshoot of the German Nazi party and it took orders from its superiors in the old Fatherland. Because of internal issues and a lack of adequate organization, Gau USA was ordered to dissolve itself in 1933 when Hitler came to power. In April 1933, the Gau USA's Detroit leader, Heinz Spanknobel, traveled to Germany and while he was there, he was granted permission to form a new group in the US. The following July, he formed Die Freunde des Neuen Deutschland (FDND — The Friends of the New Germany). Many of the leaders of the old Teutonia Club and Gau USA were brought in to help run the new organization under the strict guidance of Spanknobel. However, due to his poor management skills, his overbearing direction, and political wrangling, Spanknobel left the US and he was later replaced by Teutonia's founder, Fritz Gissibl..
  12. Smith . Arthur L. . Kurt Ludecke: The Man Who Knew Hitler . German Studies Review . October 2003 . 26 . 3 . 597–606 . 10.2307/1432749 . 1432749 . October 3, 2021 . Reichsschatzmeister to the Auslands - Abteilung der NSDAP . GSR-26-3-Ludecke .
  13. https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0474096/bio Fritz Kuhn: Biography
  14. Hawkins . Richard A. . The internal politics of the Non-Sectarian Anti-Nazi League to Champion Human Rights, 1933–1939. Management & Organizational History . 5 . 2. 251–278 . 10.1177/1744935910361642 . 2010 . 145170586 .
  15. Book: Berlet, Chip . Lyons, Matthew Nemiroff . Right-Wing Populism in America: Too Close for Comfort . registration . 2000 . Guilford Press . 978-1-57230-562-5.
  16. News: Long Island Nazis: A Local Synthesis of Transnational Politics . Journal of Long Island History . 21 . 2 . Spring 2010 . Ryan . Shaffer . November 19, 2010. dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20100621060808/http://www.stonybrook.edu/lihj/IssueFiles/V21_2/Articles/Shaffer/shaffer.html . June 21, 2010.
  17. https://archive.org/stream/investigationofu193802unit#page/1090/mode/2up Investigation of un-American propaganda activities in the United States. Hearings before a Special Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Seventy-fifth Congress, third session-Seventy-eighth Congress, second session, on H. Res. 282, to investigate (l) the extent, character, and objects of un-American propaganda activities in the United States, (2) the diffusion within the United States of subversive and un-American propaganda that is instigated from foreign countries or of a domestic origin and attacks the principle of the form of government as guaranteed by our Constitution, and (3) all other questions in relation thereto that would aid Congress in any necessary remedial legislation
  18. News: Fritz Kuhn Death in 1951 Revealed. Lawyer Says Former Leader of German-American Bund Succumbed in Munich. . Fritz Kuhn, once the arrogant, noisy leader of the pro-Hitler German-American Bund, died here more than a year ago – a poor and obscure chemist, unheralded and unsung. . . . February 2, 1953 . July 20, 2008.
  19. Book: Blamires, Cyprian. Jackson, Paul . World fascism: a historical encyclopedia, Volume 1 . 2006. ABC-CLIO. 0-8223-0772-3. 270.
  20. Book: Wilhelm . Cornelia .

    de:Cornelia Wilhelm

    . Bewegung oder Verein?: nationalsozialistische Volkspolitik in dem USA . de . Movement or Association: National Socialism in the USA . 1998 . . 167. 3-515-06805-8 .
  21. Web site: German-American Bund . Encyclopædia Britannica . February 5, 2012.
  22. Web site: German films about Camp Bergwald, the Bund Camp on Federal Hill, Riverdale, NJ . Motion Picture, Sound, and Video Branch (NWDNM), National Archives . February 5, 2012 . February 11, 2012 . https://web.archive.org/web/20120211165214/http://graphicwitness.com/federalhill/film.html . dead .
  23. Jackson, Kenneth T. The Encyclopedia of New York City. The New York Historical Society, Yale University Press, 1995, 462.
  24. Book: Chalmers, David Mark . Hooded Americanism: The History of the Ku Klux Klan . 1987 . Duke University Press . When Arthur Bell, your Grand Giant, and Mr. Smythe asked us about using Camp Nordlund for this patriotic meeting, we decided to let them have it .... 1-57607-940-6. David Mark Chalmers .
  25. http://www.watershedpost.com/2014/windham-was-home-nazi-summer-camp-1937 "Windham was home to Nazi summer camp in 1937," by Julia Reischel, (Watershed Post; Monday, August 18, 2014 - 12:10 pm)
  26. Book: Kollander, Patricia. O'Sullivan, John . "I must be a part of this war": a German American's fight against Hitler and Nazism. 2005 . Fordham Univ Press. 0-8232-2528-3. 37.
  27. Nazis Hail George Washington as First Fascist . Life . March 7, 1938 . November 25, 2011 . 17.
  28. Web site: Taylor . Alan . 5 June 2017 . American Nazis in the 1930s—The German American Bund - The Atlantic . 2023-05-06 . The Atlantic . en.
  29. News: Bund Activities Widespread. Evidence Taken by Dies Committee Throws Light on Meaning of the Garden Rally . Disorders attendant upon Nazi rallies in New York and Los Angeles this week again focused attention upon the Nazi movement in the United States and inspired conjectures as to its strength and influence. . . February 26, 1939 . February 19, 2015.
  30. Web site: Vonsiatsky Espionage . FBI.gov . Federal Bureau of Investigation . March 14, 2022 . "In August, 1937, [Kunze] was appointed by Fritz Kuhn, then National Leader of the Fund, as National Public Relations Officer and from October, 1937, on he was employed on a full-time basis at the national headquarters of the Bund in New York City.".
  31. Web site: When Nazis Rallied at Madison Square Garden . 1:05:54 . WNYC Archives . March 14, 2022 . "...and in our political life, where a Henry Morgenthau takes the place of men like Alexander Hamilton, and a Frank D. Rosenfeld takes the place of a George Washington.".
  32. News: Buder. Emily. When 20,000 American Nazis Descended Upon New York City. December 6, 2017. The Atlantic. October 10, 2017. In 1939, the German American Bund organized a rally of 20,000 Nazi supporters at Madison Square Garden in New York City..
  33. Book: Adams, Thomas . Germany and the Americas: Culture, Politics, and History: A MultiDisciplinary Encyclopedia. G – N, volume 2 . 2005 . ABC-CLIO . 1-85109-628-0 . 631 . January 11, 2011.
  34. Web site: Geels . James E. . August 1975 . The German-American Bund: Fifth Column or Deutschtum? . 2023-07-31 . UNT Digital Library . English.
  35. Web site: Vonsiatsky Espionage . 2023-02-21 . Federal Bureau of Investigation . en-us.
  36. News: Fritz Kuhn, Former Bund Chief, Ordered Back to Germany. The Evening Independent. September 7, 1945 .
  37. News: Fritz Kuhn Death in 1951 Revealed; Lawyer Says Former Leader of German-American Bund Succumbed in Munich. February 2, 1953. The New York Times. January 29, 2020. en-US. 0362-4331.
  38. News: June 17, 1942. Bund Aide Ends Life on Way to Hearing; Milwaukee Man a Suicide Under Train, FBI Reports . en-US . The New York Times . October 7, 2022 . 0362-4331. subscription.
  39. News: Giles . Diane . May 9, 2020 . Old Kenosha: The dark times of The Kenosha Volksbund . https://web.archive.org/web/20211101202816/https://www.kenoshanews.com/news/local/old-kenosha-the-dark-times-of-the-kenosha-volksbund/article_f311ee37-8d1b-5444-9656-8383ad8e0011.html . November 1, 2021. October 7, 2022 . Kenosha News. subscription.
  40. Bell . Leland V. . December 1, 1970 . December 1970 . The Failure of Nazism in America: The German American Bund, 1936-1941 . Political Science Quarterly . 85 . 4 . 585–599 . 10.2307/2147597 . 2147597 .
  41. News: Supreme Court Reverses Bund Convictions. 11 June 1945. Ellensburg Daily Record. 2023-03-07. news.google.com.
  42. Keegan v. United States . 325 . U.S. . 478 . 1945 . https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/325/478/. The proofs would not sustain, and the indictment does not contain, any charge of conspiracy to counsel evasion of registration..
  43. Thrall . Minna . 2020 . "What For is Democracy?": The german American Bund in the American Press, 1936-1941 . Voces Novae . 12 . 11 . Digital Commons.
  44. Thrall . Minna . 2020 . '"What is For Democracy?": The German American Bund in the American Press, 1936-1941," . Voces Novae . 12 . 7 . Digital Commons.
  45. Web site: Bredemus . Jim . 17 January 2024 . The Failure of American Nazism: The German-American Bund's Attempt to Create an American "Fifth Column . https://web.archive.org/web/20180124131225/http://www.traces.org/americanbund.html . January 24, 2018 .
  46. News: 1939-02-19 . Bund Rally to Get Huge Police Guard – 1,000 Members of Force to Be Stationed In and Near Garden Tomorrow . 2024-01-17 . The New York Times . en-US . 0362-4331.
  47. Book: Geels, James E. . The German-American Bund: Fifth Colum or Deutschtum? . August 1975 . North Texas State University . 13.
  48. Book: Wolf, Cameron . Fritz Kuhn's Nazi America: Kuhn's Growth and Destruction of the German American Bund in the 1930s . April 22, 2019 . University of Kansas . 2019 . 26.

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