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Schlageter 1923 Commemorative Badge

SEID DEUTSCH WIE ER Schlageter: commemorates Albert Leo Schlageter, a German nationalist executed by the French on May 26, 1923, for acts of sabotage in the Ruhr region during the French occupation.  “SEID DEUTSCH WIE ER” translates to “Be German as he was.”  

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Albert Leo Schlageter Denkmal (Memorial) in Dusseldorf Schlageter was born Aug 12 1894 in Schönau im Schwarzwald to Catholic parents. After the outbreak of the First World War, he became a voluntary emergency worker for the military. During the war, he participated in several battles, notably Ypres (1915), the Somme (1916) and Verdun, earning the Iron Cross both first and second class. Following his promotion to second lieutenant, he took part in the Third Battle of Ypres (1917). After the war he became a member of a right-wing Catholic student group. He then joined the Freikorps and took part in the Kapp Putsch and other battles between military and communist factions that were convulsing Germany. His unit also took part in the Silesian Uprisings. Around the time of the Battle of Annaberg of 1921 Schlageter's unit merged with the emerging Nazi Party. Following the French occupation of the Ruhr in 1923 he led a group of nationalists in sabotage operations against the occupying force. The group managed to derail a number of trains. On 7 April 1923 information on Schlageter and his activities was obtained by the French, and he was arrested the following day. Tried by court-martial on 7 May 1923, he was condemned to death. On the morning of 26 May he was executed on the Golzheimer heath near Düsseldorf.

After his execution he became a hero to German nationalists. the Nazi party fully exploited the Schlageter story. Hitler refered to him in Mein Kampf. Rituals were constructed to commemorate his death, and in 1931 his Memorial Society succeeded in getting a monument erected near the site of his execution, a giant cross placed amid sunken stone rings. Other smaller memorials were also created. After the war, the main Schlageter memorial was destroyed by occupying Allied forces as part of the denazification process.