Eduard Schulte

Eduard Schulte ( 4 January 1891 in Düsseldorf – 6 January 1966 in Zürich) was a prominent German industrialist was one of the first to warn the Allies and tell the world of the Holocaust and systematic exterminations of Jews in Nazi Germany occupied Europe.

Already in 1916, during World War I, Schulte led the department for soap production within the War Ministry. Due to his career as a manager in the 1920s to 1940s, he had frequent contact with high German government and military officials, as well as other industrialists who had access to important information.

Giesche’s Erben Company

Bergwerksgesellschaft Georg von Giesche's Erben was a German company and a successor of the huge industrial properties of respectable aristocratic Giesche family.

In 1922, as a consequence of rebirth of the Republic of Poland, the major part of Giesche’s Erben properties located in Silesia was allotted to Poland. The new company, Giesche Corporation was created, to acquire those properties. It was the Polish corporation, registered in Katowice, although the capital was German-owned (the 100% owner was Bergwerksgesellschaft Georg von Giesche's Erben).

Soon German owners found it impossible to manage the Polish company with success and had to sell it out. In 1926 majority of stock (51%) was sold to American investors, Anaconda Copper Mining Co. and William Averell Harriman.

The same year Eduard Schulte became the general director of Giesche’s Erben, replacing Carl Besser on that position.

The new director, only 35 years old, had an ambitious plan to regain the ownership of the Polish properties. He had never put up with the loss of (as Germans used to say) “eastern estates”. However it was not possible as long as the region of Silesia belonged to Poland.

In September 1939, when German Nazi army invaded Poland, all American directors of Giesche Corporation were expelled and the control of the company went into hands of German military commissar, Albrecht Jung. But in fact, although unofficially, all decisions were made by Eduard Schulte, who became the real ruler of the huge Giesche complex.

During the occupation of Poland Schulte and Jung not only managed industrial plants seized by force from legitimate owners, but also took a lot of attempts to transfer the ownership rights of Giesche capital back to Germans. These attempts consisted of illegal changes made in real estate registers and of conveying properties to the newly created German firms.

On top of that Schulte and Jung tried to convince American owners to sell out their shares of Giesche Corporation, what finally occurred unsuccessful (the transaction was blocked by the US Treasury Department). Moreover, as Giesche Corp. was controlled by American holding company SACO (which was in 51% owned by Americans and 49% by Germans), in November 1942 American Alien Property Custodian, acting under Trading with the Enemy Act, vested German owned shares in SACO.

Eventually Schulte’s dreams to legally regain “eastern estates” collapsed and in 1945 all German “commissars” escaped west from the Red Army march.

The Final Solution

The business relations gave Schulte the opportunity to travel often between Breslau in Silesia and Zürich in Switzerland, where he had contacts with Allen W. Dulles, with the dissident German consul Gisevius, and Polish and French intelligence contacts, according to various sources.

In 1942 Eduard Schulte learned about the Final Solution concept, and in July 1942 he told Gerhart M. Riegner, the Swiss representative of World Jewish Congress. In August 1942, the Riegner Telegram notified the Allies, but they largely ignored the infos which stated the estimated number of 3,5 to 4 millions Jews, and the planned use of Hydrogen cyanide.

In 1943, the Gestapo noticed his activities, and Schulte had to permanently flee to Switzerland with his wife, while his sons had to fight in the Wehrmacht.

After the war, Schulte remained silent. Gerhart Riegner, the Swiss representative of the World Jewish Congress, always refused to acknowledge who had supplied him with the information as this was "the one request he ever made of me".

References

* NY Times article was published when Schulte's story first became widely known, 1983
* "Breaking the Silence", biography of Schulte by Walter Laqueur and Richard Breitman, 1986

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