Willibald Hentschel | |
|---|---|
| Born | Willibald Hentschel (1858-11-07)7 November 1858 |
| Died | 2 February 1947(1947-02-02) (aged 88) Berg, Upper Bavaria, Germany |
| Alma mater | University of Jena |
| Occupation | Dye chemist |
| Notable work | Varuna (1901) Mittgart (1904) |
| Political party | German Social Party |
Willibald Hentschel (7 November 1858 – 2 February 1947) was a German writer and political agitator of theagrarian andvolkisch movement. He sought to renew theAryan race through a variety of schemes, includingselective breeding andpolygamy, all within a firmly rural setting.[1]
Willibald Hentschel was born inŁódź,Congress Poland in 1858. His father was a textile factory owner fromBurgenstein (Bohemia).[2]
In 1874 he moved to Dresden, where he graduated from high school in 1875 and began to study chemistry and physics. In 1877 he moved to Jena, where he studiedbiology at theUniversity of Jena.[2] For his doctorate he studied under celebratedDarwinistErnst Haeckel.[3]
After his PhD Hentschel initially remained an assistant with Haeckel, then returned to the Technische Hochschule Dresden, where he was involved with chemistRudolf Schmitt in developing a new process to producesalicylic acid. In 1885/1886 Hentschel participated in an expedition to East Africa. After his return, he worked as a chemist at the University of Jena, University of Leipzig and University of Heidelberg.[2]
He used his knowledge to patent anindigo dye, earning a fortune which enabled him to buy two knightly estates in Silesia and concentrate his efforts on political ventures.[3] Starting in 1882, Hentschel was involved in antisemitic organisations in Dresden like the "Deutsche Reform", the "Dresdner Reformverein" and was an agitator for the "Deutscher Reform-Verein". Since 1887 he wrote for the "Antisemitische Correspondenz", where he published antifeminist articles on human breeding ideals.[2]: 352 He was a co-founder of theGerman Social Party in 1889, an anti-Semitic group led byMax Liebermann von Sonnenberg.[3]
In 1901 he published the bookVaruna, in which he explored the supposed origins of theAryan race, which made him a popular figure on thefar right.[3] In this book he argued that history was driven by the process of racial purification and the energy and spirit that drove this desire.[4] In 1903, Hentschel founded the anti-Semitic journalHammer together withTheodor Fritsch.[1] Fritsch announced thatVaruna, which complained that Germans were becoming "Semitized" through such initiatives asdemocratisation andrural depopulation, was the ideological basis of the new journal.[3]
In 1904 Hentschel published the bookMittgart in which he outlined a scheme to send 1000 ethnically pure women and 100 men picked for their military and athletic prowess to large country estates to procreate. Their children would then leave the estates at the age of 16 with the aim of travelling Germany and renewing racial stock.[3] He argued that in time the countryside would be the only place were pure Germans would be found, with the cities housing the biologically unfit who would die away quickly.[5] Hentschel's scheme attracted criticism not only from religious leaders but also from fellowracial nationalists who were outraged by what they saw as an attack on the institution of the family.[3] Hentschel for his part was anatheist[6] and belonged to the tendency within German nationalism that was strongly opposed toChristianity.[7] Despite the criticism he founded his own Mittgart-Bund to publicise his idea and even attempted to start his colony inLower Saxony although this scheme met with little success and had been abandoned before 1914.[8]
Before and during WWI Hentschel worked inRadebeul andSchreckenstein. During and after World War I, Hentschel’s stocks became worthless.
AfterWorld War I he moderated his ideas somewhat, calling instead for a migration ofethnic Germans into the east of the country in order to displace thePoles living there.[3] Hentschel called for these Germans to beArtamanen, aportmanteau word he created fromart andmanen,Middle High German words meaning 'agriculture man' and indicating his desire for a retreat from urban life to an idyllic rural past.[9] His vision inspired the creation of theArtaman League youth movement in which the likes ofHeinrich Himmler andRichard Walther Darré were active.
On 1 August 1929, Hentschel joined theNazi Party as member number 144,649 although, whilst his ideas abouteugenics were influential onNazism as an ideology, he had no real influence in the party personally.[10]
Hentschel was married with Hellen Zimmermann and had five daughters. After 1890 he lived on his estate in Seiffersdorf in Silesia, todayRadomierz, municipalityJanowice Wielkie. He died 1947 inBerg, Upper Bavaria.
Hentschel had many followers, including his teacher Ernst Haeckel, who shared his views on racial hygiene. Other admirers wereErich Ludendorff andAdolf Hitler, who congratulated the Hentschel couple on the occasion of theirdiamond wedding anniversary, even though Hentschel had left the NSDAP in 1941. In addition to the ethnic ideas, as expressed in theLebensborn, Hentschel’s influence on National Socialism consisted above all in the enforcement of theHitler salute which he initiated.[10]
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