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Friedrich Kempk * 1890

Billhorner Deich 25 (Hamburg-Mitte, Rothenburgsort)

HIER WOHNTE
FRIEDRICH KEMPK
JG. 1890
VERHAFTET 1933
ZUCHTHAUS FUHLSBÜTTEL
VERHAFTET 1937
KZ FUHLSBÜTTEL
1939 SACHSENHAUSEN
ERMORDET 21.2.1940

Friedrich (Fiete) Kempk, born 26 Jan, 1890, death on 20 Feb. 1940 in the KZ Sachsenhausen

Billhorner Deich / corner of Quartiersweg Stresowstrasse (Billhorner Deich 25)

Friedrich Kempk, called Fiete, was born as the second child of Anna Kempk, née Möller, and the worker Heinrich Kempk. His sister Erna was born 11 months later, Wilhelmine on July 15th, 1893, the brothers Karl Wilhelm and Heinrich Karl on February 9th, 1895 and February 23rd, 1896. By that time, the family had moved first from Geibelstrasse in the Winterhude district to Humboldtstrasse in South Barmbek and on to Hauffstrasse in Uhlenhorst. Heinrich Kempk now worked as a coachman. The family belonged to the Lutheran Protestant Church. Before the turn of the century, the family moved to Lindleystrasse 54/56 Hs 3 in Rothenburgsort, south of the Elbe River.
Friedrich Kempk attended elementary school and then took various jobs as an unskilled laborer. On My 17th, 1913, he got married for the first time. The marriage produced a daughter. In 1915, Kempk was drafted into the army and was taken prisoner at the end of the war, only returning in 1919. Back home, he got a job in a grain mill. On June 8th, 1920, he was divorced.

On January 26th, 1924, Friedrich Kempk married a second time, to Ella Quednau, born on June 1st, 1901 in Hamburg; her father, Friedrich August Quednau, was also a worker, her mother Louise was née Mulks. Ella Quednau had attended elementary school and, following her confirmation at Easter of 1916, got a job as a house maid. Later, she worked in various factories. The couple’s first child, born 1924, died soon after birth. She then worked as a manual laborer until her second child, the son Günter, was born on October 26th, 1929. Friedrich Kempk lost his job at the beginning of the world economic crisis.
Ella and Friedrich’s son Günter grew up in the big apartment complex at Billhorner Deich 25 that had a large courtyard and a view of the Rothenburgsort water tower.
He attended elementary school and, beginning at Easter 1941, the secondary school in Marckmannstrasse, changing to Borgfelde in 1941 when his school was combined with the Hindenburg-Oberrealschule for boys at Brekelbaumspark to make room for the extension of the Rothenburgsort children’s hospital. Günter’s schooldays ended in 1947 following a further change of schools, since his family home as well as his school had fallen victim to the "fire storm” in the aftermath of the bombings of July, 1943.
Friedrich Kempk belonged to the communist party KPD and the Red Front Fighters’ Union (Roter Frontkämpfer-Bund, RFB). He was arrested on November 28th, 1933 and sentenced to 2¾ years of hard labor for "preparing treason” and in concurrence of offenses for illegal activities, "because he had continued working for his party in Hamburg after the NSDAP had seized power. Kempk served his sentence at the Fuhlsbüttel and Rendsburg prisons.

Following his release on August 8th, 1936 he was without a job until June of 1937; in the spring of that year, he had been taken into "protective custody”, allegedly to prevent him disturbing the celebration of Hitler’s birthday on April 20th. Following his release, he again found work in a grain mill. On account of the Hungarian Regent Miklos Horthy’s visit to Hamburg on August 28th and 29th of 1939, Kempke was again taken into "protective custody”, and on September 1st, arrested again at his job, on account of alleged Communist activities, and taken directly to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp, where he died on February 20th, 1940, of "asthenia”. The urn with his ashes was buried in the family plot at the Ohlsdorf Cemetery.

On October 2nd, 1945, Kempk’s sentence was deleted from the penal register according to Art. 3 of the Hamburg Judicial Decree no. 1.

Translated by Peter Hubschmid

Kindly supported by the Hermann Reemtsma Stiftung, Hamburg.

Stand: October 2016
© Hildegard Thevs

Quellen: VAN-Totenliste 1968; VVN 20. K9; StaH 241-1 II, Justizverwaltung II, Abl. 13; 332-5, 6351-622/ 1896; 351-11 Amt für Wiedergutma­chung, 010601, 261290; div. AB; Brahm, Felix, Lehren, Heilen, Überwachen, Hamburg 2007.