Judith Auer

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Judith Auer, née Vallenthin (19 September 1905 – 27 October 1944) was a resistance fighter against the Nazi régime in Germany.

1 Life
2 Literature
3 Sources
4 External links

[edit] Life

Auer was born in Zurich. After her parents' untimely deaths, Judith was brought up by a well-to-do Jewish family. She completed her Abitur and began studies in music in the hopes of becoming a pianist.

In 1924, when she was a student, she joined the Communist Youth League of Germany, and the next year, she moved to Berlin. There she met and married Erich Auer, a functionary in the Communist Party of Germany (KPD), in 1926. In 1927, she joined the KPD. In 1928, Auer went with her husband to Moscow, and worked there at Comintern's offices.

In 1929, her daughter Ruth was born. To earn some money, Auer learned typing and shorthand. She took a job at a KPD establishment.

After Hitler seized power in Germany in 1933 and the KPD was banned by the new régime, Auer eventually found herself working for AEG at the Oberspree Cable Works, first as a shorthand typist, and later as a buying agent. It was here that Auer first came into contact with the resistance group around Fritz Plön, a welder, who himself had contacts with the resistance group around Anton Saefkow, Franz Jacob, Bernhard Bästlein and Karl Klodt.

Auer managed her resistance group's finances and used business trips to do courier work, especially with a view to establishing links with resistance fighters in Thuringia. She also hid Franz Jacob in her flat for several months after he fled from Hamburg.

On 7 July 1944, Judith Auer was arrested at her workplace. She was sentenced at the Volksgerichtshof together with Bruno Hämmerling and Franz Schmidt to death. Auer was hanged at Plötzensee Prison in Berlin on 27 October 1944.

In East Germany, Judith Auer was honoured by having many streets named after her (for instance in Berlin-Lichtenberg), as well as public institutions.