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Title: Erich Mühsam chronology Author: Anonymous Date: 2003 Language: en Topics: biography, anarchist writers, poetry, Germany Source: Page copied from Wayback Machine archive Notes: Originally published at: http://erichinenglish.org/
Mühsam chronologies in print include: Chris Hirte. Erich Mühsam: “Ihr
seht mich nicht feige.” Berlin: Verlag Neues Leben, 1985 (pp.453-456 and
passim) and: Chris Hirte (ed.). Erich Mühsam: Tagebücher 1910-1924.
Munich: deutscher taschenbuchverlag, September 1994. Other chronologies
can be found online at anarchismus.at, The Daily Bleed, the
Erich-Mühsam-Gesellschaft, Irina und Conrad Piens' Mühsam website,
zeno.org, and the Erich Mühsam page of the Deutsches Historisches
Museum.
1838
Birth of Siegfried Seligmann Mühsam, Erich's father.
1871
January 18: Founding of the German Reich.
1875
German Social Democrats unite with the Lassallians.
1876
July 1: Death of Mikhail Bakunin.
1878
April 6: Erich Mühsam is born in Berlin as the fourth child of
apothecary Siegfried Seligmann Mühsam and his wife Rosalie (neé Cohn)
(their first child, a son, died in infancy).
October 19: The first of Bismark's Anti-Socialist Laws is approved by
the Reichstag, and is signed into law on October 22 by Kaiser Wilhelm I.
1878
May 11 (ca. 3:30 pm): Max Hödel (b. 27 May 1857) attempts to assassinate
Wilhelm I with a pistol during the emperor's daily carriage ride down
Unter den Linden in Berlin. [cf. Carlson, Vol.I, pp. 115-137]
June 2 (2:30 pm): Dr. Karl Eduard Nobiling (b. 10 April 1848; aka “The
Crazy Doctor” — of philosophy: dissertation on agricultural history)
attempts to assassinate Kaiser Wilhelm I with a double-barreled shotgun
during the emperor's daily carriage ride down Unter den Linden in Berlin
[cf. Carlson, Vol.I, pp. 139-171; according to Barbara Tuchman, Hödel
and Carl Nobiling represented “the last and only activists” of the
German anarchist movement: “Otherwise, German Anarchists remained
theorists, except for those who got away to America” (Barbara Tuchman.
The Proud Tower. p.119)].
1879
February: The Mühsam family moves to Lübeck.
1880
November 14: August Reinsdorf is arrested by the Berlin police for
plotting to blow up the Reichstag, while it was in session, by tunneling
under it and placing charges at critical stress points (a plan which he
had communicated to Johann Most). [cf. Carlson, Vol.1, p.285]
1883
May 10: Eugen Leviné, a future leader of the Munich Council Republic, is
born in St. Petersburg.
September 28: August Reinsdorf planned to blow up Kaiser Wilhelm along
with other royalty and dignitaries at the dedication ceremony of the
Niederwalddenkmal; the actual attack was carried out by his
collaborators Franz Rupsch and Emil Küchler [cf. Carlson, Vol.1,
pp.283-302].
1885
January 13: Frankfurt Police Chief Karl Ludwig Franz Rumpf is
assassinated in the night. Julius Lieske, an anarchist and journeyman
cobbler, was convicted of the deed on poor evidence and ultimately
executed by axe to the neck at 8:02 am on 17 November 1885 [cf. Carlson,
Vol.I, pp.302-20. The New York Times, on 28 November 1885, ran the
following notice in the “City and Urban News: New York” section: “The
International Working People's Association will hold a meeting in
Germania Hall, No. 291 Bowery, at 3 o'clock to-morrow afternoon, in
memory of Julius Lieske, the German who was executed at Kessel last week
for the murder of H. Rumpf, of the German Secret Political Police.”].
1887
Siegfried Mühsam is elected to the Lübeck city parliament.
1888
June 15: Kaiser Wilhelm II ascends the throne.
1890
The 12 year-old Mühsam is held back a grade for the first time; he is
forced to repeat the next two grades as well, so that he ends up at 17
years of age with 14 year-old class mates [Hirte, Ihr seht mich nicht
feige, p.47].
Beginning in 1890, the new Reichskanzler Leo Graf von Caprivi sets the
“New Course” (Neuen Kurs): “an agressive foreign policy, massive
build-up of arms, chauvinism, elaborate restrictive measures against the
Social Democrats — in short: preparation for war”. [Hirte, p.67]
1896
Mühsam anonymously publishes a sarcastic commentary on a speech given by
his school principal, Direktor Schubring of the Katharineum (parodied by
Thomas Mann in Budenbrooks as Direktor Wulicke), in the Socialdemocratic
Lübecker Volksboten
January 11: Mühsam is expelled for “socialist intrigues” (Umtriebe). He
finishes his schooling with the tenth grade, obtaining a diploma
(mittlere Reifezeugnis) at a distant, rural school in Parchim
(Mecklenburg), which he attended for about six months [Hirte, p.51-5,
quotes letters from Mühsam to his parents ranging from mid-April to
mid-November].
1896-1899
Mühsam's apprenticeship in pharmacy.
1898
Mühsam's first essays and poems are published.
September 10: Luigi Luccheni assassinates Empress Elizabeth of Austria
as she is about to board a steamship in Geneva.
1899
Mühsam's mother dies. Over the next two years, he works as an
apothecary's assistant (Apothekengehilfe) in Lübeck, Blomberg (Lippe),
and Berlin.
1900
Mühsam moves to Berlin.
July 29: Gaetano Bresci shoots and kills King Umberto of Italy in Monza
(Lombardy).
Fall: Starts work at the pharmacy on Wedingplatz, but quits before the
year is out, ruining his father's plans of Erich following him in
business and eventually inheriting the pharmacy. [Hirte, pp.81, 89]
December: Mühsam's first meeting with Heinrich Hart.
1901
He becomes deeply involved in the Hart brothers' “Neue Gemeinschaft”
(New Community). Start of his friendship with Gustav Landauer. [Hirte,
p.88]
January 1: Mühsam becomes a freelance writer and bohemian in Berlin.
1901-1904
Mühsam publishes in Simplicissimus, Gesellschaft and Aktion.
As an evolving proponent of “literary Anarchism”, Mühsam, influenced by
Pierre Joseph Proudhon (1809-1865), Michail Bakunin (1814-1876), and
Peter Kropotkin (1842-1921), as well as by Max Stirner (1806-1856) and
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900), cultivates a personal style which he
terms “sentimental anarchism” [Gefühlsanarchismus].
1902
In the summer, moves to Friedrichshagen on the outskirts of Berlin; he
commutes frequently between the two.
Mühsam makes his first contacts with anarchist groups; begins performing
as a cabaretist in Berlin.
After an invitation from Albert Weidner, Mühsam begins contributing
(under the pen-name “Nolo”) to the bi-weekly Der arme Teufel starting
with the first issue.
[...this gap soon to be filled!...]
1932
Joseph Goebbels identifies Mühsam as one of the Jewish agitators
(Wühler) who the National Socialists will make short work (kurzen
Prozeß) of once they come to power.
The Liberation of Society from the State (Befreiung der Gesellschaft vom
Staat) first appears in the anarchosyndicalist journal “Internationale”
July 20: KPD proposes to the SPD and labor unions a general strike for
the date to protest the scheduled ...The Social Democratic government of
Prussia to be replaced on this date by the Reichswehr.
1933
January: “Die Befreiung der Gesellschaft vom Staat” is published as a
special edition of Fanal, Berlin: Fanal-Verlag.
February 27: On the day of the Reichstag fire, Mühsam is arrested by
members of the SA and taken to the Lehrter Strasse jail.
February 28: Without a trial he is arrested by the SA, and serves time
in Lehrter Strasse jail, Sonnenburg concentration camp, Plötzensee
prison, Brandenburg concentration camp, where he experiences torture and
abuse.
While in Plötzensee he creates the “Verse und Bilder für Zenzl”.
April 6: Mühsam's 55th birthday; the SA breaks into the protective
custody unit [Schutzhaft] where Mühsam is being held and takes
possession of the political prisoners, who are brought to the
dilapidated Sonnenburg prison, now being used as a concentration camp
[Hirte, p.439]
1934
February 2: Transported to Oranienburg concentration camp on an open
truck.
July 1: The SS (specifically, the “SS-Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler”, under
the command of a certain Eicke) takes over Oranienburg concentration
camp from the SA.
July 9, evening: Mühsam is ordered to go to the commandant's office.
July 10, night: Mühsam is murdered by SS-guards and his body hung in a
latrine; international protest ensues. [Hirte, p.448]
July 15: Zenzl Mühsam emigrates to Prague.
July 16: Buried in a poorly attended ceremony at the Waldfriedhof
Berlin-Dahlem. [Hirte p.450; see the passage from Susand Leonard and
Frederic V. Grunfeld quoted in the "Documents" section]
July 23: Memorial celebration for Mühsam is held by the “Pariser Exil
des Schriftstellerverbandes” [cf. Hirte, p.448].
1935
The hundreds of unpublished essays, poems, articles and plays
constituting Mühsam's literary estate (including diaries, letters, and
manuscripts) end up in the hands of the Soviet “People's Commissar for
Internal Affairs” (NKWD), which takes them to Moscow, to be archived in
the Maxim Gorki Institute.
1936
Zenzl Mühsam travels to the Soviet Union at the invitation of the
International Red Aid. She turns over Mühsam's literary estate
(consisting of manuscripts, diaries and letters) to the Maxim Gorki
Institute in Moscow. She is subsequently arrested, spending most of the
next twenty years in various internment camps and penal facilities. [see
the "Documents" tab several brief accounts of Zenzl's travails after
Mühsam's death]
1949
December: Mühsam's autobiographical Namen, Menschen: Unpolitische
Erinnerungen is published in the German Bundesrepublik.
1956
Zenzl Mühsam returns to Germany and takes up residence in Berlin-Pankow.
1962
March 10: Death of Zenzl Mühsam.