85 Notable Peacemakers in Germany

Click here for peace monuments in Germany.
Click here for return to worldwide list of notable peacemakers (& for meaning of symbols).
1098-1179 - Hildegard of Bingen - Composer, philosopher, Christian mystic, Benedictine abbess, visionary & polymath. "Sibyl of the Rhine" Wrote first surviving morality play.
1495-1527 - Michael Sattler - Benedictine Monk. Became an Anabaptist leader. Helped develop the Schleitheim Confession. "Burned after severe torture" His wife Margareta & others were drowned.

1577-1640 - Peter Paul Rubens - Flemish Baroque painter, classically educated humanist scholar, art collector & diplomat. See Classic Peace Art.

1691-1768 - Conrad Beissel - Charismatic religious leader. Came to America in 1720. Founded the Ephrata Community in Pennsylvania in 1732.

1700

1724-1804 - Immanuel Kant - Enlightenment philosopher. Wrote "Towards Perpetual Peace" in 1795.

1759-1805 - Friedrich Schiller - Poet. Wrote Ode to Joy ("All men will become brothers.") - 4th movement of Beethoven's 9th symphony - in 1785.

1797-1856 - Heinrich Heine - Romantic poet. Wrote "Where they burn books, they will ultimately also burn people" in 1821.

1800

1813-1887 - Johannes Ronge - Defrocked priest. Opposed antisemitism. Founded Freireligiöse / Freethinkers.

1824-1899 - Ludwig Büchner - Philosopher, physiologist & physician. Founded Deutsche Freidenkerbund / German Freethinkers League in 1881.

1829-1906 - Carl Christian Schurz - Statesman & reformer, Minister to Spain, etc. Said "My country, right or wrong; if right, to be kept right; and if wrong, to be set right." Husband of Margareth Meyer-Schurz (qv).

1833-1876 - Margarethe Meyer-Schurz - Opened the first German-language kindergarten in USA. Wife of Carl Schurz (qv).

1847-1898 - Christoph Moritz von Egidy - Prussian officer, pacifist, Christian reformer & moral philosopher. Wrote "I Have Dared It." Memorial in Potsdam. P

1850
1851-1933 - Felix Adler - Professor of political & social ethics, rationalist, popular lecturer, religious leader & social reformer. Founded Ethical Culture movement in 1877.

1857-1943 - Anita Augspurg - Lawyer, actor & feminist. Germany's 1st female jurist. Partner of Lida Gustava Heymann (qv). At Intl Women's Conf for Peace & Freedom (1915). Conf

1858-1941 - Ludwig Quidde - Pacifist. Opposed German militarism from Emperor Wilhelm II to Hitler. P 1927 with Ferdnand Buisson

1860-1922 - Margarethe Lenore Selenka - Zoologist, anthropologist, feminist, peace activist & pacifist. One of the first female scientists whose work was widely recognized. P

1864-1921 - Alfred Hermann Fried - Pacifist, publicist & journalist. Co-founded German peace movement. P 1911 with Tobias Asser

1867-1919 - Kurt Eisner - Politician & journalist. Declared Bavaria a free state & republic in 1918. Blamed Prussia for bringing about World War I.
1867-1922 - Walther Rathenau - Industrialist & statesman. Foreign Minister during Weimar Republic. Assassinated two months after signing Treaty of Rapallo.

1867-1945 - Käthe Schmidt Kollwitz - Painter & sculptor of victims of poverty, hunger & war. Three museums in Germany. Son buried in Belgium.

1868-1943 - Lida Gustava Heymann - Prominent in bourgeois women's movement. Partner of Anita Augspurg (qv). Attended Intl Women's Conf for Peace & Freedom in 1915. Conf
1868-1947 - Anna B. Eckstein - Teacher & pacifist. Sponsored by Edwin Ginn (qv). Attended many peace conferences. Born & died in Germany. P Conf

1871-1919 - Rosa Luxemburg - Marxist theorist, philosopher, economist & revolutionary socialist. #6
1871-1945 - Hermann Kallenbach - Architect & Zionist. Had intimate & long lasting friendship Mahatma Gandhi starting in South Africa.

1872-1949 - Oswald Garrison Villard - Journalist. Pacfist. Wealthy. A founder of the American Anti-Imperialist League. P

1873-1954 - Gertrud Baumer - Politician who actively participated in the Feminist movement. Reichstag member 1919-1932.

1875-1955 - Thomas Mann - Novelist, short story writer, social critic, philanthropist & essayist. 1929

1878-1929 - Gustav Stresemann - Liberal politician. Chancellor & Foreign Minister during Weimar Republic. 1926 with Aristide Briand

1878-1929 - Kästle, Klaus (20xx & ongoing), One World - Nations Online.

1879-1955 - Albert Einstein - Physicist. Opposed WW-I. Did peace work in 1930s. Issued Russell-Einstein Manifesto in 1955. P 1921
1879-1968 - Otto Hahn - Chemist & Nobel laureate. Pioneer in radioactivity & radiochemistry. "The father of nuclear chemistry." Campained against nuclear weapons.

1881-1920 - Hans Paasche - Navy officer, politician, big game hunter & "combative pacifist." Attempted to change the Prussian Deutschland-über-alles military mindset. P
1881-1965 - Willhelm Lamszus - Teacher. Wrote novel "The Human Slaughterhouse – Pictures of the Coming War" in 1912 anticipating horrors of WW-I.

1882-1950 - John Rabe - Businessman. Tried to stop Japanese atrocities during the Nanking Massacre. "The Good Nazi."
1882-1965 - Alice Herz - Peace activist. Fled Germany in 1933. Immolated herself in Detroit to protest Vietnam War. Mother of Helga Herz (qv).

1883-1963 - Rudolf Gunst - Friedensbund Deutscher Katholiken/German Catholics' Peace Association. Click here for more information. Named by Gerard Lössbroek.
1883-1971 - Franziskus Maria Stratmann - Friedensbund Deutscher Katholiken/German Catholics' Peace Association. Click here for more information. Named by Gerard Lössbroek.

1885-1969 - Friedrich Siegmund-Schultze - Co-founded Fellowship of Reconciliation with Henry Hodgkin in 1914.

1886-1965 - Paul Tillich - Theologian & existentialist philosopher. Wrote Courage to Be in 1952 & Systematic Theology in 1951–63.

1887-1944 - Max Josef Metzger - Priest. Established the German Catholics’ Peace Assn. in 1919. Executed by Nazis.

1889-1938 - Carl von Osietzky. Journalist. Exposed Germany's Treaty of Versailles violations. Opposed Hitler. P 1935

1890-1935 - Kurt Tucholsky - Important journalist of Weimar Republic. Satirist. Warned against National Socialism. His books burned by Nazis. P

1891-1942 - Edith Stein - German-Jewish philosopher, nun, martyr & saint of the RC Church. Holocaust victim.

1892-1984 - Martin Niemöller - Anti-Nazi theologian & Lutheran pastor. Wrote "First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out - Because I was not a Socialist..." in 1946.

1894-1967 - Ernst Friedrich - Anarchist. Wrote "War Against War!" in 1924. Operated Anti-War Museum in Berlin 1925-1933. Reopened in 1982. P

1898-1940 - Hermann Stohr - Pacifist & anti-Nazi resistance fighter. P

1898-1970 - Erich Maria Remarque - Wrote anti-war "All Quiet on the Western Front" in 1929 & Three Comrades in 1936.
1898-1990 - Hugo Enomiya Lassalle - Missionary. Built Memorial Cathedral for World Peace in Hiroshima in 1954.

1900

1900-1980 - Erich Fromm - Humanistic philosopher & democratic socialist. Wrote "The Fear of Freedom" in 1941. 1966

1901-1990 - Fritz Eichenberg - Illustrator. His work concerned religion, social justice & nonviolence.

1906-1945 - Dietrich Bonhoeffer - Theologian & pacifist. Lived twice in NY City & once in London. Nazi resister & Holocaust victim. P
1906-1975 - Hannah Arendt - Political theorist. Fled to France in 1933. Fled to USA in 1941 on visa issued by Hiram Bingham IV (qv). Wrote "The Origins of Totalitarianism" in 1951.
1906-2005 - Hans Bethe - Manhattan Project physicist. For Partial Test Ban Treaty & peaceful use of nuclear energy. 1967 1992

1907-1944 - Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg - Army officer. Central figure of Resistance movement within the Wehrmacht.
1907-1945 - Helmuth James Graf von Moltke - As a draftee acted to subvert German human-rights abuses. Jurist. Resisted Hitler. Home is now Conference Center for European Understanding.

1908-1974 - Oskar Schindler - Industrialist credited with saving over 1,100 Jews. Buried in Israel. Subject of the film "Schindler's List."

1909-1944 - Adam von Trott zu Solz - Lawyer & diplomat. Played central role July 20 Plot against Hitler . Plaque in Postdam.
1909-2002 - Marion Gräfin Dönhoff - Journalist & intellectual. Member of anti-Nazi resistance.

1910-1939 - August Dickmann - First conscientious objector executed by the Nazis in Germany during World War II. CO

1911-1977 - E. F. (Fritz) Schumacher - Economist & statistician. Rhodes Scholar. Protoge of John Maynard Keynes. Wrote "Small is Beautiful" in 1973. His library is in Masschusetts (USA).

1913-1992 - Willy Brandt - Chancellor 1969–1974. Espoused Ostpolitik to improve relations with East Germany, Poland etc. 1971
1913-1998 - William Denson - US Army lawyer. Proscecuted all Nazi war criminals in US Zone of Occupied Germany.
1913-2010 - Helga Herz - Peace activist. Fled Germany in 1933. Received German reparations in 2000. See Helga Herz Peace Archives at Wayne State Univ.

1914-2004 - Rainer Hildebrandt - Anti-communist resistance fighter. Founded Museum Haus am Checkpoint Charlie ("1st museum of intl nonviolent protest"). Wife=Alexandra Hildebrandt (qv).

1915-2012 - Albert Otto Hirschman - Economist. Wrote "Exit, Voice, and Loyalty" & "The Rhetoric of Reaction: Perversity, Futility, Jeopardy."

1918-1943 - Hans Scholl - Student. Opposed Hilter in non-violent White Rose resistance group. Executed with his sister Sophie.

1921-1943 - Sophie Scholl - Student. Opposed Hilter in non-violent White Rose resistance group. Executed with her brother Hans.

1923-Alive - Henry Kissinger - US Secretary of State. Signed Paris Peace Accords in 1973. 1973 with Le Duc Tho

1924-2003 - Ernst B. Haas - Political scientist. Authority on international relations theory. Founder of neofunctionalism.

1925-1942 - Helmuth Hübener - Mormon. One of the youngest opponents of the Third Reich to be sentenced to death by the Volksgerichtshof. Executed at age 17 in Plötzensee Prison.

1929-1945 - Anne Frank - Holocaust victim. Died of typhus at age 16 in Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. Famous for diary published in 1947.
1929-2003 - Dorothee Sölle - Writer & liberation theologian. Coined the term Christofascism in 1970 to describe fundamentalists.
1929-2012 - Thomas Wechs, Jr. - Founded Peace Museum-Lindau 1980, Peace History Museum-Bad Hindelang 1999 & on-line Friedenshistorisches Museum-Augsburg 2009.

1930-2000 - Klaus Rauterberg - Pastor of (Lutheran) Evangelical Church. Curator since 1981 of Antikriegshaus/Peace Museum Sievershausen between Hanover & Brunswick. Dutch wife Jacoba.

1933-Alive - Werner Fornos - President of The Population Insitute. "The foremost spokesman on global population issues." 1991 w/Lester R. Brown
1933-Alive - Ursula Grattapaglia - Esperantist. Works at Bona Espero in Brazil since 1974. Active in Esperanto Rotarian Fellowship (RADE).

1940-Alive - Tommy Spree - Nephew of Ernst Friedrich (qv). Reopened Anti-Kriegs/Anti-War Museum in Berlin in 1982. Click here for more information. P Named by Gerard Lössbroek.

1944-Alive - Jakob von Uexkull - Lecturer, activist & politician. Established Right Livelihood Award (aka "Alternative Nobel Prize") 1980 & World Future Council 2006.

1947-1992 - Petra Kelly - Helped found German Green Party after living in USA 1959-70. Murdered at age 44. 1982
1947-Alive - Gunter Demnig - Artist. Laid about some 15,000 Stolpersteine/Stumbling Stones in over 345 towns 1997-2008 to honor individual Holocaust victims.

1949-2012 - Gerd Greune - Teacher & peace activist. Key figure in Inst for Intl Assistance & Solidarity (IFIAS) & European Bureau for Conscientious Objection (EBCO). CO

1950

1957-Alive - Peter Rühe - Scholar. Foremost Gandhian activist. Founded & heads Ganditopia & GandhiServe Foundation.

1959-Alive - Alexandra Hildebrandt - Artist. Director of Museum Haus am Checkpoint Charlie ("1st museum of intl nonviolent protest"). Widow of Ranier Hildebrandt (qv).

c1960-Alive - Christian Bartolf - Researcher. Established Gandhi Information Center in Berlin in 1990. Author of Manifesto against conscription & the military system.

c1962-Alive - Laura Poitras - Filmmaker. Made films about Iraq, Guantanemo & Edward Snowden (qv). Now part of First Look Media.

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