Loeper, Wilhelm Friedrich.

Loeper, Wilhelm Friedrich, born 13-10-1883 in Schwerin, the son of a pharmacist. In 1884 his family moved to Friesack (Mark Brandenburg). A short time later the company moved to Roßlau / Elbe, where the father took over a pharmacy. He first attended school in Roßlau, later the Friedrichs-Gymnasium in Dessau, where he passed his high school diploma in 1903. Loeper then embarked on a military career. Wilhelm joined the Reichswehr as a Fahnenjunker in the Pioneer Battalion 2 in Spandau and then completed training at the Neiße Military School. Already in 1904 he was made a leutnant, and after various other commands, eventually a first leutnant in 1912. Then came his transfer to the Magdeburg Pioneer Battalion 4, where he took over command of a searchlight platoon. On 12-07-1915 (war wedding) Wilhelm Loeper married his wife Elisabeth.

After the First World War broke out, Loeper was then deployed between 1914 and 1918 at the Western Front as a Hauptmann and company chief of Pioneer Battalion 19. He was wounded several times.  For the service in the World War I, he was decorated with the both classes of Iron Cross both classes of the Mecklenburg-Schwerin Military Merit Cross, Fredericks Cross, Prussian Service Cross and the Wounded Badge in Black.

After the war ended, Loeper became leader of a Freikorps  that saw deployment both in the Baltic States and the Ruhr area. In this capacity, he was involved in quelling the Spartakus uprising.

With the founding of the Reichswehr, Loeper became Company Chief of Pioneer Battalion 2. In 1923, he worked as an Instructor at the Pionierschule in Munich, and got to know Adolf Hitler  (did you know). Loeper took part in the

of 09-11-1923 and aimed at getting the Pionierschule to fall in and follow Hitler’s orders. After the putsch failed, Loeper was discharged from the Reichswehr in 1924 for his participation.

Loeper joined the NSDAP in 1925. He moved to Dessau and first led the Nazi local as Ortsgruppeführer there. In the same year he became the Gau’s manager and in the end, in 1927, Gauleiter of the Gau of Magdeburg-Anhalt, succeeding Gustav Herman Schmischke. Schmischke’s death date is unknown. Loeper, here left, and with SA leader Victor Lutze

gave himself over to building the Party up in his Gau, and fought against the Bauhaus, which was located in Dessau at that time. In 1928, Loeper became a member of the Anhalt Landtag. Anhalt had a Nazi Land government as early as 1932. As of 1930, Loeper was also a member of the Reichstag for electoral district 10

Loeper became leader of the Nazi Party’s personnel office and publisher of the Trommler. In 1932 he instituted at Schloß Großkühnau (in Dessau) the first Stammabteilung and the Führerschule of the Reichsarbeitsdienst. In the same year came Loeper’s appointment to provincial NSDAP inspector for Middle Germany-Brandenburg.

After the Nazis’ nationwide seizure of power in 1933, Loeper became Reich Governor in Braunschweig and Anhalt. He set up office in Dessau. Also in 1933, the city of Magdeburg made him an honorary citizen, a distinction of which he was posthumously stripped in 1946. In 1934, he was appointed an honorary SS Gruppenführer and an honorary Gau leader of the Reichsarbeitsdienst. In 1935, he became a member of the Academy for German Law.

Death and burial ground of Loeper, Wilhelm Friedrich.

On 23-10-1935, age 52, Wilhelm Loeper died of throat cancer (larynx or throat cancer). His burial, with Adfolf Hitler personal, took place in the Napoleon Tower (Napoleonturm) in Mildensee near Dessau

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