November 9th: The Significance of This Date for National Socialists
Of all the important dates in the National Socialist calendar, November 9, 1923, stands out for several reasons. It was a failed attempt to seize power by armed force; the ‘putsch’ to take control of the state of Bavaria by seizing the state capital Munich which was halted by a volley of police bullets.
In 1932, the NSDAP publication “Das Braune Heer” made a powerful reference to the march and bloody sacrifices made at Munich in November 1923. “Before Commander’s Hall, Munich, a hundred men lie in their own blood – some dead.”
Yet, the terrible sacrifice was not in vain; despite all the deaths, the arrests, and the banning of the National Socialist Party, the movement survived and rose like a phoenix from the blood and the deaths of November 9th, 1923, and with that example before them, the National Socialists made greater sacrifices, fought, bled and built a movement many millions strong.
Other political ideologies would have withered and died when faced by the sledgehammer of Munich on November 9th, but National Socialism not only survived the ordeal but became a worldwide movement that lives on to this day.
“I am old. I know many things that I did not know in my youth, that goes without saying. And yet: I believe that old people only have something to gain from their age if they take their childhood, their early years, seriously. If they can stand by everything they believed, hoped and loved. If he can’t, then he will be pitifully poor. I can tell you that I am very rich”
Emil Klein, who took part in the march to the Feldherrnhalle when he was 17-years old. He died in 2010 aged 104.
Andreas Bauriedel
04.05.1879 – 09.11.1923
Andreas Bauriedel was born on May 4, 1879 in Aschaffen in Lower Franconia and joined the Koniglich Bayerische Infanterie-Leibregiment in 1899. Bauriedel was discharged as a non-commissioned officer in 1901. In 1914, he went to war with a Landwehr regiment.
He saw action in Luttich, took part in the Winter Battle of Champagne and fought in Russia. The deputy officer was discharged in 1918 when his unit in Vilsbiburg, Bavaria, was disbanded. During the war, he had earned the Blue Ribbon Medal of Merit and the Iron Cross 2nd Class.
Back home, Andreas Bauriedel immediately volunteered for the local army. In 1923, the veteran joined the army and worked as a hat maker. He took part in the march on the Feldherrnhalle as a leader of the 6th company of the Munich SA regiment and carried the flag. As the flag bearer, he was at the head of the procession when the police fired.
Bauriedel fell with the flag in his hand; a comrade pulled it up again before he himself was hit. Mortally wounded, the soldier lay at the feet of Ulrich Graf, who had taken several bullets for his fuhrer. Bauriedel’s blood made the first flag of the NSDAP into the famous Blutfahne (blood flag), which has been missing since the end of the war.
Wilhelm Wolf
19.10.1898 – 09.11.1923
Wilhelm Wolf was born in Munich on October 19, 1898. At the age of fourteen, he finished elementary school and completed an apprenticeship in his parents’ business.
Wilhelm earned his baptism of fire as a soldier in the 2nd Infantry Regiment in 1916. He temporarily lost his sight after two months at the front. After the war, the young front-line soldier returned to his parents’ business to work as a merchant.
A little later, he enlisted in the 3rd Regiment of the 2nd Ehrhardt Marine Brigade. In this unit, but also in the Epp and Oberland Free Corps, Wilhelm Wolf fought in Munich, Berlin and Upper Silesia. Wolf was a member of the NSDAP from 1920.
We will leave the final words to Emil Klein, the 17-year-old who, with his comrades, took part in the putsch attempt. In 1928, Emil Klein took over the leadership of the Hitler Youth in Bavaria, was appointed head of the Hitler Youth in 1935, and was appointed to the German Reichstag in 1936. When war broke out, he volunteered for the Wehrmacht. He was the liaison officer of the Gebirgsjager Regiment 98.
“I took part in the march to the Feldherrnhalle in Munich on November 9, 1923. I was 17-years old at the time.
“I belonged to the Hitler movement and was an SA man in the 1st company of the Munich SA regiment. We marched from the Burgerbraukeller in the direction of Isarbrucke to Marienplatz, singing German marching songs. Here we turned off to Maximilianstrasse and the Felherrnhalle.
“Unarmed as we were, we arrived there, and suddenly we experienced a fire attack by the Bavarian state police, who fired on the front of the platoon with Adolf Hitler, Ulrich Graf and Erich Ludendorf, behind which my company was marching, without warning.
“The sudden attack caused the marching columns to break up. The men sought cover at the roadside and in the houses.The shots faded, silence fell; what had happened?
“16 men had been shot dead. The Hitler movement had its first dead SA men. They fell for Germany.”
Emil Klein, who passed away on February 22, 2010.
“Only The Forgotten Are Dead”
Resources:
Top Image: The Banner Must Stand, Even If The Man Falls – Albert Leo Schlageter. Werner von Axster-Heudtlass, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Lower Images: British Movement Northern
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