25th November 1939
'Der Reichsprotektor'

'Der Reichsprotektor in Böhmen und Mähren'

At the time of this cover being posted the Reichsprotektor was:

Konstantin von Neurath (1873-1956)

From Wikipedia:

Konstantin Hermann Karl Freiherr von Neurath was a German diplomat and Nazi war criminal who served as Foreign Minister of Germany between 1932 and 1938.

In the early years of the Nazi regime, Neurath was regarded as playing a key role in Hitler's foreign policy pursuits in undermining the Treaty of Versailles and in territorial expansion in the prelude to World War II. However, he was often averse to Hitler's aims for tactical, not necessarily ideological, reasons. That aversion eventually induced Hitler to replace Neurath in 1938 with the more compliant Joachim von Ribbentrop, a fervent Nazi.

In March 1939, Neurath was appointed Reichsprotektor of occupied Bohemia and Moravia, serving as Hitler's personal representative in the protectorate. Hitler chose Neurath in part to pacify the international outrage over the German occupation of Czechoslovakia. Soon after his arrival at Prague Castle, Neurath instituted harsh press censorship and banned political parties and trade unions. He ordered a crackdown on protesting students in October and November 1939 (1,200 student protesters went to concentration camps and nine were executed). He also supervised the persecution of Czech Jews according to the Nuremberg Laws. Draconian as those measures were, Neurath's rule overall was fairly mild by Nazi standards. Notably, he tried to restrain the excesses of his police chief, Karl Hermann Frank.

However, in September 1941, Hitler decided that Neurath's rule was too lenient and so stripped him of his day-to-day powers. Reinhard Heydrich was named as his deputy but in truth held the real power. Heydrich was assassinated in 1942 and succeeded by Kurt Daluege. Neurath officially remained as Reichsprotektor. He tried to resign in 1941, but his resignation was not accepted until August 1943, when he was succeeded by the former Interior Minister Wilhelm Frick. On 21st June 1943, Neurath had been raised to the honorary rank of an SS-Obergruppenführer, the equivalent to a three-star general.

Late in the war, Neurath had contacts with the German resistance.

The Allies prosecuted Neurath at the Nuremberg trials in 1946. The prosecution accused him of 'conspiracy to commit crimes against peace; planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression; war crimes and crimes against humanity'. Neurath's defence strategy was predicated on the fact that his successor and fellow defendant, Ribbentrop, was more culpable for the atrocities committed in the Nazi state than Neurath was.

Neurath was held as a war criminal in Spandau Prison until November 1954, when he was released in the wake of the Paris Conference, officially because of his ill health, as he had suffered a heart attack.

He retired to his family's estates in Enzweihingen, where he died two years later, aged 83.

Contact Brief History to inform us of additional information regarding this page