Elisabeth Schmitz Resigns from Teaching


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Following the events of November 9, 1938, Elisabeth Schmitz drew the personal consequence of no longer serving the Nazi state. She no longer wanted to be the civil servant of a government that allows synagogues to be set on fire. She had ceased going to her school since the night of the pogrom, initially with the aid of a medical certificate.


The forty-five year old submitted an application for retirement on December 31, 1938. She wrote to the Berliner school board: I have become increasingly doubtful whether I can teach my purely ideological subjects – religion, history, German – as the Nazi state expects and demands of me. And she stated: Since this constant moral conflict has become unbearable, I feel compelled to submit the application above.


Thanks to civil servants well-disposed toward her, her application was approved on April 1, 1939 and she was granted a pension.


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  • © Original: Dietgard Meyer. Abdruck: H. Erhart/I. Meseberg-Haubold/D. Meyer: Katharina Staritz 1903–1953. Dokumentation 1: 1903–1942. © Neukirchener Verlagsgesellschaft Neukirchen-Vluyn, 2002.