The Bayerische Staatsbibliothek during National Socialism

The records of the Generaldirektion der Bayerischen Staatlichen Bibliotheken (Directorate General of the Bavarian State Libraries) as well as of the State Ministry of Education and Culture and, in particular, the numerous personal logs and private correspondence between the former employees offer deep insights into the procedures at the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek between 1933 and 1945. According to this, no department remained untouched by National Socialism.

As a result, the seizure of power by the National Socialists in Bavaria on 9 March 1933 soon had its effect on the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek as well: On 7 April, the government of the Reich decreed the "Gesetz zur Wiederherstellung des Berufsbeamtentums" (law for the reconstitution of the civil service). Consequently, the academic librarian Max Stefl (1888 – 1973), the applicant for the middle grade of library service Paul Schumacher and the administrative assistant Marianne Lacher lost their jobs. They were regarded as not politically reliable, since they had made critical statements about National Socialism during political discussions among colleagues. In 1935, the managing librarian Otto Hartig (1876 – 1945) was removed for political reasons to a post at the Staatsbibliothek Bamberg (Bamberg State Library).

In 1935 the Director General Georg Reismüller (1882 – 1936), in office since 1929, was dismissed from his post. He fell victim to an intrigue, which was carried out among others by his deputy Georg Leidinger (1870 – 1945), who aspired to the post of director general. On 23 March, the Political Police arrested Reismüller. As of 1 July 1935, he was temporarily retired. In October, Reismüller was interrogated at the State Ministry for Education and Culture. Subsequently the ministry applied for disciplinary action at the Oberlandesgericht München (provincial high court, Munich). Reismüller was accused of having purchased and processed antinational-socialist writings as well as of having withheld texts in favour of National Socialism from library users. Reismüller fell grievously sick and died soon after in 1936.

Georg Reismüller

Chief library councillor and member of the NSDAP Rudolf Kummer (1896 – 1987) was among the driving forces behind these dismissals. Starting in 1935, he directed the department general for librarianship at the Reich Ministry of Education, Sciences and Public Instruction and managed to influence from this post the composition of staff at the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek.

On 1 October 1935, Rudolf Buttmann (1885 – 1947) succeeded Reismüller in the role of director general. Buttmann was an academic librarian trained at the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek as well as a long-standing politician in the service of the NSDAP with the membership card number "four". The convinced National Socialist, nonetheless, directed the library according to professional standards. The new director general appointed excellent librarians, Emil Gratzl (1877 – 1957) and Otto Handwerker (1877 – 1947), as his deputies. In the case of promotions, he usually put great store by the qualifications and the entitlement of his staff according to their seniority. In addition, however, his applications always contained statements in merit of the political preference of functionaries and employees.

Buttmann, thus, promoted Heinz Zirnbauer (b. 1902), who jointly with Rudolf Kummer had been in favour of the dismissals of Max Stefl and Georg Reismüller, to a distant post. Taking advantage of the political circumstances, he had him removed to Speyer as director of the Pfälzische Landesbibliothek (Palatinate State Library).

In 1941, Buttmann also displayed unrelenting harshness in his dealings with the unskilled labourer Wilfried Bering, who had taken part in a discussion among colleagues about his personal stance towards the NS regime and towards the progress of the Second World War. Buttmann not only fired Bering without notice but also denounced him for treason with the Geheime Staatspolizei (Secret State Police). A special court trial was convened, at the conclusion of which the Geheime Staatspolizei again arrested Bering. Bering died on 15 January 1945 at the concentration camp Dachau.

Director General Rudolf Buttmann

The outbreak of the Second World War constituted an important watershed in the work of the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek. From then on, staff was mainly occupied with security measures. In 1941 search started for secure storage facilities outside Munich. In 1942, Buttmann ordered the location directory to be recorded on film and the catalogues to be moved to storage rooms considered relatively fireproof by the Munich building authority. By the time, the library building received its first heavy air-raid damage on 9/ 10 March 1943, ten thousands of manuscripts and incunabula had been moved into safety. Buttmann, however, arranged the rescue of the majority of the book collections rather late. Around one fifth of the entire collections – between 400,000 and 500,000 books – were destroyed by fire and by the firefighting operations. As the result of a second conflagration in the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek in April 1944, lending and reading room operations finally collapsed. Solely the acquisitions department continued to function.

In 1946 began the reconstruction of the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek. In 1947 the library staff started once more with the back office administration in the former NSDAP buildings in the Arcisstraße. From 1948, it became once more possible to borrow books. In 1952, the administration and main departments returned to the premises at Ludwigstraße. It took as long to bring back the collections from safe storage. The sorting and shelving was completed by January 1955 – with the exception of newspapers and maps.