August Dickmann
August Dickmann | |
|---|---|
.png) August Dickmann in 1936 | |
| Born | January 7, 1910 |
| Died | September 15, 1939 (aged 29) |
| Cause of death | Execution by firing squad |
August Dickmann (January 7, 1910 - September 15, 1939) was one of Jehovah's Witnesses[1] and a Conscientious objector from Germany, and the first person to be killed for rejecting military service during World War II.[2] He was one of many German Jehovah's Witnesses executed because of his religious beliefs during the Nazi regime.[3] Commanding the firing squad that murdered Dickmann was SS officer Rudolf Höss, who was later to become the longest-serving commandant of Auschwitz concentration and extermination camp.
References
[edit]- ^ "He Died for a Principle". wol.jw.org. Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania. Retrieved September 4, 2022.
- ^ Germans execute objector to war: first conscientious resister was member of Jehovah´s Witnesses sect. New York Times; Sep 17, 1939; p. 26
- ^ "Sachsenhausen Memorial to Honor One of Jehovah's Witnesses Executed by Nazis". JW.ORG. JW Newsroom (Germany). Retrieved September 4, 2022.
Further reading
[edit]- Detlef Garbe (2008). Between Resistance and Martyrdom: Jehovah's Witnesses in the Third Reich, The University of Wisconsin Press, pp. 415–416. ISBN 9780299207946