Figure 1.--Here NAZI Interior Minister Wilhelm Frick is greeted by ethnic German children in the Czech Sudetenland (September 23, 1938). Source: Bundesarchiv Bild 121-0041.

Wilhelm Frick was born in Germany (1877). He pursued a career with the police in Munich. He was an early member of the NAZI PArty. He joined Hitler in the abortive Beer Hall Putsch (1923). He was arrested and found guilty of treason. After serving a short term he was released and elected to the Reichstag. He was associated with the NAZI radicals led by vicious anti-Semite Gregor Strasser. He was the first NAZI to achieve a high office when he was appointed as Minister of the Interior in the state of Thuringia. When Adolf Hitler was appointed Chancellor (January 1933), he appointed Frick Minister of the Interior. He was one of the older NAZI leaders. In most of Europe, the Interior Ministry was responsible for the police and law enforcemrent. Because of Germany's federal system, this was not the case when Hitler was initially appointed Chancellor. Hermann Göring in Prussia and Himmler in Bavaria had more control over the police. This changed with the Enabling Act (March 1933) which Frick helped draft. He also helped draft the Nuremberg Acts (September 1935) which stripped Jews of their citzenship and began the organized persecution of German Jews. Frick was involved in a struggle Heinrich Himmler and the Schutzstaffel (SS). Frick was gradually sidelined by Göring and Himmler who took effective contol of the German police and began centralizing them within the SS structure. Frick was finally removed as Minister of the Interior (1943). Hitler appointed him the Protector of Bohemia and Moravia to replace Heyfdricj who was assasinated. He remained there until the end of the War when he fled back to the Reich ahead of the advancing Red Army.

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Created: 4:51 AM 3/14/2011
Last updated: 4:51 AM 3/14/2011