Who we are
Dipl. Ing. Hans Schellenberg - Conscripted into service
Lifetime: 1891-1969
Profession: Engineer
Employment at the plant: 1926-1956
Grounds for discriminaton/persecution: "Half-Jew" [Nazi terminology]
Fate: Compulsory service (“Organization Todt”); survived
The last months of the war were especially demanding for engineer Hans Schellenberg. In 1945, his son Hans-Herwig was killed in action. Hans Schellenberg himself was forced to serve in “Organization Todt” from December 1944. The organization was responsible for the construction of protective and armament projects, especially in the occupied territories, using countless forced laborers. Schellenberg was sent to the special construction unit in Eschershausen, in the district of Holzminden, more than 350 kilometers from his home in Ludwigshafen, where he had lived with his wife Gertrud and two sons in a company-owned apartment on Rupprechtstraße since 1932.
Notification of deportation
Under the Nazi regime, Hans Schellenberg was classified as a “half-Jew" [Nazi terminology] because he had two Jewish grandparents. Like others in similar circumstances, he was forcibly transferred from his job as an engineer in the technical department of the Ludwigshafen plant to “Organization Todt.” His service order stated that he must report “on December 4, 1944, at 4:00 p.m. in Schifferstadt [...] for deportation.” He must have felt it particularly discriminatory that he was deployed as a construction worker in Eschershausen, despite his qualifications. Given his advanced age – Hans Schellenberg was already 53 years old in 1944 – the work imposed on him must also have been very physically demanding.
“Severe physical impairment”
The fact that he was unable to fulfill the duties of his compulsory service to the degree expected was suggested in a letter from the personnel department of the Ludwigshafen plant to the local employment office in early February 1945. It stated that Schellenberg had been removed from construction labor duty by the end of 1944 “due to a severe hearing impairment.” Since then, the engineer had been performing cleaning tasks. For I.G. Farben, this was reason enough to request his reassignment back to Ludwigshafen: “Mr. Schellenberg is currently greatly missed due to his many years of specialized experience in the planning and operation of energy systems.” His employer also emphasized that he was “obviously unsuitable for the work assigned to him” due to “his advanced age and severe physical impairment.” However, the company’s intervention was unsuccessful. Schellenberg had to fulfill his compulsory service until the end of the war.
“Victim of fascism”
On November 9, 1946, Hans Schellenberg was officially recognized as a “victim of fascism.” The records do not show whether this recognition was solely based on the compulsory service imposed on him or whether there were additional reasons. It is also not known whether he held and expressed a critical view of the Nazi regime, or whether he suffered from further discrimination and persecution as a "half-Jew". All we know is that he considered emigrating with his family in 1939. He expressed his interest in a position brokered by I.G. Farben as an engineer for a Turkish bank in Ankara, which was looking for a specialist to oversee the industrial companies it managed. Of course, the transfer never happened.
As of June 29, 1945, Hans Schellenberg resumed work in the construction office at the Ludwigshafen plant, until his retirement in December 1956. He died in Ludwigshafen in 1969.
