Heinrich Welsch

Heinrich Welsch (born 13 October 1888 in Saarlouis – died 23 November 1976 in Saarbrücken) was a politician but not a member of a political party. He was Minister President of Saarland in 1955 and 1956.

From 1908 to 1911 he studied law at the Universities of Freiburg, Munich and Bonn. In 1911 he graduated from the 1st state exam and then was a trainee at the local courts and Merzig Saarlouis, the District Court and the Prosecutor's Office and the Saarbrücken Higher Regional Court of Cologne. In 1921 he passed the 2nd state examination and was then until 1934 Attorney in Saarbrücken. Then he was until 1935 when the provincial government in Trier Speaker and head of the state police office. From 1935 to 1936 he acted as a representative of Germany at the Supreme Court vote in Saarland, which was to monitor the referendum on the membership of the Saarland. Then he served until 1945 as Chief Prosecutor at the Higher Regional Court in Zweibrücken. During this period he was also 1938-1940 Special Representative with the authority of the Reich Commissioner for the reunion of Austria with the German Reich and from 1940 to 1945 head of the German justice administration in occupied Lorraine.

Even after the war took Welsch numerous functions: From 1948 to 1957 he was president of the National Insurance Office and the country's supply Court of Saarland and 1950 Chairman of the Board of the Railways of the Saarland. Activities during the Nazi era

In the years 1934/1935 Welsch led the Gestapo office in Trier, collected in the spy reports from the Saarland on antifascists, signed by Welsch and were forwarded by Secret State Police Office in Berlin. Welsch provided among others lists of recipients of the newspaper "New Post Saar" (Ed .: John Hoffmann), including 22 pastors, and lists of Communist functionaries in the Saar. This information gave the Nazis the basis for persecution, torture and murder. [1]

Welsch's career in the Third Reich has several major stations:

Representatives of the German Reich in polls court

Attorney General in Zweibrücken

Special Representative of the Reich Ministry of Justice in Austria

Chief of the entire administration of justice in Lorraine

From 1951 to 1952 Welsch was the director of the Ministry of Labor and Welfare, and after the resignation of the Saarland Prime Minister Johannes Hoffmann, who thus drew the consequences of the rejection of the favored him Saar Statute, he was, although he belonged to no party, on 29 October 1955 his successor as prime minister and at the same time Minister of Justice and Minister of Labor and Welfare. On 18 December 1955, the parliament of Saarland was newly elected. Welsch ruled with his Cabinet until January 10, 1956. His successor then was Hubert Ney.

1956-1973 Welsch was president of the National Association Saar the German Red Cross.

Heinrich Welsch was awarded the Grand Cross of Merit with Star and Sash of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany. [2]