Fritz Heckert

Friedrich "Fritz" Carl Heckert (28 March 1884 – 7 April 1936) was a German trade unionist and politician who co-founded the Spartacus League and the Communist Party of Germany. He was a member of the Reichstag from 1924 to 1933, a leading Comintern functionary, and briefly served as the Saxon Economic Minister in 1923.

Early life

Fritz Heckert was born in Chemnitz on 28 March 1884, the son of a working-class family; his father was a knife maker and his mother a glove weaver. Both belonged to the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD). After school, Heckert learned the bricklaying trade and attended trade school.

Political career Returning to Chemnitz in early 1912, Heckert became a full-time union secretary. During World War I, he was one of the co-founders of the Spartacus League and the Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany (USPD). After the death of Karl Wilhelm Stolle, Heckert ran in the Reichstag by-election on 13 May 1918 in the constituency, but was easily defeated by Social Democrat . Their opposing candicacies were a breach of the Burgfrieden truce.

"Fritz Heckert; led the communist group of delegates—together with Eugen Leviné—at the First Congress of Councils."

In November 1918, he became chairman of the Chemnitz Workers' and Soldiers' Council. Heckert was one of the delegates to the founding party conference of the KPD on 30 December 1918. The name "Communist Party of Germany" was his suggestion.

Under the leadership of Heinrich Brandler and Heckert, the Chemnitz KPD organisation was one of the strongest in Germany. At the side of his friend Brandler, Heckert rose to the Central Committee of the KPD (ZK) after the unification party congress with the USPD in December 1920. Except for a brief interruption in 1924, he remained a member of the Central Committee until his death in 1936. Heckert was temporarily the KPD's representative at the Red International of Labor Unions in Moscow, then from 1922 onward he was the deputy of Jacob Walcher, the head of the trade union department at the KPD headquarters in Berlin. During this time and the subsequent illegality of the KPD in 1923–24, Heckert was actively involved in the party's preparations for a civil war. This resulted in his imprisonment in October 1924, which lasted until July 1925 when the Reichstag passed a resolution recognizing Heckert's parliamentary immunity.

Heckert died of a stroke in Moscow on 7 April 1936. His urn was buried in the Kremlin Wall Necropolis. Along with (1893–1921), (1884–1921) and Clara Zetkin (1857–1933), he is one of the few Germans to be buried at the Kremlin Wall. His widow Wilma was given an honorary grave in the Pergolenweg grave complex of the Memorial to the Socialists at the Zentralfriedhof Friedrichsfelde.

Works What Happened in Germany? (English) Moscow: Party Publishing House, 1933. Heckert Archive at Marxists.org.