Hilarius Gilges

Hilarius Gilges (28 April 1909 – 20 June 1933) was a black German actor, dancer and communist political activist. He was murdered at the age of 24 by the Nazi party.

Life Hilarius Gilges was one of the few black Germans born in the country before the First World War. His mother Maria Stüttgen was a white German textile worker Maria married Franz Peter Gilges in 1915, giving the boy the family name Gilges.

Gilges grew up in the working class milieu of Düsseldorf and joined German Communist Youth in about 1925 or 1926. He became an amateur actor with the communist agitprop theatre group "Nordwest ran" directed by Wolfgang Langhoff. His radical politics led in 1931 to his arrest and sentencing to one year in prison. After his release in 1932 he continued as an active communist agitator.

Gilges married Katharina Hubertine Laatsch (born Vogels) and fathered two children.

Death In early 1933, after the Nazis seized power, he attempted to go into hiding, but his visibility due to his skin color made this difficult. In June 1933, he was arrested in his apartment in the city's Altstadt district (Old Town) district of Düsseldorf. His body was found under a bridge the next day. The perpetrators are believed to have been six members of the Gestapo and SS, but even after the end of Nazi rule, were not tried in court. It shows a relief profile of Gilges.