Käthe Latzke

Käthe Latzke (8 May 1899 - 31 March 1945) was a German political activist (KPD) who resisted Nazism and spent most of her final twelve years in state detention. Her health having been broken, she died in Ravensbrück concentration camp.

Life Käthe Latzke came from a working-class family in Königsberg in East Prussia, which at that time was part of Germany. The accusation, which was an extremely serious one, referred to Westermann's advocacy of closer collaboration with the Social Democratic Party (SPD) in order to present a more united front on the left to resist the threat of electoral success by the extreme right. Latzke was also subjected to appalling mistreatment, but she survived and on 26 June 1935 faced the Hamburg District High Court. She received a two-year prison sentence which she served at the Lübeck detention facility. After the two years had been spent, she was held for several more years in "protective detention" ("Schutzhaft") on the other side of the country, at the Moringen concentration camp.

In 1940 she was released. The serious mistreatment to which she had been subjected was apparent from her physical condition. She was suffering from edema (dropsy) on her legs, typhus and heart damage. Her released was made conditional on her not returning to her Hamburg home base, and she therefore settled in Stralsund. Through Paul and Magda Thürey, she nevertheless established contacts with the Hamburg based resistance group round Bernhard Bästlein. At the end of 1943, at the request of the :de:Staatspolizeileitstelle HamburgHamburg Gestapo, she was rearrested, and in April 1944 she was transferred to Ravensbrück concentration camp. Here she died on 31 March 1945, following complications arising from the typhus to which she had fallen victim.