On July 17, 1940, the communist and former Reichstag deputy Werner Scholem was shot dead. After a life that reflected the promises and tragedies of the German communist movement, he died at the hands of SS officer Johannes Blank in the quarry of Buchenwald concentration camp.

Werner Scholem (geboren am 29. Dezember 1895 in Berlin; gestorben am 17. Juli 1940 im KZ Buchenwald) war ein deutscher, jüdischer Politiker der KPD, Abgeordneter im Reichstag und Opfer des Nationalsozialismus. Scholem wurde 1895 als dritter Sohn von Betty, geb. Hirsch (1866–1946) und Arthur Scholem (1863–1925) geboren.

Dec 29, 2016 · For his patriotic pains, Werner Scholem was one of the first people the Nazis arrested after they took power. Karl-Liebknecht-Haus, the KPD's headquarters from 1926 to 1933. The KPD leaders were arrested by the Gestapo in this building in January 1933, when Hitler became Chancellor. Credit: WikiCommons.

Eighty years ago, on 17 July, the SS guard Johannes Blank murdered Werner Scholem in the Buchenwald concentration camp. Blank shot Scholem in the back. Scholem died wearing a yellow triangle overlaid with a red – a symbol that he was a Jew committed to working-class liberation.

Scholem climbed the party ladder and orchestrated the KPD's ‘Bolshevisation’ campaign, only to be expelled as one of Stalin's opponents in 1926. He was arrested in 1933, and ultimately murdered in the Buchenwald concentration camp seven years later.

Walter Benjamin derided Werner Scholem as a ‘rogue’ in 1924. Josef Stalin referred him as a ‘splendid man’, but soon backtracked and labeled him an ‘imbecile’, while Ernst Thälmann, chairman of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD), …

Apr 29, 2019 · Scholem participated in oppositional communist groups, but he resigned from the Leninbund in 1928 when it ran candidates in an election, against the KPD. He was expelled from his political home, but Scholem remained true to his communist views.

In 1920 he joined the Communist Party (KPD) and in 1921 was elected to a seat in the Prussian Parliament (Preußischer Landtag). In 1924 he became a member of the national parliament (Reichstag) and the Central Committee of the KPD.

Jul 17, 2020 · Als Stalin 1928 eine »Linkswende« einleitete und die Sozialdemokratie zum Hauptfeind erklärte, schwiegen die Kritiker: Werner Scholem und Ruth Fischer traten aus dem Leninbund aus und riefen zur Wahl der KPD auf.

The repeated instances of partisanship by authorities on the side of reaction and emerging fascism would play a key role in the scepticism of KPD-figures such as Scholem regarding the need to defend its constitution and promote a united-front policy.