Hermann Maaß was a German

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 member of the Resistance

German Resistance

The German resistance was the opposition by individuals and groups in Germany to Adolf Hitler or the National Socialist regime between 1933 and 1945. Some of these engaged in active plans to remove Adolf Hitler from power and overthrow his regime...

 against the Nazi régime

Nazi Germany

Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...

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Biography

Maaß was born in Bromberg, Province of Posen

Province of Posen

The Province of Posen was a province of Prussia from 1848–1918 and as such part of the German Empire from 1871 to 1918. The area was about 29,000 km2....

, German Empire

German Empire

The German Empire refers to Germany during the "Second Reich" period from the unification of Germany and proclamation of Wilhelm I as German Emperor on 18 January 1871, to 1918, when it became a federal republic after defeat in World War I and the abdication of the Emperor, Wilhelm II.The German...

 (modern Bydgoszcz, Poland), he volunteered for the German Army

German Army (German Empire)

The German Army was the name given the combined land forces of the German Empire, also known as the National Army , Imperial Army or Imperial German Army. The term "Deutsches Heer" is also used for the modern German Army, the land component of the German Bundeswehr...

 in World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

 and was wounded in a gas attack in 1918. After the war he studied philosophy, psychology, and sociology at the Humboldt University of Berlin

Humboldt University of Berlin

The Humboldt University of Berlin is Berlin's oldest university, founded in 1810 as the University of Berlin by the liberal Prussian educational reformer and linguist Wilhelm von Humboldt, whose university model has strongly influenced other European and Western universities...

 and the political science institute (Hochschule für Politik).

Maaß worked as general manager of the Reich Committee of German Youth Associations (Reichsausschuß der deutschen Jugendverbände). After the Nazis seized power

Machtergreifung

Machtergreifung is a German word meaning "seizure of power". It is normally used specifically to refer to the Nazi takeover of power in the democratic Weimar Republic on 30 January 1933, the day Hitler was sworn in as Chancellor of Germany, turning it into the Nazi German dictatorship.-Term:The...

 in 1933 he lost this position because all youth organizations were forced to conform to the party line

Gleichschaltung

Gleichschaltung , meaning "coordination", "making the same", "bringing into line", is a Nazi term for the process by which the Nazi regime successively established a system of totalitarian control and tight coordination over all aspects of society. The historian Richard J...

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Maaß now became a close associate of Wilhelm Leuschner

Wilhelm Leuschner

Wilhelm Leuschner was a social-democratic politician who opposed the Third Reich....

, the former minister of the interior of the People's State of Hesse.

Maaß turned down a teaching position at the Harvard University

Harvard University

Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...

 to continue his fight against National Socialism from within Germany. He organized resistance among former labor unionists and had close contact to the Kreisau Circle

Kreisau Circle

The Kreisau Circle was the name the Nazi Gestapo gave to a group of German dissidents centered on the Kreisau estate of Helmuth James Graf von Moltke. The Kreisauer Kreis is celebrated as one of the instances of German opposition to the Nazi regime...

 of Helmuth James Graf von Moltke

Helmuth James Graf von Moltke

Helmuth James Graf von Moltke was a German jurist who, as a draftee in the German Abwehr, acted to subvert German human-rights abuses of people in territories occupied by Germany during World War II and subsequently became a founding member of the Kreisau Circle resistance group, whose members...

, Peter Yorck von Wartenburg

Peter Yorck von Wartenburg

Peter Graf Yorck von Wartenburg was a German jurist and a member of the German Resistance against Nazism.-Biography:...

 and Adam von Trott zu Solz

Adam von Trott zu Solz

Adam von Trott zu Solz was a German lawyer and diplomat who was involved in the conservative opposition to the Nazi regime, and who played a central part in the 20 July Plot...

. In the autumn of 1943 Maaß met Claus von Stauffenberg at his home.
After the failure of Stauffenberg's attempt to kill Hitler Maaß was arrested on 8 August 1944 and imprisoned at Ravensbrück concentration camp

Ravensbrück concentration camp

Ravensbrück was a notorious women's concentration camp during World War II, located in northern Germany, 90 km north of Berlin at a site near the village of Ravensbrück ....

. He was charged at the Volksgerichtshof for his involvement in the resistance movement next to Adolf Reichwein

Adolf Reichwein

Adolf Reichwein was a German educator, economist, and cultural policymaker for the SPD. He was also a resistance fighter in Nazi Germany.-Biography:...

, Julius Leber

Julius Leber

Julius Leber was a German politician of the SPD and a member of the German Resistance against the Nazi régime.-Early life:...

 and Gustav Dahrendorf

Gustav Dahrendorf

Gustav Dietrich Dahrendorf was a German SPD politician.-Biography:Dahrendorf was born in Hamburg, he served as member of the German Parliament from November 1932 to June 22, 1933. He was also several times a member of the Hamburg Parliament...

. Maaß, Reichwein and Leber were sentenced to death on 20 October 1944, with Maaß and Reichwein executed the same day at 3.40 p.m. at Plötzensee prison

Plötzensee Prison

Plötzensee Prison was a Prussian institution built in Berlin between 1869 and 1879 near the lake Plötzensee, but in the neighbouring borough of Charlottenburg, on Hüttigpfad off Saatwinkler Damm. During Adolf Hitler's time in power from 1933 to 1945, more than 2,500 people were executed at...

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His 43 year old wife died of pneumonia

Pneumonia

Pneumonia is an inflammatory condition of the lung—especially affecting the microscopic air sacs —associated with fever, chest symptoms, and a lack of air space on a chest X-ray. Pneumonia is typically caused by an infection but there are a number of other causes...

5 weeks after his death, they left behind 6 underage children.