Biographie

August Fuhrmann was born in Kassel on 27 September 1899. The trained electrician was a member of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) as well as a member of the district management of the Revolutionary Union Opposition (RGO). As a political opponent of the Nazis, Fuhrmann was held in captivity for much of the period between 1933 and 1945.

On 5 March 1933, August Fuhrmann was taken into "protective custody" for the first time. He was held at the Kassel detention centre for almost a year. Although he was acquitted, he was then transferred to the Breitenau concentration camp nonetheless, where he was detained only a few weeks before his release on 16 March 1934. However, on 23 October 1936, the High Regional Court of Kassel again charged Fuhrmann with "preparing high treason". He was accused of having spoken with another former KPD official about the possibilities of rebuilding the banned Communist Party. The High Regional Court of Kassel then sentenced Fuhrmann to two years and six months in the correctional house in Wehlheiden (Kassel). After that, a three-month sentence followed in the Kassel police prison. In June 1938 he was finally transferred to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp where he would be imprisoned until May 1941. From June 1941 until his release in April 1945, August Fuhrmann was a prisoner in the Natzweiler concentration camp. There, Fuhrmann befriended the French artist Henry Gayot, who gave him several drawings from everyday camp life after the camp was liberated. Among these drawings was a portrait of August Fuhrmann himself. Upon his release, August Fuhrmann had been in prison for a total of 121 months.

After the end of the war, August Fuhrman, whose health had seriously deteriorated, became dependent on special support services and benefits, which he received as someone who had been persecuted by the Nazis. He found work as an assistant guard at the Wehlheiden prison and finally as the operations manager from October 1945 because the American military government had released much of the prison staff who had been Nazi party members. August Fuhrmann died in December 1947 from the complications of pneumonia that remained untreated during his concentration camp imprisonment.