Otto Abetz

Heinrich Otto Abetz was born in Schwetzingen. An early supporter of the NSDAP, Abetz represented German interests in France as early as 1938, but was expelled from France on suspicions of endangering domestic security. Following Germany’s invasion of France in May 1940, Joachim von Ribbentrop, Nazi minister of foreign affair, appointed Otto Abetz to a diplomatic post in Paris, and in November of that year, he received the title of Ambassador of the Reich, a position he held until July 1944. Following Hitler’s June 1938 directive, Abetz was responsible for “safeguarding” cultural objects, in particular Jewish-owned objects, a task he carried out with the help of the Wehrmacht and the Geheime Feld Polizei (GFP). Once the ERR emerged in September 1940 as the main agency responsible for cultural plunder in Western Europe, Abetz’s active participation in the looting of cultural property was suspended. His main task was to maintain the stability of Vichy France’s collaboration with the Nazis in furthering their anti-Semitic goals. He was instrumental in the planning and deportation of tens of thousands of foreign-born Jewish refugees residing in France and French-born Jews, particularly after Nazi Germany occupied the southern part of France in November 1942. Abetz’s deputy, Rudolf Schleier, handled many of the details surrounding the seizure, dismemberment and sale of the Schloss Collection from spring to late fall of 1943. In October 1945, Allied authorities arrested Otto Abetz in the Black Forest (Schwarzwald), and a French military court found him guilty of war crimes. Although sentenced to 20 years of hard labor, he served just five years. In 1958, Abetz died in a car accident. Literature: “Otto Abetz.” Shoah Research Center, Yad Vashem, https://www.yadvashem.org/odot_pdf/Microsoft%20Word%20-%205713.pdf. Mauthner, Martin. Otto Abetz and His Paris Acolytes French Writers who Flirted with Fascism, 1930-1945. Sussex Academic Press, 2016. Wistrich, Robert. Who’s Who in Nazi Germany. Taylor & Francis, 2013, p. 1.