Degussa
AG RM1,000 Stock Certificate
Deutsche
Gold- und Silber- Scheideanstalt vormals Roessler
(German Gold and Silver Refinery formerly Roessler)
What
You See Is What You Get
Lot: G73731 - In
this lot you get:
ON OFFER: Authentic
stock certificate from the firm of Deutsche Gold- und
Silber- Scheideanstalt vormals Roessler, owner of the patent for the pesticide Zyklon
B, and the operating manager and co-owner (along with I.G.
Farben,) of the Zyklon B distribution firm Degesch; it
was also a major refiner of gold stolen from the victims of
the Holocaust.
Printed by Druckerei von August
Osterrieth of Frankfurt am Main on standard European A4 sized
bond. The VF+ condition punch cancelled stock certificate has
no faults, is clean and bright. This and millions of other WWII era German
corporate stocks and bonds came onto the collectors'
market in 2003 when the German Ministry of Finance began
to auction off the 'Reichsbankschatz,' a
great hoard of pre-WWII shares and bonds which were
discovered in the vaults of the former Reichsbank in
Berlin shortly after German reunification in 1991.
Appealing to scripophily
collectors, history buffs, students of finance and educators
alike, this makes for an interesting addition to any Second
World War or financial history collection.
Shipped FLAT via USPS Ground Advantage, with tracking. First lot ships at standard rate, all
others in same order ship free.
Thanks
for looking!
Please
see my other
items for more Third Reich, Soviet and other
historical curios.
Q: What am I buying,
and why would I want it?
A: This is a
stock certificate from the Deutsche Gold- und
Silber-Scheideanstalt vormals Roessler company, a
prime contractor involved in the Holocaust. In 1998 the Board of Degussa AG hired the
historian Peter Hayes, a Professor of History and German
and the Theodore Z. Weiss Professor of Holocaust Studies
at Northwestern University, to
examine its role in the National Socialist era and the
Holocaust. A version of this report was published in 2004
as, 'From Cooperation to Complicity:
Degussa in the Third Reich' - The excerpts below are from the website of Evonik Industries AG, the corporate successor to
Degussa AG:
The
Deutsche Gold- und Silber-Scheideanstalt vormals Roessler
(German Gold and Silver Refinery, formerly Roessler, after
1980 known as Degussa AG for short), was founded as a joint
stock company in Frankfurt am Main in January 1873. It
quickly established itself as a successful company in the
field of precious metals, and in producing and distributing
chemical products…
Degussa survived
[the 1920s] inflation and the world economic crisis largely
unscathed. Despite everything, however, the company remained
vulnerable... it was obliged to enlist the participation of
I.G. Farbenindustrie AG in some of its projects (e.g.
Degesch, Österreichische Chemische Werke). At the beginning
of the 1930s I.G. Farben was a powerful, potentially
overwhelming competitor…
When
the national socialists came to power in January 1933, none
of the nine Degussa Management Board members was a member of
the NSDAP… Nevertheless, as their primary objective was for
Degussa to continue to grow, they attempted to gradually
come to terms with the new government. In this they were
following the motto that Ernst Busemann, the Chairman of the
Management Board, had stated in 1937: “There’s no point in
swimming against the current.”...
The
six Jewish members of the Supervisory Board were given the
choice in 1933 of leaving straightaway or stepping down once
their term of office had expired. The last, Richard Merton,
Supervisory Board Chairman of the Metallgesellschaft, left
in 1938. Moreover, some of those in charge at Degussa made
every effort to continue to employ Jewish staff. With the
radicalization of NS policy in 1938 this was no longer
possible...
Cooperation with the national socialists included
“aryanization“, meaning the acquisition or transfer of
Jewish property to “purely German” companies and people.
Degussa took over ten companies (seven in Germany, three in
the so-called Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia), three
holdings, acquired four extensive blocks of shares, ten
parcels of real estate in Frankfurt, Cologne, Hamburg,
Berlin, Vienna and Prague, and lastly purchased a
confiscated patent in August 1944...
The
economic upswing of the Third Reich was based after 1935
primarily on the two pillars of armament and autarchy. The
latter was intended to make Germany largely independent of
imports. From 1938 on Degussa was, as were many other
companies, firmly integrated into the national socialist
economic system, and its managers had only very limited room
for independent decision making...
When
the national socialists came to power, Degussa’s precious
metals business was sluggish due to the foreign exchange
controls that were subsequently introduced. As it was nigh
on impossible to convert the Reichsmark, and because the
Reichsbank was stockpiling gold, Degussa’s refineries
operated well below capacity until 1938. This changed
towards the end of the year with the so-called “precious
metals campaign”. After the pogrom night of November 9,
1938, the Reich government decided to confiscate all the
gold, silver and platinum owned by the Jewish population. It
was supposed to serve as “atonement money” (Sühnegeld) for
the damage caused during the so-called Reichskristallnacht
(the night of broken glass). Jews had to hand in their
precious metal at state-run pawnshops...
When
the Jews were subject to plunder in the areas occupied by
Germany between 1940 and 1945, Degussa also proved useful to
the regime in its capacity as one of the most significant
precious metals processors. In this respect the company took
a totally profit-oriented approach, and those in charge paid
no attention to the origin of the precious metals. Degussa’s
Berlin refinery received direct shipments of gold from teeth
from the Lodz ghetto. To all intents and purposes the
delivery and processing of dental gold was nothing unusual,
as this was one of the refinery’s business areas. However,
deliveries sometimes arrived in a condition that left no
doubt where they had originated...
Degesch
and Zyklon B
The
pesticide Zyklon B was used between 1939 and 1945 primarily
for gassing military accommodation and supplies, uniforms,
vehicles and ships, or for pest control in forced laborers’
barracks. At the same time, however, the SS misused 1
percent of the manufactured quantities of this substance to
kill approximately one million people…
Hydrocyanic acid, the main ingredient of Zyklon B and better
known as prussic acid, was used... towards the end of the
19th century to gas vermin. During the [First] World War,
TASCH, the Technische Ausschuss für Schädlingsbekämpfung,
(Technical Committee for Pest Control) was founded under the
auspices of the War Ministry. This committee developed a
prussic acid gas which was intended for use on the front,
especially to destroy the overwhelming numbers of lice...
The Deutsche Gesellschaft für Schädlingsbekämpfung m.b.H.
(Degesch), Frankfurt, emerged in 1919 out of TASCH, which
worked with Degussa’s procedures and those of others.
Besides Degussa, there were initially many other firms
involved in this company, which by 1922 had sold their
stakes to Degussa…
By
1936, the Dessauer Werke für Zucker und Chemische Industrie
was the only manufacturer of this pesticide. The prussic
acid required came from Dessauer Schlempe GmbH, which
extracted the highly poisonous substance from the waste
produced when processing sugar beet (Schlempe)...The
stabilizer for the gas came from I.G. Farbenindustrie AG’s
Uerdingen-based plant, while Schering supplied a warning
ingredient. Degussa bought the finished product from
Dessauer Werke... before selling it on to Degesch.
To
thwart the competition in the pest control market, Degussa
had to sell Degesch shares in 1930 [and]1931 to I.G.
Farbenindustrie AG (42.5 percent) and to the Essen-based
company Th. Goldschmidt AG (15 percent). Degesch now
distributed a wide range of pesticides, its managing
directors continued to come from Degussa, which from this
point on until the end of the war held a minority stake of
42.5 percent. Owing to the size of the company and the
quantities of sales involved, Degesch tended to be of
secondary importance for Degussa. Profits from distributing
Zyklon B until 1938 came mainly from abroad...
******
Degussa survived WWII
and in 2006 was fully acquired by the RAG AG (formerly
Ruhrkohle AG,) industrial conglomerate. After another
round of re-organization, the company would emerge as Evonik
Industries AG in 2007, with three business areas: Chemicals,
Energy, and Real Estate. It is based in Essen, Germany.
Please see other
items for stocks from I.G.
Farben and Dessauer
Werke.
You will hold history in your
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