Sprenger, Jakob

Postal inspector, Gauleiter

Born: 24.07.1884 in Oberhausen (Palatinate)

died: 07.05.19345 in Kössen (Tyrol)

Sprenger, a Frankfurt postal clerk, joined the NSDAP in 1922, became a local group leader in Frankfurt am Main and was elected to the Frankfurt City Council in 1925.

On March 1, 1927, Hitler appointed him district leader of the Hesse-Nassau (South) district. Sprenger thus took over the leadership of a regional party body that had been set up between the local and Reich levels in order to guarantee the reliable and rapid implementation of Hitler's orders in the local and district leaderships. At the turn of the year 1932/33, his responsibilities as Gauleiter were extended to the neighboring Gau of Hesse-Darmstadt. From then on, the newly formed Gau was known as Gau "Hessen-Nassau".

Parallel to his official party influence, Sprenger's state power also grew: on 14.09.1930 he entered the Reichstag, and on 05.05.1933 he was appointed Reich Governor (head of government) in Hesse. On 01.09.1939, he was appointed Reich Defense Commissioner and in August 1944, he was appointed Chief President of the newly created Prussian province of Nassau, based in the state parliament. It was not until the Allied advance in the spring of 1945 that his steady rise to power came to an end.

In the night from March 25 to 26, 1945, he fled in the direction of Kössen/Tyrol. There he took his own life.