Wilhelm Meinberg
Wilhelm Meinberg was a German Nazi Party politician and agricultural expert who served as the head of the Reichsnährstand and on the board of directors of the industrial conglomerate Reichswerke Hermann Göring during the Second World War. He was also an SS-Gruppenführer. After the war, he headed a neo-Nazi Party in West Germany.
Early life
Meinberg was born in Wasserkurl. He attended the Realgymnasium in Unna, obtained his Abitur and completed an agricultural apprenticeship in Brandenburg and Mecklenburg before enlisting in the Imperial German Army in 1916 and serving with Pioneer Battalion 15 in the First World War. He was awarded the Iron Cross 2nd class and was taken prisoner by the British near the war's end. Released from captivity in October 1919, in November he became a member of the Deutschvölkischer Schutz- und Trutzbund, the largest and most active antisemitic organization in the Weimar Republic. He also joined the conservative German National People's Party and, in 1923, became a farmer in Wasserkurl and founded a Stahlhelm group of war veterans, which took part in the fighting during the occupation of the Ruhr in the same year.Nazi Party career
Meinberg joined the SA in 1929 and on 1 April 1930 he joined the Nazi Party, into which he brought his Stahlhelm group. As a relatively early member of the Party, he would later be awarded the Golden Party Badge. He became the agricultural policy expert for the Gaue of North and South Westphalia, as a representative of the Party's Office for Agricultural Policy, headquartered in Munich and headed by Walther Darré. Meinberg became a board member of the Westphalia Chamber of Agriculture in 1931 and was elected as a member of the Prussian Landtag in April 1932.Following the Nazi seizure of power, Meinberg was appointed President of the Agricultural League in March 1933. On 6 May 1933, Ferdinand von Lüninck, the Westphalian Oberpräsident, appointed him State Commissioner for the Chamber of Agriculture. Meinberg became a co-founder and, from June 1933 to April 1937, Reichsobmann and Leiter der Reichsverwaltungshauptabteilung of the Reichsnährstand, working directly under Darré in his capacity as the Reichsbauernführer. The Reichsnährstand absorbed all other farmers' organizations, including the Agricultural League, and became the sole regulator of German agriculture, controlling supply and setting prices. On 20 July 1933, Meinberg became leader of the Westphalia Farmers' Federation and on 20 February 1934, a member of the Reich Farmers' Council. On 11 July 1933, Prussian Minister President Hermann Göring appointed him to the recently reconstituted Prussian State Council, where he served until the fall of the Nazi regime.
Meinberg joined the SS on 7 October 1933 as an SS-Sturmbannführer and eventually attained the rank of SS-Gruppenführer on 30 January 1942. In addition, Meinberg was elected as a deputy to the Reichstag at the November 1933 German federal election from electoral constituency 18. He was reelected in 1936 and 1938, and served until he resigned his mandate in 1943.
In 1936, Darré, in his capacity as Reich Food and Agriculture Minister, appointed Meinberg his personal Special Representative for questions of food policy and market organization in the ministry. However, Meinberg intrigued to replace Darré as Reich Peasant Leader while he was on a leave of absence, and a court of honor proceeding was instituted against him. Due to the intervention of Göring, this action was suspended for a year and then dismissed, as Meinberg had left Darré's ministry when Göring appointed him to the board of directors of Reichswerke Hermann Göring.
Meinberg now changed his focus from agriculture to industry and the war economy, remaining on the industrial conglomerate's board from 1937 to 1945 and served as the deputy to Paul Pleiger, the managing director. He served on the boards of eight subsidiary and affiliated industries of the massive combine. Meinberg also was a member of the supervisory board at Dresdner Bank and the Allianz insurance company. He was appointed a Wehrwirtschaftsführer in June 1940. He also sat on the military economics council of the Reich Chamber of Commerce and the military economics committee of the Lower Saxony Chamber of Commerce in Hanover. In 1941, Göring, in his capacity as the Plenipotentiary for the Four-Year Plan, appointed Meinberg to be the Sonderbeauftragter for coal transport.