Jan Hendrik Hofmeyr (Onze Jan)

2025-08-07T17:02:00Z

2A02:8012:227B:0:180D:FE42:9944:EA57: Removed Category:Cape Colony politicians as already in Category:Afrikaner Bond politicians and Category:Members of the House of Assembly of the Cape Colony

{{short description|South African politician}}
{{distinguish|Jan Hendrik Hofmeyr (1894–1948)|Jan-Hendrik S. Hofmeyr}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=July 2021}}
{{Use South African English|date=September 2012}}
{{Infobox officeholder
| honorific-prefix =
| name = Jan Hendrik Hofmeyr
| honorific-suffix =
| image = OnzeJanHofmeyr crop.jpg
| imagesize =
| smallimage = 
| alt =
| caption =
| order = [[Minister without portfolio]]
| office =
| term_start = May 1881
| term_end = November 1881
| alongside = 
| monarch = [[Victoria of the United Kingdom|Victoria]]
| primeminister = [[Thomas Charles Scanlen]]
| governor = [[Hercules Robinson, 1st Baron Rosmead|Hercules Robinson]]
| governor-general =
| governor_general =
| constituency =
| majority =
| order2 = Member of the Cape House of Assembly for [[Stellenbosch]]
| office2 =
| term_start2 = 1879
| term_end2 = 11 October 1909
| monarch2 = [[Victoria of the United Kingdom|Victoria]] [[Edward VII]]
| primeminister2 = [[Sir John Gordon Sprigg]] [[Thomas Charles Scanlen]] [[Thomas Upington]] [[Sir John Gordon Sprigg]] [[Cecil Rhodes]] [[Sir John Gordon Sprigg]] [[William Philip Schreiner]] [[Sir John Gordon Sprigg]] [[Leander Starr Jameson]] [[John X. Merriman]]
| governor2 = [[Sir William Gordon Cameron]] [[Hercules Robinson, 1st Baron Rosmead|Hercules Robinson]] [[William Howley Goodenough|Sir William Howley Goodenough]] [[Alfred Milner]] [[Sir William Francis Butler]] [[Sir Walter Hely-Hutchinson]]
| succeeding2 = 
| predecessor2 = 
| constituency2 = [[Stellenbosch]]
| birth_date = {{birth date|1845|7|4|df=yes}}
| birth_place = [[Cape Town]], [[British Cape Colony|Cape Colony]]
| death_date = {{Death date and age|1909|10|11|1845|7|4|df=yes}}
| death_place = [[Westminster]], [[County of London|London]], [[United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland|United Kingdom]]
| restingplace = [[Cape Town]], [[Western Cape]], [[South Africa]]
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| party = [[Afrikaner Bond]]
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| occupation = [[Politician]]
| profession = [[Journalist]]
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| signature = Signature of Jan Hendrik Hormeyr.png
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'''Jan Hendrik Hofmeyr''' (4 July 1845 – 11 October 1909) was a [[politician]] in the [[Cape Colony]]. He was affectionately known as ''Onze Jan'', "our Jan" in Dutch.

== Life ==

He was born in [[Cape Town]], educated at the [[South African College]], and at an early age turned his attention to politics, first as a [[journalist]].{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}

He was editor of ''[[de Zuid-Afrikaan]]'' until its incorporation with ''Ons Land'', and of the ''Zuid Afrikaansche Tijdschrift''.
By birth, education and sympathies a typical Dutch Afrikaner, he set himself to organize the political power of his fellow-countrymen. This he did very effectively, and when in 1879 he entered the [[Parliament of the Cape of Good Hope|Cape parliament]] as member for [[Stellenbosch]], he became the real leader of the Dutch party.
Yet he only held office for six months – as minister without portfolio in the Scanlen ministry from May to November 1881.
He held no subsequent official post in the colony, though he shared with Sir [[Thomas Upington]] and Sir Charles Mills the honor of representing the Cape at the intercolonial conference of 1887.
Here he supported the proposal for entrusting the defence of [[Simon's Town]] to Cape Colony, leaving only the armament to be provided by the imperial government, opposed trans-oceanic penny postage and moved a resolution in favor of an imperial customs union.
At the [[1894 Colonial Conference|Colonial Conference of 1894]] at Ottawa he was again one of the Cape representatives.
In 1888 and in 1889, he was a member of the South African customs conference.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}

His chief importance as a public man was, however, derived from his power over the Dutch in [[British Cape Colony|Cape Colony]], and his control of the [[Afrikaner Bond]]. But it remained an organization for obtaining the political supremacy of the [[Cape Dutch]]. His control over the Bond enabled him for many years, while free from the responsibilities of office, to make and unmake ministers at his will, and earned for him the name of Cabinet-maker of South Africa.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}} His preference for working behind the scenes and avoiding overt political stands earned him another nickname, "the Mole" (described by [[John X Merriman]] as ''"an industrious little animal . . . You never see him at work, but every now and then a little mound of earth, thrown up here or there, will testify to his activities."'')<ref>{{cite web|url=http://152.111.1.88/argief/berigte/beeld/1999/03/18/4/15.html |title=Leipoldt, 'Mol' Hofmeyr en die president |access-date=23 December 2015 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151223235848/http://152.111.1.88/argief/berigte/beeld/1999/03/18/4/15.html |archive-date=23 December 2015 }}</ref>

Although officially the term ''Afrikander'' was explained by Hofmeyr to include white men of whatever race, yet in practice the influence of the Bond was always exerted in favor of the Dutch, and its power was drawn from the Dutch districts of Cape Colony.
The sympathies of the Bond were thus always strongly with the Transvaal, as the chief centre of Dutch influence in South Africa; and Hofmeyr's position might in many respects be compared with that of [[Charles Stewart Parnell|Parnell]] at the head of the Irish Nationalist party in Great Britain. In the Bechuanaland difficulty of 1884 Hofmeyr threw all the influence of the Bond into the scale in favor of the Transvaal.
But in the course of the next few years he began to drift away from [[Stephanus Johannes Paulus Kruger|President Kruger]].
He resented the reckless disregard of Cape interests involved in Kruger's fiscal policy; he feared that the Transvaal, after its sudden leap into prosperity upon the gold discoveries of 1886, might overshadow all other Dutch influences in South Africa; above all he was convinced, as he showed by his action at the London conference, that the protection of the British navy was indispensable to South Africa, and he set his face against Kruger's intrigues with Germany, and his avowed intention of acquiring an outlet to the sea in order to get into touch with foreign powers.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}

[[File:Jan Hendrik Hofmeyr (Onze Jan).jpg|thumb|left|Statue of J.H. Hofmeyr on [[Church Square (Cape Town)|Church Square]], Cape Town]]
In 1890, Hofmeyr joined forces with [[Cecil Rhodes]], who became premier of Cape Colony with the support of the Bond. Hofmeyr's influence was a powerful factor in the conclusion of the [[Swaziland]] convention of 1890, as well as in stopping the trek to Banyailand ([[Rhodesia]]) in 1891, a notable reversal of the policy he had pursued seven years before. But the reactionary elements in the Bond grew alarmed at Rhodes's [[imperialism]], and in 1895 Hofmeyr resigned his seat in parliament and the presidency of the Bond.
Then came the [[Jameson Raid]], and in its wake there rolled over South Africa a wave of Dutch and anti-British feeling such as had not been known since the days of [[Battle of Majuba Hill|Majuba]]. (The proclamation issued by [[Hercules Robinson, 1st Baron Rosmead|Sir Hercules Robinson]] disavowing Jameson was suggested by Hofmeyr, who helped to draw up its terms.) Once more Hofmeyr became president of the Bond.
By an alteration of the provincial constitution, all power in the Cape branch of the Bond was vested in the hands of a vigilance committee of three, of whom Hofmeyr and his brother were two.
As the recognized leader of the Cape Dutch, he protested against such abuses as the dynamite monopoly in the [[South African Republic|Transvaal]], and urged Kruger even at the eleventh hour to grant reasonable concessions rather than plunge into a war that might involve Cape Afrikanderdom and the Transvaal in a common ruin.
In July 1899, he journeyed to [[Pretoria]], and vainly supported the proposal of a satisfactory franchise law, combined with a limited representation of the ''Uitlanders'' in the [[Volksraad of the South African Republic|Volksraad]], and in September urged the Transvaal to accede to the proposed joint inquiry.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}

He died in London on 11 October 1909.{{sfn|Lucas|1912}}

== Family ==

Hofmeyr married Aleda Hendrikz in 1880; she died 1883. He married her sister, Johanna Hendrikz on 1 September 1900.{{sfn|Lucas|1912}}

== See also ==
* [[Parliament of the Cape of Good Hope]]

== Notes ==
{{Reflist}}

== Books ==
*{{cite book |last=Hofmeyr |first=J.H. |date=1913 |title=THE LIFE OF JAN HENDRIK HOFMEYR (Onze Jan) |location=Cape Town |publisher=Van De Sante De Villiers}}

== References ==
{{refbegin}}
* {{cite EB1911|wstitle=Hofmeyr, Jan Hendrik}}
* {{cite DNB12|wstitle=Hofmeyr, Jan Hendrik |first=Charles Prestwood |last=Lucas}}
* {{cite ODNB|first=T. R. H.|last= Davenport|title=Hofmeyr, Jan Hendrik|doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/33922}}
* {{cite book|last=Hofmeyr|first=Jan Hendrik|title=The Life of Jan Hendrik Hofmeyr (onze Jan)|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QxbFoAEACAAJ|year=1913|publisher=Van de Sandt de Villiers Print Company}}
{{refend}}

== External links ==
{{commons category|Jan Hendrik Hofmeyr (1845–1909)}}
* {{PM20|FID=pe/008050}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hofmeyr, Jan Hendrik}}
[[Category:1845 births]]
[[Category:1909 deaths]]
[[Category:Afrikaner people]]
[[Category:Politicians from Cape Town]]
[[Category:Afrikaner Bond politicians]]
[[Category:Members of the House of Assembly of the Cape Colony]]

Josef Pfitzner

2025-08-07T13:18:35Z

2A02:8012:227B:0:180D:FE42:9944:EA57: - Category:Czechoslovak politicians + Category:Czechoslovak fascists

{{short description|German politician and writer}}
[[File:Josef Pfitzner František Teuner 1944.png|thumb|Josef Pfitzner (right) with [[František Teuner]] (Chairman of the [[Board of Trustees for the Education of Youth|Board of Trustees]]), 1944]]
'''Josef Pfitzner''' (24 March 1901 – 6 September 1945) was a politician of [[Nazi Germany]] and a writer. He held the rank of SA-''[[Standartenführer]]'' in the ''[[Sturmabteilung]]'' (SA). Pfitzner was publicly executed in [[Prague]] after [[World War II]] for speaking in favour of the Nazis, taking part in Nazi organisations, and defrauding Prague city in financial deals with the Germans.

== Life ==
Pfitzner was born in [[Petrovice (Bruntál District)|Petersdorf]], [[Austrian Silesia]]. He was a German [[historian]] and [[politician]] and was Professor of medieval and Eastern European history at the [[Karl-Ferdinands-Universität|German University of Prague]]. Early on, he was attracted to [[Nazism]] and belonged to the branch of [[Austrian National Socialism]].

He held the rank of SA-''[[Standartenführer]]'' in the [[Sturmabteilung|SA]]. In 1939, he became the German deputy mayor of [[Prague]] and held this office until May 1945.  Pfitzner was publicly executed in [[Prague]] after [[World War II]] within three hours of being convicted for speaking in favour of the Nazis, taking part in Nazi organisations, and defrauding Prague city in financial deals with the Germans. He was hanged in public before up to 50,000 spectators. {{Citation needed|date=March 2007}}

== Work ==
Pfitzner took a special interest in the [[Sudeten German]] past and published ''Volkstumsschutz und Nationale Bewegung''.  Pfitzner wrote that the [[National Socialism]] of Germany was "the synthesis of the two great dynamic powers of the century, of the [[Socialism|socialist]] and [[Nationalism|national]] idea".<ref>''Leftism Revisited'', [[Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn]], [[Regernery Gateway]], Washington, D.C., 1990. 149.</ref> This specific brand of German socialism was perfected in the German borderlands of [[Cisleithania|Austria]] and especially in the [[Sudetenland]] before it came to Germany. His views on the essentially German character of Bohemia and Moravia influenced [[Reinhard Heydrich]] during his time as Reich Protector; see R. Gerwarth, ''Hitler's Hangman: the life of Heydrich'' (2011), p. 266 with n. 220. However, it was Heydrich's influence that contained Pfitzner's further career; the Protector considered the deputy mayor - a man of words rather than deeds - to be unsuitable for a responsible position in the times of struggle.

==Writings==
* ''Großfürst Witold von Litauen als Staatsmann'' (1930)
* ''Das Sudentendeutschtum'' (Cologne:Scharffstein, 1938)
* ''Volkstummsschutz und Nationale Bewegung'' (Ethnic Preservation and National Movement: 1938)
* ''Das tausendjährige Prag'' (1940)

==Footnotes==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
{{Commonscat}}
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20071012161757/http://abicko.avcr.cz/bulletin_txt_show_clanek.php?Cislo=09%2F2007&Poradi=17 Biography] {{in lang|cs}}
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20111202004125/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,854467,00.html ''Time'' article dated 17 September 1945, on trial]

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pfitzner, Josef}}
[[Category:1901 births]]
[[Category:1945 deaths]]
[[Category:Sudeten German people]]
[[Category:People from Austrian Silesia]]
[[Category:People from Bruntál District]]
[[Category:Charles University alumni]]
[[Category:Academic staff of Charles University]]
[[Category:20th-century German historians]]
[[Category:Czechoslovak fascists]]
[[Category:Nazi Party politicians]]
[[Category:SA-Standartenführer]]
[[Category:Mayors of Prague]]
[[Category:Executed Austrian Nazis]]
[[Category:Austrian people executed abroad]]
[[Category:Nazis executed by Czechoslovakia by hanging]]

Vero - Wikipedia - User contributions [en]

Jan Hendrik Hofmeyr (Onze Jan)

Josef Pfitzner