21 Facts About John Rittmeister

John Friedrich Karl Rittmeister, often abbreviated John F Rittmeister, was a German neurologist, psychoanalyst and resistance fighter against Nazism.

John Rittmeister was known as a communist member of the anti-fascist resistance group that was later called the Red Orchestra by the Abwehr.

John Rittmeister was born in Hamburg to a Hanseatic merchant family that had lived in Hamburg for generations and included politicians and artists.

John Rittmeister fought in last two years of World War I on the French Champagne and Italian high mountain fronts as a telephone operator and by the end of the war he had become a non-commissioned officer.

In 1922, John Rittmeister became interested in psychotherapy through the work of the neurologist and psychoanalyst Hans von Hattingberg after he sought psychological help.

John Rittmeister specialised in Neurology under Max Nonne at the newly founded University of Hamburg.

In 1939, after returning to Germany, John Rittmeister married Eva John Rittmeister nee Knieper, who was a pediatric nurse and fifteen years younger than him.

John Rittmeister considered her "life-affirming", who often enriched his depressed tendencies.

John Rittmeister continued his education by studying in Paris and London.

In 1928, John Rittmeister's moved to Zurich, Switzerland and after two years he obtained a voluntary position to work at the Burgholzli Institute in Switzerland, staying for three years between 1929 and 1931.

From 1931 to 1935, John Rittmeister worked as an assistant physician at the Polyclinic for Nervous Diseases at the University of Zurich, founded by the noted neuropathologist Constantin von Monakow.

In 1935, John Rittmeister began studying under the Swiss psychiatrist Gustav Bally.

John Rittmeister developed a professional relationship with Storch that eventually blossomed into strong friendship.

In 1941, John Rittmeister was appointed the director of the clinic.

For John Rittmeister, he understood that Jung taught the virtues of introversion, an immersion of the self to the exclusion of others, while Freud taught humanity in the ecumenical virtues of love.

John Rittmeister hosted a small ideological, humanist and political discussion group that included his wife's friends like the mechanic Fritz Thiel, the student Ursula Goetze and a soldier Friedrich Rehmer after he moved to Germany.

John Rittmeister did not share the activist politics of the people around Schulze-Boysen, nor did he confess knowledge of the hard espionage activities that the group had undertaken in 1941 and 1942.

However, John Rittmeister did take part in the resistance activities of the group, becoming involved in leafleting.

John Rittmeister had a longing for a "new humanism", so resistance was seen by him as a path that led away from the what he saw as the crass and heartless culture of the west.

On 26 September 1942, John Rittmeister was arrested by the Gestapo along with his wife Eva.

John Rittmeister was executed on 13 May 1943 by the guillotine in Plotzensee Prison.