Willi Stöhr

Willi Stöhr (6 November 1903 – after 1994) was a Nazi Party official who served as Gauleiter of Gau Westmark in the closing months of the war.

Born in Wuppertal-Elberfeld, he studied economics and political science at the universities in Cologne and Frankfurt but left due to his participation in student unrest. He joined the Nazi Party in 1923 and was active in the Orstgruppe (Local Group) in Wuppertal. He remained active in the Nazi movement even after the party was banned. He formally rejoined the party in 1929, became a member of the SA and the Nazi student union. In 1932 he became Ortsgruppenleiter in Frankfurt and a Oberbannführer (Senior Banner Leader) in the Hitler Youth (Hitlerjugend).[1]

After the Nazi seizure of power, Stöhr was elected to the City Council in Frankfurt in March 1933. Also that year he was appointed Gau Inspector and Adjutant to Jakob Sprenger, the Gauleiter of Hesse-Nassau, a position he would hold until 1937. In February 1935, Stöhr became a member of the Reichstag from electoral constituency 19, Hesse-Nassau. He also became a member of the Prussian Provincial Council in Hesse-Nassau. In 1937, he became head of the party's propaganda organization in Hesse-Nassau as well as State Cultural Officer. He would hold these posts until 1 January 1944 when he was transferred to the party Chancellery in Munich to be trained for higher party leadership assignments. In 1940 he served in the military, as a company propaganda officer in France.[2]

Upon the death of Josef Bürckel, the longtime Gauleiter of Gau Westmark, on 29 September 1944 Stöhr was promoted to Deputy Gauleiter and installed as Acting Gauleiter. Then on 4 October, he was appointed Chief of Civil Administration (Chef der Zivilverwaltung) for German-occupied Lorraine, although the area was already being overrun by the Allied armies. At the same time, he was named both Acting Reichsstatthalter (Reich Governor) and Acting Reich Defense Commissioner for Gau Westmark. On 30 January 1945, his appointments were made permanent.[3]

He led the defense of his capital, Saarbrücken, which fell to the Americans on 20 March 1945. At the war's end, Stöhr disappeared, living under assumed names until a general anmesty.[4] He then emigrated to Canada, where he was still living in 1994; his date of death is unknown.[5]