In January 1933 the NSDAP (Nazi party) seized power and moved fast to create a one-party state. As a member of the SPD Friedrich Wehmer was, from the government's point of view, a member of the wrong party and he was relieved of all his official functions later in the year. He concentrated on forestry work, at least till 1941. After that, now aged 56, he took charge of the "Raifessen" (agricultural produce) cooperative in Plate, remaining in post till 1944. In July 1944 there was a serious (though unsuccessful) assassination attempt against Hitler. One of the government's responses was "Operation Grill" ("Aktion Gitter") which involved rounding up and interning large numbers of suspected dissidents. Wehmer was taken into "protective custody" ("Schutzhaft") and held, locally. in the prison at Dreibergen (Bützow) till 1945. At the start of 1945 the population of Plate had stood at around 800. By August 1945 the figure had been swollen to as much as 2,400 by refugees streaming through, as part of the enforced relocation of millions of ethic Germans from parts of what had been Germany that were now controlled by the Soviet army and being integrated into Poland and the Soviet Union. Many of those passing through were sick and had lost children and parents. There was a desperate shortage of food and shelter. In political terms, although the entire region would end up in the Soviet occupation zone, when the fighting stopped in May 1945 Plate found itself at the meeting point of the American and Soviet forces. In the summer of 1945 typhoid was rife. Into all this, on 16 August 1945, Friedrich Wehmer, recently released from prison, was returned by the occupation forces to the position of mayor from which he had been removed by the Nazis twelve years earlier. In October 1945 the local school was reopened, with just one classroom for 223 pupils and hardly any books: teaching took place in shifts.