page_title: Krupp
section_title: Alfried's era
hierarchical_section_title: Krupp / History of the family / Alfried's era
caption_attribution_description: For documentary purposes the German Federal Archive often retained the original image captions, which may be erroneous, biased, obsolete or politically extreme. Staatspräsident von Togo, Olympio, zu Besuch bei der Firma Krupp, Essen, Villa Hügel
context_page_description: The Krupp family, a prominent 400-year-old German dynasty from Essen, is famous for their production of steel, artillery, ammunition and other armaments. The family business, known as Friedrich Krupp AG, was the largest company in Europe at the beginning of the 20th century, and was the premier weapons manufacturer for Germany in both world wars. Starting from the Thirty Years' War until the end of the Second World War, it produced battleships, U-boats, tanks, howitzers, guns, utilities, and hundreds of other commodities.
  The dynasty began in 1587 when a trader named Arndt Krupp moved to Essen and joined the merchants' guild. He began buying vacated real estate from families who fled the city due to the Black Death, and became one of the city's richest men. His descendants produced small guns during the Thirty Years' War and eventually acquired fulling mills, coal mines, and an iron forge. During the Napoleonic Wars, Friedrich Krupp founded the Gusstahlfabrik and started smelted steel production in 1816.
context_section_description: As the eldest son of Bertha Krupp, Alfried was destined by family tradition to become the sole heir of the Krupp concern. An amateur photographer and Olympic sailor, he was an early supporter of Nazism among German industrialists, joining the SS in 1931, and never disavowing his allegiance to Hitler.
  His father's health began to decline in 1939, and after a stroke in 1941, Alfried took over full control of the firm, continuing its role as main arms supplier to Germany at war. In 1943, Hitler decreed the Lex Krupp, authorizing the transfer of all Bertha's shares to Alfried, giving him the name "Krupp" and dispossessing his siblings.
  During the war, Krupp was allowed to take over many industries in occupied nations, including Arthur Krupp steel works in Berndorf, Austria, the Alsacian Corporation for Mechanical Construction (Elsaessische Maschinenfabrik AG, or ELMAG), Robert Rothschild's tractor factory in France, Škoda Works in Czechoslovakia, and Deutsche Schiff- und Maschinenbau AG (Deschimag) in Bremen. This activity became the basis for the charge of "plunder" at the war crimes trial of Krupp executives after the war.
  As another war crime, Krupp used slave labor, both POWs and civilians from occupied countries, and Krupp representatives were sent to concentration camps to select laborers. Treatment of Slavic and Jewish slaves was particularly harsh, since they were considered sub-human in Nazi Germany, and Jews were targeted for "extermination through labor". The number of slaves cannot be calculated due to constant fluctuation but is estimated at 100,000, at a time when the free employees of Krupp numbered 278,000. The highest number of Jewish slave laborers at any one time was about 25,000 in January 1943.
  In 1942–1943, Krupp built the Berthawerk factory (named for his mother), near the Markstadt forced labour camp, for production of artillery fuses. Jewish women were used as slave labor there, leased from the SS for 4 Marks a head per day. Later in 1943 it was taken over by Union Werke.
  In 1942, although Russia in retreat relocated many factories to the Urals, steel factories were simply too large to move. Krupp took over production, including at the Molotov steel works near Kharkov and Kramatorsk in eastern Ukraine, and at mines supplying the iron, manganese, and chrome vital for steel production.
  The battle of Stalingrad in 1942 convinced Krupp that Germany would lose the war, and he secretly began liquidating 200 million Marks in government bonds. This allowed him to retain much of his fortune and hide it overseas.
  Beginning in 1943, Allied bombers targeted the main German industrial district in the Ruhr. Most damage at Krupp's works was actually to the slave labor camps, and German tank production continued to increase from 1,000 to 1,800 per month. However, by the end of the war, with a manpower shortage preventing repairs, the main factories were out of commission.
  On 25 July 1943 the Royal Air Force attacked the Krupp Works with 627 heavy bombers, dropping 2,032 long tons of bombs in an Oboe-marked attack. Upon his arrival at the works the next morning, Gustav Krupp suffered a fit from which he never recovered.
  After the war, the Ruhr became part of the British Zone of occupation. The British dismantled Krupp's factories, sending machinery all over Europe as war reparations. The Russians seized Krupp's Grusonwerk in Magdeburg, including the formula for tungsten steel. Germaniawerft in Kiel was dismantled, and Krupp's role as an arms manufacturer came to an end. Allied High Commission Law 27, in 1950, mandated the decartelization of German industry.
  Meanwhile, Alfried was held in Landsberg prison, where Hitler had been imprisoned in 1924. At the Krupp Trial, held in 1947–1948 in Nuremberg following the main Nuremberg trials, Alfried and most of his co-defendants were convicted of crimes against humanity (plunder and slave labor), while being acquitted of crimes against peace, and conspiracy. Alfried was condemned to 12 years in prison and the "forfeiture of all [his] property both real and personal," making h
caption: Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach (to the right), with Sylvanus Olympio the President of Togo, while visiting Villa Hügel on 17 May 1961
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