200 years ago, Wilhelm Liebknecht (1826-1900), the father of the more well known Karl Liebknecht, was born in the rural town Giessen in the middle of Germany.

His private and political life was closely linked to the radical democratic and socialist movement of his time: as a revolutionary, he had to flee persecution to London, where he internalised the ideas of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Back in his German homeland, he fought tirelessly in the ranks of the socialist labour movement.

As a courageous politician and sharp-tongued journalist, he opposed militarism, imperialism and colonialism. He played a key role in the creation of a united Social Democratic Party and in the spread of Marxist ideas in the German Empire in the late 19th century. As a ‘soldier of the revolution’ (his nickname), neither personal imprisonment nor the persecution of German socialists in the 1880s could deter him from standing up for his internationalist convictions.  

Valentin J. Hemberger (*1987), works as an historian, lecture and journalist. Research focuses are the Weimar Republic (especially left-wing media), labour movement and the history of the Soviet Union until 1945.