CONTROL COMMISSION GERMANY 1945-49
How did the victorious Allies govern Germany after the second World War?
The Control Commission for Germany operated for only five years, from 1945 to 1949, and its story is little known. Alongside the great dramas of post-WWII Europe - the cold war, the fall of communism and the reunification of Germany - the story of how British, American and French public servants, together with their German counterparts, worked to establish the Federal Republic of Germany is hardly the stuff of popular history. Yet the origins of the post-war regeneration of Europe can be traced back, at least in part, to the Control Commission’s activities. Few great men occupy the stage, although there were some exceptional individuals, as well as many ordinary men and women who helped to rebuild the institutions, laws, systems and attitudes that, within ten years, transformed a “stunde null” wasteland into the modern, democratic, peaceable West Germany which became the economic powerhouse of Europe.
This project examines one small component of the bigger story, namely the British element of the Control Commission. It does not portray CCG as either heroic or hopeless; nor is it a story about personalities, or a personal memoir. It is intended as a factual account: what CCG was and what it did – in order to fill a gap in the written history. At its 1947 peak, CCG (BE) employed around 26,000 people.
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Who were they? How were they recruited and trained? What skills did they have?
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How much were they paid? How were they organised? Where did they work, and functions did they perform?
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What was it like for them and their families to live in the country of the former enemy, and how did they get on with the Germans?
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Click here to read how Germany was divided into four zones of occupation in 1945
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Click here to discover how the Military Government in the British Zone created the joint military/civilian Control Commission for Germany (British Element) known as CCG
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CCG's Organisation and Functions are described here.
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Follow these links to find out
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Click here to read about life in the British Zone of Germany between 1945-1949, including housing, food, shopping, servants, and the black market
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Click here to find out what life was like in one small German town during the early years of the British occupation
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Click here to discover why there is no official history of CCG
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OR ... click here to see the full contents of this site.
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TRACING CCG PERSONNEL
From time to time, I receive enquiries from website visitors who are trying to trace relatives who worked for CCG. Sadly, I have to disappoint them, because my focus is on the organisation and functions of the Control Commission – what it was and what it did – rather than on individual employees, although anecdotes illustrating particular aspects of life and work in CCG are sometimes included.
But enterprising website visitor Paul Barlow has discovered that the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) holds a series index cards that record details of CCG staff. These include the names, grades, salaries, and birth dates of staff employed from 1940-1959, along with the names of the German towns they were assigned to, although not every card contains all these details. It seems that the index cards are currently being processed as part of the FCDO’s archive transfer programme under the Public Records Act, indicating that at some future date they may be transferred to the National Archives. You can find out more about this on FCDO non-standard files - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).
My thanks to Paul for this information.