Josef Wagner (12 January 1899 – 22 April or 2 May 1945) was from 1931 the Nazi Gauleiter of Gau Westphalia-South and, as of December 1934, also of Gau Silesia. In 1941 he was dismissed from his offices, then expelled from the Nazi Party (NSDAP), imprisoned by the Gestapo, and likely executed around the time of end of the war in Europe. Early life and First World War Wagner was born in Algringen (today, Algrange), Alsace-Lorraine, to miner Nikolaus Wagner. He went to the volksschule in Kneitlingen until 1909 and then to a preparatory school in Zeltingen. Beginning in the summer of 1913 he attended the teachers' seminary in Wittlich until 1917 when he entered military service as a one-year volunteer in the Imperial German Army. He was assigned to Reserve Infantry Regiment 65 on the western front during the First World War. On 14 May 1918, he was severely wounded and taken as a prisoner of war by the French. After five attempts, he managed to escape from a POW camp in Etampes disguised in a French officer's uniform. He returned to Germany in August 1919 by way of Switzerland, completed his last year of training at a teacher seminary in Fulda and passed his teaching examinations in October 1920. Unable to find a teaching position, he was then employed a finance official in Fulda. In July 1921 he became a clerical office worker at the Bochum Association for Cast Steel Production and worked there until April 1927. Early Nazi career, 1922 to 1932 Wagner joined the Nazi Party quite early on, in 1922 (membership number 16,951) and co-founded the local NSDAP branch in Bochum, becoming its first Ortsgruppenleiter (Local Group Leader). As an Alter Kämpfer (Old Fighter) he eventually would be awarded the Golden Party Badge. When the Nazi Party was outlawed in the wake of the Beer Hall Putsch in November 1923, Wagner joined the Völkisch-Social Bloc, a Nazi-oriented electoral alliance, becoming its leader in the Westphalia Industrial District. When the Nazi Party was re-established in February 1925, Wagner rejoined and resumed his position as the local leader in Bochum, advancing in 1926 to the position of Bezirksleiter (District Leader). In May 1927, he found employment as a teacher at the Volksschule Horst-Emscher and then at the Gelsenkirchen branch, from which he was fired in November 1927 for political activity. On 20 May 1928 he was elected