You can help expand this article with text translated from the corresponding article in German. (December 2023) Click [show] for important translation instructions. View a machine-translated version of the German article. Machine translation, like DeepL or Google Translate, is a useful starting point for translations, but translators must follow the LLM translation guideline, revise errors as necessary and confirm that the translation is accurate, rather than simply copy-pasting machine-translated text into the English Wikipedia. Do not translate text that appears unreliable or low-quality. If possible, verify the text with references provided in the foreign-language article. You must provide copyright attribution in the edit summary accompanying your translation by providing an interlanguage link to the source of your translation. A model attribution edit summary is Content in this edit is translated from the existing German Wikipedia article at [[:de:Preußische Geheimpolizei]]; see its history for attribution. You may also add the template {{Translated|de|Preußische Geheimpolizei}} to the talk page. For more guidance, see Wikipedia:Translation.

This article needs more citations. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Prussian Secret Police" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (February 2026) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

The Prussian Secret Police (German: Preußische Geheimpolizei) was the secret police of Prussia in the 19th and early 20th centuries.^[1][2]

Forerunners

King Frederick William III founded the Königlich Preußische Polizeipräsidium zu Berlin (lit. "Royal Prussian Police Presidium") in 1809 with Justus von Gruner as its first president.^[3]

Karl Ludwig Friedrich von Hinckeldey [de; fr], the Police Commissioner of Berlin, was appointed by King Friedrich Wilhelm IV in the wake of the 1848 revolutions and promoted to Generalpolizeidirektor (lit. "General Police Director") in 1854, which gave him authority outside of the Ministry of the Interior.^[1]

In 1851, Hinckeldey founded the Police Union of German States alongside representatives of the police forces of Austria, Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, Hanover, Baden, and Württemberg, to establish police cooperation within the German Confederation. The union met at least once annually from 1851-1866 and published weekly reports to secretly disseminate information on any people or groups seen as being a threat to political stability, from the press to the Freemasons. This practice of information-sharing encouraged the other governments to establish political police divisions and surveillance networks similar to what Hinckeldey oversaw in Berlin, which included informants, undercover agents, and regular raids on press offices.^[1]

Reorganization under a new name

The Prussian Secret Police was renamed in 1933 as the Gestapo. Prussia itself was dissolved as an administrative entity following World War II.

See also

• Wilhelm Stieber

References

This German history article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by adding missing information.

• v
• t
• e

This article about government in Germany is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by adding missing information.

• v
• t
• e