A few days before the end of the war, on 5 April 1945, the assistants Kurt Horeischy and Hans Vollmar – members of a resistance group – the were shot when they tried to prevent the damaging of the electron microscope of the 1st Chemical Institute.
On 10 April 1945, the first Soviet soldiers reached the university main building. The academic senate was elected on 20 April 1945 and on 25 April Ludwig Adamovich as the first post-war rector. Students were used as workers in the removal of bomb debris and the restoration of destroyed buildings, so that lectures could begin on 29 May 1945.
With the “Verbotsgesetz” adopted on 8 May 1945, the “de-Nazification” of teachers and students began, but was soon weakened resp. practically finished by amnesties. Dealing with the involvement in National Socialism increasingly took a back seat to “reconstruction”.
