Clara Helene Immerwahr was a German chemist. She was the first German woman to be awarded a doctorate in chemistry in Germany, and is credited with being a pacifist as well as a women's rights activist. From 1901 until her suicide in 1915, she was married to the Nobel Prize-winning chemistFritz Haber.
Early life and education
Immerwahr was born on the Polkendorff Farm near Breslau. She was the youngest daughter of Jewish parents, chemist Philipp Immerwahr and his wife Anna. She grew up on the farm with her three older siblings, Elli, Rose and Paul. In 1890, her mother died of cancer; while Elli and her husband Siegfried stayed at the farm, Clara moved with her father to Breslau. Immerwahr studied at the University of Breslau, in 1900 attaining her degree and a PhD in chemistry under Richard Abegg. Her dissertation was entitled Beiträge zur Löslichkeitsbestimmung schwerlöslicher Salze des Quecksilbers, Kupfers, Bleis, Cadmiums und Zinks. She was the first woman Ph.D. at the University of Breslau and received the designation magna cum laude.
Marriage and work
Immerwahr married Fritz Haber in 1901, four years after she had converted to Christianity in 1897. Due to societal expectations that a married woman's place was in the home, her ability to conduct research was limited. She instead contributed to her husband's work without recognition, translating some of his papers into English. On 1 June 1902 she gave birth to Hermann Haber the only child of that marriage. Confiding in a friend, Immerwahr expressed her deep dissatisfaction with this subservient role: During World War I, Fritz Haber became a staunch supporter of the German military effort and played an important role in the development of chemical weapons. His efforts would culminate in his supervision of the first successful deployment of a weapon of mass destruction in military history, in Flanders, Belgium on 22 April 1915. Immerwahr spoke out against her husband's research as a “perversion of the ideals of science” and “a sign of barbarity, corrupting the very discipline which ought to bring new insights into life.”
Death
Shortly after Haber's return from Belgium, Immerwahr shot herself in the chest using Haber's military pistol. On 2 May 1915, she died in her son's arms. The morning after her death, Haber left for the first gas attack against the Russians on the Eastern Front. Her suicide remained largely in the dark. Six days after her death, only the small local newspaperGrunewald-Zeitung reported that "the wife of Dr. H. in Dahlem, who is currently on the front, has set an end to her life by shooting herself. The reasons for this act of the unhappy woman are unknown." There is no evidence of an autopsy. The poorly documented circumstances of her death have resulted in considerable discussion and controversy as to her reasons. Immerwahr's ashes were moved from Dahlem to Basel and buried together with Haber's after his death in 1934. Subsequently, their son Hermann Haber emigrated to the United States, where he eventually committed suicide in 1946. Ludwig Fritz Haber, the son of Fritz Haber and his second wife, Charlotte, published a book on the history of poison gas, The Poisonous Cloud.
In drama, fiction and writing
A number of works have been inspired to explore Fritz and Clara's relationship. The short filmHaber, written and directed by Daniel Ragussis, attempts to examine some of the issues in the couple's relationship. The Habers also feature prominently in the novelA Reunion of Ghosts by Judith Claire Mitchell, where their characters are named Lenz and Iris Alter. Works such as The Greater Good, directed by Celia de Wolff and written by Justin Hopper, portray Clara as deeply affected by her husband's research on gas warfare. Their lives are portrayed in the American television seriesGenius. In 2014 the film Clara Immerwahr was released. Clara and Fritz are also discussed, in brief account, in the book How to Hide an Empire: A History of the Greater United States by Daniel Immerwahr, when referencing the history of nitrogen's role in agriculture in American history.
