Anna Perthen

Perthen was born Anna Nickel in Jílové in Bohemia, Austrian Empire (today in the Czech Republic) in 1866.^[1] She began working in a factory in Bodenbach at the age of 12,^[2] and continued to work there until she married. She became involved with the Social Democratic Workers' Party of Austria, chairing the Imperial Women's Social Democratic Committee and becoming a member of Bodenbach municipal council.^[1]

Following the independence of Czechoslovakia at the end of World War I, Perthen became a member of the German Social Democratic Workers' Party (DSAP) and chair of its women's committee. She was a DSAP candidate for the Senate in the 1920 parliamentary elections, and was one of sixteen women elected to parliament.^[1] She remained in parliament until 1925.^[1] After World War II she was deported to Germany, where she settled in the Soviet occupation zone, later East Germany. She died in Magdala in 1957.^[1]