by Jürgen Schmidt (Author) August Bebel (1840-1913) was one of the towering figures of late nineteenth century European socialism and the leading figure of the German labour movement from the 1860s until his death in 1913. Born into a modest family, and a half-orphan from the age of four, his advancement to a pivotal role in the politics of Imperial Germany mirrored the success of German social democracy in this period. Bebel was not only the founder and first leader of the Social Democratic Workers Party of Germany (SDAP), a political movement that became the largest socialist party in nineteenth-century Europe, but he was also a powerful orator and leading member of the German parliament.