[1] Gustav Siemon was born into a working-class family in a small town near Kassel during the closing months of the war.
During his time in detention Siemon joined the (Soviet sponsored) National Committee for a Free Germany (NKFD) in July 1943 and in September 1943 he was a founder member of the German Officers' League, effectively an organisation similar in its objectives to the NKFD (with which it would later be merged), but one targeted directly on members of the "officer classes" among the German prisoners of war held by the Soviets.
Many German prisoners of war held by the victorious powers would not be released back to Germany for one or two years, but Gustav Siemon was back in what remained of Germany on 26 May 1945: this was barely three weeks after the arrival in Berlin of the thirty man Ulbricht team had launched the implementation phase in a nation building exercise that would lead to the creation, formally in October 1949, of the German Democratic Republic.
The Ulbricht Team had split into three sub-groups based respectively in Berlin, Dresden and Mecklenburg: in Mecklenburg Siemon was now co-opted to work with Gustav Sobottka, who was the senior Ulbricht team member responsible in the northern part of the Soviet administered zone.
Following the contentious merger, in the Soviet controlled zone, of the KPD and SPD, this made him a member of the Socialist Unity Party (SED / Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands) after April 1946.
It might have seemed strange that at a time when the Soviet occupation zone was in the process of reverting to one-party government, there should be space for a new political party, but it was explained that the NDPD would provide a political outlet for groups that had been attracted by the Nazi Party before 1945, such as military men and some of the middle classes.
The opposition parties were nevertheless assured of their place in the system through the allocation of a pre-determined quota of seats in the National Legislature (Volkskammer).
In 1948/49 he also sat for his new party as a member of the German People's Council (Volksrat), the precursor body for the new country's National Legislature (Volkskammer).
From 1967 till 1973 he chaired the Volkskammer Credentials Committee and he was also, during this period, deputy leader of the NDPD group in the chamber.