Freies Volk ('Free People') was a newspaper published daily from Düsseldorf, West Germany 1949-1956. Freies Volk was printed at Freier Verlag GmbH, Ackerstrasse 114. The first issue of Freies Volk was published on 3 January 1949. Freies Volk replaced Die Freiheit, an organ of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) in Düsseldorf that had been banned in October 1948, following sharp criticisms against the Allied occupation powers. Freies Volk carried the by-line 'People's Newspaper for the Rhine-Westphalian Industrial Region'. On 1 September 1949 Freies Volk became the central organ of the Communist Party. At the time it had a circulation of 80,000. Hugo Erlich was named as the editor in chief of Freies Volk.