Marie Henning was a member of the Women's Policy department and belonged to the Soviet sponsored Red Aid workers and her mother became a member of the Hamburg Parliament
Meanwhile her husband became a member of the Hamburg Parliament ("Hamburgische Burgerschaft") in 1927/28. At the next election, which took place in September 1931, despite being the widowed mother of three small children, Marie Henning stood for election to the parliament in his place. Marie Henning was married twice: both her husbands predeceased her, and both died violent deaths. Her first marriage, to , ended when her husband was murdered on a bus in 1931. This marriage produced one son and two daughters. The couple's son, Otto, was killed on the Russian front in August 1944. Her second marriage was to Carl Rohde, a former leader of the pre-Nazi Black-Red-Gold anti-extremist organisation. He was conscripted into the army and died on 5 June 1944 at a munitions depot in when an anti-tank "Panzerfaust" gun exploded. 
