2045: Hulse calls Bickel. Oswald Pohl, who received more support than any of his fellow prisoners, although his crimes (i.e., the destruction of the Warsaw ghetto) were among the worst, had great success with a booklet called The Way to God in which he explained his reason for converting to the Catholic faith. 10, Trials of War Criminals before the Nuernberg Military Tribunals, vol. They seem collected and self-controlled, and I make an effort to get a grip on myself. Ohlendorfs apparently reliable testimony was attributed to his distaste for the corruptionin Nazi Germany and a stubborn commitment to duty. Ohlendorf, Otto. - WW2 Gravestone Bickel says he will not be a witness. The charter defined as crimes the following acts: The United States Military Government in Germany, on October 18, 1946, enacted an ordinance under which military tribunals were established in the American Zone of Occupation, with the purpose of trying and punishing criminals within that zone who had escaped prosecution at Nuremberg. . God have mercy on those who murder me. You cant hurry them, you know, says the Colonel philosophically. Copyright 2023 Facing History & Ourselves. It is a report from Denmark, of all places, to the effect that the men have already been executed. Students examine how choices made by individuals and groups contributed to the rise of the Nazi Party in the 1920s and 1930s. His wrists are tied behind him. Otto. Nazi sons Niklas Frank and Horst von Wachter look back at 'What Our [22][c], Ohlendorf disliked the use of the oft-employed Genickschu (shot to the back of the neck) and preferred to line up victims and fire at them from a greater distance so as to alleviate personal responsibility for individual murders. Some 20 newspaper-men have converged on the Hotel Goggol, the towns leading hotel, where they are waiting for news and filing background and human interest stories. [4] His role in collecting intelligence from his secret police agents was disliked by some of the Nazi leadership. Birth 4 Feb 1907 - Unavailable. Blobel, Braune, Naumann, and Ohlendorf had all been leaders of the Extermination Squads ( Einsatzgruppen ), which were the chief instruments devised by the Nazis for wiping out the Jews of Europe. Another newspaper calls to inquire whether it is true that the executions will go forward. We also can examine how the commanders of the Einsatzgruppen, like Ohlendorf, summarized this barbarity. They killed on their own. [54] Defending his actions, Ohlendorf compared Einsatzgruppen activities to the Biblical Jewish extirpation of its enemies; he likewise claimed that his firing squads were "no worse than the 'press-button killers' who dropped the atom bomb on Japan". . 3. I watch the preparations. 0007: Borom says he wishes there were a seven-man gallows. [32] This act should not be seen as a change of heart or kindness, as just a month prior in September 1941, Ohlendorf reported to his men that "from now on the Jewish question is going to be solved and that means liquidation". Their own reports will show that the slaughter committed by these defendants was dictated, not by military necessity, but by that supreme perversion of thought, the Nazi theory of the master race. Browning, Christopher (with contributions by Jrgen Matthas). Carlo Schmid, vice-president of the Bundestag, one of the principal Socialist party leaders, and a highly regarded anti-Nazi and enemy of anti-Semitism, then added that We wish to create a new moral climate in Germany. He said that if the U.S. and the other occupying powers in West Germany granted clemency, the Soviet Military Administration in Eastern Germany would in all probability follow suit. The others are relaxed now, smoking. Allied Control Council no. Someone suggests that the prisoners must be well heeled to have been able to lay out the money it cost to circulate the petition. And for providing the also rapidly dwindling number of Holocaust survivors the chance to face their tormenters. It was clear from the moment Dr. Herman Ehlers (Bundestag president) delivered his opening address, that the delegates had made elaborate preparations for the meeting. After the IMT trial, the United States conducted twelve additional trials on the basis of the Charter. He doesnt want it delayed or snafued by a suicide, which would mean writing lengthy reports and involve him in interminable red tape. The extreme anti-Semitism of the Nazi regime was given full license with these criminal orders. Colonel Graham, whose office is the nerve center, makes pointed reference to the possibility of suicide. When Otto Friedrich Ohlendorf was born on 31 January 1893, in Millstadt, St. Clair, Illinois, United States, his father, Friedrich Ohlendorf, was 24 and his mother, Maria Schwab, was 21. In 1941, Ohlendorf is appointed the commander of Einsatzgruppe D, which perpetrates mass murder in Moldova, south Ukraine, the Crimea, and, during 1942, the North Caucasus. That was my biggest disappointment; nobody, including my mass murderers, ever said Im sorry. "[26][d], Many of the killing operations were personally overseen by Ohlendorf, who wanted to ensure they were "military in character and humane under the circumstances". After a talk by Hans Joachim Von Merkatz, a functionary of an influential right-wing political group, Ehlers introduced Bundestag Deputy Jakob Altmeier, a Socialist party member. 2 (a subunit of Einsatzgruppe A), who received a death sentence, was extradited to Belgium. Ohlendorf's comment that Mueller was ordered to remain adds weight to the probability that Mueller died in Berlin. Schmidt had been in charge of Buchenwald for three years. Those bastards, he mutters, those unmitigated bastardsif they try anything. He didnt know what they were for a moment, suspected a suicide attempt. Schubert claimed that, unlike the radio transmissions, these reports contained exact details and descriptions of the places in which the actions had taken place, the course of the operations, losses, numbers of places destroyed and persons killed, arrest of agents, reports on interrogations, reports on the civilian sector, etc. Heydrich and others at the Reich Security Main Office parsed this material and assessed the success of the commanders. Otto Ohlendorf was the Head of Amt lll of the Reich Main Security Office during the Second World War and organiser of mass murders in the Southern Ukraine in 1941 and 1942. This unit perpetrated mass murder primarily in Belarus and in Russian territory west of Moscow. 2008 - 2023 INTERESTING.COM, INC. 1935: JAG1 lieutenant colonels from Heidelberg, two of them, have arrived to serve as army witnesses. Ferencz called no witnesses and based the case on wartime SS reports that detailed mass shootings conducted by the Einsatzgruppen. What insights do the Milgram experiments (see reading. To the end, he exhibited hardly any remorse about what he had done. Otto Ohlendorf, the head of the SD Domestic office in the RSHA, personally commanded Einsatzgruppe D. This unit deployed to southern Ukraine, Crimea, and the North Caucasus. 14 officials of other Nazi organizations that engaged in racial persecution. In 1936, three years after Hitler and the Nazi Party came int Show more The. I seat myself next to Lieutenant Colonel Borom. 2242: Big clock is ticking. His murderous activity certainly influenced the decision-making process of the other Einsatzgruppenleaders, insofar as Ohlendorfs formal transgressions were obviously in no way restricted, neither by the Reichssicherheitshauptamt[RSHA] nor by the relevant military commander. In September 1941, the earliest known murder of Soviet Roma by EinsatzgruppeD occurred at Nikolayev. Our small talk is mostly about McCloy and his amazing courage. Among people born in 1907, Otto Ohlendorf ranks 36 . He shakes hands also with Bickel when I introduce them. The first of a series of indictments was filed on October 25, 1946, and the trial opened on December 9 of that year. The chief prosecutor was 27-year-old Ben Ferencz. Radio transmissions were conducted weekly or bi-weekly under conditions of absolute secrecy. 08-06-1951, age 44, hangedat theLandsberg PrisoninBavaria. And the way we treat them.. Britt removes it, places it back on the mans head for the second time, tightens it with the knot at the nape of the neck. Otto Ohlendorf (1907-1951) FamilySearch This was done to avoid any possibility of poison or suicides. Otto Ohlendorf. The army executioner, Mr. Britt, suddenly puts in an appearance, trim and neat in his tight-fitting uniform. It was, he argued, almost inhuman to keep men, regardless of the crimes they might have committed, in a state of terrible uncertainty as to whether they were going to live or die. 2. Find topics of interest and explore encyclopedia content related to those topics, Find articles, photos, maps, films, and more listed alphabetically, Recommended resources and topics if you have limited time to teach about the Holocaust, Explore the ID Cards to learn more about personal experiences during the Holocaust. The 24 defendants in Case #9 were all leading members of Einsatzgruppen that operated on the Eastern Front during World War II. They were the parents of at least 2 sons. In November 1944 he was promoted again to Gruppenfhrer. Rochester: University of Rochester Press, 2012. [20][b] Ohlendorf's Einsatzgruppe in particular was responsible for the 13 December 1941 massacre at Simferopol, where at least 14,300 people, mostly Jews, were killed. Explore a timeline of events that occurred before, during, and after the Holocaust. Hanning declared he was sincerely sorry and ashamed that he had belonged to a criminal organization that committed mass murder and countless atrocities, and that he had never done anything to prevent such actions. Such actions continued right through December 1941. But I should like to emphasize that if you execute these men, their lives will be wasted! Two of the men have fathers who were high-up servants of Hitler and soaked in the blood of the Holocaust. An officer reports that hes taking a bath. He could count on two streams of information. In some cases they had to dig their own graves. They report to the commandant, Colonel Graham. I have a queasy feeling in my stomach. His job was to wait for a possible last-minute reprieve by the Supreme Court. Facing History & Ourselves, "Obeying Orders," last updated August 11, 2017. I have photographs of the seven men in my hands. Schallermair had been directly in charge of prisoners in a sub-camp of Dachau named Muehldorf where large numbers of beatings were personally administered by him. Otto Ohlendorf (1907-1951) - Find a Grave Memorial The Registrar sits very still, his legs crossed, staring at the gallows. Another popular leaflet was a catalogue of the good deeds of Otto Ohlendorf who, by his own uncontroverted testimony, was responsible for slaughtering 60,000 Jews and Gypsies. For the Nazi hunters -- the government investigators and prosecutors along with the freelance operatives who have tracked and exposed the perpetrators -- this magnifies the role of these remaining court cases. American officials finally executed Otto Ohlendorf in June 1951. According to Dehler, someone else was adjutant general. The IMT prosecuted German leaders for international crimes defined in the Nuremberg Charter. OHLENDORF: Heydrich was wounded at the end of May 1942, and died on 4 June 1942. Ohlendorf said that Gestapo Chief Heinrich Mueller was "ordered to stay in Berlin as long as the FHRER remained there, as he shared responsibility for the FHRER's safety." He joined the SA in 1925 when he was only 18, then Heinrich Himmlers SS the following year. [52] He expressed no remorse for his actions, telling prosecutor Ben Ferencz that the Jews of America would suffer for what the prosecutor had done, and seemed to have been more concerned about the moral strain on those carrying out the murders than those being murdered. [40] Another historian, Mark Mazower, described Ohlendorf as a "gloomy, driven, self-righteous Prussian". [41] He did, however, express misgivings about the barbarity and sadism being meted out by the Romanian units that accompanied the Einsatzgruppen in their murderous tasks, since they were not only leaving a trail of corpses in their wake, they were also pillaging and raping in the process. However, the U. S. Military Governor (General Lucius Clay), and his successor (High Commissioner John J. McCloy) felt that the right of appeal should not be denied the convicted men. Graham gets his retirement discharge next week. The remainder of the trial, which lasted more than three months, was devoted to the defendants arguments. There is a slight crackle. Graham is amused. The tradition dated back to the 19th century. Holmes starts discussing the injustices of the law. On August 8, 1945, in London, the governments of the USA, France, Britain, and the USSR resolved to punish those German officers and men and members of the Nazi party who have been responsible for or have taken a consenting part in atrocities and crimes. Many historians have written about the famous Buffalo Soldiers of the all-Black 92nd Infantry Division, who fought with distinction during World War II. Die Truppe des Weltanschauungskrieges: Die Einsatzgruppen der Sicherheitspolizei und des SD 1938-1942. Showing real aptitude as a student Ohlendorf studied economics and lawat the University of Leipzig and the University of Gttingen, and by 1930 was already giving lectures at several economic institutions. Our headquarters are located at: 89 South Street, Suite 401, Boston, MA 02111. Another voice in my head says, No, you must see it through. He is tried at the Einsatzgruppen Trial, convicted, and executed on June 8, 1951 in Landsberg Prison, West Germany, https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/pa1042218. Mr. Britt is testing the rope now; he lifts and then lowers himself on the closed trap. First Blobel, then the jurist Braune; Naumann, the SS General; Ohlendorf, the economist and lawyer who murdered 90,000; Pohl and Schallermair and Schmidteach in his turn. Explore resources that meet the California HistorySocial Science Framework standards. It is still remotely possible. Essentially, they were to murder commissars attached to units of the Red Army, officials of the Communist Party, and deal with any overt resistance to the German presence. 2147: Bickel receives confirmation from Frankfort: proceed with executions. That is in large part the product of the efforts of Nazi hunters like Ferencz, Bauer and others who pushed for such trials, not allowing the past to be buried along with its victims. And Ive never ordered anyone to kill a Jew. That gave him a certain peace of mind, he added, although he was under no illusions about his ultimate fate. Ohlendorf, Otto, born 04-02-1907 in Hoheneggelsen, the son of farm owners. 2235: Graham is discussing the business of last rites. Referring first to the charge that the delay in carrying out the death sentences was inhuman, he said that if they had been carried out within four weeks after the final verdict, many men might have been unjustly executed: a good number of war criminals had already been released, after reviews of their sentences and their trials. BillionGraves FREE Dr. Phil Otto Ohlendorf, 1879 - 1913 was born in 1879. He was sentenced to death on 08-04-1948 and spent three years in detention before being hanged at the Landsberg Prison in Bavaria on 07-06-1951, age 44, and he buried on the Spottinger prison cemetery. If the Justices agree, there will be another two month delay, since the Court goes into summer recess. Four of the defendants who were charged had commanded Einsatzgruppen units sent into the Soviet Union and Soviet-controlled territory as part of Operation Barbarossa in June 1941. In his opening statement, Ferencz underscored that: It is with sorrow and with hope that we here disclose the deliberate slaughter of more than a million innocent and defenseless men, women, and children. Each assumed the right to decide the fate of men, and death was the intended result of his power and contempt. For some reason, Warrant Officer Britt seems just right for his job. (Case No. 0003: Britt steps back, glances at Graham. [34], Between February and March 1942, Himmler ordered that gas vans should be used to murder women and children so as to reduce the strain on the men, but Ohlendorf reported that many of the Einsatzkommandos refused to utilize them since burying the victims proved an "ordeal" afterwards. Twenty Einsatzgruppen leaders were found guilty by the court, and four, including Ohlendorf, were eventually executed. The slaughter perpetrated by Ohlendorf and his fellow commanders was face-to-face, and the murdered usually perished relatively close to their homes. We were all so trained to obey orders without even thinking that the thought of disobeying an order would simply never have occurred to anybody, and somebody else would have done just as well if I hadnt. With Alexander Bickel of the Office of the General Counsel, I motored to Landsberg-on-the-Lech, in Bavaria, on Tuesday the 6th, in an army staff car with a GI driver, arriving at 7 P.M. An attorney from McCloys office was detailed to remain in the Frankfort headquarters of the High Commissioner, where he was in radio-telephone communication with the General Counsels office in the State Department in Washington. . Since Jews were automatically assumed to be ultra-Bolsheviks and to be the ruling class of the Soviet Union, they were singled out. Leave a message for others who see this profile. Re: Otto Ohlendorf by Helge 05 May 2012, 10:55 The children were two boys and three girls: 1) Henning - Born February 11, 1938 2) Behrend - Born September 18, 1943 3) Irmtraut - Born March 25, 1936 4) Meinhard - Born October 30, 1940 5) Ulrike - Born May 11, 1945 Sota ei pt kuka on oikeassa, vain sen ett kuka on jljell. The Tribunal rendered its judgment on April 89, 1948. Otto Ohlendorf (1866 - 1866) - Genealogy Modern mechanized armies need a robust logistics chain to provide fuel, ammunition, and other sinews of war to sustain combat operations. In 1947-48, Ohlendorf was the most notable of the 23 members of the Einsatzgruppentried by the Americans. . I am a Jew, said Altmeier in English. Ohlendorf described the broad extent of Himmler's "degrading" and "unworthy" efforts to gain a post in the Doenitz government and Himmler's real anger on hearing that he was an "encumbrance" who would do the new government more harm than good. All of the remaining convicted defendants in this case were released from prison in 1958. Otto Ohlendorf on Trial Chief among the SS officials put on trial following the conviction of the surviving Nazi government ministers were the commanders and senior staff of the four Einsatzgruppen that operated on the Eastern Front in conjunction with the Wehrmacht. I really never gave much thought to whether it was wrong. Someone is looking for Warrant Officer Britt, the official executioner. There were pleas from churchmen and politicians, university men and students, former soldiers, disinherited royalty. . The Holocaust in Eastern Europe: At the Epicenter of the Final Solution. There was one case in which the criminal admitted to having killed 60,000. He cited examples from the Medical Case in which the defendants were charged with and convicted of performing medical experiments on concentration camp inmateshigh altitude tests, freezing tests, tests with typhus and malaria germs, artificially induced infections, salt water tests, etc. 2244: Graham hangs up the telephone. Reference to telephone orders by Himmler days before Hitler's suicide. During the Einsatzgruppen Trial, Ohlendorf was the chief defendant, and was also a key witness in the prosecution of other indicted war criminals. Mr. McCloys mail was marked by an increasingly large number of appeals for clemency, both signed and anonymous, and soon these appeals assumed the proportions of an avalanche. Seven times I have listened as they swore, in their dying words, that they had merely carried out orders; that they had been fighting for their country; that the Americans were their enemies. [5] By 1938 he was also manager in the Trade section of the Reich Business Board (Reichswirtschaftskammer[de]). Translated by Tom Lampert. On September 10, 1947, the US Military Government for Germany created Military Tribunal II-A (later renamed Tribunal II). Their names were Paul Blobel, Werner Braune, Erich Naumann, Otto Ohlendorf, Oswald Pohl, Georg Schallermair, and Hans Schmidt. Behind him is Paul Blobel whose Sonderkommando SS unit was involved in sixteen instances of mass murder, including the killing of 33,000 Jews in the Kiev massacre alone. Krausnick, Helmut, and Hans-Heinrich Wilhelm. . Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2009. Ninety-nine out of one hundred of these communications showed as much understanding of the cases as your dog, Professor Schmid.. Reichsfhrer-SS Heinrich Himmler once characterized Ohlendorf as "an unbearable Prussian" who was "without humour". [17] Einsatzgruppe D was the smallest of the task forces, but was supplemented by Romanians along their way through the killing fields of Bessarabia, southern Ukraine, and the Caucasus. His remarks have a refreshing banality. The defendant answered: You cant cast pearls before swine., High Commissioner McCloy indicated that in certain cases at Landsberg, new evidence had made it possible to reduce the death sentence to time served. The views expressed in this article are not those of Reuters News. But only four were executed, including Otto Ohlendorf, a notorious SS commander. He closes with a soft amen. Britt throws the black hood over Blobels head. He also cited examples from other cases, including the High Command Case in which military commanders carried out the so-called Fuehrer Order calling for the murder of undesirable elements such as Jews and Gypsieswomen, men, and children alike who were offensive to the Germans. And he further noted that a great number of terrible and terrifying crimes had been committed in the name of maintaining the ethnic purity of the German people. Reinhold Hanning, a 94-year-old former Auschwitz guard who will go down in history as one of the last of Hitlers perpetrators to be charged for his role in the Third Reich, offered an apology. . Students turn their attention to the collapse of the Ottoman Empire and the emergence of a strong current of ethno-nationalism rooted in Turkish identity. Germany has come a very long way since then. He is determined to prevent suicide. Over 90,000 murders are attributed to Ohlendorfs command, who testified to this effect during his trial at Nuremberg. I look around. [38] As far as Ohlendorf was concerned, the gas vans were impracticable for the scale of killing demanded by Himmler; namely, since they could only kill between fifteen and twenty-five persons at a time. Students are introduced to the many factors that influenced Americans will and ability to respond to the Jewish refugee crisis, including isolationism, racism, xenophobia, and antisemitism. Ohlendorf said that Himmler showed the letter to him and that he altered Himmler's text because "it had been unfortunately worded."
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