Charles Dameron

Charles Haywood Dameron (born November 11, 1914 in New Roads , Pointe Coupee Parish , Louisiana , † January 9, 2002 in Port Allen , West Baton Rouge Parish , Louisiana) was an American lawyer and officer in the US Army . As such, was involved in the investigation of crimes committed by the National Socialists .

Life

Charles Dameron came from a respected family of lawyers; one of his ancestors was William Claiborne , the first governor of Louisiana .

From 1934 to 1938 Dameron studied law at the Law School of Louisiana State University . He then worked as a lawyer. Even before the United States entered the Second World War , Dameron volunteered as a reserve lieutenant in the US Army in 1940. During the war, he first served as a senior army lawyer with police duties at Camp Polk . In 1944 he was assigned to General George S. Patton's 3rd Army in Europe and entrusted with the investigation of war crimes . On May 31, 1945, Dameron assumed leadership of War Crimes Investigation Team No. 6824 with headquarters in Regensburg. This unit was subordinate to the War Crimes Group in Wiesbaden . His team's tasks included investigating war crimes such as air murders and crimes in Buchenwald and Dachau concentration camps as part of the War Crimes Program . The team worked in the Linz area from mid-May to July 1945 to investigate intelligence reports that crimes had been committed in Hartheim Castle . Within a short time, Dameron succeeded in clearing up the euthanasia crimes that became known under the code names Aktion T4 and Aktion 14f13 in the NS killing center in Hartheim . The results were summarized in the so-called Dameron Report . The most important find during the investigations were the bureaucratic calculations for the euthanasia murders, which have entered the research under the term Hartheimer Statistics . Furthermore, parts of the correspondence of the medical director of T4, Paul Nitsche , were among the finds. As evidence, the latter was part of the indictment at the Nuremberg doctors' trial .

In early 1946 Dameron returned to Louisiana under promotion to Lieutenant Colonel and served as a lawyer and prosecutor in Baton Rouge until his retirement .

Charles Dameron married Mary Nichols of DeRidder on April 1, 1943 . The marriage remained childless.

literature

• Brigitte Kepplinger , Irene Leitner (eds.): Dameron Report. Report of the War Crime Investigating Team No. 6824 of the USArmy of July 17, 1945 about the Hartheim killing center. Studienverlag, Innsbruck 2012, ISBN 978-3-7065-4947-9 .
• Genius Hendry: Ethel Claiborne Dameron. Puffy's Legacy. A Southern Lady's Story. Xlibris Corporation, 2012, ISBN 978-1-4797-0395-1 , Dameron's photo .