Erich Ehrlinger

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Erich Ehrlinger (born October 14, 1910 in Giengen an der Brenz , † July 31, 2004 in Karlsruhe ) was a German lawyer , SS-Oberführer , head of the Reich Main Security Office (RSHA) and u. a. directly involved in the murder of Eastern European Jews as the commander of Einsatzkommandos .

Early years

Ehrlinger, son of the mayor of Giengen (1929–45), Christian Ehrlinger, finished his school career in 1928 with the Abitur in Heidenheim . He then studied law in Tübingen, Kiel, Berlin and again Tübingen. There he became a member of the Tübingen royal society Roigel in 1928 . Careers in the SD , the RSHA and in the Einsatzgruppen later grew out of the anti- racist network at the University of Tübingen , where there had been no Jewish professor since 1931 . To the right on the mass murder involved doctorate Tübingen lawyers are u. a. Walther Stahlecker , Erwin Weinmann , Martin Sandberger , Rudolf Bilfinger , Albert Rapp and Eugen Steimle .

Erich Ehrlinger himself joined the NSDAP ( membership number 541.195) and the SA in 1931 . As a NS student functionary, he was not only active at the university. In his SA -Führungszeugnis said: "Ehrlinger was one of the few Tubingen connecting students who even before the seizure of power have been unconditionally the SA. [Ehrlinger was] regularly on the field for hall security, propaganda or field service. "

On the occasion of an SA leader course in early 1934, Ehrlinger decided to give up his legal career and become a full-time SA functionary. In the meantime he was the head of an SA sports school at Rieneck Castle near Gemünden and an official at the "Chief AW" (SA training system), but after its dissolution in May 1935 he changed his direction and switched to the SD. In the course of this he became a member of the SS (SS No. 107.493). As early as September 1935 he was employed in the Berlin SD main office , where he worked as a staff leader in the press department, central department I 3. Ehrlinger became Franz Six's deputy there .

Ehrlinger was after the connection for the SD 1938 in Austria and from April 1939 the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia in the SD Sonderkommando Prague operates.

Second World War

After the outbreak of the Second World War , Ehrlinger was on the staff of Einsatzgruppe IV in the German attack on Poland . He then acted as head of SD Warsaw. In August 1940 he met Walter Stahlecker while the Waffen SS was being set up in Norway . In 1941 Stahlecker became the leader of Einsatzgruppe A , Ehrlinger took over the leadership of the subordinate Sonderkommando 1b. His 70 to 80-strong unit followed the start of the war against the Soviet Union of Army Group North in the Baltic States to the area south of Leningrad . Ehrlinger led the mass murder of Jews behind the front, especially in the area of Kovno , Dünaburg and Rositten . In the USSR event report No. 24 of July 16, 1941, the SD reported that "1150 Jews have so far been shot" in Dünaburg by Sonderkommando 1b. According to Michael Wildt , Ehrlinger showed himself during these actions "as a hardened SS perpetrator, who himself stood at the shooting pits and cheered on the perpetrators [...] with legs apart, with a submachine gun slung around his neck, arms on his hips".

In December 1941 he was appointed commander of the Security Police and SD and SS and Police Leader (SSPF) in Kiev . Here, too, many executions took place on his orders. Often present at the shootings, he also took up arms himself if, in his opinion, they were proceeding too slowly,

In September 1943 Ehrlinger was promoted to SS-Standartenführer and was transferred to Minsk , where he succeeded Horst Böhme as head of Einsatzgruppe B. In addition, he was again in personal union commander of the Security Police and the SD and SSPF for Central Russia and Belarus . There, too, he participated in the murder of the Jews and explicitly ordered the participation of all officers, since "there are still SS leaders who have not yet fired a shot".

Ehrlinger then returned to Berlin and on April 1, 1944 became head of RSHA Office I, Personnel. In November 1944 he was promoted to SS-Oberführer by Heinrich Himmler on the basis of special intercession by Ernst Kaltenbrunner .

After 1945

At the end of the war Ehrlinger hid under the name Erich Fröscher in Schleswig-Holstein and then went to Roth near Nuremberg in October 1945 . In 1950 he moved with his family to Konstanz and worked under a false name as a receptionist in the casino there. In 1952 he married for the second time and revealed his true identity at the registry office, which, however, had no consequences. In 1954 he became head of the Volkswagen dealership in Karlsruhe.

He was arrested in December 1958. The Karlsruhe Regional Court sentenced him on December 20, 1961 to twelve years in prison . The case went back to the first instance after being appealed by the public prosecutor's office and was finally discontinued in December 1969 because of Ehrlinger's “permanent incapacity to stand trial”; as early as 1965 he was at large. After Karl-Heinz Bürger's death, he was the last surviving SS and police leader to live in Karlsruhe, without ever being prosecuted again. He died in 2004 at the age of 93.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Peter Stadlbauer: Eichmanns boss: Erich Ehrlinger
  2. ↑ a b c d e Ernst Klee: Das Personenlexikon zum Third Reich , Frankfurt am Main 2007, p. 128.
  3. ↑ Erich Ehrlinger on www.dws-xip.pl
  4. ↑ VEJ 7/27, note 4.
personal data
SURNAME Ehrlinger, Erich
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German lawyer and SS-Oberführer
DATE OF BIRTH October 14, 1910
PLACE OF BIRTH Giengen on the Brenz
DATE OF DEATH July 31, 2004
Place of death Karlsruhe