Ernst-Heinrich Schmauser

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Ernst-Heinrich Schmauser

Ernst-Heinrich Schmauser (born January 18, 1890 in Hof (Saale) ; † missing on February 10, 1945 near Altenrode / District of Breslau ) was a German SS-Obergruppenführer , General of the Police and Waffen-SS , Higher SS and Police Leader in Breslau as well as member of the Reichstag for the NSDAP .

Live and act

Schmauser was born the son of a businessman. He attended elementary school and secondary school in Hof an der Saale, then the upper secondary school in Bayreuth . After graduating from high school, he embarked on an officer career. First he was a member of the 11th Bavarian Infantry Regiment "von der Tann" in Regensburg for a year. After that he became a cadet in the 9th Royal Saxon Infantry Regiment. 133 in Zwickau.

After training at the war school in Hanover, he took part in the First World War as a company commander from 1914 to 1918 . He fought with infantry regiments No. 133 and 183 in the west . He was wounded three times and received several awards: Iron Cross II. And I. Class, Wound Badge in silver, Knight's Cross II. Class of the Order of Albrecht with swords. On November 9, 1915, he also received the Knight's Cross of the Military St. Henry's Order .

In 1919 Schmauser said goodbye to the "Old Army" . At the same time, he was promoted to captain and given permission to continue to wear the regimental uniform of Infantry Regiment No. 133.

From 1919 to 1933 Schmauser worked as a cashier in Zwickau. He married in 1921 and had two children. Schmauser belonged to the Völkisch Social Block in 1924 and became head of the SA in Zwickau. At the beginning of March 1930 he joined the NSDAP ( membership number 215.704) and was accepted into the SS on October 14, 1930 with the rank of SS-Sturmbannführer (SS-No.3,359), in which he rose to SS-Obergruppenführer in April 1937. From mid-December 1930 he headed SS-Brigade 7 in Saxony and from August 1932 SS Section XVI (Province of Saxony).

In the general election of July 1932, Schmauser was a candidate of the Nazi Party for the constituency 20 (Leipzig) in the Reichstag voted, which it initially belonged to November 1,932th Schmauser lost his mandate in the Reichstag election of November 1932 . A year later, in November 1933, Schmauser returned to parliament as a member of the NSDAP, which he subsequently belonged to until his death in February 1945. In the National Socialist Reichstag he first represented constituency 24 (Upper Bavaria-Swabia) (November 1933 to February 1936), then from March 29, 1936 to February 1945, constituency 26 (Franconia).

Period of National Socialism (1933 to 1945)

At the end of July 1933, Schmauser gave up his professional activity at Heinrich Himmler's request and took over the management of the SS Upper Section South with headquarters in Munich . On April 1, 1936, he was appointed SS-Oberabschnittsführer Main, based in Nuremberg . During the Second World War , Schmauser was SS-Obergruppenführer and Higher SS and Police Leader from May 20, 1941 in Breslau , and later also leader of the SS-Oberabschnitt South-East.

Schmauser accompanied Himmler during his visits to the Auschwitz concentration camp on March 1, 1941 and in mid-July 1942. On July 17, 1942 u. a. Himmler and Schmauser in the camp in Bunker II reported the murder of people using gas . On the evening of the same day Schmauser took part in a reception given by Gauleiter Fritz Bracht for Himmler, which was also attended by camp commandant Rudolf Hoess , Hans Kammler and Joachim Caesar .

On January 20, 1945, shortly before the Red Army (1st Ukrainian Front) liberated Auschwitz on January 27, thousands of prisoners were to be murdered on Schmauser's orders, and 700 prisoners from Auschwitz-Birkenau and other sub-camps were taken by special units of the SS murdered. Almost 8,000 prisoners escaped death because SS officers would rather save their own skin than carry out the order.

Schmauser, General of the Police since April 1941, was appointed General of the Waffen SS on July 1, 1944. On February 10, 1945, he was driving to Breslau when German troops near Altenrode pointed out that the Soviet tank spearheads had already cut the road connection. Schmauser, however, did not believe the warning and drove on. He has been missing since then. It is believed that he fell into the hands of the Red Army and was shot either immediately or later while in captivity.

See also

literature

  • Ernst Klee : The dictionary of persons on the Third Reich . Updated 2nd edition. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2007, ISBN 978-3-596-16048-8 .
  • Ruth Bettina Birn : The Higher SS and Police Leaders. Himmler's representative in the Reich and in the occupied territories. Droste Verlag, Düsseldorf 1986, ISBN 3-7700-0710-7 .
  • Ernst Klee : Auschwitz. Perpetrators, accomplices, victims and what became of them. A dictionary of persons . S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2013, ISBN 978-3-10-039333-3 .
  • Utho Grieser: Himmler's husband in Nuremberg. The Benno Martin case. A study on the structure of the 3rd Reich in the "City of the Nazi Party Rallies". (= Nuremberg workpieces on city and state history, Volume 13). Nuremberg City Archives, Nuremberg 1974, ISBN 3-87432-025-1 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Ruth Bettina Birn: The higher SS and police leaders. Himmler's representative in the Reich and in the occupied territories. Düsseldorf 1986, p. 346.
  2. ↑ The Royal Saxon Military St. Heinrichs-Orden 1736–1918, an honorary sheet of the Saxon Army. Wilhelm and Bertha von Baensch Foundation, Dresden 1937, p. 579.
  3. ↑ Utho Grieser: Himmler's husband in Nuremberg: The case of Benno Martin. Nuremberg 1974, p. 311.
  4. ↑ Wacław Długoborski, Franciszek Piper, Aleksander Lasik: Auschwitz 1940–1945. 1999, p. 30.
  5. ^ Ernst Klee: Auschwitz. Perpetrators, accomplices, victims and what became of them. Lexicon of persons. Frankfurt / M. 2013, p. 356f.
  6. ↑ Laurence Rees: Auschwitz. Story of a crime. 2005, p. 352.
  7. ↑ Andreas Schulz, Dieter Zinke: The generals of the Waffen SS and the police. Volume 5: Schlake-Turner. Bissendorf 2011.
personal data
SURNAME Schmauser, Ernst-Heinrich
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German politician (NSDAP), MdR and HSSPF Breslau
DATE OF BIRTH January 18, 1890
PLACE OF BIRTH Hof (Saale)
DATE OF DEATH after February 10, 1945
Place of death Wroclaw