Friedrich Hartjenstein

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Fritz Hartjenstein called Fritz Hartjenstein (* 3. July 1905 in Peine ; † 20th October 1954 in Paris ) was in World War II, a German obersturmbannführer and commandant of the concentration camp Auschwitz-Birkenau and Natzweiler , for which he repeatedly for convicted death was .

Life

Hartjenstein, the son of a shoemaker, worked as a farmhand on an agricultural estate for four years after attending school for ten years. At the same time he studied agriculture in Hanover. From December 1926 he did twelve years of military service as a professional soldier in the Reichswehr in an infantry regiment, which he completed in 1938 as a sergeant major and reserve officer . Fearing that he would have to return to a civilian life with a mediocre degree, Hartjenstein then accepted a position as a trainer with the SS available troops. In January 1939 he switched to the SS-Totenkopfverband (SS-No. 327.350). Initially, Hartjenstein was assigned to the 2nd SS Totenkopfregiment (Brandenburg) in Oranienburg - he rose there to Obersturmführer in a few months - and was then assigned to the Wewelsburg subcamp, a subcamp of the Sachsenhausen concentration camp , as the leader of the guard company. At the beginning of January 1941 he switched to the SS Totenkopf Division . First deployed in the West, then in the East, he was wounded in the Demyansk Kessel Battle and then transferred to Auschwitz in September 1942 , where he was the Sturmbannführer and headed the Guard. Arthur Liebehenschel , the successor to Rudolf Höß as camp commandant, appointed Hartjenstein to lead the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp, which at that time was still independent alongside the main camp, and whose camp commandant Hartjenstein was from November 22, 1943 to May 1944. Hartjenstein, who was accused by Rudolf Höß of having failed as a commander, was then replaced by Josef Kramer . In the Waffen-SS , Hartjenstein rose to SS-Obersturmbannführer in 1944 . In 1944 he was appointed as the successor to Kramer as commandant of the Natzweiler concentration camp , which he headed until the end of February 1945. After the main camp was moved to the Neckar Valley in Guttenbach / Binau in November 1944 , he was responsible for the additional sub- camps built on the right bank of the Rhine around the Neckarelz concentration camp from September 1944 . Numerous executions took place in Natzweiler under Hartjenstein's leadership. After the end of his activity as a concentration camp commander, Hartjenstein transferred to an SS training regiment at the Putlos military training area and from March 8 to April 23, 1945 to the training center for SS armored troops in Bergen .

Hartjenstein's professional biography is an example of the ongoing rotation between the units of the Waffen SS and the concentration camp SS. He is also an example that even higher SS ranks could be taken by non-party members, because he did not join the NSDAP .

Between January 1944 and the liquidation of the Natzweiler-Struthof main camp, the number of executions skyrocketed to around 250. Allied prosecutors held Hartjenstein responsible for five of them after the end of National Socialism . He was sentenced to life imprisonment by a British military tribunal in Wuppertal (May 29 - June 1, 1946) for the murder of four British resistance fighters. The four women who belonged to the Special Operations Executive and worked in the French Resistance were arrested in Dijon and Paris in June and November 1943. After staying in a women's prison in Karlsruhe, they were transferred to the Natzweiler-Struthof concentration camp and killed by phenol injections on July 6, 1944 and then burned in the crematorium . The convicted Hartjenstein was initially transferred to French custody for further proceedings. Hartjenstein was then sentenced to death by the French military courts in Rastatt (1947) and Metz (July 2, 1954). He died of a heart attack in a Paris prison before the execution of the sentence .

literature

  • Wacław Długoborski , Franciszek Piper (eds.): Auschwitz 1940-1945. Studies on the history of the Auschwitz concentration and extermination camp. Verlag Staatliches Museum Auschwitz-Birkenau, Oswiecim 1999, 5 volumes: I. Construction and structure of the camp. II. The prisoners - conditions of existence, work and death. III. Destruction. IV. Resistance. V. Epilog., ISBN 83-85047-76-X .
  • Ernst Klee : The dictionary of persons on the Third Reich: Who was what before and after 1945. Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2005, ISBN 3-596-16048-0 .
  • Karin Orth : The concentration camp SS. Social structural analyzes and biographical studies. unconditional Edition Munich 2004, ISBN 3-423-34085-1
  • Tom Segev : The Soldiers of Evil. On the history of the concentration camp commanders . Rowohlt, Reinbek near Hamburg 1995, ISBN 3-499-18826-0 .
  • Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum (ed.): Auschwitz in the eyes of the SS. Oświęcim 1998, ISBN 83-85047-35-2
  • Robert Steegmann: The Natzweiler-Struthof concentration camp and its external commandos on the Rhine and Neckar 1941-1945 , Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-940938-58-9

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Tom Segev : The Soldiers of Evil. On the history of the concentration camp commanders , Reinbek bei Hamburg 1995, p. 86f.
  2. ↑ a b Aleksander Lasik: The organizational structure of KL Auschwitz , in: Aleksander Lasik, Franciszek Piper, Piotr Setkiewicz, Irena Strzelecka: Auschwitz 1940-1945. Studies on the history of the Auschwitz concentration and extermination camp. , Volume I: Construction and structure of the camp , Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum , Oświęcim 1999, p. 178.
  3. ↑ a b Karin Orth: The Concentration Camp SS , Munich 2004, p. 242
  4. ↑ a b c d Robert Steegmann: The Natzweiler-Struthof concentration camp and its external commandos on the Rhine and Neckar 1941-1945 , Berlin 2010, p. 354ff.
  5. ↑ a b State Museum Auschwitz-Birkenau (ed.): Auschwitz in the eyes of the SS. Oswiecim 1998, p. 228.
  6. ↑ a b Ernst Klee: Das Personenlexikon zum Third Reich , Frankfurt am Main 2007, p. 228.
  7. ^ Robert Steegmann: The Natzweiler-Struthof Concentration Camp and its external commandos on the Rhine and Neckar 1941-1945 , Berlin 2010, p. 210
  8. ↑ See: Webb, Anthony M. (Ed.): Trial of Wolfgang Zeuss (!), Magnus Wochner, Emil Meier, Peter Straub, Fritz Hartjenstein, Franz Berg, Werner Rohde, Emil Bruttel, Kurt aus dem Bruch and Harberg. (The Natzweiler Trial) . London, Edinburgh, Glasgow 1949.
personal data
SURNAME Hartjenstein, Friedrich
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Hartjenstein, Fritz
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German camp commandant of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp
DATE OF BIRTH 3rd July 1905
PLACE OF BIRTH Torment
DATE OF DEATH October 20, 1954
Place of death Paris