Friedrich Wilhelm Ruppert
Friedrich Wilhelm Ruppert (born February 2, 1905 in Frankenthal (Pfalz) , † May 28, 1946 in Landsberg am Lech ) was a German SS-Obersturmführer (1943) and first protective custody camp leader in the Dachau concentration camp and also in the Majdanek concentration camp .
Activity in concentration camps
From April 11, 1933, Ruppert, married and father of one child, was a member of the guards at the Dachau concentration camp and worked as a warehouse electrician. On September 18, 1942, he was transferred to the Majdanek concentration camp near Lublin . Ruppert was the technical director of warehouse management there. In Majdanek, Ruppert claims to have witnessed the so-called harvest festival in November 1943, a mass murder of 43,000 Jews.
From May 1944, Ruppert was employed as camp manager in the Warsaw concentration camp until it was evacuated. Ruppert returned to the Dachau concentration camp. From August 6, 1944, he held the position of First Protective Custody Camp Leader under the camp commandant Eduard Weiter . In this function, Ruppert was responsible for the "running" of the camp, its internal order and the daily routine with roll calls and thus for the prison conditions. On April 23, 1945 he was replaced by Max Schobert and briefly appointed as the third protective custody camp leader.
Ruppert was assigned to the evacuation march of the prisoners from the concentration camp in April 1945. The death march went via Pasing, Wolfratshausen, Bad Tölz to Tegernsee and ended on April 30th. Shortly afterwards, Ruppert was arrested by the Americans.
Trial and sentencing
On November 5, 1945, the main Dachau trial against Ruppert and 39 other defendants from the Dachau concentration camp took place as part of the Dachau trials before a US military court in Dachau . Due to his capacity as First Protective Custody Camp Leader in 1944 and 1945, he was charged with having been responsible for carrying out punitive measures and executions within the camp. The execution of around ninety Russian prisoners (accused of "saboteurs" and " partisans ") in September 1944 in the Dachau crematorium, which he is said to have supervised, played a special role . The court also held that individual excesses had been proven: Ruppert kicked prisoners and hit them with a whip.
In his defense, Ruppert protested against such accusations; in his function he did not have the necessary influence. On 13 December 1945 was military court , all 40 defendants guilty and sentenced 36 - including Ruppert - to death by the strand . On May 28, 1946, Ruppert was executed in the Landsberg War Crimes Prison .
literature
- Holger Lessing: The first Dachau trial (1945/46) . Nomos, Baden-Baden 1993, ISBN 3-7890-2933-5 .
- 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 .
- Case No. 000-50-2 (US vs. Martin Gottfried Weiss et al.) Tried 13 Dec. 45 in tight. Language (PDF file; 40.9 MB)
Individual evidence
- ^ Holger Lessing: The first Dachau trial (1945/46). Baden-Baden 1993, ISBN 3-7890-2933-5 , p. 323.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Ruppert, Friedrich Wilhelm |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German SS-Obersturmbannführer and first protective custody camp leader in Dachau concentration camp |
| DATE OF BIRTH | February 2, 1905 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Frankenthal |
| DATE OF DEATH | May 28, 1946 |
| Place of death | Landsberg am Lech |