Heinrich Josten

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Heinrich Josten (born December 11, 1893 in Malmedy , † January 24, 1948 in Krakow ) was a German SS-Obersturmführer and member of the guards in Auschwitz .

Life

Josten, a locksmith by profession, joined the NSDAP ( membership number 1.593.636) and the SS (SS number 92.316) in 1933. In the SS, Josten rose to SS-Obersturmführer in 1944. From 1939 he was a member of the Waffen SS and was deployed in the Flossenbürg concentration camp from July 26, 1939 . After the outbreak of World War II , he did brief military service with a regiment of the Waffen SS. Afterwards Josten was deployed in Sachsenhausen concentration camp .

On June 25, 1940, he was transferred to the Auschwitz concentration camp, where he worked until the camp was "evacuated" in mid-January 1945. At first Josten was used as a command leader and in the arrest administration . Then he was commander of the II. And III. Security team and then head of the weapons and equipment unit at the camp commandant's office . From there he moved to Department IIIa - Labor Assignment. From October 1943 to January 1945 was Josten II. Protective custody camp in Auschwitz concentration camp (main camp) , most recently under the I. protective custody camp leader Franz Hössler . Josten led firing squads several times in the gravel pits.

After the "evacuation" of the Auschwitz concentration camp, Josten became camp leader of the Boelcke barracks subcamp of the Mittelbau concentration camp in January 1945 . Thousands of inmates died in this camp under his leadership of malnutrition, neglect and unsanitary conditions. A few days before the Boelcke barracks subcamp was liberated by soldiers from the US Army , Josten and other SS men left for the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in early April 1945 .

After his arrest in Poland , Josten was sentenced to death in the Kraków Auschwitz Trial before the Supreme National Tribunal of Poland on December 22, 1947 for participating in selections . The sentence was carried out by hanging on January 24, 1948 in Kraków's Montelupich Prison .

literature

  • Ernst Klee : The dictionary of persons on the Third Reich: Who was what before and after 1945. Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2007, ISBN 978-3-596-16048-8 .
  • 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 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e 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. 231.
  2. ↑ a b c Ernst Klee: Das Personenlexikon zum Third Reich , Frankfurt am Main 2007, p. 290
  3. ^ Jens Christian Wagner: Nordhausen (Boelcke barracks). In: Wolfgang Benz , Barbara Distel (eds.): The place of terror . History of the National Socialist Concentration Camps. Volume 7: Niederhagen / Wewelsburg, Lublin-Majdanek, Arbeitsdorf, Herzogenbusch (Vught), Bergen-Belsen, Mittelbau-Dora. CH Beck, Munich 2008, ISBN 978-3-406-52967-2 , p. 320f.
personal data
SURNAME Josten, Heinrich
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German SS-Obersturmführer in Auschwitz concentration camp
DATE OF BIRTH December 11, 1893
PLACE OF BIRTH Malmedy
DATE OF DEATH January 24, 1948
Place of death Krakow