Hermann Schwenninger

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Hermann Schwenninger (born January 31, 1902 in Munich , † after 1985) was a German perpetrator of the Nazi homicide . He headed the transport team that brought victims to the Grafeneck killing center and also wrote (partial) scripts and exposés for the films legitimizing the crimes of euthanasia, such as: I Accuse (1941) and Dasein ohne Leben - Psychiatrie und Menschlichkeit (1942) . A third film, Three People , did not get beyond the planning stage. For the cultural film Dasein ohne Leben he filmed all parts of “ Aktion T4 ”, including the murder of a group of patients with carbon monoxide in the gas chamber of the Pirna-Sonnenstein killing center .

Biography until 1945

Schwenninger was born in Munich as the son of a professional officer. Before graduating from high school, he was a member of the Epp Freikorps . After the end of the Munich Soviet Republic , Schwenninger studied mechanical engineering and German studies in Munich without a degree . He made friends with Viktor Brack during his studies . While skiing, he met a production manager for Bavaria Filmgesellschaft and then worked in insignificant positions in the film industry. He made his living mainly as a truck driver and travel agent. His lifelong dream of becoming a famous director did not come true until the Great Depression. In 1936 he joined the NSDAP .

Euthanasia crime as a profession

One of the buses of the charitable Krankentransport GmbH (around 1940)

In October 1939 Viktor Brack, now Senior Service Manager of the Office II in the Chancellery of the Führer (KdF), engaged him for the T4 campaign . October 1939 is also the point in time when the cover organizations for euthanasia crimes were founded in the central office T4 , such as the Reich Association of Hospitals and Nursing Agencies (RAG) or the Gemeinnützige Krankentransport GmbH (GeKraT). The KdF should not appear officially, a legally tenable basis for the murder of the mentally ill and disabled did not exist - also within the framework of Nazi law.

After some perpetrators of Aktion T4 in 1940 had begun to conceal themselves behind cover names, the first GeKraT managing director Reinhold Vorberg (Tarnnarme: Hintertal) disappeared from the commercial register in April 1940, and Schwenninger became managing director under real names. He took over the management of the transport team to the Grafeneck killing center , so he organized the transport of the victims. Almost 10,000 patients, mainly from Bavaria , Baden and Württemberg, were murdered in Grafeneck . Grafeneck was operated from January 1940 to January 1941. On June 26, 1941, Schwenninger was removed from the commercial register again.

Propaganda films for euthanasia

The former killing center Grafeneck in a beautiful landscape (photo from 2007)

The large number of transports and the smoke from the crematoria set up in the killing centers did not remain hidden and caused unrest among the population.

Probably Schwenninger put Hans Hefelmann of the KdF in contact with Tobis Film GmbH, which made it possible to realize the film propaganda for the euthanasia program. Schwenninger was now involved in several film exposés, scripts, changes to scripts and filming in parallel. Ultimately, the cultural film Dasein ohne Leben (directed and screenplay by Schwenninger) was realized , the filming of which began in 1940 and was completed in early 1942. The later started feature film Ich klage an (script partly Schwenninger) based on the letter novel Sendung und Gewissen by Hellmuth Unger promised a better propaganda effect and was brought forward. Schwenninger's exposé Drei Menschen , on the other hand, remained only a draft, which, however, meant suggestions for the framework for I complain .

On August 1, 1940, Schwenninger and a Mr. Stöppler from Tobis received a certificate from the Reich Minister of the Interior , signed by Herbert Linden , that Tobis had been commissioned to make a scientific film in sanatoriums and nursing homes. With this document, for example, he asked the Württemberg Ministry of the Interior for access to the institutions.

Planned filming location at Schloss Werneck (photo from 2004). The "sanatorium and nursing home" which Bernhard von Gudden helped to build was dissolved in 1940 as part of "Aktion T4".
Planned location: Hubertusburg Castle (photo from 2007). The "sanatorium and nursing home" was closed in early 1940

According to the film scripts and notes he received, he was looking for particularly beautiful institutions in the best scenic, beautiful location for the filming. Karl Heinz Roth calls this the "palace legend". Schwenninger noted peculiarities, Werneck Castle would be ideal because of Balthasar Neumann's architecture , Hubertusburg offers a "hunting castle in the middle of the forest, driving record: Entrance through old park". The institution in Hall near Innsbruck has a "wonderful location in the mountains".

Scenic beauty as a selection criterion for the location: view of the mountains from Hall (photo from 2004). Around 360 people were brought from the asylum in Hall to the Hartheim killing center, and in 2011 a mass grave with 220 victims was discovered on the asylum grounds.

This beauty is juxtaposed with deformed people who are staged as monsters. Even in the Nazi institutions, suitable victims could only be found through intensive searches. A "group of idiots" was filmed in Hartenheim. Film commentary: “We see the future destined for them in the distorting mirror.” In Kindberg, Schwenninger also filmed a “group of idiots”. In Egelfingen and Scheremberg a patient with a water head each, in Grafeneck a man with trisomy 21, a seated woman in Salzburg. This was followed by recordings in the children's ward in Görden, in Munich-Haar. When other patients are shown, the disturbances can be guessed at, the recording locations are not mentioned.

The speaker's voice emphasizes the contrast between the beauty of the landscape and the patient and the futility of the care: “How well meant: the sick should be happy in the spring sun! - But the behavior of the dull and restless women shows no rapport with the environment. ”This culminates in the demand to“ redeem ”these patients.

The work on Dasein ohne Leben was interrupted for I complain and resumed after its success. Schwenninger temporarily switched entirely to Tobis, in the summer of 1942 work on Dasein ohne Leben stagnated , the KdF granted 51,000 RM in October . He submitted a final manuscript, which was endorsed by Paul Nitsche , the medical director of Aktion T4.

All individual steps of the T4 campaign were filmed, including the bureaucratic acts and the killing of the victims in a gas chamber . The shooting of Dasein ohne Leben could mean changes in the course of "Action T4". In one case, on March 18, 1941, just under 40 disabled people from Sch scrub were taken to the Pirna-Sonnenstein killing center instead of the Hadamar killing center responsible for the regional division . Schwenninger had selected the disabled because of their special appearance in Schubbing. The transport took place by train with our own escorts.

The killing centers were called "excretion centers" by Schwenninger. Originally, a trick sequence was provided to portray their killing, which described excretion. Ultimately, a real gassing was filmed. The manuscript classified as a Secret Reichssache describes: "Gas room (as intercuts turning on the tap, gasometer, observation by the doctor)." The scene was filmed in the Sonnenstein killing center. Schwenninger also filmed the death of the victims through the observation window.

I sue came to theaters in 1941 and won a prize at the 9th Venice International Film Festival in 1941 . Dasein ohne Leben was premiered in March 1942 in front of 28 doctors and the people around "Aktion T4". Hellmuth Unger in particular criticized the film; it was subsequently only shown internally to the police , the SS and the Wehrmacht . The six copies of the film were destroyed in 1945 before they could fall into the hands of the Allies .

After 1945

Schwenninger testified in several federal German criminal trials, but was never convicted himself. Schwenninger defended himself in his statements. In 1966 he declared:

"... to endure the sight of these horrific figures, who had nothing in common with humans, who were far below any animal in every respect ... Why should a human endure what one does not expect every animal to do out of humanity."

- Schwenninger October 2, 1966, comments on the decision of the investigating judge Frankfurt am Main

Schwenninger worked as a film salesman in Hamburg . In 1983 he was interviewed by the historians Götz Aly and Karl Heinz Roth . In 1985 Schwenninger lived in Hamburg.

literature

  • Karl Heinz Roth : Film propaganda for the extermination of the mentally ill and handicapped in the “Third Reich” . In: Reform and Conscience. “Euthanasia” in the service of progress . Berlin 1989, 2nd edition, pp. 125–196, here pp. 172–179

Archival material

  • Document from BA, R96 I / 8, "Draft for the scientific documentary GK [= mentally ill] by Hermann Schwenninger" (October 29, 1942), Abschr.
  • Personnel file Hermann Schwenninger NSDAP central file, BDC
  • Eight rolls of film (uncut raw material) from Dasein ohne Leben from the Reichsfilmarchiv were handed over to a GDR archive; these are now in the Federal Archives. It is 3700 of the original 8000 film meters.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d Ernst Klee : The culture lexicon for the Third Reich. Who was what before and after 1945. S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2007, ISBN 978-3-10-039326-5 , pp. 561-562.
  2. ↑ Klee, 2007, pp. 561-562
  3. ↑ Roth, 1989, p. 133
  4. ↑ The Freikorps only existed for a short time. It was set up outside Bavaria in February 1919 and disbanded in May 1919 after the occupation of Munich by being transferred to the Reichswehr . Freikorps Epp. historisches-lexikon-bayerns.de - Schwenninger was 17 years old when he was only with the Corps for a short time.
  5. ↑ Roth, 1989, p. 133
  6. ^ "Euthanasia" in the Nazi state. 11th edition. Fischer-Taschenbuch, Frankfurt am Main 2004, ISBN 3-596-24326-2 , p. 103
  7. ↑ Roth, 1989, p. 133
  8. ↑ Roth, 1989, p. 133
  9. ↑ Roth, 1989, p. 133
  10. ↑ Sources on the history of euthanasia crimes 1939-1945. Explanations (PDF; 234 kB) Federal Archives
  11. ↑ Klee euthanasia p. 103
  12. ↑ Eugen Kogon (ed.): National Socialist mass killings through poison gas . Frankfurt a. M. 1989. p. 34 f.
  13. ↑ Ernst Klee : What they did, what they became . Frankfurt a. M. 1990, p. 296
  14. ↑ Roth, 1989, p. 135
  15. ^ Probably Wilhelm Stöppler , who worked for the Tobis on propaganda war films. This is how he worked on Baptism of Fire (1940) murnau-stiftung.de ( Memento of the original from May 17, 2005 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. or Front am Himmel (1942) books.google.de . After 1945 he was still active in the film business. B. he made the film Nanga Parbat in 1953 . Above all peaks Buhl . In: Der Spiegel . No. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.murnau-stiftung.de  49 , 1953 ( online ).
  16. ↑ Klee 1990, p. 296
  17. ↑ Thomas Schmelter: Schloss Werneck Hospital at the time of National Socialism . werneck.de
  18. ↑ Ortschronik wermsdorf.de
  19. ↑ Roth, 1989, p. 137
  20. ↑ Roth, 1989, p. 137
  21. ↑ Sven Felix Kellerhoff : The euthanasia murders of the Nazis did not end until 1945. Remains of 220 people were found in Tyrol. You are probably a victim of the Nazi delusional idea of ​​"hereditary health" . Welt Online , January 4, 2011.
  22. ↑ a b Hans Schmid: Look into the Abyss. ( Memento of January 8, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Telepolis , January 1, 2012.
  23. ^ After Roth 1989, p. 173
  24. ↑ Roth, 1989, p. 179
  25. ↑ Roth, 1989, p. 174 f.
  26. ^ After Roth 1989, p. 173
  27. ↑ Roth, 1989, p. 175
  28. ↑ Roth, 1989, p. 125
  29. ↑ Roth, 1989, p. 179
  30. ^ Peter Sandner: Administration of the murder of the sick: the district association Nassau in the national socialism . Psychosozial-Verlag, 2003, p. 459.
  31. ↑ Klee Eutha p. 344
  32. ↑ Klee Kulturlexikon, p. 561, Klee Eutha p. 344
  33. ↑ mediabiz.de
  34. ↑ Roth 172-179
  35. ↑ Testimony of April 27, 1962 before the examining magistrate Frankfurt am Main, testimony of August 11, 1965 before the Attorney General Frankfurt am Main, both: Roth 1989, p. 192. As well as testimony of October 28, 1970, Sandner: Zeit der Gasmorde. P. 460
  36. ↑ Klee 1990, p. 84
  37. ^ Ernst Klee: The dictionary of persons on the Third Reich. Frankfurt am Main 2007, p. 574
  38. ↑ Roth, 1989, p. 192
  39. ↑ Roth, 1989, XXX
  40. ↑ Roth, 1989, p. 192
  41. ↑ bundesarchiv.de
personal data
SURNAME Schwenninger, Hermann
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German perpetrators of Nazi euthanasia
DATE OF BIRTH January 31, 1902
PLACE OF BIRTH Munich
DATE OF DEATH 20th century or 21st century
Place of death unsure: Hamburg